Image provided by: The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde; Grand Ronde, OR
About Weekly Chemawa American. (Chemawa, Or.) 189?-198? | View Entire Issue (July 29, 1910)
THE CHEMAWA AMERICAN 5 VALEDICTORY THE OUTLOOK. HARRY JONES. The outlook for the Indian race at the present time is brighter and broader than ever before in the hisfory of my unfortunate and unhappy people. "UNFORTUNATE," because a civiliza tion which had taken many centuries to reach the perfection the Jndian first paw. was supposed to be accepted at once by a barbaric p'eopie and was forced upon 'them by the white men, who forgot, or were indifferent to the fact, that they, the superior race, were many centuries attaining the arts of civilization with its laws, duties, habits, religion, trend of thought, so unlike anvthing this simple, primitive people had known. The white race ig the conquering race, and what it conquers it subdues The red man had to follow in the white man's ways or perish. Sickness, disease, and all the attendant ills of a forcpd and un comprehended way of life, was the fate of this unhappy people. Accustomed to a wild, free life, the attempt to civilize them bv slavery was a dismal failure, TheMnherent stoliditv ann1 sullenness of the Indian was intensi fied. The white man waa looked upon as their natural enemy All the savage ferocity of which he was capable was. awakened against this people. As the Indian was driven back, back toward the setting sun, his hatred toward th white man increased. The hunting grounds which had been his wee his no longer. The Great Spirit had for gotten the redman The sadness of dis aster even predominated in the Indian's music the weird, minor strains which were sung bv the mothers to their little ones, colored the life of the Indian, and gave p'ace onlv to the terrible warcrv the war chant which their young men defiantly sang in a despairing, futile hope of regaining the power of their an cestors. This hope died hard, but it died. No more will the Indian live his life as did his forefathers. This isgenerall)7 understood by all 'the Indians, even those who have been most corrupted by the evil habits learned from the white man. . As the Indian was brought to bay he looked around and saw the white man everywhere. He has submitted to the inevitable, and is now beginning to knrtw, to understand, that the Great Spirit is the same as the white man's God the universal father who .calls all men his children and intends that all men should be brothers. . Instead of looking on the white man as an er.emy, we turn t( you for help. Will you be our brothers? You have established schools for us, given us good, devoted teachers. Our industrial departments are among the best in the worlH. And now we are get ting your confidence because you have ours. The Indians of the present gener ation have the white man's opportun ities and the white man's friendship. Even an educated Indian has been looked nnon with suspicion and a lack of confidence by the western people. They could not forget the barbarities practiced a short time ago comparatively. They see the filth, the misery, the drunkenness and disease ' surrounding the wretched camps and homes of many of the In dians, forgetting that in certain places, the white men are no better off. I am not sorry that I am an Indian. This is the era in which an Indian can