Kate and Sue McBeth, Missionary Teachers to the Nez Perce

1866

Since the treaty had not been ratified, the anti-treaty bands who lived off the reservation were not forced to move onto it. Save for the social visiting and communal gatherings at root grounds and fishing sites, the breach between them and the Lawyer bands was almost complete, ameliorated only by continued contacts between relatives and friends. In large measure, the non-treaties went their own way, ignoring Lawyer and his headmen, trying to cope with the aggressive expansion of the whites, and continuing to follow many of their old ways. Some of them built up large herds of cattle, but they hunted and fished regularly and still crossed the mountains to hunt buffalo and visit friends among the plains tribes.

Lawyer had many problems of his own. Not only was he not receiving payments for the huge 1863 land cession, but the government was again derelict in observing promises of the 1855 treaty. When driblets did arrive, they were embezzled by a series of corrupt agents. Even Caleb Lyon, the Federally-appointed governor of Idaho, which had become a territory in 1863, managed to abscond with $46,418.40 of the Nez Perces' money. Moreover, Lawyer's headmen seethed over the way their people were mistreated and their property and resources stolen. They had numerous complaints for the head chief, ranging from the presence on the reservation of whisky sellers to whites who cut down Indian-owned trees without paying. At the same time, they reminded Lawyer that the Nez Perces could expect no protection from the Americans' laws or courts. (pp. 108)