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WRITINGS OF SAM: HOUSTON, 1855
peace with them. The honorable Senator from Tennessee says that it is an imperative necessity to send the army. He says if the commissioners fail you must have recourse to chastisement; but if they succeed, the force of three thousand men will be un- necessary. But, Mr. President, my life upon it, and I do not say it lightly, if from three hundred to five hundred men were taken by the three commissioners; or, if they limited their escort to forty, or fifty, or one hundred men, they would succeed in conciliating every Indian on this side of the Rocky mountains, if in the mean- time the white men do not commit aggression. If you send such discreet men as could be selected, you can keep peace; and yet, upon the contingency that they may not succeed, you are to go to the expense of an army. But if we can not keep up our pres- ent establishment of fourteen thousand complete and efficient men for actual service, with all the resources of this nation, its increased bounty, and pay, and rations, let us give up the army; let them go to more useful employments. What is the use of talking about making the establishment commensurate with the present wants, if you can not keep up the present establishment to the necessities and exigencies of the country? Let them do that, and expose the fallacy of the theory which says that we must keep on increasing the army until we get the requisite number to keep up to the established standard. That is the way to do it. We must have some criterion to go by; and until we do it we shall never ha~e an efficient army. The army is small enough. Its efficiency is the great object. Now, fourteen thou- sand men are sufficient for all the exigencies of the country; and we must have some mode to give the emigrants security, or they must go at their own hazards or adventure. I desire to give them protection. You have to rely upon the disposition of the Indians for security to our emigrants. Unless you conciliate them, all the armies we can take will never give the emigrants protection. What kind of security can you give to emigrants for a distance of fifteen or eighteen hundred miles? You can give no protection where the troops would be a mile apart, for the unprotected emigrants might be attacked and slaughtered before any succor could come to them. Sir, it is the feelings of the Indians which you have to conciliate; it is their friend- ship, their confidence, you must obtain. Treat them with justice and liberality, and a hundredth part of the money which you spend in supporting the army will keep them faithful. They . ·' I
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