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The Church-State Conflict in Early Indian Education
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 February 2017
Extract
The early history of Indian education in the United States reveals an arresting segment of the continuing, current controversy between church and state over the use of tax funds for the support of religious schools. In the history reviewed below, church and state not only stood toe to toe but also “eyeball to eyeball.” The degree to which either stepped back or blinked is subject to an interpretation of the consequences which are not all in yet. This brief history of federal support of religious Indian schools is not only important in itself, but perhaps something is to be learned from the scars of battle by those involved in the struggle today.
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- Copyright © 1966 by New York University
References
Notes
1. There is a record of one earlier instance, dating from the year 1803, during the Jefferson administration, when the government gave money for the support of religion among the Indians. A peace treaty was signed between W. H. Harrison, Governor of the Ohio Territory, and the Kaskaskia Indians, which gave $100 annually for seven years to a priest and $100 outright to help the tribe build a church. American State Papers, Indian Affairs (Washington, D.C.: Gales and Seaton, 1832), I, No. 104, 687.Google Scholar
2. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1896-1897, p. 12.Google Scholar
3. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1882, pp. vi-vii.Google Scholar
4. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1886, p. xiv.Google Scholar
5. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1889, p. 97.Google Scholar
6. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1891, pp. 68–69.Google Scholar
7. 27 Stat. 143, Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1892, p. 176.Google Scholar
8. 29 Stat. 345, Appropriation Act of 1895, p. 188.Google Scholar
9. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1892, p. 182.Google Scholar
10. Ibid., p. 179.Google Scholar
11. Christian Education of Youth. This encyclical, published on the last day of 1929, reaffirms earlier statements by the Catholic Church. It may be found in a number of places including the book, Five Great Encyclicals (New York: The Paulist Press, 1949).Google Scholar
12. Between the years 1889 and 1897, Congress appropriated $4,437,339 for the support of private Indian schools. Of this amount, the Catholic Church received $3,094,247, or about three-fourths of the total appropriations. (Commissioner's Report of 1896, p. 17.)Google Scholar
13. The Official Catholic Directory (New York: P. J. Kennedy & Sons, 1914), p. 874.Google Scholar
14. Report of the Commissioner of Indians Affairs of 1892, pp. 153–56.Google Scholar
15. Ibid., pp. 10, 166.Google Scholar
16. Reuben Quick Bear et al. v. Leupp, 210 U.S. 50 (1908), p. 66.Google Scholar
17. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1891, pp. 68–69.Google Scholar
18. Ibid., p. 68.Google Scholar
19. Ibid., p. 68.Google Scholar
20. Ibid., p. 169.Google Scholar
21. Montana Catholic Missions v. Missoula County, 200 U.S. 118 (1906).Google Scholar
22. 210 U.S. 50 (1908), p. 67.Google Scholar
23. Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1904-1905, p. 39.Google Scholar
24. 210 U.S. 50 (1908), pp. 81–82.Google Scholar
25. 35 Wash. Law Reporter 766 (1906), p. 770.Google Scholar