For a number of years past it has been apparent that the conditions under which the Five Civilized Tribes were established in the Indian Territory under treaty provisions with the United States, with the right of self-government and the exclusion of all white persons from within their borders, have undergone so complete a change as to render the continuance of the system thus inaugurated practically impossible.  The total number of the Five Civilized Tribes, as shown by the last census, is 45,494, and this number has not materially increased; while the white population is estimated at from 200,000 to 250,000 which, by permission of the Indian Government has settled in the Territory.  The present area of the Indian Territory contains 25,694,564 acres, much of which is very fertile land.  The United States citizens residing in the Territory, most of whom have gone there by invitation or with the consent of the tribal authorities, have made permanent homes for themselves.  Numerous towns have been built in which from 500 to 5,000 white people now reside.  Valuable residences and business houses have been erected in many of them.  Large business enterprises are carried on in which vast sums of money are employed, and yet these people, who have invested their capital in the development of the productive resources of the country, are without title to the land they occupy, and have no voice whatever in the government either of the Nations or Tribes.  Thousands of their children who were born in the Territory are of school age, but the doors of the schools of the Nations are shut against them, and what education they get is by private contribution.  No provision for the protection of the life or property of these white citizens is made by the Tribal Governments and Courts.

The Secretary of the Interior reports that leading Indians have absorbed great tracts of land to the exclusion of the common people, and government by an Indian aristocracy has been practically established, to the detriment of the people.  It has been found impossible for the United States to keep its citizens out of the Territory, and the executory conditions contained in the treaties with these Nations have for the most part become impossible of execution.  Nor has it been possible for the Tribal Governments to secure to each individual Indian his full enjoyment in common with Other Indians of the common property of the Nations.  Friends of the Indians have long believed that the best interests of the Indians of the Five Civilized Tribes would be found in American citizenship, with all the rights and privileges which belong to that condition.