FREEDOM'S SIGNAL FOR THE INDIANS 

Vol. I, No. 7 Issued Monthly October 1916. 

ARROW POINTS. 

Ex-President Coolidge of the Society 
of American Indians says that he can 
be loyal to the Indian race and at the 
same time serve the Indian Bureau. 
W ASSAJA wonders if he serves God 
and the Devil the same way. 

All the administrative machinery of 
the government pertaining to Indian 
management, having come into existence 
as a temporary expedient, should 
be made the subject of immediate action 
toward its abolishment. 

Longfellow's worqs oug·ht to be 
taken by the Society of American Indians 
as a guiding star: 

In the world's broad field of battle, 
In the bivouac of life, 
Be not like dumb, driven cattle! 
Be a hero in the strife! 
The Indian Office is the ''hero'' in the 
Indians' life. 
Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant, 
Let the dead Past bury its dead! 
Act,-act in the living Present! 
Heart within, and God o'erhead! 
The Indian Office is always pointing 
Continaed oi, JJ•te ,~ 

KILL THE INDIAN BUT NOT THE 
MAN. 

(Extracts from a speech delivered by 

an Indian.) 

"In the remarks I am abeut to make 
on the future of the Indian, I will endeavor 
to make clear to yeu that the 
efforts heretofore made by the wellmeaning 
agents of thi!! Qovernme11t 
have been frequently ab!!urd and always 
misguided. In a lal'ge measure 
the governmental machinery, our philanthropists 
and missionaries, have 
treated and dealt with the Indian as 
if he were a grotesque euriosity, encouraging 
him in his groteequeness and 
trying to educate ( ?) him to cherish 
anq perpetuate every absurdity of his 
primitive life on this eontine»t. This 
method, my friends, is all wr n~. It is 
worse than useless-it is very harmful 
to the Indian. Make the ledian forget 
that he i!! an object of curio ity and 
make him :r~member that he is a man, 
a human bemg moved by all the noble 
impulses that move you, subject to the 
same temptation!! and J.lOl!!l!!essing the 
same fault!!' common to the llnman rare. 
It is the Indian eu!!tome, habits and 
peculiarities you !!hould eradicate, and 
develop lhe :manhood and nobility of 



2 

WASSAJA 

"WASSAJA" 

Vol. l No. 7 October 1916 
Subscription SOc a Year Single copie.s Sc 
lOO for $2.00 

Address all communication to 
CARLOS MONTEZUMA, M. D. 
313S So. Parle Ave, Chicago, Ill. 


the man, &nd 110 writer or statesman 
of authority ever , denied that nature 
was prodigal when it endowed my people 
with these splendid attributes. 

''Shortly after the American, Thomas 
Paine, wa.s masie an honorary citizen 
of France and elected a member of the 
French. .A8sembly during the Revolution, 
the proposal to take the life' of the 
King WIH submitted to the Assembly. 
The great body of the French people 
having jU8t broken the chains that had 
for centuries bound them in tyranny 
and oppression, were at the time nnable 
.to appreciate freedom and administer 
justice, and had, as Lord Byron expressed 
it, 'Got drunk on blood to vomit 
crime,' and were for the minute howling 
like wild beasts for the blood of 
Louis. This great patriot, this great 
American, this greatest advocate of the 
fraternity and equality of man, Thomas 
Paine, brning the fury of the mob and 
inviting imprisonment and death, rose 
in his place in the French Legislature, 
and in 11. speech of great power and 
beauty opposed the execution of the 
man, but urged the destruction of 
everything ·represented by the King, 
closing with these memorable words, 
'Kill the King, but not the man.' Paraphrasing 
this immortal phrase, I say, 
'Kill the Indian, but save and develop 

the human being.' " 

FREE THE INDIANS. 

(From the Chicago Day Book, 
August 10, 1916.) 

Jennie Drago, a Shawnee Indian, 
daughter of Peter W. Drago of Utah, 
now 72 years old, born at Newark; 0., 
pleads that President Woodrow Wilson, 
while he has the power, in the name of 
his wife, who is a direct descendant 
of Pocahontas, the American Indian, 

proclaim freedom to the American 
Indian. 

They are the only race who have no 
freedom in these United States, though . 
they once owned this beautiful land. 
The United States has not paid even 
interest on that land, but kept the Indians 
in bondage. 

The Indian wigwam had no locked 
door, and still there are no Indian illegitimate 
children, and no Indian woman 
ever broke the Indian laws concerning 
women. The Indian was sublime 
until the pale face came with his :firewater 
and syphilis. 

Let President Woodrow Wilson do 
this act of justice and his name will go 
down in glory with Abe Lincoln's.Jeruiie 
Drago. 

ARROW POINTS. 

Continued from page 1 

to the great future, the pleasant future 
when there will be larger appropriations 
for a few hundred MORE government 
employees, higher salaries, bigger 
schools, etc. In the tp.eantime Indians 
are being robbed more than ever be-· 
fore, Indians are becoming more and 
more degenerate, -Indians are dying in 
chains and slavery! 

In the meantime, too, ''friends'' of 
·the Indians, the ''Indian'' Associations 
and Conferences, act only in the future 
-sh!-the Indian Office WILL be abolished 
SOME DAY! 

Starvation! What red-blooded American 
would not but make this whole 
wide country of ours ring in denunciation 
of those responsible if such an one 
knew of a guardian thus treating its 
wards? Within the past three years, 
Indians-human beings-have starved 
to death in this country! The facts? 
Why, stifled of course by the Indian 
Bureau! 

, 
,, Rottenness and immorality in our 
government schools! The facts? Hidden 
in the dusty files of the Indian Burau. 




3

WASSAJA 

Cheap teachers, scamps, rascals, 
crooks-sometimes are to be found in 
the Indian Service. Still our Uncle Sam 
"looks" after the Indian. Yes, he looks 
after the Indian is dead; looks to"'see 
what's left! 

The Indian Bureau is like an old, 
worn-out horse, perhaps quite a nag in 
days gone by. The horse is now past his 
day. He limps, has the heaves, is blind, 
cannot hear a single sound, BUT HE 
CAN SMELL THE OATS. Some say-: 
"Don't abolish the good old horse. 
Brace him up, rather. Give him more 
.oats ($12,000,000 is the present cost of 
"feed"), rub his legs with arnica, give 
him a pill or two.'' Alas! Those of us 
who say: ''Kill the brute and put him 
out of misery,'' are often laughed at 
(by .Indian Service employees) or 
rather humorously taken by the rest of 
mankind: it's so cruel to kill a poor 
suffering horse! OR MAYBE IT'S A 
DONKEY! 

To be effective a resolution must hit 
the point in the fewest words possible, 
as, ''Resolved, that the Society of 
American Indians, individually and collectively, 
believe the complete, unconditional 
and immediate abolishment >of 
the Indian Bureau is vital to the 'life,' 
J.jberty and pursuit of happiness' of the 
:tndians,-in other words, vital to the 
1ndians' freedom;'' and then it must 
stop right there. 

If the organization wishes to pass on 
other matters, let it start another resolution, 
but to continue in the same paragraph 
to elaborate at length, gets one 
into deep water and weakens the main 
issue. That is not the Indian's way of 
expressing himself: in other words, the 
Indians are not in control in the Society 
of American Indians. 

The spectacle of the Indians disagreeing, 
throttling each other, stirring up 
confusion and killing their organization 
is exactly what the Indian Bureau likes 
to see in all Indian organizations whose 
object is to sever the ties of Bureauism. 


When we Indians are wards and not 
citizens, we command no respect and 
we forego our rights. 

While the Society of American Indians 
says that it is not in with the Indian 
Bureau, WASSAJA believes that it 
is arm in arm with the Bureau when it 
incorporates in the resolution (favoring 
the abolishment of the Bureau) vocational 
Indian schools, fighting liquor 
and the baby-fad which the Bureau 
fathers. 

AND THEm ELECTION OF OFFICERS 
IS A LITTLE SHADY. 

The Indian Bureau was created to be 
an anti-toxin for the Indians, but it has 
turned into a poison virus. 

The Indian needs not to be led by the 
hand, but rather to be let out into the 
world. This is the principle upon which 
our future work is to be based; to be 
sure that we take a sufficiently broad 
view of the Indian as a man. 

To be judged worthless and dependent 
is an insult and a disgrace. It.ought 
to inake us Indians boil to think of being 
so judged. 

"Why! Mr. John Bear (an Indian) is 
earning so much a month in he Baldwin 
Locomotive Works. Indians are doing 
thi~ and that. They are picking hops 
and earning so much per day. " Oh! It 
is damnable, to an Indian, to read of 
such statements as astonishing and 
WASSAJA would ask, "Why not?" 
The Indian can do anything and be 
anything under heaven. You are surprised 
because you do not know the 
Indian as a man. 

As wards, t}Je Indians are placed in 
this position: they want to receive gifts 
but they do not want to give; they 
want you to do for them but they do 
not want to reciprocate. They want to 
get everything without paying for what 
they get. We Indians do wrong, ac• 
cept something for nothing. That is the 
very time we pay most dearly. 



WASSAJA 



ARROW POINTS 

The government should use the Indian 
to help out in shaking off the reservation 
burden a.nd, to this end, the Indians 
who come out from the schools 
should not be given employment in any 
department of the Indian Bureau. They 
should not thus be labelled and put 
away where they cannot freely (if at 
all) exert themselves in the work of 
gett~g their fellows out from the limitations 
of the reservation life. None 
can be-spared from the work. Every 
voice counts for something in advocating 
a reform that is for the welfare of 
all; and once the educated Indian becomes 
an employee of the Indian Bureau, 
he must of necessity cease to be a 
factor in the work which was designed 
to do away with that branch of the government 
service. 

In other words, the Indian cannot 
serve two masters. He snould, therefore, 
choose a calling or engage in such 
employment as will not prevent him 
from talking, writing and working for 
the speedy release of his people from 
the government nursery. 

T.he Indians must become their own 
emancipators. There is none to carry 
the burden for them. '' 

Wassaja urges that you forget the 
Indian and his trinkets as a type or a 
specimen. View him not as a curiosity. 
Look beyond the buckskin leggins, the 
paint, the feathers and the moccasins. 
Adjust your vision to the man and 
when you have discovered him, try 
wha.t you can do for him. 

We advocated unreservedly the pursuing 
of a course that would, by virtue 
of self-operation, bring the Indians out 
into the body of the people as men 
among men, thereby abolishing the reservation 
system and eliminating the 
Indian Bureau as a factor in national 
politics. 

We earnestly advocated that in a 
change of environment we have the key 
to the solution of the Indian problem. 

After gaining his freedom, the Indian 
will merge into civilization as other 
men have merged, by being left free to 
work out his own progriiss under the 
law of necessity. It is not only unjust 
to the Indian but a positive hindrance, 
for the government to assume toward 
him a parental attitude. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

From a Paleface Lady. 
Wassaja, 

3135 S. Park Avenue. 

Enclosed please find ten cents in 
stamps to cover all the expense of postage 
to which you have been put in sending 
me your paper ; and I will thank 
you to discontinue sending the same. 

I agree with you in some things, m 
others NOT. 
Very truly, 

Dear Dr. Montezmna: 

Congratulations on W ASSAJA. Si:iy 
that is going to be an outlet for the fire 
that burns within a true breast in the 
interest of the Indian. 

You have a style of your own, and 
I am glad you have. 

Wish I had a little printery right 
there near you. Gee ! We could turn 
them out by the million, and flood the 
country with proper sentiment. 

"Says so," hits the nail. I am glad 
you are a church member for ''The 
Church and the Indian'' will tell , all 
the more. 

Dr. Carlos Montezuma, 
Chicago, Ill. 
Dear Sir: 

I see by the summer number of American 
Indian Magazine that you are publishing 
a paper called W ASSAJA. I 
would like very much to become a subscriber, 
and if you will send it to me 
along with the subscription price, I will 
forward you the amount at once. 

I also wish to thank you for the copy 
of LET MY PEOPLE GO, read at Lawrence, 
Kansas, which I liked very much. 

Very truly yours,