ment, the white settlers in the valley could be induced to leave it, others would come.”
To all these statements Joseph replied that he “asked nothing of the President. He was able to take care of himself. He did not desire Wallowa Valley as a reservation, for that would subject him and his band to the will of, and dependence on, another, and to laws not of their own making. He was disposed to live peaceably. He and his band had suffered wrong rather than do wrong. One of their number was wickedly slain by a white man during the last summer, but he would not avenge his death.”
“The serious and feeling manner in which he uttered these sentiments was impressive,” the commissioners say, and they proceeded to reply to him “that the President was not disposed to deprive him of any just right, or govern him by his individual will, but merely subject him to the same just and equal laws by which he himself as well as all his people were ruled.”
What does it mean when commissioners sent by the President to induce a band of Indians to go on a reservation to live, tell them that they shall be subjected on that reservation “merely to the same just and equal laws” by which the President and “all his people are ruled?” And still more, what is the explanation of their being so apparently unaware of the enormity of the lie that they leave it on official record, signed by their names in full? It is only explained, as thousands of other things in the history of our dealings with the Indians are only to be explained, by the habitual indifference, carelessness, and inattention with which questions relative to Indian affairs and legislation thereon are handled and disposed of, in whatever way seems easiest and shortest for the time being. The members of this commission knew perfectly well that the instant Joseph and his band moved on to the reservation they became subject to laws totally different from those by which
