Viewing page 62 of 71

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

2
Oregon holding off regular Army troops numbering 1000 or more. And Joseph, the great Nez Perce, fighting a running fight that covered almost 2000 miles against United States cavalry troops numbering 2000 in all, with fewer than 300 warriors and an equal number of women and children to protect.
The earliest and possibly the greatest of the armies put together by our Indian ancestors was that which the Pueblo people here in this Rio Grande Valley called together in 1680 to expel the tyrannical Spaniards. I have never seen an estimate of the total number of Indians who participated in the uprising led by Pope of San Juan Pueblo. The historians tell us that every one of the Pueblo joined, perhaps the first time in history when they all came together in a common cause. That may be only what the white men tell us and maybe the Indians have a different tradition of how they acted in times past. We know at any rate that the effort was successful. The pueblos rose as one man, even coming together ahead of the agreed on plan when word leaked out prematurely, and they drove the Spaniards completely out of their country. This was the only occasion in all the history of North and South America in which Europeans were expelled once they had established a permanent base in Indian country.
I mention these facts not by way of extolling the fighting qualities of our ancestors. No one has ever expressed doubt about those qualities, either in those far off days, or in modern times. I want to talk of peace, not of war. Before we close our business here two days from now, I hope this convention will have taken steps to bind all our Indian people together in ties of "perpetual peace and friendship"-- to use the old phrase of the treaties. Others will speak of this, I only allude to it in passing.