Page:LewisMeriam-TheProblemOfIndianAdministration.djvu/125

The Position Taken with Respect to Division of Responsibility Between the Nation and the States. With respect to the division of authority and responsibility between the national and the state and local governments, the survey has proceeded upon these principles.

1. That under the Constitution of the United States and in accordance with the historical development of the country, the function of providing for the Indians is the responsibility of the national government.
2. That the national government should not transfer activities incident to this function to individual states unless and until a particular state is prepared to conduct that activity in accordance with standards at least as high as those adopted by the national government.
3. That the transfer of activities from the national government to the state governments should not be made wholesale, but one activity at a time, as the willingness and ability of the state justify.
4. That no great effort should be made toward uniformity in the treatment of all the states, as the question of the willingness and ability of the states is an individual one, with very different answers for different states.
5. That when a state assumes responsibility for a particular activity, as in the case of admitting the children of non-taxed Indians to public schools or providing for non-taxed Indians in hospitals, it is eminently proper that the national government should make contributions to the cost in the form of payments for tuition or hospital fees, and that so long as national funds are thus used the national government is under obligation to maintain officials such as the day school inspectors, to cooperate in the work done by the states to see that it is up to the required standard and that the Indians for whom the national government is primarily responsible are receiving the agreed service.
6. That the national government is under no legal or moral obligation to make the real property of the Indians subject to the regular state and county taxes until such time as the Indians are prepared to maintain themselves in the presence of white civilization and the states are prepared to render full governmental service to the Indians according to standards which will protect them from neglect and retrogression.