It
should be noted that in 1873, the Chickasaw Tribe Council in fact passed
legislation to adopt their former slaves and descendants in an effort to comply
with the Treaty of 1866. It was the failure of the United States Congress to
fulfill its fiduciary responsibility to protect the rights of the freedmen and
comply with the provisions of the 1866 Treaty that would have made those persons
classified as "freedmen" citizens of the Chickasaw Tribe.
Ironically,
in 1883 the Choctaw Tribe adopted its former slaves and made them citizens. The
1885 Choctaw-Chickasaw Census substantiates this and furthermore, when you look
at the Dawes Enrollment/Allotment Cards for the Choctaw Freedmen it is clear by
1896, they were given citizenship including a tribal enrollment number that
precedes their Dawes enrollment number.
43rd
CONGRESS 1st Session
SENATE
Misc. Doc. No. 118
LETTER
FROM
THE
SECRETARY
OF THE INTERIOR,
TO
THE
CHAIRMAN
OF THE SENATE COMMITTEE ON INDIAN AFFAIRS,
RELATIVE
TO
Senate bill No.680, for the relief of certain persons of African descent
resident in the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations.
JUNE 2, 1574.—Ordered to be printed.
DEPARTMENT OF THE
INTERIOR,
Washington
, D. C., May 2, 1874.
SIR: I have examined Senate bill No. 680, for the relief of
certain persons of African descent resident in the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations
on the 28th day of April, 1866, which you have been pleased to forward to me,
with a remonstrance of the Choctaw delegates against the passage of said bill.
The present condition of the persons of African descent resident among the
Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations on the 10th of September, 1865, should be
thoroughly understood in order to judge of the propriety of passing the bill,
and in order to appreciate the force of the objections made against its passage
by the remonstrance.
I proceed to state the condition of these people at the date aforesaid. By
the treaty of April 28, 1866, between the United States and the Choctaw and
Chickasaw Indians, it was provided that slavery should cease in said nations,
and that said Indians should cede to the United States certain territory west of
the 98th degree west longitude, known as the leased district, and in
consideration thereof the United States should pay the sum of $300,000, to be
invested in United States 5 per cent. bonds until the legislatures of the
Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations should make such laws, rules arid regulations as
might be necessary to give all persons of African descent resident therein on
the 10th of September, 1865, and their descendants, theretofore held in slavery,
all the rights, privileges, and immunities, including the right of suffrage, of
the citizens of said nations, except in the money annuities and in the public
domain belonging to said nations. Said nations were also to give each of said
persons of African descent and their descendants forty acres of land on the same
terms as the citizen Choctaws and Chickasaws held the same. It was further
provided that said persons of African descent who, within ninety days after the
passage of such laws, rules, and regulations, should elect to remove from said
nations, should have $100 each out of the $300,000 before mentioned, and that
the balance should be paid to the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations in the
proportions mentioned in the treaty. It was further provided that if such laws
and regulations should not be enacted by the legislatures of said nation
respectively, within two years from the ratification of the treaty aforesaid,
then the said sum of $300,000 should cease to be held in trust for the said
Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations, and should thereafter be held in trust for the
use and benefit of said persons of African descent, the United States agreeing
within ninety days from the expiration of said two years to remove said persons
of African descent from said nations as far as they were willing to be removed.
Now for the facts.
Neither the Choctaw nor the Chickasaw Nation has secured to said persons of
African descent the rights, privileges, and immunities, including the right of
suffrage provided for in the treaty. The
United States
has not removed any of the said persons of African descent, because such
persons are so identified by marriage and custom with said nations as to be
unwilling to break up their homes and go elsewhere.
The $300,000 has
not been invested nor paid to the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations; and the said
persons of African descent, who are the most industrious and useful portion of
the population of each nation, are without the rights, privileges, and
immunities of citizens, without the right of suffrage, without land, and without
money, and with a disinclination, under all these painful embarrassments, to
leave their homes, friends, and relatives, and go elsewhere, for the pitiful sum
of $100 per capita. They are as meritorious, to say the least, as the average
Choc taw and Chickasaw population. They have probably done as much toward
securing the wealth possessed by said nations per capita as the average Choctaw
and Chickasaw population. Under these circumstances their condition is not
simply anomalous; it is unjustifiable, oppressive, and wrong, and ought to be
remedied.
Now for the provisions of the bill. It provides that the
persons of African descent before alluded to shall have all the rights,
privileges, and immunities, including the right of suffrage, of citizens of said
nations, respectively, and in the annuities, moneys, and public domain claimed
by Or belonging to said nations, respectively. Is this wrong? The Choctaw and
Chickasaw Nations are under treaty obligations to secure to these people the
rights, privileges, and immunities of citizens, including the right of suffrage.
They ought to have done so long since. Their failure to do so is a great wrong
and a great injustice, which should be speedily corrected.
But ought these people to have an equal right in the
annuities and public domain of the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations? Let us see.
The present annuity-fund of these nations amounts to about one hundred dollars
per capita. The
United States
, by the treaty aforesaid, secured to these persons of African descent, under
certain conditions, one hundred dollars per capita, and this is about what the
three hundred thousand dollars amounts to.
By the second section of the bill objected to, this three
hundred thousand dollars is to be invested and paid in trust for the use and
benefit of the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations, so that these persons of African
descent will bring to the trust-fund of said nations a sum per capita to the
amount per capita of the present annuity trust-fund of these nations.
This, it seems to me, answers satisfactorily the objection to this bill so
far as it relates to the rights of the Africans in the annuity-funds of the
Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations.
But
the bill also gives to these Africans an equal right in the public domain
claimed by said nations. Is this wrong? Lands are not held in severalty by these
nations, they are held in common. The treaty contemplated making the Africans
citizens, with equal rights and privileges with the Choctaws and Chickasaws, and
upon this principle, in justice and equity the common property of the nation
should belong as much to the Africans made citizens as to the native-born
citizens of said nations.
The argument against
this provision, drawn from a pretended analogy between this case and the case of
the liberated slaves of the
United States
, does not rest upon a solid foundation. The liberated slaves of the United
States did not become entitled to the property held by individual citizens of
the United States in severalty, but to so much of the public domain and other
property of the United States as was not the separate property of individuals,
these liberated slaves, when they became citizens, did become entitled to equal
rights and privileges as other American citizens.
If you look at the manner in which the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations
acquired their property, and if you consider that the improvements made thereon
have been made by the labor of the African people in as large, if not a larger
proportion, than by the labor of the native Choctaws and Chickasaws, you will
see that there is not any injustice in giving to these persons of African
descent, made free and made citizens, equal rights in all respects with the
native Choctaw and Chickasaw people.
A failure to pass this bill will leave the treaty of 1866 unexecuted; will
continue the Africans among the Choctaws and Chickasaws in their present unjust
and disastrous situation, will preserve the strife, animosity, and disturbance
incident to these relations, and therefore I cannot too earnestly or too
urgently recommend the passage of the bill referred to, or some equivalent
measure, during the present session of Congress.
I beg your careful and attentive consideration of this
subject, and hope you will bring it before such of your colleagues as feel an
interest in the welfare of these people, and that if you concur with me in this
opinion you will endeavor to procure the passage of the measure referred to
immediately.
I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient
servant,
C.
DELANO
, Secretary.
Hon. WILLIAM A. BUCKINGHAM,
Chairman
Committee Indian Affairs,
United States
Senate
