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President Roosevelt approves of the way Captain Harry O. Williard handled the conflict on the Navajo Reservation in a response to Commissioner of Indian Affairs Leupp.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-12-06
President Roosevelt thanks Charles J. Bonaparte for the information which will allow him to discuss the postmaster positions intelligently with Senator Louis E. McComas. Roosevelt is grieved about the Indian Territory business but will investigate in the same way as the postmaster case.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-12-07
President Roosevelt believes that Charles Fletcher Lummis and the Sequoya League receive credit for the Charles E. Burton investigation.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-10-05
President Roosevelt has reviewed the evidence in the Charles E. Burton case. Burton will be reprimanded for his actions and for not removing the teacher, but no further action will be taken.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-09-10
President Roosevelt returns the papers on the investigation into the affairs of the Moqui and Navajo Indian Reservation. Roosevelt agrees with Secretary of the Interior Hitchcock that the Sequoya League and Charles Fletcher Lummis should retract their charges.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-08-29
The charges of the Sequoya League against Charles E. Burton “fall absolutely flat” and he will not be removed.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-09-02
Charles Fletcher Lummis, David Starr Jordan, and others have accused Charles E. Burton, Superintendent and Special Distributing Agent of the Moquis and Navajos at Keams Canyon, Arizona, of incompetence and cruel treatment of Native Americans. President Roosevelt supports Burton’s removal and asks that Secretary of the Interior Hitchcock take up the matter.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-06-22
Commissioner of Indian Affairs Leupp responds to a letter that Edward J. Wilcox sent to President Roosevelt criticizing the way that Captain Harry O. Williard handled a conflict on a Navajo Reservation. Leupp provides context for the situation and argues that Captain Williard was justified in his actions, adding that other Navajo on the Reservation are pleased with the outcome.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-12-03
As per President Roosevelt’s request, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Leupp encloses a letter that presents the facts about the conflict on a Navajo Reservation in New Mexico. Leupp wrote the letter in response to a complaint from Edward J. Wilcox about how the situation was handled by Captain Harry O. Williard and William T. Shelton, the Superintendent of the San Juan Indian Agency. He knows that Roosevelt feels similarly that there are times “when it is necessary to enforce some salutary lesson by painful methods.” Leupp defends Williard’s and Shelton’s character and their actions in the conflict.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-12-05
Captain Williard writes to Commissioner of Indian Affairs Leupp about an issue that came to his attention recently. Father Anselm Weber notified him that the Indian Rights Association was protesting about Leupp and Superintendent William T. Shelton about their actions against Navajos that resulted in several being killed. Williard explains that he has become involved because he believes that he is responsible for the matter, and he defends the choices he made that resulted in the deaths.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-11-29
David Eugene Conrad examines the relationship between President Theodore Roosevelt and retired naval officer George T. Emmons. Roosevelt made Emmons “his principal adviser on Alaska,” and tasked him with helping to resolve a boundary dispute with Canada and with examining the condition of Native American tribes who were suffering at the hands of white settlers and miners. Conrad notes how Roosevelt used Emmons to go around the federal government bureaucracy, especially in the Department of the Interior. He stresses Emmons’s concern for the plight of the native tribes of Alaska, and he notes that some of his recommendations to Roosevelt were made into law by acts of Congress.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
1977
A Sequoya League investigation of Charles E. Burton, superintendent and special distributing agent of the Navajo and Moqui (Hopi) Indians, has found that Burton has “repeatedly and flagrantly violated” service rules by flogging Native Americans. Burton also forced Native American men to cut their hair. An official government investigation found wrongdoing but could not substantiate all of the Sequoya League’s findings.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1903-09