Choctaw&Chickasaw Descendants-Black History Day 10, Children of Indian Descent, Have Been Denied Their Rights

Choctaw & Chickasaw Descendants Black History Day 10, #BlackHistory365 

HEARINGS before the Committee on Indian Affairs House of Representatives (61-2) 

H.R. 192789, H.R. 19552 & H.R. 22830 pp 53-54

Children of Indian Descent, Have Been Denied Their Rights

Argument by Harry J. Cantwell, esq.

 

The statement was made by Mr. Cornish, the attorney for the Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians, in the hearing before the Senate committee for the Fifty-ninth Congress, second session (S. Doc. No. 257, p251,) (sic) that-

 

“There has not only not been any discrimination so far as the Choctaws and the Chickasaws are concerned against their slaves, but they have done more for their slaves than is the case in any southern community.”

 

I say there never was made, considering the erroneous impression sought to be created, a more palpably false statement than that. The Choctaws and Chickasaws agreed in 1866 to give their former slaves 40 acres in an area of land, and in that agreement, they confined it to the former slaves and individuals alone. They have actually been given 20 acres within the last four years, and the right to purchase at the appraised value 20 acres additional when the regulations for the purchase shall be prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior...

 

But it is not with the former slaves that we are concerned. We are concerned with the children of Indian descent, born since slavery, born in the tribe to the citizenship of the tribe, who, by reason of an admixture of free but negro blood, have been denied their rights. 

Joe & Dillard Perry Petition to Transfer File-Calvin Newberry et al., #F-132 

Senate Document 257 (59th Congress, 2nd Session) pp50 & 51

"The statement that there is a desire on the part of the Choctaw and Chickasaws to discriminate against these persons because of their negro blood is absolutely untrue, because there are persons in the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations who are on the tribal roll and who are possessed of some negro blood. I do not think that a marriage and legitimacy of issue was presented when you were in the Indian Territory; but the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations have preserved their blood pure and uncontaminated, in so far as the colored race is concerned."