April 20, 1916-Johnston County Capital Democrat-Hendrix, OK-Aged Chickasaw Indians here are signing a petition asking the president, the commissioner of Indian affairs and members of congress to pay to each member of the Chickasaw Indian tribe the sum of $3,000 now in the hands of the government, but which belongs to the individual members of the tribe.
The petition recites that man of the Chickasaw Indians are becoming old and that they are becoming too feeble to work for a living.
A bill authorizing the payment of the money to the Chickasaws has passed the lower house of congress has been amended and passed in the senate and is now in the hands of a conference committee composed of members of the two houses.
The full text of the Indians petition follows:
"To the president of the United States, the secretary of the interior, commissioner of Indian affairs, congress, especially members from our own state, and more especially those of Indian blood and affiliations.
"The undersigned, members of the Chickasaw tribe of Indians, who have reached the age of sixty years, request and urge that the proportion of the money belonging to the Chickasaws, now held in the United States treasury and in Oklahoma banks, and approximating the sum of three thousand dollars for each individual Chickasaw, according to the statement recently made by the commissioner of Indian affairs before the Indian committee of the house of representatives, Washington, D. C., be immediately and without delay given to us and our several names debited with such sum on the financial books of the Chickasaws.
"We feel and sadly realize that time is passing swiftly and that our days shall soon be spent and gone and we plead for this money now, while we are living, that its benefits may accrue to us in person. We beg that it be not withheld until time has done his worst with us and we are no more. Give us our money now, we entreat. What good can it do us when we have folded our tepees for the last time, and gone through the sunset never more to return.
"We earnestly beg that this petition be not cast aside without notice or attention, and we pray that speedy action may be taken, and that this money so sorely needed by many of us, now not able to labor, may be granted to us in time to render more comfortable our last days."
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