The extension of our limits has brought within our jurisdiction many
additional and populous tribes of Indians, a large proportion of which are
wild, untractable, and difficult to control. Predatory and warlike in their
disposition and habits, it is impossible altogether to restrain them from
committing aggressions on each other, as well as upon our frontier citizens
and those emigrating to our distant States and Territories. Hence expensive
military expeditions are frequently necessary to overawe and chastise the
more lawless and hostile. The present system of making them valuable
presents to influence them to remain at peace has proved ineffectual. It is
believed to be the better policy to colonize them in suitable localities
where they can receive the rudiments of education and be gradually induced
to adopt habits of industry. So far as the experiment has been tried it has
worked well in practice, and it will doubtless prove to be less expensive
than the present system.
The whole number of Indians within our territorial limits is believed to
be, from the best data in the Interior Department, about 325,000. The
tribes of Cherokees, Choctaws, Chickasaws, and Creeks settled in the
Territory set apart for them west of Arkansas are rapidly advancing in
education and in all the arts of civilization and self-government and we
may indulge the agreeable anticipation that at no very distant day they
will be incorporated into the Union as one of the sovereign States.
State of the Union Address
December 6, 1858
The march of the army to Salt Lake City through the Indian Territory has had
a powerful effect in restraining the hostile feelings against the United
States which existed among the Indians in that region and in securing
emigrants to the far West against their depredations. This will also be the
means of establishing military posts and promoting settlements along the
route. I recommend that the benefits of our land laws and preemption system
be extended to the people of Utah by the establishment of a land office in
that Territory.
A portion of the troops sent to
Utah are now encamped in Cedar Valley, 44 miles southwest of Salt Lake
City, and the remainder have been ordered to Oregon to suppress Indian
hostilities.
But there is another view of our relations with Mexico, arising from the
unhappy condition of affairs along our southwestern frontier, which demands
immediate action. In that remote region, where there are but few white
inhabitants, large bands of hostile and predatory Indians roam
promiscuously over the Mexican States of Chihuahua and Sonora and our
adjoining Territories. The local governments of these States are perfectly
helpless and are kept in a state of constant alarm by the Indians. They
have not the power, if they possessed the will, even to restrain lawless
Mexicans from passing the border and committing depredations on our remote
settlers. A state of anarchy and violence prevails throughout that distant
frontier. The laws are a dead letter and life and property wholly insecure.
For this reason the settlement of Arizona is arrested, whilst it is of
great importance that a chain of inhabitants should extend all along its
southern border sufficient for their own protection and that of the United
States mail passing to and from California. Well-founded apprehensions are
now entertained that the Indians and wandering Mexicans, equally lawless,
may break up the important stage and postal communication recently
established between our Atlantic and Pacific possessions. This passes very
near to the Mexican boundary throughout the whole length of Arizona. I can
imagine no possible remedy for these evils and no mode of restoring law and
order on that remote and unsettled frontier but for the Government of the
United States to assume a temporary protectorate over the northern portions
of Chihuahua and Sonora and to establish military posts within the same;
and this I earnestly recommend to Congress. This protection may be
withdrawn as soon as local governments shall be established in these
Mexican States capable of performing their duties to the United States,
restraining the lawless, and preserving peace along the border.
