Our Indian Affairs [pp. 5-22]

OUR INDIAN AFFAIRS.
All directly religious efforts for the conversion of the Indians
should of course be made at the expense of the churches; but
the government may well charge itself with the cost of education,
providing suitable buildings, paying the salaries of the teachers,
etc., in a word, sustaining to the Indians in education the relation which most of our State Governments sustain to our common
school system. It may well admit the co-operation of our Missionary B13oards, calling on them to nominate persons for appointment as teachers, providing them with houses free of rent, but
in no case giving them land in fee. Other matters of detail
would of course receive due consideration.
On the reservations, the United States Indian Agent represents the goverement, but his functions need to be defined, his
authority limited, his official course regulated by statute, as far as
possible. Perhaps too much is now left to the mere discretion of
these important officers. We would give them the functions of our
magistrates, empowering them to hold courts of limited jurisdiction, their proceedings being of record, and to be reviewed by
superior officers appointed for the purpose. All this requires
what has been too long delayed, the enactment of laws,-the
fewer, the simpler, the more easily understood and enforced, the
better for all parties. We cannot expect good results from the
absence of law among the Indians, as is at present the case in
too many tribes; their usages make a poor substitute for good
laws. In this matter, we should think, the best legal minds of
the country, under the direction of the best common-sense, might
find an interesting sphere of study, and render invaluable service
to our poor wards.
The intervention of the military power would no doubt have
.to be invoked, even under the most humane guardianship,-indeed, as a resource of humanity itself. The reserves being properly grouped, and military posts chosen with reference to probable duty, no large part of our army need be held in readiness for
Indian service. Indians in some tribes are now employed as
policemen, to good purpose. We would employ them as soldiers
also in the regular army, in rank and file, with promotion for
good conduct to the grade of sergeant or even higher; enlisting
those who can understand the few English words needed, and
taking them from the settled and civilized or semi-civilized tribes;
continuing, however, in central positions detachments of the
14
[January,