Unassigned Lands - The Pro-settlement Campaign

The Pro-settlement Campaign

In about 1879, Elias C. Boudinot began a campaign, perhaps at the behest of one of his clients, the M-K-T Railroad, to open the land "unoccupied by any Indian" to settlement by non-Indians. He pointed out in a letter published in 1879 that four of the Five Civilized Tribes, unlike the Cherokee, had extinguished their complete title to the lands ceded following the Civil War and received full payment. He also said:

Whatever may have been the desire or intention of the United States Government in 1866 to locate Indians and negroes upon these lands, it is certain that no such desire or intention exists in 1879. The Negro since that date, has become a citizen of the United States, and Congress has recently enacted laws which practically forbid the removal of any more Indians into the Territory.

He put forth the view that area was now Public Land and suggested the names "Unassigned Lands" and "Oklahoma" for the district.

In an attempt to prevent encroachment, President Rutherford B. Hayes issued a proclamation on April 26, 1879, forbidding trespass into the area

...which Territory is designated, organized, and described by treaties and laws of the United States and by executive authorities as the Indian's country...

It was too late. Almost immediately speculators and landless citizens began organizing and agitating for the opening of the land to settlement. The newspapers generally referred to these pro-settlement forces as Boomers and followed Boudinot's lead in referring to the area as the Unassigned Lands or Oklahoma.

The Boomers planned excursions, which they called raids, into the area and surveyed townsites, built homes, and planted crops. The United States sent troops to round them up and expel them. The raids continued for several years. The Boomers tried to get a legal opinion as to the status of the public lands, but the government, instead of charging them for illegal settlement of Indian land, charged them only under the Intercourse Act. Finally, in United States vs. Payne in 1884, the United States District Court at Topeka, Kansas ruled that settling on the Unassigned Lands was not a criminal offense.

The government refused to accept the decision and the raids continued. Finally General Pleasant Porter, the Creek Council's delegate to Washington, offered to relinquish all Creek claims to that part of the ceded territory which remained unassigned. On January 31, 1889, the United States and the Creeks agreed to quit any claims to title of the land. The Creeks received approximately $2,250,000.