Article-1855, February 9

The Shawnee Treaty

Lawrence, February 9th, 1855

EDITOR HERALD OF FREEDOM: As this very important treaty has not yet been read by our citizens generally, I will give some of its more important features.

   The Shawnee preserve lies south of the Kansas river, and west of the State line of Missouri. Out of this reserve 200,000 acres of land are to be held by Shawnees—each man, woman, and child selecting 200 acres within ninety days after the survey has been approved by the proper authorities. It is provided also, that each family shall select their portion so as to include their present improvements; and the portion coming to any one family shall be contiguous sections. Any Indian who has no present improvements shall select where he chooses within the reserve. As there are some 800 Shawnees now present in the nation, it will be seen that there will be some 40,000 acres remaining of the 200,000, which will not be subject to entry under five years. The treaty provides that this portion shall be set apart, under the direction of the President of the United States, in a square body; and after this is done, the remaining part of the reserve will be subject to pre-emption. It is thought that pre-emptors can enter within twelve or eighteen months from the present time. Any Shawnee that may now be residing west of the western boundary of the reserve, is permitted to hold his portion where his residence is. This provision was made to apply to Mr. Stinson, and others, who have married Shawnee, and who live on land ceded to the United States, and not included in the reserve. The object of setting apart the 40,000 acres is to provide for Shawnees out of the nation scattered abroad. All such, if they return to the nation within five years from the date of the treaty, are allowed to select their 200 acres apiece; and so much of this portion and shall remain after that period not appropriated, shall be sold at public auction, or thrown open for pre-emption—I do not recollect which.

   In regard to the four missions among the Shawnee, I wish to say a word. The slavery question has for some time been a bone of contention among them. Rev. Thomas Johnson, of the Methodist Church South, is, of course a pro slavery man. He is more—he holds slaves. A preacher of a free Gospel to the degraded Indian, he at the same time keeps in a still deeper degradation those of another race. I need not say that the mission established by the Friends is thoroughly anti-slavery. The Baptist Mission, under the care of Rev. F. Barker, is also thoroughly anti-slavery. The Methodist Church North have a mission, under the direction of Dr. Still—a man of piety, and fully devoted to the cause of his Master.

   By the treaty I see that all the Indian school funds is put into the hands of the Methodist mission South, and the Baptist and the Friends’ Mission are thus thrown upon their own resources for support, except insofar as they are allowed to farm a certain number of acres so long as they keep up a school. The Baptist Mission is allowed two acres whereon stands their church, and one quarter section where their improvements are located. But in default of keeping up a school, and also being fortunate enough to get some Shawnee children to attend it, then the church and the mission house, and other improvements, after being appraised, are paid for out of the public treasury of the United States, and this money handed over to the American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society.

   I think the provisions of the treaty in regard to the Friends’ Mission are very much the same. Both are essentially crippled, if not in a fair way to be rooted out entirely. The mission of the Methodist Church North is to be at once discontinued, simply because there is no possibility of getting any of the school fund. Why it does not get any of that fund we are not informed; But Dr. Still is strongly opposed to making Kansas a slave State, and it is not at all improbable that this fact has had something to do in that the negotiations which have resulted in the present treaty. His mission house, some thirty miles from any other, is thus left, and the Indian children who have formally attended this school will have to go thirty miles away and attend a mission belonging to the Church South; and what is worse, the great body of the Shawnees are opposed to slavery and its extension. All but one of the present council are anti-slavery men, and this one, it is currently reported, will be obliged to change his politics before the next election, or he will lose his office.

   But a reference to Mr. Johnson and his mission, things are very different. The fee-simple of a large tract of the best of land lying within two miles of Westport, is thrown into his hands for a mere nominal sum, and $10,000 is to be paid him for keeping open at school 10 years, nominally for certain children, when there is no prospect that the children contemplated will ever attend. These, and some other features of the treaty, show a decided preference in some powers to that mission. Whether it be the treaty-making power, or whether it be some power behind the throne, or whether it be owing to the intrigue and finesse of the Church South, and Mr. Johnson at its head, I do not know. But enough is known to justify the opinion very generally entertained by some in this Territory, that there has not been that encouragement shown to the Baptists and Friends’ Mission that has been to that of the Methodist South. Each of the three have been established for a long time, and they have done single service to the cause of humanity and civilizing the sons of the forest. They have labored long for this great object, and each of them should have received at the hand of our government equal support and encouragement, irrespective of their views on the question of slavery.

MYCOM

Kansas Herald of Freedom (Lawrence, KS), February 10, 1855.