It is reported that only eight pieces, containing 879.76 acres of land taken from six of these Indian allotments, were sold under this statute to the settlers thereon, producing the sum of $4,058.06, and that the price paid in no case was less than $4.50 per acre.

It is proposed by the bill under consideration to sell the remainder of this allotted land to those who failed to avail themselves of the law of 1873 for the sum of $2.50 per acre.

Whatever may be said of the effect of the action of the Indian Bureau in issuing certificates of allotment to individual Indians as it relates to the title of the lands described therein, it was the only way that the Government could perform its treaty obligation to furnish homes for any number of Indians less than a tribe or band; and if these allotments did not vest a title in these individual Indians they secured to them such rights to the lands as the Government was bound to protect and which it could not refuse to confirm if it became necessary by the issuance of patents therefor.

These rights are fully recognized by the statute of 1873, as well as by the bill under consideration.

The right and power of the Government to divest these allottees of their interests under their certificates is so questionable that perhaps it could only be done under the plan proposed, through an estoppel arising from the acceptance of the price for which their allotted lands were sold.

But whatever the effect of a compliance with the provisions of this bill would be upon the title of the settlers to these lands, I can see no fairness or justice in permitting them to enter and purchase such lands at a sum much less than their appraised value in 1873 and for hardly one-half the price paid by their neighbors under the law passed in that year.

The occupancy upon these lands of the settlers seeking relief, and of their grantors, is based upon wrong, violence, and oppression.  A continuation of the wrongful exclusion of these Indians from their lands should not inure to the benefit of the wrongdoers.  The opportunities afforded by the law of 1873 were neglected, perhaps, in the hope and belief that death would remove the Indians who by their appeals for justice annoyed those who had driven them from their homes, and perhaps in the expectation that the heedlessness of the Government concerning its obligations to the Indians would supply easier terms.  The idea is too prevalent that, as against those who by emigration and settlement upon our frontier extend our civilization and prosperity, the rights of the Indians are of but little consequence.  But it must be absolutely true that no development is genuine or valuable based upon the violence and cruelty of individuals or the faithlessness of a government.

While it might not result in exact justice or precisely rectify the wrong committed, it may well be that in existing circumstances the interests of the allottees or their heirs demand an adjustment of the kind now proposed.  But their lands certainly are worth much more than they were in 1873, and the settlers, if they are not subjected to a reappraisement, should at least pay the price at which the lands were appraised in that year.