Who Gets the Reservation When the Indians Are Allotted
Eastern Washington settlers cheer the survey of the Colville reservation, expecting homesteads — but President Cleveland's message warns the surplus land may not be thrown open at all, and the paper has a barb for the waiters.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
There has been some rejoicing in Eastern Washington over the progress of surveys on the Colville reservation, such progress being supposed to insure the early opening of the lands remaining after farms have been allotted to the Indians belonging on the reservation and a large number from British Columbia, who will come over for the purpose. Let the jubilant people read this extract from the last message of the president:
"In the light of experience and considering the uncertainty of the Indian situation and its exigencies in the future, I am not only disposed to be very cautious in making allotments, but I incline to agree with the secretary of the Interior in the opinion that when allotments are made the balance of reservation land remaining after allotment, instead of being bought by the government from the Indians and opened for settlement with such scandals and unfair practices as seem unavoidable, should remain for a time at least as common land or be sold by the government on behalf of the Indians in an orderly way and at fixed prices, to be determined by its location and desirability, and that the proceeds, less expenses, should be held in trust for the benefit of the Indian proprietors."
Either the surplus lands will be used as pasture ground for Indian ponies, or they will be sold to men of means. There are poor men in Eastern Washington who expect to get homesteads on the big reservation, and who have been waiting for years. Let them cheer up. Times will be better, Mr. Cleveland says, when we owe more money. The treasury needs gold. There is much gold on the Colville reservation but there is still more in London. The owners of the gold in London have been arranging to loan it to the United States, and it would not be right to disappoint them. The people who have been waiting for the reservation to be opened have learned to be patient; Mr. Cleveland's term of office will expire March 4, 1897.
“There are poor men in Eastern Washington who expect to get homesteads on the big reservation, and who have been waiting for years.”
The Colville Confederated Tribes' land base was carved down by exactly this allotment-and-surplus machinery, the same policy that fragmented reservations across the West. The paper's sarcasm is aimed at Cleveland's gold policy, but the real stakes were Indigenous title. Today the Colville reservation remains a fraction of its original extent — the 'waiting for years' settlers got their wish, and the tribes paid for it.
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