formed an organization among themselves to
pass upon their own claims, and others that might lie submitted to
them, with attorneys and ample funds to defend each claim in outside
courts against the decision of the tribe. At the same time the Gov-
ernment policy was steadily toward the reduction or complete breaking
up of Indian reservations and the allotment of lands to the Indians in
severalty, with a view to their final citizenship, and the opening of
the surplus lands to white settlement. As a part of the same policy
the jurisdiction of the United States courts was gradually being
extended over the Indian country, taking cognizance of many things
hitherto considered by the Indian courts under former treaties with
the United States. Against all this the Cherokee and other civilized
tribes protested, but without avail. To add tothe irritation, com-
panies of armed " boomers " were organized for the express purpose
of invading and seizing the Cherokee outlet and other unoccupied
portions of the Indian territory — reserved by treaty for future Indian
settlement — in defiance of the civil and military power of the Gov-
ernment.
We come now to what seems the beginning of the end of Indian
autonomy. In 1889 a commission, afterward known as the Cherokee
Commission, was appointed, under act of Congress, to '•negotiate
with the Cherokee Indians, and with all other Indians owning or
claiming lands lying west of the ninety-sixth degree of longitude in
the Indian territory, for the cession to the United States of all their
title, claim, or interest of every kind or character in and to said
lands." In August of that year the commission made a