Volume 10 , Issue 5

Indian Land Cession & Opening Proclamation

From Vol. 2, A Standard History of Oklahoma, pp. 603-636, by Joseph B. Thoburn, we learn a bit more history of the Indian land cessiion and opening proclamation.

The Creek and Seminole nations, which had formerly held a fee simple title to the lands of the unassigned district and to those of that part of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Reservation situated north of the Canadian River, had ceded the same to the government by the terms of their respective treaties, entered into in 1866, for the express purpose of locating other tribes of friendly Indians.

Before the lands of the unassigned district were thrown open to white settlement, it was very desirable to secure the consent of the Creek and Seminole Nations to the proposed opening, in the form of a a full, complete and unqualified transfer of title to the United States.

The Act of March 3, 1885, under the terms of which the president of the United States had been authorized to appoint a commission to negotiate such an agreement with the Creek and Seminole Nations (as well as witH the Cherokee Nation for the session of its lands lying west of the 96th meridian), had evidently been formulated and passed in the belief that the people of those tribes had not merely a claim on the lands (which they had ceded under pressure for a special purpose and at a price that was a pittance) but that they also still held an equitable interest in the same, at least until such time as they might execute an unqualified relinquishment of their fee simple title.

Negotiations, for the purpose of extinguishing the claims of the Creek and Seminole Nations to ownership of all lands in the Indian Territory west of their diminished reservations as defined by the treaties of 1866, were carried on in Washington City during the last session of the 50th Congress. An agreement was reached with the duly authorized delegates of the Creek Nation, January 19, 1889, where the government was to pay to the Creek Nation the sum of $2,280,857.10, which, added to the sums paid to the Creek Nation under the provisions of the Creek treaty of 1866 and by Indian tribes which had been subsequently located upon tracts included in the ceded area, would equal a total of $1.25 per acre. Twelve days after the conclusion of this agreement (January 31st) it was ratified by act of the Creek Council. President Cleveland laid the matter before Congress in a special message, dated February 5, 1889. It was ratified by act of Congress approved March 1, 1889.

At the time of the passage and approval of the Indian Appropriation Bill, in the closing hours of the 50th Congress, no agreement had been reached with the Seminole Nation relative to such a final and full relinquishment of its claim to the lands lying west of the Seminole boundary, between the North and South Canadian rivers. Section 12 of that act provided for the appropriation of $1,912,952.02 to pay the Seminole Nation in full for all of its rights, title and interest in such lands, that sum representing the difference between the value of the tract in question at $1.25 per acre and the sums previously paid to the Seminole Nation in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of 1866 and by, or in behalf of, Indian tribes which were subsequently settled there.

On March 16, 1889, two weeks after the passage and approval of the Indian Appropriation Act, with its amendment for the opening of the Oklahoma lands for white settlement, the duly authorized delegates of the Seminole Nation entered into an agreement with the government where the desired release and conveyance was executed and the title to the lands in question was formally transferred to the United States.

This removed the last obstacle to the opening of the lands of the unassigned district to settlement under the homestead laws. One week later (March 23rd) President Benjamin Harrison issued a proclamation, formally announcing and declaring that, at and after the hour of noon, on the 22nd day of April 1889, the lands of the Oklahoma country should be open to settlement, subject to the conditions, limitations and restrictions contained in the act authorizing the same and to the Federal laws applicable. Thus ended the 10 year struggle for the right of settlement in Oklahoma.
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