Sixth—That experience fully demonstrates that the holding of their lands in common by the Indian tribes is an effectual safeguard against the worst effects of Indian improvidence. Apart from any considerations of justice or humanity, it would be unwise and unstatesmanlike to adopt measures which, by destroying that safeguard, would be calculated to reduce the great mass of them, in opposition to their own earnest protests, to a state of hopeless penury and degradation.
The report is signed by Messrs. Neal, Riddle, Muldrow, Aldrich, Reed, Bagley and James T. Jones of the committee.
—When Gen. Howard went alone, as it were, and unarmed among the hostile and ferocious Chiricahuas, and boldly faced their head chief Cochise, he showed them a moral power which they had never seen before, and so produced a deep impression of respect for the superiority of white men that has probably done more than any brute force could have effected towards the pacification of the tribe. The treaty then made was, and is still, sacredly respected by Taza, the son and successor of Cochise, and by all the Apaches, except, perhaps, fifty hostiles, who still prowl on the Mexican border.
The Chinese.
—Last month we recorded the failure of the proposal to transfer the Indians to the War Department. This month, with equal pleasure, we note the failure of the bill virtually to prohibit Chinese immigration. After passing both House and Senate, it was vetoed by the President, and on the motion to pass it over the veto, was defeated, having evidently lost ground in the intervening days.
—Among the many memorials addressed to the President on this subject, the following was sent by our Executive Committee:
To the President of the United States:
Sir: The Executive Committee of the American Missionary Association respectfully but most earnestly ask that the Executive veto be affixed to the bill passed by Congress affecting the relations of this country with China. We regard that bill as a surrender to caste prejudice, an injury to this country, a wrong to China, and a violation of treaty stipulations, of the fundamental principles of the Declaration of Independence, and of the law of God.
| Signed by vote of the Committee, | Charles L. Mead, |
| John H. Washburn, | |
| February 21, 1879. | M. E. Strieby. |