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it was done by this Department. But Congress took no notice of it. If the reparation to the Poncas proposed in the bill submitted to Congress was not satisfactory, then there was a full opportunity for Congress to amend that bill and to act upon its own judgment. If the Poncas had any real friends in Congress, those friends had, ever since 1877, sufficient knowledge furnished them by me upon which to speak and to act. But session after session passed; this Department again and again called attention to the matter and Congress said nothing, and did nothing except to appropriate money for the support of the Poncas.
Had Congress directed this Department to do this or that, there would have been no hesitation in executing the law. But now I read in your speech that all that was required to right the wrongs of the Poncas was “a heart and a stroke of the pen” on the part of the principal officer of the Government managing Indian affairs. Three years ago, by my declarations in the annual report, I showed that I had a heart for the Poncas long before the speakers at your meeting. But when you said that it required merely a stroke of the pen on my part to return the Poncas to Dakota, you had certainly forgotten that the powers of the executive branch of the Government are limited; that such a removal, and the resettlement of the Poncas in Dakota would have required much more money, than their support where they were; and that this Department had no authority of law to spend a dollar of money that was not appropriated. You go even so far as to say that this Department had no legal authority to keep them in the Indian Territory, and to spend any money for them there; you forget that this Department reported the matter to Congress in 1877, without any concealment as to the wrong done, and that Congress by law made appropriations for the support of the Poncas in the Indian Territory year after year with that full knowledge. It is said that had I recommended to Congress an appropriation for their return to Dakota, it would have been granted. But an appropriation was recommended by this Department for the purpose of indemnifying them in another way, and Congress, with a full knowledge of the facts spread by me before them, might have amended that bill, had it been so minded; yet the matter received no notice at all.
The reasons why I recommended that the Poncas be indemnified upon the lands they then occupied, and why I thought it wise that it should at least be tried whether they could not be made comfortable and contented there, are stated above.
It was hoped that when they were settled upon their new reserve in the Indian Territory they would go vigorously to work to improve their condition, and that such work, with the prospect of increasing prosperity and well-being, would render them gradually satisfied. Their
