I earnestly recommend that provision be made by law for locating these
Indians upon lands in the Indian Territory.

BENJ.  HARRISON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, January 27, 1890.

To the Senate of the United States: 

I transmit, in reply to the resolution of the Senate of the 8th instant, a report from the Secretary of State, with accompanying documents, in relation to the execution of the acts of Congress approved May 6, 1882, and October 1, 1888, concerning Chinese.

BENJ.  HARRISON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, February 10, 1890.

To the Senate and House of Representatives: 

In pursuance of the power vested in me by the terms of the last clause of section 3 of the act of Congress approved March 2, 1889, entitled “An act making 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, 1890, and for other purposes,” a commission, as therein authorized, was appointed, consisting of Charles Foster, of Ohio, William Warner, of Missouri, and General George Crook, of the United States Army.  This commission was specially instructed to present to the Sioux Indians occupying the Great Sioux Reservation, for their acceptance thereof and consent thereto in manner and form as therein provided, the act of Congress approved March 2, 1889, entitled “An act to divide a portion of the reservation of the Sioux Nation of Indians in Dakota into separate reservations and to secure the relinquishment of the Indian title to the remainder, and for other purposes.”

The report of the commission was submitted to me on the 24th day of December, 1889, and is, with the accompanying documents and a letter of the Secretary of the Interior, herewith transmitted for the information of Congress.  It appears from the report of the commission that the consent of more than three-fourths of the adult Indians to the terms of the act last named was secured, as required by section 12 of the treaty of 1868, and upon a careful examination of the papers submitted I find such to be the fact, and that such consent is properly evidenced by the signatures of more than three-fourths of such Indians.

At the outset of the negotiations the commission was confronted by certain questions as to the interpretation and effect of the act of Congress which they were presenting for the acceptance of the Indians.  Upon two or three points of some importance the commission gave in response to these inquiries an interpretation to the law, and it was the law thus explained to them that was accepted by the Indians.  The commissioners had no power to bind Congress or the Executive by their construction of a statute, but they were the agents of the United States, first, to submit a definite proposition for the acceptance of the Indians, and, that failing, to agree upon modified terms to be submitted to Congress for ratification.  They were dealing with an ignorant and suspicious people, and an explanation of the terms and effect of the offer submitted could not be avoided.  Good faith demands that if the United States accepts the lands ceded the beneficial construction of the act given by our agents should be also admitted and observed.