f they allowed the
savages to remain upon it, and did not drive them beyond the lakes, it
was purely from "motives of compassion," and not because these savages
enjoyed any right of occupancy that was bound to be respected by the
government. That these statements are true is proven by the report of
Henry Knox, secretary of war, to President Washington, on June 15th,
1789, in a review of past conditions relative to the northwestern
Indians. The representations of Knox correctly reflected the views of
Washington himself. The Secretary says: "It is presumable, that a nation
solicitous of establishing its character on the broad basis of justice,
would not only hesitate at, but reject every proposition to benefit
itself, by the injury of any neighboring community, however contemptible
or weak it might be, either with respect to its manners or power * * *
The Indians being the prior occupants, possess the right of the soil. It
cannot be taken from them unless by their free consent, or by the right
of conquest in case of a just war. To dispossess them on any other
principle, would be a gross violation of the fundamental law of nations,
and of that distributive justice which is the glory of a nation." He
then says the following: "The time has arrived, when it is highly
expedient that a liberal system of justice should be adopted for the
various Indian tribes within the limits of the United States. By having
recourse to the several Indian treaties, made by the authority of
congress, since the conclusion of the war with Great Britain, except
those made in January, 1789, at Fort Harmar, it would appear, that
congress were of the opinion, that the treaty of peace, of 1783,
absolutely invested them with the fee of all the Indian lands within the
limits of the United States; that they had the right to assign, or
retain such portions as they should judge proper." Again, and during the
negotiations of Benjamin Lincoln, Beverly Randolph and Timothy
Pickering, with the northwestern Indians in 1793, this candid admission
is made of the former errors in the negotiations at Fort Stanwix: "The
commissioners of the United States have formerly set up a claim to your
whole country, southward of the Great Lakes, as the property of the
United States, grounding this claim on the treaty of peace with your
father, the king of Great Britain, who declared, as we have before
mentioned the middle of those lakes and the waters which unite them to
be the b