Hon. Warren K. Moorehead, of
the United States Board of Indian Commissioners, who investigated the
situation in that state, intimates that as many as 21,000 such cases
exist there. He says the handling of estates in Oklahoma costs often
from 30 to 90 per cent., whereas the average rate in thirty states is 3
per cent. "Why do not our laws prevent the robbing of Indians? Because
they are not enforced," declares Mr. Moorehead, who also investigated
White Earth, Minnesota, a few years ago, and uncovered a scandal of
large proportions, relating to the theft of over two hundred thousand
acres of valuable land, as a result of suddenly removing all
restrictions on the mixed bloods at that agency, many of whom were
incompetent to manage their own affairs.

Much of this graft might readily be stopped, and the ignorant Indian
protected, were it not for the fact that the relationship between the
shysters and certain officials is very much like that between the police
of New York City and the keepers of illegal resorts. When complaint is
made, big envelopes with "U. S." printed in the corner pass back and
forth--and that is too often the end of it! The Sioux call the U. S.
Indian inspectors, who are supposed to discover and report abuses, "Big
Cats"; but an old chief once said to me: "They ought rather to be called
prairie owls, who are blind in the daytime and have rattlesnakes for
their bedfellows!"

At the suggestion, I believe, of Dr. George Bird Grinnell and Hamlin
Garland, an attempt was made under President Roosevelt to systematize
the Indian nomenclature. The Indian in his native state bears no
surname; and wife and children figuring under entirely different names
from that of the head of the family, the law has been unnecessarily
embarrassed. I received a special appointment to revise the allotment
rolls of the Sioux nation. It was my duty to group the various members
of one family under a permanent name, selected for its euphony and
appropriateness from among the various cognomens in use among them, of
course suppressing mistranslations and grotesque or coarse nicknames
calculated to embarrass the educated Indian. My instructions were that
the original native name was to be given the preference, if it were
short enough and easily pronounced by Americans. If not, a translation
or abbreviation might be used, while retaining as much as possible of
the distinctive racial flavor. No English surname might be arbitrarily
given