TE}CAS INDIAN PAPERS, 1846-1859
117
Texas, and their associate bands, ratified the 8th of March, 1847, was acquiesced in by the State, as it was likely to answer the exigencies of her frontier, and from its being in conformity to the general Indian policy of the United States. It has been ob- served on the part of the State and her citizens with sedulous care, and though there have been multiplied infractions of an aggravated character by the other party, forbearance has been used, and no retaliatory measures adopted. But after a long series of losses and outrages on the persons and property of the frontier inhabitants (to which they have submitted with a forbearance scarcely to have been looked for in a people who have been characterized for boldness and fearless enterprize) it is manifest that patience and endurance will no longer be used. Nothing but an abiding disposition to respect the laws of the State and a wish to act in concert with the policy of the United States Government in respect to her Indians, have restrained a regular and systematic organization with a view to the extermi- nation, if possible, of the offending tribes. It is hoped that the General Government will promptly interpose by adopting a policy that will require the withdrawal of the Indians, or else establish a line of military posts at such intervals as will guarantee peace and security to our afflicted frontier. Skilful, energetic mounted troops, in sufficient numbers, can alone effect this object. Texas, since her union with the States, has relied naturally and most properly upon the General Government for that de- fence on her frontier, which, with many sacrifices of men and means, she had barely been able previously to give herself. She was invited into the Union, and accepted the invitation with the high expectation that she would, at no very distant day, at least reflect no discredit upon its honored flag; but she felt, and knew also, that her exhausted condition called imperiously for bene- fits, immmediate and practical; and one of the most pressing and important was to be drawn from the aid and comfort that the ability, to say nothing of the obligation, of the General Gov- ernment, could so easily, and was expected to supply. Her own exhausted Exchequer does not supply the necessary means of defence against the numerous Indian Tribes that infest her border. Full credit and acknowledgment is accorded to the gov- ernment for the satisfactory protection which for the period of about two years since annexation, (1847, 1848 and part of 1849,) was afforded to our frontier, and there is every reliance that when the proper array of facts shall be made familiar at Wash-
Powered by FlippingBook