51-1Indian AffairsMiami Indians of Indiana. [2807] Bill to reimburse the Indians for moneys improperly withheld; due under various treaties.1890-3

House of Representatives Report No. 22, 51st Congress, 1st Session (1890)

51-2Indian AffairsMiami Indians of Indiana. [2885] Bill to reimburse Miamies for
moneys improperly withheld; treaty of 5 June 1854.1890-37

House of Representatives Report No. 3259, 51st Congress, 2nd Session (1890)

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51ST CoNGRESS, } HOUSE OF RBPRESENTATIVES. 2d Session. MIAMI INDIANS OF INDIANA. { REPORT No. 3259. DECEMnER 91 1890.-Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union and ordered to be printed. Mr. SHIVELY, from the Committee on Indian Affairs, submitted the following REPORT: [To accompany S. 4205.] The Committee on Indian Affairs, to whom was referred the bill (S. 4205) to reiwburse the Miami Indians of Indiana for money improperly withheld from them, having had the same under consideration, llereby report: The matters embraced by said bill cover the same matters coYered by section 1 of Bouse bill No. 253, upon the same subject, wllich bill was by this cominitt('e heretofore, in February, 1890, at tlle first session of this Congress, favorably 1·eported with certain amendments, as shown in the amended bill and the report thereon then filed by this committee aurl now on the Honse Calendar. In said amended bill the committee recommended the payment of the sum of $48,072.09, ueing onls the principal of the sum claimed by, and by us fouud due to, said Indians, without interest, wllile the bill under consideration (S. 4205) provides for the payment of both principal and interest. Your committee, still feeling that said intArest ought not to be paid and that the principal is a just debt, hereby report the bill (S. 4205) favor-ably, amended, however, by striking out of the bill ( S. 4205) all after the enacting clause and inserting in lieu thereof the said amended House bill (H. R. 253), in the following words, to wit: AN AC'.r to reimburse the Miami Indians of Indiana for money improperly withheld rom them. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Secretary of the In-terior be, and he hereby is, authorized and directed to pay to the Miami Indians of the State of Indiana, being three hundred and two persons listed on the corrected list under the treaty of June fifth, eighteen hun-dred and fifty-four, and the increase of their families, the sum of forty-eight thousand seventy-two and sixty-nine one-hundredth dollars, being the amount improperly paid out of moneys due to said Indians, over their protest, to Indians not entitled to participate therein, and in violation of the treaty of eighteen hundred and fifty-four: Provided, That the sum hereby appropriated shall be in full settlement of any and all claims, in favor of said Miami India11.s, or any of them, arising out of any and all alleged violations of the terms of said treaty of June fifth, eighteen hundred and fifty-four, on the part of the United States Government. SEC. 2. That the amount necessary to carry out the provisions of this act is hereby appropriated out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated. 0 H.Rep.l-7 

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Miami Indians of Indiana.

51-1Indian AffairsMiami Indians of Indiana. [2711] Bill to reimburse the tribe for
moneys improperly withheld from them under various treaties.1890-34

Senate Report No. 1798, 51st Congress, 1st Session (1890)

51sT CoNGREss, } 1st Session. SENATE. {REPORT No. 1798. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES. SEPTEMBER 24, 1890.-0rdered to be printed. Mr. VooRHEES, by Mr. DANIEL, from the Committee on Indian Affairs, submitted the following REPORT: [To accompany S. 4205.] rn1e Committee on Indian Affairs, to whom was referred the bill (S. 4205) to re-imburse the Miami Indians of Indiana for money improperly · withlleld from them, submit the following report, to wit: In 1854 the United States made a treaty with certain Indians known as the Miamis of Indiana, whereby it was agreed that certain perRons belonging to said tribe, then residing in Indiana, should receive certain annuities and lands. It was further expressly agreed that the number of perRons thus re-siding was 302; and their names were at the time, by the United States officials, enrolled, in accordance with the terms of the treaty, in a list known as the "corrected list," made in the presence of and approved by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs then in office. It was further expressly agreed that no persons other than these 302, together with the increase of their families and such other persons as should be received into tribal relation with them "by the consent of the said Miami Indians of Indiana, obtained in council, according to the custom of the Miami tribe of Indiana" (see book of Indian Treaties, p. 516), should be entitled to any portion of said annuities and lands. It is admitted by the Attorney-General of the United States, in an official communication to Congress in 1867, as well as in the debates then had in Congress, ..that" the tribe in council never did, according to their custom, consent to the addition of those names or to their being paid,'' referring to the names of 73 persons other than the orig-inal 302 and the increase of tlwir families, which were plac-ed orr th~e said "corrected list" by the Secretary of the Interior under the act of Congress of June 12, 1858, passed some four years after the treaty was made. (Congressional .Globe, second session Thirty-ninth Uongress, 1648, 1649.) Under this act of 1858 the Secretary of the Interior, in October, 1858, placed on said "corrected list" 68 names of persons not received into the tribe, and 5 additional names in November, 1862; so that at that time 73 in all had been added who were not listed when the treaty was made, who had not been received into the tribe by action of its coun-cil, and who were not of the increase of the families of the original 302 listed persons. To these 73, who, with the increase of their families, in 1867 amounted to 119 persons, there was paid 3, ratable proportion of twelve annual payments of the annuities of the said original 30J Miami •• 2 MIAMI INDIANS OF INDIANA. Indians, to wit: of the payments for the years 1854-'55 to 1866-'67 in-clusive. The only authority claimed by the United States officials for making these payments, which clearly, not to say ruthlessly, violated the treaty of 1854, was this act of Congress passed in 1858; an act passed with-out consult.ation with the 302 listed Indians, and it is admitted upon all hands without their consent express or implied. It is worthy of note, also, that this act of 1858 was a provision in-serted as a Senate amendment in the supplemental Indian appropria-tion bill of that year. The following is the discussion in the Senate upon which the action was had. Mr. SEBASTIAN. I offer another amendment as an additional section: SEc. 7. And be it further enacted, That the Secretary of the Interior be, and he here-by is, authorized and directed to pay to such persons of Miami blood as have hereto-• fore been excluded from the annuities of the tribe, since the removal of the Miamis in 1846, and since the treaty of 1854, and whose names are not included in the sup-plement to said treaty, their proportion of the tribal annuities from which they have been excluded; and he is also authorized and directed to enroll such persons upon the pay-list of said tribe, and cause their annuities to be paid to them in future: Provided, That the foregoing payments shall ue in full of all claims for annuities arising out of previous treaties. And said Secretary is also authorized and directed to cause to be located for such persons each 200 acres of land, out of the tract of 70,000 acres reserved by the second article of the treaty of June 5, 18!14, with the Mi-amis, to be helU by such per sons by the same tenure as the locations of individuals are held which have been made under the third article of said trea.ty. Continuing, Mr. Sebastian says: There is no appropriation from the Treasury in this amendment; it is a mere inter-tribal regulation between the Miamis of Indiana and a few families who have been improperly deprived of their annuities. It is to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to arrange and adjust the proportion of annuit,ies among them, annuities already due by treaty. Mr. HuNTER. fs this on the recommendation of the Department 7 Mr. SEBASTIAN. The information is official and comes from the Department. They entertain no doubt as to the improper exclusion of the families mentioned in the amendment, lmt they do not recommend it. They thought it a matter properly referable to Congress, and the Committee on Indian Afi'airs report this as proper leg-islation by Congress. Mr. FITCH. It is all right. Mr. HUNTER. Does it commit us to make any appropriation-to take from one tribe to giYe to another¥ Mr. FITCH. They are all the same triue. Mr. SJmSTIAN. This simply extends the pay-roll of the Indiana Miamis so as to include a few families who have heretofore been improperly excluded. The amendment was agreed to. The foregoing is the whole of the discussion in the Senate when the act of 1858 was paRsed. (Congressional Globe, first session Thirty-fifth Oougress, p. 2822.) "''hether or not the act violated the terms of the treaty of 1854 was not discussed. That it violated this treaty by taking away from the original 302 listed Indians, and the increase of their families, over one-fourth of their lands and annuities, without their consent, witbont their knowledge, and in direct violation of their solemnly guarantied treaty rights, was not even remotely hinted at in this slight and brief discussion. No evidence whatever of any "improper exclusion" of the added fndians was placed before the Senate at that or any other time. -when this amendment came back to the House for concurrence, the debate upon it was and the facts adduced were still more meager, if possible, than when the measure was before the 8enate. There the House, on motion of Mr. J. Glancy Jones, on June 10,1858, MIAMI INDIANS OF INDIANA. 3 went into Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union to consider the Senate amendments to the the supplemental Indian ap-propriation bill. (Congressional Globe, first session Tbirty.fifth Oon-gress, p. 2910.) The amendment (being act of 1858 under consideration) being in or-der, the consideration it received was as follows: Mr. J. GLANCY JONES. Upon examination of the matter it was ascertained that some of the Mhtmi Indians were omitted from the list. The amendment provides that they shall be reckoned in. It brings in a few Indians who wero unjustly left out. The Committee of Ways and Means recommeml a concurrence. The amendment was concurred in. This was all the information given to the House. (Congressional Globe, first session Thirty-fifth Congress, pp. 2912, 2913.) Thus did Con-gress, in violation of the treaty of 1854, and of the rights of the per-sons to whom the treaty guarantied them almost without consideration, and certainly without adequate proof, parcel out the moneys and lands of the 302 to those who by that treaty had no possible right to any portion of either land. or moneys. This was all done on the assumption that these 73 added persons had been ':improperly excluded" by the treaty of 1854. But if this was so, why were not the 302 given an opportunity to defend against the charge~ Surely the truth would have lost nothing by such au investi-gation. But the charge was not true. At the time of the repeal of this act of 1858, viz, in February, 1867, it was clearly shown that the 73 were not entitled to be listed with the 302 for two reasons: First, They were not of full Miami blood. Second, Their right to annuities and lands rested with the remainder of the tribe, which had chosen to emigrate west of the Mississippi under treaty stipulations with the United States, made in 1846 and 1854, and it was unjust, as well as violative of the treaty of 1854 to list them with the 302. And after a very full discussion Congress repealed the law of 1858 on these grounds. (Congressional Globe, second session Thirty-ninth Congress, pp. 1647, 1650. It is also worthy of notice that this repeal was had upon the mution of the Senate, where the mistaken action of 1858 first originated and came in by way of an amendment to the Indian appropriation bill of 1867, first proposed in the Senate (Oong:r:essional Globe, second session Thirty-ninth Congress, 1646, 1647). And the discussion in the Senate as to the propriety of the repeal was clear and full, and conclusively shows that the act of 1858 was a clear and palpable violation of the treaty of 1854, and upon the repeal of the law the 73 persons, together with the increase of their families, were dropped from the list and have been paid nothing since 1867. But this action of Congress was only a partial reparation for the wrong committed by the act of 1858. It only stopped the wrongful payment. It did not make restitution of the lands and moneys wrong-fully diverted. It is too late now to correct the wrong as to the lands so taken, for the rights (}f innocent purchaseis have intervened and render that impracticable. But it is not too late to restore the moneys, which have never been refunded. · During most of the years from 1858 to 1867 the 302 strenously objected to the payments of which they now complain. A bill (H. R. 2099, first session Fiftieth Congress) was introduced into the Honse by the Bon. George W. Steele, then representing the distrirt in which these Indians reside, and upon his inquiry of the Oom~issioner of 4 MIAMI INDIANS OF INDIANA. Indian Affairs on this point while the bill waR being considered in committee, be received the following reply and document, viz : To the honorable the Sena'e and House of Rep1·esentatives of the United States in Congress assembled: The undersigned, your petitioners, would, to your honorable body, most respectfully represent that they are Miami Indians, residing in the State of Indiana, and that they and their families and the pNsons whom they represent are the individuals referred to as theMiamilndiansin the Senate amendment to tlw fourth article of thetreatyoft.he 5th of June, 1854, between the United States and the Miami Indians, and whose names are em braced in the corrected list referred to in said treaty amendment; and your peti-tioners respectfully call your attention to that provision which stipulates that no person other than tlwse embraced in the corrected list agreed upon by the Miamis of Indiana, in the presence of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, in June, 1854, compris-ing 302 names, as Miami Indian!:! of Indiana, and the increase of the families embraced in said corrected list, shall be recipients of the payments, annuities, commutations, moneys, and interests hereby stipulated to be paid to the Miamis of Indiana, unless other persons shall be added .to said list by the consent of said Miami Indians of Indiana, obtained in council, according to tbe custom of the Miami Indians oflndiana. Your petitioners further show that the Secretary of the Interior, in pursuance of the third section of an act of Congress approved June 12, 1858, entitled "An act making supplementary appropriations for the current and contingent expenses of the Indian department, and for fulfilling treaty stipulations with various Indian tribes for the year ending June 30, 1859," has cansed to be added to said list the names of some sixty persons, as we are informed That the same have been added without our consent and against our wishes, and have been paid out of our moneys. That we conceive that if the section of the act referred to was intended to refer to the Miamis of Indiana, as it is construed by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, it is in direct violation of said treaty. Your petitioners, therefore, humbly pray that said third section of the act referred to, or so much thereof as violates their rights and appropriates their money for the benefit of persons whom they do not recognize, may be repealed, and that the moneys heretofore diverted to that purpose may be refunded. And in duty bound your peti-tioners will ever pray, etc. Done in C'>nncil on the 1st day of February, 1859, at the bouse of Gabriel Godfrey, on the MisRissinewa River, Miami County, Indiana. (Signed with an x mark:) John B. Bronellitt or Te-qnah-"'fah, Peter Bon die or Waw-pow-pe-tab, Me·shing-o-me-sha. Pim-y-tine-aw, Kil.oc-com-acb, La·maw-wah, Shaw-aw-pe-ne-maw, Waw-caw-co-now, Po-con-ge-ah, Len-e-pe shew-saw, Waw-pe-man-gnaw, Po-can-ge-ab, Ah-toh-a-ton, Pe-me-to-sin-wah, Ke-oh-cat-wah, Shp-pen-do-ciab, Ke-oh-cat-wah, Pa-len-swah, My-ac-gne-ah, Gabriel Godfrey, We-shing Goodhoo, So-mile-le-jes-ion, Sho-quang-oh, William Gotlfrey, Tow-wah-quah-iey. Ron. GEORGE vV. STEELE: No written protest was filed by Miami Indians at each payment against allowing Indian!')_ placed on roll in 1858 to participate in annuities. Several of the agents making payments, however, report that these Indians were objected to. J.D. C. ATKIXS, Commissioner. It may be claimed that these Indians occupied the relation of wards to the United States Government, and therefore Congress bad the right to pass the act of 1858, notwithstanding it violated the treaty of 1854. As a matter of mere force Congress could so act, but certainly not as a matter of conscience and right. Your committee know of no principle of guardianship which protects the guardian in appropriating the property of one ward to the use of another ward. BesidesJ these Indians are now and for many years have been resident citizens and voters in the · State of Indiana,. and were such when the act of 1858 was passed. MIAMI INDIANS OF INDIANA. 5 As to the amount that should be refunded, your committee fix it at the sum of $48,072.69; this being the amount as computed by the In-terior Department in its communication to Bon. George W. Steele un-der date of February 14, 1887, as follows: DEPAR.TMENT OF THE INTERIOR, OFFICE OF INDIAN AFFAIRS, Washington, February 14, 1887. Sm: In compliance with yonr verbal request, I submit the following statement in rPferen<'e to certain Miami Indians of your State who were, under act of June 12, 1358 (U. S. Stats., 11, p. 332), enrolled with the 302 persons uarued in the Senate amend-ntent to the treaty of 1854 (U. S. Stats., 10, p. J 099). * * * Repeated efforts have been made in this office to trace the original 73 persons who were added to the Miami rolls of 1854-'55 through the rolls for the snbseq ueut twelve payments, but owing to the brief manner of enrolling Indians for payment followed some years hack, and the frequent changes in the family relations and manner of spelling Indian names, this was found to be impracticable; neither can the 119 per-sons :finally excluded under the opinion of tbe Attorney-General be traced back for the same reasons, but it is believed that the total amount paid to these 73 or 119 per-sons named can be arrived at sufficiently close to satisfy all parties by the following method, viz: 'l'o :find the number who drew a share of this money each year from 1854 to 1867, inclusive, we must :first take from the 119 excluded 11 who were born subsequent to the payment of 1867, as appears by the records in thi~ office, which leaves but 108 who actually shared in the payment of 1867 or could have shared in the other payments. To this 108 we add theoriginal73, making 181, which, divided by 2, gives an average enrollment for the thirteen ;vears of 90t. In the same way we take the amount of one per capita share as the same appears on the rolls for each of the thirteen years in question, viz: Fiscal year. 185!--'55 .•• -- .... ---.--.------- ... ---- ... 1855-'56 ...... -·---- ------------ ..... -- .. 1856-' 57 .. -- -- ---- ...... --- • -- . - - . --. -- .. 1857-'53 ........ - ............... ----.- .. . 1858-'59 ..... ---· ............ ---.--.-- ... 1859-'60 ................... -.... -.- ... - .. 1860-'61 ....... -- ............ ---- ...... --1861-'62 ...... - .................... --.--. Amount .. $41.4!) b5. 50 6.J.. 66 52.11 43.85 ! 48.71 28. 5l 28.51 Fiscal year. 1862-'63 ............................... . 1863-'G4 ............................... . 18G4-'65 ............................... . 18G5-'66 ....................... · ...... .. 1866-'()7 . --.------ •• ------ ............ .. Total ................... --~- .... .. Amount. $67.00 2.3.00 25.00 51.05 5:.11.19 Which, multiplied h.v 90i, the average number of ihe 73 or 108 who shared in these payments, gives $48,072.69 as the total umouut so paid, or say, jn round numbers, $48,000, which is no doubt very nearly correct-I shoulU think sufficiently~ for Con-gress to act upon in case it is proposed to pay it or any part of it to the original 302 persons on tho corrected list of ltl54 and to their descendants. * * * Respectfully, Ron. GEORGE W. STEELE, House of RepreBentativeB. J. D. C. ATKINS, CommiBsioner. Calculating interest on this principal at the rate of 4 per ~ent. per annum from the date of the decision of the Attorney-General in 1867, which is certainly the latest time ~t which interest should commence, the account stands thus, to wit: Principal .. _ ....... _ ...... _ .............................•.•..........•. $48,072. 69 Interest . _ ........ _ ..........................•• _ •......•••• ~ .... _. . . . . . 43, 657. 31 Making a total of .................... _ ........................... ~91, 730. 00 the sum named in the bill. Upon tbe foregoing facts it is apparent that the United States has done g-reat injustice to these Indians in withholding from them the money positively promised them lJy a ~olemn treaty, and the committee recommends the passage of the bill without amendment. 0 

Miami Indians of Indiana

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Miami Indians of Indiana

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