Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 July 1885 — LAND-GRABBERS. [ARTICLE]

LAND-GRABBERS.

Power of the Government to Prevent Illegal Occupation of Lands in Indian Territory. Millions of Acres Occupied by Oittle Companies Without the Color of Law or Justice. Washington telegram to Chicago Tribune ] Gen. Sparks, Commissioner of the General Land Office, has had a complete list of all the cases where the public lands have been improperly fenced made out, with a statement of the present status of affairs. In all of these cases the parties have been notified to remove the fences. In some instances they have consulted attorneys who have held that a reasonable number of openings in the fences is sufficient. In such cases the openings are guarded, and to all intents and purposes fences still exist The total amount of land that has been appropriated in this way is between one and two million acres. Secretary Lamar has received a letter from Gen. McCook, ex-Governor of Colorado, relative to the power of the Government to prevent illegal occupation of lands in Indian Territory. The writer asserts that the law declares that the Secretary of the Interior has full control of all Indian affairs under the laws, subject to direction by the President; that ceitain contracts may be made by individuals with Indians relative to services in procuring the payments of claims, but no authority exists for making contracts of any other nature, and, if made, they are null and void; that no purchase, grant, lease, or other conveyance of lands or of any tide or claim thereto from any Indian nation or tribe of Indians shall be of any validity in law or equity, unless the same shall be made by treaty or convention, entered into pursuant to the Constitution; that only the United States can make any contract with any Indian nation or tribe affecting lands, whether by purchase, lease, or otherwise, and the United States can do so only by formal agreement; and that the President may employ the military to remove trespassers from the Indian lands.

Gen. McCook substantiates the above points by citations from the Revised Statutes, and declares that the United States can make agreements respecting Indian lands only with the Indians themselves, and not with third parties, and only with the Indians by agreement ratified by Congress. Notwithstanding the positive prohibitions of the law against the leasing or conveyance of lands by Indian tribes, substantially all the lands in Indian Territory set apart for exclusive Indian occupation, General McCook says, are in the possession of white men, under leases from Indians who had no power to lease, and with the tacit recognition of the Department of the Interior (under a former administration), which he believes had no fiower to recognize or assent to any such ease or possession.

LIST OF THE LESSEES. The following is given as a partial list of parties in occupation of such lands in the Cheyenne and Arapahoe Reservations in Indian Territory, and the amount of land controlled by them and embraced in their designated boundaries: Hampton H. Denman of Washington, D. C., formerly member of the Kansas State Senate, 55,000 acres. Edward Fenlon of Leavenworth, Kas., and William C. Mallelly of Caldwell, Kas., each 564,800 acres. Robert A. Hunter of St. Louis, Mo., 500,000 acre?. Albert G. Evans of St. Louis, Mo., 456,960 acres. Lewis L. Briggs of Muscoton, Kas., 318,720 acres. Jesse S. Morrison, of Darlington, I. T., 138,240 acres. Unknown lessee, leasing Oct. 15, 1883, 714,000 acres. Total to above parties, 3,832,520 acres. THE NOMINAL RENTAL.

“Briggs, a member of the Kansas State Senate, 1881-85, and E. M. Hewius, and others, in trust for the Cherokee Strip Live-Stock Association of Kansas, a Kansas corporation, leased for five years from Oct. 1, 1883, 3,000,000 acres, being all the unoccupied lands conveyed to the Pawnees, Poncas, Nez Perces, Otoes, Missouris, Osages, and Kansas Indians. The rental is ij cents per acre. If the Indians had power to make leases, and if the Interior Department had power to assent to them, what can be said of such an execution of a public trust, supposed to be created for the purpose of protecting Indian rights and interests, as the acquiescence in a lease of lands for a term of years at a rental which is nothing more than nominal? Is that the way the Government of the United States should care for its wards? If such leases were legal—if authority existed to make them—they would still be obtaining from the Indian wards, with the assent of their guardian, valuable property rights and privileges for a pittance. If the legality of the leases were doubtful they should not be permitted the countenance of an administration pledged to set its face against corruption, collusion, and wrong. Being, as they unquestionably are, wholly unauthorized and illegal, as well as improvident, should there be an instant’s hesitation in disavowing them, and in the summary exercise of all the power and authority of the Government in dispossessing the holders under them?”

TRESPASSERS. Continuing his argument declaring the illegality of the leases, Gen. McCook says: “Both under the common law and the enactments of Congress all parties other than Indians occupying these lands are trespassers. The intention of the law setting apart this domain was that it should be enjoyed by the Indians for the purpose of making to them civilized homes, encouraging them in habits of industry, and elevating and improving their condition. The actual facts now are that, instead of the Indians possessing and enjoying the benefits designed for them, the r country is overrun with speculators and adventurers of every - degree, who have despoiled them of (heir property, and practically sequestrated their birthrights, destroying their opportunities of self-sup-port, and leaving them nothing for the future, while keeping them dependent in the present” Senator Plumb, of Kansas, is said to be engaged in a careful study of Southern scenes and life, and the horrible possibility is suggested that he is going to write a book.

The builder of tumble-down houses in New York has been sentenced to the penitentiary. The New York World says: \Buddensick charges his present misfortune to the newspapers. A great many other violators of the law share these baleful opinions entertained by Buddensick concerning the press, but the man who builds his fortune by mixing common mud in his mortar should think of the capacity of the newspapers to bring rascals to justice.”

The preachers, who last year denounced polygamy in one breath and slandered Grover Cleveland in another, will doubtless be interested to observe that more has been accomplished tdward crushing out the Mormon institution by this administratio > than was done by all the republican administrations the country has ever had. Indeed, until the man whom these preachers maligned became president no serioue attempt had been made to suppress the Mormon evil. At this time, although Cleveland has been in office only four months, the polygamists are terrified by the vigor with which he is enforcing the anti-Mormon laws, and are already eparing, it is said, to a refuge in Mexico.

A New York paper says: “Honest civil-service reformers feel indignant at the clean sweep made in the department of justice by Attorney General Garland.” If this be true, the honest civil-service reformers must have forgotten the scandalous record of the department of justice under Brewster everyone of whose appointees, it is safe to say, should be removed for the good of the service.

General Logan shamelessly states that the republicans were willing to buy St. John. Clarkson, the lowa member of the republican national committee, has also as shamelessly asserted that negotiations looki g to St. John’s betrayal of his political trust for pay were attempted. Little by little the truth of this matter will leak out. and it will then be seen that not only the leaders of “the party of God and morality,” as they themselves admit, made St. John a dishonest proposition, but that he and his friends have at all times insisted, rejected it with scorn,

The Jury in the Loucks-Lou-thain case at Delphi stood 9 for defendant and 3 for plaintiff. The Kentland Gazette implies from this that J nines G. Blaine made a happy escape by dismissing his libel suit against the Indianapolis Sentinel. Of course Blaine’s letters to William Walter Phelps, and his answers to Judge Turpie’s interrogatories were sufficient to have settled his hash.

Mr. Buchard, of the mint, appears to have disappearod. Among his Rs he refused to include “resigned,” but he has been obliged to include “removed”

Judge Hammond will preside over the Clinton Circuit Court next week.

Mr. Jackson Phegley and Geo. Hoover have returned from Hot Springs, Arkansas, the former no! materially, and. the latter considerably benefitted.

Enterprise.— Mrs Geo. Dexter supervised the construction of an incubator, and its first use has resulted in the production of a brood of about 150 chickens.

The action of the reunion Committee has been reconsidered and the reunion will be held at Win. amac instead of Monticello.

Jim Rice, the Democratic Auditor of State, recently stuffed an Indianapolis Minute reporter, as follows: “A great many people think that General Grant smokes an enormous number of cigars. I have been with him and noticed his smoking in particular. He holds a ciga. in his mouth for hours at time without lighting it I probably use twice as much tobacco each day as General G.iant did. I use from $2 $2.50 worth of tobacco each day, besides consderable plug tobacco, it is surprising how the human body will absorb nicotine. When at the Arkansas Hot Springs after my first bath the waiter in charge of the bath room said, ‘why* Mr. Rice, how much tobacco you must use!’ The room was completely filled with the fumes of tobacco that the bath had brought fjom the pores in my body”

'he Pittsburg Post: “If the character of General Black’s record for the first two and a half months of his service as commissioner of Pensions is maintained through his term, honest claimants will have cause to bless the day that replaced the politrcan Dudley with a Democratic soldier In the four months’ interregnum be ween the resignation of W. W. Dudley as the head of the pension Bureau and the appointment of General Black, during which time O. P. Clarke was Commissioner, there was no noticeable improvement in the manner in which the office was conducted. Claims continued to accumulate, and claimants grew sick and disgusted over indifference and delay, General Black entered the office March 17, and almost instantly, says the National Tribune, a higher spirit of activity and efficiency was infused ihto the employes of the bureau. The result is that now, for the fiist time in the history of the bureau, claims are being disposed of faster than they they come in, and the work of reduction has begun upon the mountain of the accumulations of years. For the year 1882 the number of certificates issued was 38,150; for 1883 01,853; for 1884 58,048, and for two and a half months under General Black 20,627. To appreciate the difference of the work under the present commissioner, it is only necessary to state thut the monthly average for 1884 was 4,838, and for this year it is 8,254.”

Rev. B. F. Ferguson now uses crutches on account of a sprained ankle.

A drunken tramp was considerably used up at the Jones establishment Wednesday. At the trial which took place yesterday before justice Purcupile, the tramp was fined $3 and costs, for drunkenness and Mary Jones $5 and costs for assau t.—Douthitfor state; Jensen for defendant.

Rensselaer had a yery creditable celebration on the 4th. A goodly number were present notwithstanding the short notice, and t£e proceedings were orderly, instructive and interesting.

Samuel m., son of Mr. and Mrs. James Peffley died at the home of his parents in Remington, Sunday, July sth, in the 29th year of his age. Isaac N. Paris, aged 57 years, died at the residence of his sister, Mrs. Joseph White, in Rensselaer, Sunday morning/last, after a protracted illness. J. W. Roberts, Esq., of Kentland, united with his friends at this place on the 4th. He returned to Kentland Tuesday.