President McKinley Approves Expenses of the Chickasaw Mineral Trustee

In the 18th century, a trader by the name of James L. Colbert settled in Chickasaw country and married three different Chickasaw women in succession. Among his progeny were seven sons, and for nearly a century, the Colbert descendants provided critical leadership during the tribe’s greatest challenges. Benjamin H. [B.H.] Colbert was a descendant of this family; his grandfather, Martin Colbert, was one of the Chickasaw leaders sent from Mississippi in 1838 to investigate the new Indian Territory in which the tribe would soon settle. In May 1898 B.H. Colbert enlisted in the Rough Riders. His heroism at San Juan Hill brought him to the attention of Theodore Roosevelt, and after the battle he was sent for by TR and named his orderly and field secretary. After the war, Chickasaw Nation  Governor Douglas H. Johnston selected him as his private secretary and later made Colbert a member of his cabinet and National Secretary. When his friend TR became president, he quickly appointed Colbert United States Marshall for the Southern District of the Indian Territory (now Oklahoma). As a final achievement in his Rough Rider legacy, Colbert, while visiting Roosevelt at the White House, suggested assigning fifty Rough Riders as honor guards to lead him to the Capitol during the second Inaugural parade. Roosevelt replied, “Bully!” …and the Rough Riders were called to Washington.

The Akota Agreement between the tribe and the U.S. government provided that United States courts would henceforth have sole jurisdiction in tribal areas, and that only routine legislation and ordinary appropriations could be enacted without the approval of the President of the United States. It also provided that tribal government would be discontinued in 1906.  This was followed on June 28, 1898, by the Curtis Act, officially “An Act for the protection of the people of the Indian Territory, and for other purposes.” This gave the Secretary of the Interior exclusive power over oil, coal, asphalt and other natural resources in Indian territory, and authorized him to make and set conditions for leases of oil, coal, asphalt and other minerals. There were extensive asphalt deposits on Chickasaw land to be mined, and these were leased out to companies like the Oklahoma and Gulf Railroad under provisions approved the the Interior Secretary. To supervise these mines, President McKinley and tribal leaders agreed to appoint a mineral trustee for the Chickasaw Nation, and they agreed on L.C. Burris, Colbert’s predecessor as National Secretary.

Apparently Burris ran into some rather high expenses, and a bill was passed by the Chickasaw Legislature appropriating funds for his relief “in excess of the $1000.00 Expense Fund of the Coal and Asphalt Trustee.” It was signed by L.V. Colbert, Speaker of the House; W.M. Grey, President of the Senate; and D.H. Johnson, Governor of the Chickasaw Nation. A fully executed copy, certified by B.H. Colbert, was then sent to President McKinley for his approval. That certification page states, “I, B.H. Colbert, do hereby certify that the foregoing is an Act of the Legislature of the Chickasaw Nation, passed at its regular session, October 1900…and approved by D.H. Johnston, Governor of the said Nation… on October 24th 1900; and I do hereby submit the same for the approval of the President of the United States, under the provisions of the agreement concluded on the twenty-third day of April, 1897, at Atoka, Indian Territory…and the Act of Congress of June 28, 1898, entitled, ‘An Act for the protection of the people of the Indian Territory, and for other purposes’…” That page was approved and signed by McKinley as President in Washington on December 29, 1900.  Whether the expenses claimed by Burris were valid, or were part of a corruption fund, is hard to say. In any case, with Burris cooperating with the U.S. government, McKinley had no reason to object.

In 1901, the Chickasaw became citizens of the United States. Then in 1906 came the end of tribal government, and with it the need for presidents to approve tribal legislative acts. From then until 1970, the U.S. government exercised control over all official acts of the Chickasaw Nation. Tribal voting rights were not restored until Congress passed the Principal Chiefs Act in 1970.