The day schools are experiencing a great deal more difficulty. The allotments are so far apart that there are, necessarily, but few families close to the schools. The remainder of the children are compelled to come a long way. This, together with the bad, rainy climate of Puget Sound, makes the enforcement of attendance at day schools a very difficult problem. These factors make the attendance uncertain and irregular, and when the pupils do go they are often compelled to sit all day long with wet clothing. Such conditions are enough to break down the strongest constitutions. What wonder is it, then, that the death rate is high among the Indian children, who are often poorly fed, poorly clad and already predisposed. Then, too, to be efficiently administered these schools require a strong, capable, well-trained teacher, one imbued with the true missionary spirit. Such teachers are not, as a rule, found in the Indian service, and the salaries are not usually large enough to attract them into the service from outside. On the whole, however, it must be said that progress in the right direction is slowly being accomplished. Better teachers and a larger number of well-equipped schools are being supplied.
In a great many cases, it is a difficult undertaking to influence the older people to change their customs and habits, although the rising generation do so very readily. Some progress can be noted among the old people, however. For example, over three-fourths of the families on the Lummi reservation use the English language exclusively at home, and in a great many cases the children can speak nothing but English. The Indians have given up a great many of their forms and ceremonies and superstitions. Marriage is now performed according to the customs of the whites. Licenses are obtained usually from the county officials, seldom from the agency. Each reservation has individual courts of Indian offenses, officered and administered by Indians. These, on the whole, have done very careful, conscientious and helpful work, not only in the administration of justice, but in maintaining law and order and peaceably adjusting quarrels and disputes.
The morals of the Indians of Puget Sound are as good as could reasonably be expected when we take into consideration our ignorant, unwholesome legislation and the fact that, as a race, laxness in this respect has been only too common. Contact with the lower class of whites has unfortunately resulted in the copying of a great many of their vices, as well as virtues. Some progress can be noted, however. They are observing the marriage tie with much more faithfulness than formerly, and where man and wife are not living together, they are divorced by due process of law.
The Heff decision has undoubtedly done much toward sending the Indian down to destruction. Since then it has been almost impossible to keep drink and the Indians apart. The Puyallup Indians have nearly all passed the trust period and become citizens, as, in fact, have a good many on the other reservations. Since that time they have lost their property, self-respect, and health to a large degree. The only thing they haven't been able to get rid of is their citizenship, which has been largely responsible for their present condition. Superintendent Buchanan reports in 1907, in speaking of the enforcement of our state laws in regard to liquor selling, "In thirteen years of life in this vicinity I have yet to see or hear of the first case of actual enforcement of any of these provisions. In six years of very vigorous prosecution I have secured remarkably few convictions in such cases, and these only on pleas of guilty, and in all of which the minimum penalty was inflicted. Indeed, the situation is so very extraordinary that one is not always sure of a conviction even when the defendant admits his guilt and pleads guilty. In one such case, which went before the federal grand jury on such a plea of guilt, the jury, with all the facts before them, and with the defendant admitting guilt and pointing out and identifying the confiscated bottles and flasks, turned the prisoner loose as innocent, even though he insisted that he was guilty. This very extraordinary event occurred in Seattle before the May, 1905, session of the Federal Grand Jury." (Page 58, Report of Indian Agents and Superintendents to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, 1907.) Is it any wonder, then, that liquor dealers violate the law with impunity when it is such a difficult matter to secure conviction?
In 1909, the State of Washington passed a very stringent law relating to the selling of liquor to Indians and since that time, enforcement has been somewhat stricter. This makes it a felony for anyone to sell liquor in any form, at any time, and under any pretense, to an Indian, to whom allotment has been made, while the title is held in the trust period, or to an Indian who is held under guardianship of an Indian agent or superintendent, or under the charge of the United States. This law is being much more rigidly enforced than has hitherto been the case, yet the Indians still get the liquor. Saloon keepers in towns bordering on the reservations are wary about selling it to them, but in towns some distance from the reservations open selling still goes on. On the whole, our liquor laws are more honored in the breach than the observance.
The consumption of such a large amount of liquor in the past has, in a great many cases, absolutely destroyed the health of the Indians. Their constitutions always have been weak, subject to tuberculosis, pneumonia, and all pulmonary diseases, and when the consumption of large amounts of alcohol is added to this, little wonder is it that the death rate is high among them, and that so many weak, diseased Indian children come into the world.
In the matter of religion, the Puget Sound Indians are in an evolutionary stage. On the whole, the old form of religion, called Tamahnous, in which the evil spirit was worshipped in order to appease it, and hence not to be visited by it, has been replaced by the Christian religion, or by a mixture of the Christian and the old. The Puget Sound Indians are peculiar in one respect, viz: that they are indolent and lazy, are easily persuaded to accept and follow any belief, but are usually unwilling to make an effort to think or reason out a question. They are indolently and willingly superficial. The result of this has been that while a great many have been converted to the Christian religion, still that conversion has been very superficial in character. They have been satisfied with the content that external forms and actions would make them right with God, and secure to them a future happiness, and, at the same time, have utterly disregarded the true inner spirit of religion. Hence, they have readily taken up anything that appeals to the sensuous in their religious nature.
In 1882 or 1883, a Mud Bay Indian, named John Slocum, who had been converted to Catholicism, but who had led a rather desultory life, fell sick and apparently died. The usual death ceremonies took place. But to the great surprise of the Indians, Slocum came to life again on the second or third day after his death. He brought with him a wonderful tale. He affirmed that he had indeed died, gone up to the pearly gates and there met St. Peter, who refused him entrance on the grounds that he had led too loose a life. There was one way, however, so St. Peter informed him, by which he could yet earn his way into Paradise, and that was to go back to earth and teach his fellow Indians a new form of religion, which was to be the same as that in the white man's book, but better adapted to the needs of the Indians. Hence his return to life.
Slocum immediately began to preach his new doctrine, a religion since named "Shakerism," which has gathered together at least half of the Indians of Puget Sound, who profess any religion at all. This is a curious mixture of the old Tamahnous religion and Protestantism and Catholicism. It is undoubtedly a decided step in advance of the old religion, since it enjoins a worship of an all-powerful, good God rather than malicious devils and evil spirits. The beliefs and ceremonies differ among different tribes, and are more nearly in harmony with the Christian religion where the missionaries have had the most influence. The influence of Catholicism is to be seen in the elaborate forms and ceremonies of worship and the cross and candle sticks on the altar. Those afflicted with a guilty conscience remain on their knees during the entire Sunday service, crossing themselves repeatedly. The songs and prayers are translations into Indian or Chinook done by the early missionaries.
The retained features of the old Tamahnous religion are to be seen largely in the conversion ceremonies and the healing of the sick—the so-called "Night Work." It is difficult for the Indians to give up their old superstitions and barbaric rites. These still remain in their minds and crop out with the more modern beliefs in their religion. To quote from an article by Edwin L. Chalcraft, a teacher in one of the Indian schools, "Every act tends to excitement. The weird Indian chant, the dance music, the frenzied dances, the ringing of hand bells and the rubbing of the patient's body to drive out sickness or the evil spirit, as the case may be, and let in the new religion, all have a place, and are sometimes continued through the night, or until the participants become exhausted."