Arizona Republican

INDIANS AND THE ARMY.

It is probable that the Indian appropriation bill, when it leaves the House and goes to the Senate, will contain a clause authorizing the president to appoint army officers as Indian agents.

These officers would, while acting as agents, be under the authority of the interior department.

The provision is a move in the right direction, but it does not go far enough. It aims to secure the services of competent men as Indian agents, but it would leave those men under the control of the incompetent chief of the Indian bureau.

The entire Indian bureau should be placed under the care of the army. In other words, it ought to be taken away from the department of the interior and given to the war department.

There is no work connected with the Indians which the war department could not do better than the interior department is doing it now. It would be next to impossible for so incompetent a man as Commissioner Morgan to secure the place of chief of the bureau if it were attached to the war department.

Bigotry and general inefficiency would not characterize the administration of the bureau. The education of the Indian children would be attended to in a better way than at present, for the entire administration of Indian affairs would be in better hands than it is now.

Whatever may be said of the results of the education of the Indian children at the Carlisle school, it cannot be denied that the school itself is well conducted. It is under the direction of Captain Pratt of the regular army.

If all Indian agencies were under the care of army officers, there would be no more trouble with the Indians on account of a scarcity of food and good clothing, unless congress failed to make the requisite appropriations. The system and order which would characterize the administration of Indian affairs would prevent the complications which from time to time arise at Indian agencies under the present method of governing them.