In the light of the conduct of the Commissioners, there is no basis
for doubting forgery of the document. "Bill Mojave" purported to
sign his certificate as interpreter. On cross-examination of Patrick
Miguel this colloquy between the witness and opposing counsel ensued:

"Q He Bill Mojave 7 could not sign it?
"A No.

"Q Well this certificate at the end was 'Given under
my hand at Ft. Yuma Reservation this 5th day of December
A. D. 1893' and there appears a signature, Bill Mojave.
You do not think he could sign his name? You don't think
he could sign it?
How could he sign his name, he had never

"A No sir.

been educated?

"Q Do you know of your own knowledge who did sign the name Bill Mojave?

"A No, I do not." 25/

Warranted here is reference to the fact that Federal lawyers opposing the Quechan claim subjected the witnesses whose depositions were taken as set forth above, to searching cross-examination. A review of the entire transcript in that connection is most instructive.

Forgery of the Agreement of December 4, 1893, by substitution of documents is a real probability. The names of the alleged signers 1-203 are on seven and a quarter pages with the first name at the top of page 1 of the signatures. In the light of the general fraud and deception practiced on the Quechans it is probable that the alleged document allegedly presented to the Quechans is not the same document to which the forged signatures were attached. Indeed, there is found in the files the Commission's "work agreement" which differs drastically from the "official" document. That "work agreement" has written into the alleged cession clause a proviso limiting it to lands "lying under the line of the proposed Colo River Irrigation Company's proposed canal."

From the files it is impossible to know what document was allegedly explained by the illiterate interpreter Bill Mojave to the illiterate Indians. What is known is this:

That Bill Mojave could neither read nor write is

a proved fact hence his certificate is without
meaning.

25/ Before The Indian Claims Commission Of The United States, Docket No. 320; Deposition of Patrick Miguel ***, p. 16, lines 6 through 17.

(4) Void though the December 4, 1893 alleged agreement
is due to the criminal acts upon which it was predi-
cated, there has never been compliance with it or
the Congressional enactment approving it; it was,
indeed, violative of Congressional enactments
respecting allotments

There has not been compliance with the Agreement of December 4, 1893, or the Act of Congress approving it. 26/

Provision is made in Article II that "Each and every member of said Yuma Indians shall be entitled to select and locate upon said reservation and in adjoining sections five acres of land * * *." Funds were authorized by Congress to make surveys and to carry out the proviso allotting to the Yumas the lands in question. 27/ There was never compliance with that provision of the Act of Congress. To be observed the agreement limiting the Quechans to five acres of land, while in keeping with the amorality of it, is clearly in violation of the General Allotment Act of 1887 as it was then in force. 28/

Article III of the agreement in the statute approving it implements the allotment proviso. Nine years after the alleged execution of the agreement of December 4, 1893, the then Commissioner by a letter dated January 2, 1902, reported to the Secretary of the Interior in part as follows:

26/

27/

28/

"No allotments have thus far been made inasmuch as
the Colorado River Irrigating Company failed to construct
its canal, and nothing has been accomplished towards
carrying out the agreement with the Indians than to have
the reservation surveyed. A subdivisional plat thereof

made by the General Land Office, is on file in this office." 29/

See attached copy of Act of August 15, 1894, containing agreement and Congressional approval.

28 Stat. 286, 336 et seq.

24 Stat. 388:

"To each head of a family, one-quarter of a section;

"To each single person over eighteen years of age, one-eighth

of a section;

"To each orphan child under eighteen years of age, one-eighth of a section; and

"To each other single person under eighteen years now living, or who may be born prior to the date of the order of the President directing an allotment of the lands embraced in any reservation, one-sixteenth of a section; ***."

29/

Letter dated January 2, 1902, from Commissioner W. A. Jones of the
Office of Indian Affairs, to the Secretary of the Interior, page 6.

Total failure to perform is thus evidenced. After allotting the lands as provided by both the Agreement and the statute to date the allotting as provided has not taken place the Agreement then provided that "** all of the residue of said reservation which may be subject to irrigation, shall be disposed of ***." (Article III) In accordance with Article IV the proceeds from the sale of the irrigable lands would be placed in the Treasury of the United States, to the credit of the Yuma Indians "with interest at five per centum" which moneys were to be used to pay for water charges, seeds, for implements and "for the education and civilization of said Yuma Indians." Article V provides for the patents which were never issued, for lands never allotted as provided by the Agreement and the Congressional Act approving it.

Prime "come-on" used by the Commissioners to trick the Quechans respecting the Agreement of 1893 was an illusory canal never to be built to be constructed by the Colorado River Irrigation Company. By the Congressional Act approving the Agreement with which there was never compliance, provision was made that the Irrigation Company "shall be required to begin construction of said canal through said reservation within three years from the date of the passage of this Act, otherwise the rights granted by the Act aforesaid shall be forfeited." 30/

It is essential to reiterate that the right-of-way granted by Congress was expressly conditioned upon the Colorado River Irrigation Company being required to furnish

"*** the Indian occupants of the land
situated on the lower side

of the canal with water

sufficient for all domestic and agricultural
purposes and purposes of irrigation on such terms
and under such rules and regulations as shall be
prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior." 31/

Two important elements are presented by the last quoted excerpts: (a) The Indian lands below the canal were the lands involved - not the entire reservation; (b) If the canal was not built, all of the consideration upon which the alleged Agreement of 1893 was predicated would fail for, as reiterated throughout, it was the irrigation of their lands in which the Indians expressed their interest in "negotiating" with the Commissioners; it was the "gimmickry" relied upon by the Commissioners in practicing their deception upon the Indians.

30/ 28 Stat. 286, 336 et seq.

31/ 27 Stat. 456-7.

Here is a chronicle of events taken from the letter dated January 2, 1902, from the Commissioner of Indian Affairs to the Secretary of the Interior above mentioned. It in part reveals that the proposed canal to irrigate the lands of the Quechans was, indeed, illusory and, being illusory, was never constructed. It comments upon the seizure of the lands of the Quechans through the Agreement of 1893 which failed totally from the standpoint of the promises to the Indians that their lands would be irrigated:

"Under date of March 9, 1895, this office notified Beatty, of the Colorado River Irrigation Company, of the objections of the Department to the plat of the canal of said Company through the Yuma reservation, filed under the provisions of the Act of February 15, 1893." 32/

Three years were to elapse:

"In a letter dated August 1, 1898, Mr. Beatty stated that it would be well to have the allotments made at an early date." 33/

In due course the ouster of the Colorado River Irrigation Company from the reservation came about, which, of course, effectively prevented the construction of the canal and just as effectively deprived the Quechans from obtaining the waters they were promised as a consideration for allegedly signing the December 4, 1893, Agreement. The ouster is described in these terms in the source last mentioned:

"By Department letter of December 2, 1898, this
office was advised that the authority granted April 6, 1895
to John C. Beatty, of the Colorado River Irrigation
Company, to erect a temporary building and corral on the
reservation, was revoked, and that the removal of

Mr. Beatty and all of his employes and property from
the reservation was ordered. Under this order Mr. Beatty
was given ninety days from the receipt thereof to remove
his effects." 34/

There was thus a total failure to perform either the Agreement of
December 4, 1893, or the Act approving it.

(5) It is unconscionable to seize the Quechan lands
as has been done in view of the total failure to
perform in accordance with either the provisions
of the December 4, 1893 Agreement or Act of
Congress approving it.

Congress prescribed in detail the Nation's obligations in connection
32/ Letter of January 2, 1902 Commissioner to Secretary, page 9.
33/ Ibid., page 9.

with the Agreement of December 4, 1893. There was a total and
complete failure to carry any of the provisions of either the Agree-
ment or the Act in question into effect. Seizure of the Quechan
lands by agents purporting to act for the National Government is the
only aspect of the alleged Agreement that was accomplished. That
seizure is a clear violation of honesty and good conscience; it
must not be tolerated. There is no basis in law for that seizure
for Congress most assuredly did not authorize it.

(6) Yuma Federal Reclamation Project and acts creating
it have no relationship with the defunct December 4,
1893 Agreement

Failure to perform the fraudulent and probably forged December 4,
1893 Agreement most assuredly ended a shameful page in history.
A report dated November 27, 1901, relative to the Yuma Indian Reser-
vation, eight years after the alleged signing of the 1893 Agreement
underscoring the total failure of compliance with it, stated:
"*** that the best thing for the Indians would be for the government
to build a ditch and control the water for them ***." 35/

From the same source this statement is taken:

"In view of all the circumstances and in the light of experience had with the Colorado River Irrigating sic_/ Company, it would seem that if anything is to be done for the Yuma Indians in the way of irrigation, the government should do it alone and not through the instrumentality of any ditch company."

36/

(7) Ten (10) years after defunct Agreement of December 4,
1893, Reclamation attempted to develop projects on
Yuma Reservation and others

As reviewed above, eight years after the alleged signing of the
December 4, 1893 Agreement, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs
reviewed for the Secretary of the Interior, the total failure to
perform any aspect of that Agreement, including the fact that the
Colorado River Irrigation Company was ousted from the Reservation,
and recommended that the United States construct an irrigation
system for the Quechans. Nine years later the Reclamation Act of
June 17, 1902 37/ became law. Eleven years after the Agreement was
allegedly signed the Congress, as part of the Appropriation Act for the
fiscal year ending June 30, 1905, enacted a law the objectives of which
are stated as follows: "Reclamation and disposal of irrigable lands
in Yuma and Colorado River reservations ** *." 38/

351

36/

Letter January 2, 1902, Commissioner of Indian Affairs to Secretary, p.10
Ibid., p. 11.

37/ 32 Stat. 388. 38/ 33 Stat. 189.

40-787 O-74-6