Res. I. That the Association shall do all in its power for the education of Indian youth at their own homes, and in its colored schools at the South.
Res. II. That the Executive Committee of this Association be charged with the duty of pressing upon the general public and the Government their responsibility for the Indian race, and by co-operation with other societies, and by direct effort, exert its influence at the seat of government in behalf of legislation that shall secure citizenship to the Indian; to that end a legal status and education to fit him for it.
S. C. Armstrong, Chairman.
ADDRESS OF GEN. S. C. ARMSTRONG
The Indian question is this: education in its broadest sense or extermination. But at least one white man must fall for every Indian who is shot, and it takes as much money to kill one red man as it would to train a hundred of their children in civilized ways. To educate is economy.
Fifty thousand Indians receive every day from the Government a pound and a half of fresh beef, with flour and coffee and sugar and tobacco to match, and a fair outfit for all purposes of decent living and good farming, and the number will increase. An agency warehouse is a huge store filled with utensils of every kind, from which the ex-warrior draws gratuitously at the agent’s discretion. There is no treatment like this in any other country on the globe—a stupendous wholesale charity to a people, of whom a large portion are thus hired to keep the peace.
When first fed they are modest and satisfied, gradually they get importunate, and finally become most grievous beggars. There is an unevenness of treatment in this matter, based chiefly on the varying difficulties of settlement; the strong and wicked Sioux getting the maximum in return for their good behavior. The quiet and thrifty Fort Berthold Indians, who are doing as much, if not more per capita than any others, complain; for Indians visit much and discuss things; they have not yet discovered that virtue is its own reward.
Yet I have seen and heard of agencies where, notwithstanding gratuities, there has been steady improvement in houses, crops and herds. Good management on the one hand and the good sense of the better class of Indians on the other hand, at certain points led to remarkable results; but a forward move along the whole line of the Indian population is not to be looked for till they shall have the same motives to industry that other men have and that all men need. Agencies, reservations and rationing are and long will be a necessity, lessening only as by wise use of public bounty, and by proper legislation and care, the Indians shall approach self-support and citizenship. The persistently indolent should not remain as they are now, unless the nation has pledged itself, by solemn treaty, to feed forever the savage who squats on his haunches and refuses to work.