The Story of the Bitter Root
legislation which would not for a moment bear the scrutiny of the whole people.
The plans for this removal were well laid. The Honorable Commissioner of Indian Affairs, in his report, alluded to these Indians as "the Flatheads and other Indians remaining by sufferance in the Bitter Root Valley," and in the spring Congress passed an act ordering their removal to the Jocko reservation. Within ten weeks of the passage of the removal act special commissioner James A. Garfield (afterward President of the United States) appeared among the Flathead Indians, to acquaint them with the demands of the Government and to secure their removal.
The argument with which they met the mandate of the Government is given in General Garfield's own words:
"Responses were made by the three chiefs, and by several head-men of the tribe, and all of the same tenor. The substance of their views may be thus briefly stated:
"It seemed to be their understanding that they had never given up the Bitter Root Valley, and they were very strongly opposed to leaving it. They insisted, and in this I believe they are partly borne out by the facts, that when the treaty of 1855 was nearly completed, Victor, the Flathead chief, refused to sign it unless he and his people could be permitted to remain in the Bitter Root Valley.
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