Letters, Telegrams, Petitions 111-120

No. 111

Department of the Interior, Office of Indian Affairs,
Washington, October 1, 1903

The Secretary of the Interior

Sir: I have the honor to submit herewith letter of the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes of the 5th ultimo, acknowledging receipt of departmental letter of August 24, inclosing a letter from Mary Nairn, of Coodys Bluff, Ind. T., in which she states that she desires to know why all the registered Delaware lands were not segregated as required by the Cherokee agreement ratified August 6, 1902; that there are probably 50 Delaware whose lands are not segregated; that on the contrary half the land segregated belongs to the Cherokee, to the best of her knowledge and belief, or is only nominally held by the Delaware, who have no equitable or legal interest in it; that these Delaware whose lands have not been segregated are at a great disadvantage with other citizens because they can not file on their lands, l3ut other Cherokee citizens are at liberty to file on lands held by these Delaware, and the only redress they have is a contest.

She also states that the Commission has been asked to right the wrong, but so far it has not done so, and the Department requests a report concerning the matter complained of in this letter.

In reply the Commission states that on April 19, 1903, it made a report to the Department concerning this Delaware segregation, and also reported upon a letter, which had been received from William Nairn complaining of these same matters, in which report the Commission used the following language:

“In addition to the contention of the Delaware for the lands embraced within the limits of the town sites mentioned, and for land claimed and in the possession of other Cherokee citizens, quite a serious situation with reference to the Delaware segregation has developed in the work of allotment. Not a few Delaware citizens have presented themselves at the land office and asked to be allowed to make a final selection of lands containing their improvements and upon which they reside, claiming that no portion of the lands occupied by them is included within said Delaware segregation.

“The Commission has been informally advised of cases of numerous other Delaware citizens, whose improved lands are not included within said segregation, and the statement has been frequently made that the representatives of the Delaware Indians, or their business committee, refused to schedule for segregation the lands of any Delaware citizen who failed to pay a pro rata share of the fee which said representatives or committee demanded. The Delaware whose property rights are thus unprotected are for the most part in moderate circumstances, and the improvements on the lands occupied by them represent, in most instances, the efforts of a lifetime.

‘The extent of the condition of affairs last mentioned is indicated by the correspondence had with William Nairn, of Coodys Bluff, Ind. T., copies of which are hereto attached and marked Exhibit E.

“It is quite evident that while lands occupied by Delaware citizens have not been included in this schedule of lands made a part of the record in the suit of the Delaware, an amount of the public domain of the Cherokee Nation sufficient to bring the total segregation up to 157,600 acres has been included.

“There are also attached hereto and marked Exhibits F and G, copies of reports of the clerk in charge of the Cherokee land office at Vinita, dated February 12, 1902, showing that since the segregation of lands for Delaware by this Commission on December 17, 1902, the Department has fixed the exterior limits of the town sites of North Tulsa and Lawton, in the Cherokee Nation, which embrace, respectively, 20 and 25 acres of land theretofore included in said Delaware segregation.

“Under all circumstances the Commission believes that the lands embraced in the original schedule and in the first and second amended schedules, made a part of the record in the case of the Delaware, have not been selected with a due regard for the interests of either the Delaware citizens generally, or other citizens of the Cherokee Nation, and in so far as town sites are affected, without any intention of conforming to the laws relating to the establishment of such town sites.

“The Commission is in receipt of a communication from Mr. Adams to Hon. M. S. Quay, United States Senator from Pennsylvania, dated April 10, 1903, and referred by Senator Quay to the Commission. A copy of said letter and of Senator Quay’s indorsement thereon is hereto attached, marked ‘Exhibit H.’ In this latest letter Mr. Adams takes the position that the Commission is without jurisdiction to receive applications of Cherokee citizens for lands embraced in the Delaware segregation, notwithstanding the proviso of counsel in the stipulation hereinbefore set forth, providing for the protection of the property rights of other Cherokee citizens.

“The Commission believes that some steps should be taken to guard against the possibility of the Supreme Court rendering a judgment adopting said schedule as the definite and specific tracts of land to which the Delaware are entitled under their claim, and respectfully request that the Department may issue such instructions as it may deem proper in the premises.”

Further, the Commission says it is believed that the former report of the Commission fully covered the facts complained of in the letter of Mary Nairn, and that no addition of value can be made to such report at this time.

I do not agree with the Commission in its statement that the former report, from which quotation is made, fully covers the facts complained of in the letter of Mary Nairn. If the lands she occupies, she being a Cherokee citizen of Delaware blood, were not included in the lands segregated for the Delaware she is entitled to protection in her rights to as great an extent as any other citizen of the Cherokee Nation.

On October 20, 1902, in its report relative to certain requests of Walter S. Logan, attorney for the Delaware, in their suit against the Cherokee Nation, the Commission reported as follows:

“The Commission holds that it has no authority under the law to make allotments to Delaware of land not embraced in the segregation required by the agreement; that the allotments to the Cherokees should begin at the earliest possible date; that upon the application of any Delaware citizen there should be reserved from allotment until the final determination of the suit mentioned, such lands not embraced in such segregation, not exceeding an amount equal in value to 110 acres of average allotable land of the Cherokee Nation as contain permanent and valuable improvements owned by such Delaware citizen. The Commission is of the opinion that if the course outlined by it is pursued the rights of the Delaware will be fully protected.”

It appears from the complaint of Mary Nairn in this case that the Commission has not pursued the policy, which it reported in October 1902, would be its duty with reference to the Delaware lands. This, of course, was before the so called segregation of the Delaware lands, but in my judgment in no way altered the duty of the Commission. Mary Nairn, as a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, is entitled to have reserved to her the lands she occupies and has improved, and it should not be possible for any other citizen of the Cherokee Nation to file upon this land and compel her, in order to protect her rights, to institute contest proceedings. It is therefore my opinion that on application of Mary Nairn, or any other Delaware similarly situated, the land occupied by them should be withheld from allotment, with notation on the books of the Commission that it is so held for their protection.

Very respectfully,
W. A. JONES, Commissioner.

No. 112

Department of the Interior,
Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes,
Muscogee, Ind. T., September 5, 1903

The Secretary of the Interior.

Sir: The Commission is in receipt of departmental letter of August 24, inclosing a letter from Mary Nairn, of Coodys Bluff, Ind. T., in which she states that she desires to know why all the registered Delaware lands were not segregated as required by the Cherokee agreement, ratified August 6, 1902; that there are probably 50 Delaware whose lands are not segregated; that on the contrary, half the lands segregated belongs to the Cherokees to the best of her knowledge and belief, or is only nominally held by Delaware who have no equitable or legal interest in it; that these Delaware whose lands have not been segregated are at a great disadvantage with other citizens because they can not file on their land, and other Cherokee citizens are at liberty to file on lands held by these Delaware, and the only redress they have is a contest. She also states that the Commission has been asked to right the wrong, and so far it has not done so; and the Department requests a report concerning the matters complained of in said letter;

In reply the Department is advised that on April 19, 1903, the Commission made a report to the Department concerning this Delaware segregation, and also reported upon a letter which had been received from William Nairn complaining of these same matters, in which report the Commission used the following language:

“In addition to the contention of the Delaware for the lands embraced within the limits of the town sites mentioned, and for land claimed and in the possession of other Cherokee citizens, quite a serious situation with reference to the Delaware’ segregation has developed in the work of allotment. Not a few Delaware citizens have presented themselves at the land office and asked to be allowed to make a final selection of lands containing their improvements and upon which they reside, claiming that no portion of the lands occupied by them is included within said Delaware segregation.

“The Commission has been informally advised of cases of numerous other Delaware citizens whose improved lands are not included within said segregation, and the statement has been frequently made that the representatives of the Delaware Indians, If their business committee, refused to schedule for segregation the lands of any Delaware citizen who failed to pay a pro rata share of the fee which said representatives or committee demanded. The Delaware, whose property rights are thus unprotected, are for the most part in moderate circumstances, and the improvements on the lands occupied by them represent, in most instances, the efforts of a lifetime.

“The extent of the condition of affairs last mentioned is indicated by the correspondence had with William Nairn, of Coodys Bluff, Ind. T., copies of which are hereto attached and marked Exhibit E.

“It is quite evident that while lands occupied by Delaware citizens have not been included in the schedule of lands made a part of the record in the suit of the Delaware an amount of the public domain of the Cherokee Nation sufficient to bring the total segregation up to 157,600 acres has been included.

“There are also attached hereto and marked Exhibits F and G copies of reports of the clerk in charge of the Cherokee land office at Vinita, dated February 12, 1903, showing that since the segregation of lands for Delaware by this Commission on December 17, 1902, the Department has fixed the exterior limits of the town sites of North Tulsa and Lawton in the Cherokee Nation, which embrace respectively 20 and 25 acres of land theretofore included in said Delaware segregation.

“Under the circumstances, the Commission believes that the lauds embraced in the original schedule, and in the first and second amended schedules, made a part of the record in the case of the Delaware, have not been selected with a due regard for the interests of either the Delaware citizens generally or other citizens of the Cherokee Nation, and in so far as town sites are affected, without any intention of conforming to the laws relating to the establishment of such town sites.

“The Commission is in receipt of a commutation from Mr. Adams to Hon. M. S. Quay, United States Senator from Pennsylvania, dated April 10, 1903, and referred by Senator Quay to the Commission. A copy of said letter and of Senator Quay’s indorsement thereon is hereto attached, marked “Exhibit H.” In this latest letter Mr. Adams takes the position that the Commission is without jurisdiction to receive applications of Cherokee citizens for lands embraced in the Delaware segregation, notwithstanding the proviso of counsel in the stipulation hereinbefore set forth providing for the protection of the property rights of other Cherokee citizens.

“The Commission believes that some steps should betaken to guard against the possibility of the Supreme Court rendering a judgment adopting said schedule as the definite and specific tracts of land to which the Delaware are entitled under their claim, and respectfully request that the Department may issue such instructions as it may deem proper in the premises.”

It is believed that the former report of the Commission fully covers the facts complained of in the letter of Mary Nairn, and that no addition of value can be made to said report at this time.

The letter of Mary Nairn is herewith returned.

Respectfully,
TAMS BIXBY, Chairman
{Through the Commissioner of Indian Affairs.)

No. 113

Department of the Interior,
Washington, October 7, 1903

Mary Nairn, Coodys Bluff, Ind. T.

Madam: In reply to your letter of August 8, 1903, to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, requesting to be informed why all of the registered Delaware lands were not segregated as required by the Cherokee agreement contained in the act of July 1, 1902 (32 Stat., 716), you are advised that on September 5, 1903, the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes reported in the matter, referring to a former report from the Commission, which it states covers the facts complained of in your letter.

Without entering into any of the statements made by the Commission in its report of September 5, 1903, or the Commissioner of Indian Affairs transmitting that report October 1, 1903, you are advised that on October 6, 1903, the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes was advised that the schedule of lands upon which it made its so called segregation of Delaware lands does not meet the requirements of the statute, in that it does not include all of the lands which have been selected and occupied by Delaware, and in that it does include lands which no Delaware has selected and occupied, but to which other Cherokee citizens have claims based upon alleged settlement and improvements thereon.

The Commission was therefore directed to proceed at once to make such examination and investigation as would enable it to determine what tracts should be added to said list and what tracts now embraced therein should be excluded, care being taken to make the list cover the full quantity of land required to be segregated, and as soon as practicable to report the result of such investigation with suitable recommendation in the matter.

It would appear that your proper course would be to consult with the Commission in regard to the segregation of any lands you may desire to have segregated. Respectfully,

THOS. RYAN, Acting Secretary

No. 114

Department of the Interior, Office of Indian Affairs,
Washington, August 31, 1903.

The Secretary of the Interior
Sir: I have the honor to transmit herewith report of the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes of the 11th instant, covering the work of the Commission for the month of July, 1903, which 1 recommend be approved by the Department.

In this connection permit me to state that there are the following citizenship cases now pending in this office:

Very respectfully,
A. C. TONNER, Acting Commissioner

No. 115

Department of the Interior
Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes
Muscogee, Ind. T., August 11, 1903

The Secretary of the Interior

Sir: We have the honor to submit herewith the following statement of the work of the commission to the Five Civilized Tribes for the month of July1903. There is merged in this report the work accomplished by the Commission during the month of June, together with a statement showing the work of the allotment contest division during the month of May, the same having been omitted from the report for that month heretofore submitted.

Cherokee allotment Division

Approximately 1,100 tickets of admission to the Cherokee land office were issued during the month of July, 175 to full bloods. A total of 10,370 tickets have been issued to the close of the month, of which number, approximately, 4,000 have been presented at the land office.

Four hundred and fifty-nine citizenship certificates, embracing 995 applicants, and 224 reservation certificates, embracing 366 applicants, were issued during the month.

Applications for 1,850 allotments and homesteads were made during the month. Of this number, 1,266 were approved, the approval of 584 being withheld for various reasons, viz: 433 because the enrollment of the applicants had not been approved by the Secretary of the Interior; 110 because the land applied for had already been allotted; and 41 because the land applied for was embraced within the 157,600 acres of land which the Commission caused to be segregated for the Delaware Indians. The allotments made during the month include 123,098.88 acres of land, valued at 1398,642.72.

There were prepared during the month 500 allotment certificates and 500 homestead certificates for the execution of the Commission.

Allotment Contest Division

The progress of the work in the allotment contest division, during the months of May, June, and July, and the condition of contested allotment cases at the close of each month, as indicated by the records of that division, are shown by the following detailed statement:

Cherokee Nation

Respectfully submitted.
TAMS BIXBY, Chairman
T. H. NEEDLES, Commissioner
W. E. STANLEY,
(Through the Commissioner of Indian Affairs.)

No. 116

Department of the Interior,
Washington, September 4, 1903

The Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes

Gentlemen: The Department is in receipt of your report covering the work of the Commission for the month of July 1903. There is enclosed a copy of report of the Acting Commissioner of Indian Affairs transmitting your said report. Respectfully,

THOS. RYAN, Acting Secretary

No. 117

Department of the Interior, Office of Indian Affairs,
Washington, September 17, 1903

The Secretary of the Interior

Sir: I have the honor to submit for your consideration letter of Richard C. Adams, representing the Delaware Indians, of the 14th instant, inviting attention to what he denominates the very great wrongs that are being perpetrated upon the Delaware Indians now residing in the Indian Territory, and the great injustice they are suffering by reason of the failure of the United States to protect them in their rights as promised and guaranteed in the treaty of 1866, under which they consented to give up their homes in Kansas and to settle in the Cherokee Nation.

Mr. Adams refers to the delays that have been incident to the location of the Delaware in the Cherokee Nation, the failure to have their lands, which they purchased, defined, and quotes from the treaty of 1866 as follows:

“The United States guarantees to the said Delaware peaceable possession of their new homes, protection from hostile Indians and internal strife and civil war,” etc.

Mr. Adams says further that notwithstanding all this, when the Dawes Commission began negotiations with the Cherokee for the allotment of their lands in severalty, the Cherokee at once set up a claim that the Delaware had no title to the 157,600 acres they had so purchased and paid for.

In the meantime Congress had passed the Curtis Act, and a little later what was known as the “Cherokee allotment act,” by the former of which it was provided that the Delaware Indians might institute a suit in the Court of Claims to determine the nature and extent of their title to the 157,600 acres so purchased by them, and in both of said acts it was provided that should the Dawes Commission proceed to allot any lands in the Cherokee Nation, the 157,600 acres selected and claimed by the Delaware should be segregated and set aside and so remain until the final determination of said suit, and thereafter the Commission should proceed to allot the remaining lands in the Cherokee Nation.

Having been authorized and directed by the Delaware in council assembled, Mr. Adams says he appealed to the Commission to have the lands selected and occupied by the Delaware segregated in accordance with the acts referred to, and supplied the Commission with schedules and maps thereof, which had been prepared with great labor and expense, copies of which were at the same time filed with the Department of the Interior.

Notwithstanding the rights acquired by the Delaware by the various proceedings in this matter, and for reasons, which Mr. Adams says he is unable to suggest, the Commission in January last began accepting applications for allotments by Cherokee of lands so selected and segregated for the Delaware. As the representative of the latter of these people he protested, and alleges that during the months of March and April filings by Cherokee upon lands segregated for the Delaware became more and more numerous, and by May more than 200 of such filings had been made on the land so segregated. He also states that during all this time the Delaware who lived upon these lands and owned the improvements and had been in occupancy for many years, were denied the right to file; that protests against this outrage made orally and by letters and telegrams to the Commission and the Secretary and the Department were utterly disregarded, until finally, on June 2 last, all other means of self-protection having been tried and found of no avail, suit was brought by injunction on behalf of the Delaware in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia against the Commission and the Secretary of the Interior, and a restraining order granted requiring the defendants to desist from allowing any filings to be made upon lands so segregated, or from doing or performing any act or thing in connection therewith; but that notwithstanding this, and notwithstanding the fact that the chairman of the Commission was duly served with the restraining order, the Commission continued to receive selections and applications for allotments upon the segregated lands from persons other than Delaware, who have not now and never did have any interest in or claim thereto or to any part thereof more than 27 such selections having been made since the service of the restraining order upon the chairman of the Commission and in open violation and defiance thereof.

These matters were again brought by Mr. Adams, so he reports, to the attention of the Department, and he was informed that orders were delivered by the Department to the Dawes Commission forbidding them to continue to receive “such applications, but still no attention was paid to the instructions, and the Commission has since continued to deal with such applications, to notify Delaware to appear and contest them within nine months, or be forever barred from claiming any interest in such land all of which he declares to he in direct violation and defiance of the restraining order, unjust and unfair to the Delaware, and in violation of the plain mandatory provision of section 23 of the Cherokee allotment act, which has been referred to.

Mr. Adams says correspondence in his office shows that Delaware of the highest standing who have lived upon their present home some of them for more than a score of years have made lasting and valuable improvements there, have had their lots filed upon by strangers who have not now and never have had a claim of any nature or kind to any part of the lands or to any of the improvements; and these people have set up claims and made leases, which leases have been assigned for the purpose of getting them into the hands of alleged innocent persons, mere speculators and the Delaware are thus sent upon a pilgrimage of litigation with all its attendant uncertainties, delays, expenses, and vexations.

Mr. Adams says he has himself received a letter signed by Tams Bixby, commissioner in charge of the Cherokee land office and the individual upon whom the restraining order of the supreme court of the District of Columbia was served, the letter bearing date of August 31 last, stating that one James S. Fuller, of Fort Gibson, has appeared before the Cherokee land office and claimed a part of the land on which he (Adams) owns all the improvements and for which he paid Fuller in full satisfaction in cash, which land is included in the Delaware segregation.

Mr. Adams requests that the Indian agent he instructed to remove from the segregated land all persons objectionable to the Delaware, and likewise that the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes be instructed to notify all parties who have made selections on the segregated lands that such selections have been canceled and that no contests will be heard, and no filings made until after the Supreme Court of the United States shall have determined the rights of the Delaware Indians thereto.

The 157,600 acres of lands claimed by the Delaware are claimed by the Com-mission to have been segregated by it December 17, 1902, in accordance with the provision of law to which Mr. Adams refers. This land having been segregated was not subject to be filed upon by Cherokee or even Delaware who are citizens of the Cherokee Nation. A question having been raised as to the right of the Delaware to this land would in no wise justify the Commission in presuming that the claims of the Delaware would in the end be defeated, an