some years the income from this timber has aggregated as high as $1,350,000. ese Indians sell their timber direct to timber contractors under contracts of a nplicated and technical nature. The timber contractors who purchase the nber always have the advice of competent and experienced attorneys and the dians feel they have a right, out of their own funds, to engage their own attorys for their own purposes, in the same manner as would white people running omparable business. Negotiation between the Indians, on one side, and either e timber contractors or the Bureau of Indian Affairs, on the other, requires nstant advice of attorneys.

Moreover, these Indians at the present time have legal problems with respect problems of tribal government on which they want independent advice. Their torneys are trying to devise for them a system of government which will meet eir needs and, at the same time, establish self-government which will be the strument for preserving order on the reservation. Their governmental probns also are saturated with problems of setting up proper capital reserves, etc., hich require legal advice.

This tribe, on March 8, 1937, had to its account in the Treasury in excess of 28,918.97. This amount is now being augmented annually.

Approximately 2 years ago we entered into a contract as general Counsel for the Klamath Tribe, which contract was approved by the ecretary of the Interior. The appropriation bill, or one of the approriation bills, of last year carried a similar item.

I might say that the Klamath Tribe has timber resources which ave produced income for many years, an income as high as $1,300,000, nd they have over 800,000 acres of timberland.

Our contract does not contemplate the ordinary Washington busiess in this case of lobbying before Congress, but the main contemplaion of the contract is to give service and advice in connection with heir timber contracts and things of that nature which are incidental o their large business.

A member of the Klamath Tribe or delegation is here, if you desire o ask him any questions, but I think it probably is unnecessary unless you have certain definite questions that you wish to ask him.

I might say that our representation of these Indians in the first place was solicited by the Indians themselves. We never knew of them until they came and asked us to represent them.

We have been operating under this contract up to the present and we think there is justification for continuance of the contract and for our being paid for it. The money we are now asking for is for past services which have already been performed, and we think there is no justification for refusing to pay under the contract that has been entered into.

Mr. LEAVY. Were you paid last year under the contract?
Mr. WILKINSON. We were paid last year.

Mr. LEAVY. How did you come to make this contract?

Mr. WILKINSON. The Klamath Indians had the contract approved by the Secretary of the Interior.

Mr. LEAVY. Was it independent of the Indian Department?
Mr. WILKINSON. Yes.

Mr. LEAVY. Without their cooperating or participating?

Mr. WILKINSON. Well, the Secretary of the Interior approved our

contract.

Mr. LEAVY. Why could not the Legal Department of the Bureau of Indian Affairs render the Indians such legal services as they required, Mr. Wilkinson?

Mr. WILKINSON. Well, I don't like to say myself that they could not, but I do think that the Indians have a right to get their indepen139751-37-pt. 2- -22

dent counsel, whether it is us or anyone else. I think that is up to the Indians.

Mr. LEAVY. That is argumentative and it is purely a question of opinion.

Mr. WILKINSON. Yes.

Mr. LEAVY. If the Indians need counsel to represent them in the sale of timber at Klamath, Oreg., why wouldn't local counsel accom plish the purpose better than counsel some 3,000 miles away?

Mr. WILKINSON. They have these timber contracts which have to be negotiated and they also have to meet the approval of the Office of Indian Affairs. I am for instance at the present time planning: trip out to the Klamath Tribe in order to ascertain what the tre situation is, and then I come back here and take it up with the Department and consult them.

Mr. LEAVY. Of course you are planning this trip at the expense d your clients?

Mr. WILKINSON. Of course, obviously so.

Mr. LEAVY. And they are paying you $6,500 a year?

Mr. WILKINSON. No; it is $4,000 a year.

Mr. LEAVY. $4,000 a year?

Mr. WILKINSON. That is right.

Mr. LEAVY. How many contracts did you draw up last year and examine?

Mr. WILKINSON. Most of the contracts so far have been merely modifications.

I might say also that during the last year we have prepared a pla of self-government for these Indians which took a great deal of time We did that after the council declined to come in under the Whee Howard bill. And therefore we proposed that they should have some kind of government, and we developed the form of self-government that they now have, and it took a great deal of time.

Mr. LEAVY. Are you from out in that section?

Mr. WILKINSON. I am from Utah.

Mr. LEAVY. Are other members of the firm from the West? Mr. WILKINSON. Some of them, and some from the East. Mr. LEAVY. How did your firm happen to make contacts with thes Indians so that they became your clients?

Mr. WILKINSON. I happened to appear before the Indian Affairs Committee on behalf of the Menominee Indians on some matters. Mr. Ben Marshall, who is an Indian from the Klamath Tribe, undoubtedly saw me appearing before that committee, and the came to my office and asked us to represent them.

Mr. LEAVY. How long ago was that?

Mr. WILKINSON. That was about a year ago.

Mr. LEAVY. And how much have you drawn out from those Indian funds today in addition to what you are asking in this proposed appropriation?

Mr. WILKINSON. My memory is that we have drawn about 1 year's salary, about $4,000.

Mr. LEAVY. And that was by appropriation?

Mr. WILKINSON. That was by appropriation of the last Congress. Mr. JOHNSON. That is the tribal fund?

Mr. WILKINSON. That is the tribal fund. These Indians have in the Treasury at the present time in their own funds approximately $500,000.

At the present time we are also working on a financial plan for them hereby they will have a revolving fund so that when their timber is epleted they will have conserved what we hope is considerable of their ssets so that it will not be a diminishing capital.

Mr. JOHNSON. How much are their assets?

Mr. WILKINSON. At the present time they have a half a million. ollars in the Treasury and the timber reserves are over 800,000 acres. Do you know, Mr. Jackson, as to the total value or of the present alue of the timber?

Mr. JACKSON. No, sir; it has never been subject to any appraisal. Mr. WILKINSON. There has not been an appraisal made of the tim

er.

Mr. O'NEAL. How is that $500,000 of the tribal fund invested? Mr. WILKINSON. The same as practically all Indian funds. They re just in the Treasury of the United States.

Mr. O'NEAL. Drawing any interest?

Mr. WILKINSON. The United States pays 4-percent interest in the und.

Mr. JOHNSON. Just what do you want to put in this record?

Mr. DODD. The item which Mr. Wilkinson is discussing is found on Dage 233.

Mr. LEAVY. The item is "Klamath Indians", but in this breakdown there is no item.

Mr. O'NEAL. There is one item in here, the item Mr. Wilkinson efers to. It advocates in lieu of $64,650 in line 1, a change to $71,150, and at the end of the item the following wording is suggested:

Which $6,500 shall be available for compensation and expenses of acquisition during the fiscal years 1937 and 1938.

Mr. O'NEAL. Why was not this included?

Mr. DODD. We requested funds for it in the Budget, and we were not informed as to why it was not allowed.

Mr. O'NEAL. Have the Indians the right to contract, and if they did have the right was it carried out according to the requirements? Mr. DODD. Yes; that is so; they have the right to contract.

Mr. O'NEAL. And in this case it was carried out according to the legal requirements?

Mr. DODD. Yes, sir; I may say that the contract with the attorneys was approved by the Secretary of the Interior at the request of the Indians.

The Indians, as Mr. Wilkinson has stated, took the initiative in making the contract.

Mr. O'NEAL. It is a yearly contract?

Mr. WILKINSON. It is a 3-year contract.

Mr. O'NEAL. Do you think that value has been received?

Mr. JACKSON. I do.

Mr. O'NEAL. Is that the feeling of your tribe about it?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. JOHNSON. And you want this item included in the bill to pay for past and future services?

Mr. JACKSON. That will be my request and feeling, and inasmuch as I have no further instructions we are in favor of it.

Mr. LEAVY. You have an Indian agency there, haven't you?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. LEAVY. And you have an Indian superintendent there? Mr. JACKSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. LEAVY. And you have available all of the facilities of the Indian Department just like they do in every other reservation?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes, sir; as to that; but I take the position t when legal questions arise we must have legal advice on our own size of the fence, so to speak.

In other words, if you went into court, or a legal question arose you would not feel justified in securing the advice of the county officials or whatever it might be, the State. You would want to secure legal advice from your own, which was their feeling, and that is the feeling of us now.

Mr. LEAVY. In other words, you and perhaps a majority of you group-I do not know, but I am just assuming it for the purposed my question-you do not have faith enough in the Indian Service to have them look after your interests in the tribal trust funds and y feel that you should get someone else to give you advice?

Mr. JACKSON. That has been the feeling from sad experience. Mr. JOHNSON. It is not unusual for Indian tribes to have s counsel?

Mr. LEAVY. Have you had any litigation or lawsuits in the last 2 or 3 years involving your property or the sale of it?

Mr. JACKSON. Well, we had one in the Court of Claims for a good many years, and that is independent of that, but we are more or less concerned in a lot of problems, and they need more or less legs! advice, and we feel that it is best to get advice from a firm of good standing, that it pays for.

Mr. LEAVY. You are still not answering the question. Have ever been taken into court, either the circuit or Federal courts there in the last 2 or 3 years?

Mr. JACKSON. No, sir.

Mr. JOHNSON. Probably they have passed some resolution covering the use of the trust fund.

Mr. LEAVY. Now, in your sale of timber have you had difficulties with the companies that buy? There are only two or three operating companies of any consequence there. Isn't it a fact that there are only two or three big lumber companies around Klamath Falls? Mr. JACKSON. Well, there are more than that.

Mr. LEAVY. There are a lot of small ones.

Mr. JACKSON. No; we have none.

Mr. LEAVY. And you have a written form of contract which the Department approved?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes.

Mr. LEAVY. And they go out and square your timber and blaze your trees, and mark the timber that can be bought?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes.

Mr. LEAVY. What I am trying to get at is this: I am a lawyer myself and I think lawyers should be paid, but here we are appropriat ing large sums of money for Government attorneys to handle this work and I cannot see the use of appropriating money, with all due respect to the request here, for legal services in the substantial form of $4,000 or $5,000 a year for services rendered, considered from the standpoint of the service, and when you sell timber it is purely matter of form and is based on a form contract with rare exceptions.

Mr. JACKSON. Well, I might say this: That is true. Our reservan is situated 3,000 miles away from here, and we must also agree this, that the seat of our Government is also 3,000 miles away from me and hence we cannot go from one place to the other at a mont's notice, and we must have a legal firm here at the seat of governnt which can intercede for us, as we say, from our side of the fence. As you know, law is something that can be interpreted as it might ect you or affect me.

Mr. LEAVY. If there are local legal problems that are beyond the >pe of the Department to handle on that reservation in transactions at involve production, whether it be timber, agricultural products, what not, then it would seem to me that there might be some need Washington counsel. However, it may be that I am somewhat in fense of lawyers in the West who are on the ground in Portland, ich is only a few miles away, or at Pendleton, who could handle ch problems much more effectively and expeditiously than a law m many miles away.

However, if it is a question of procuring legislation in the Capital r the purpose of looking after your interests and lobbying for those ings that you want, and opposing those things that you do not, it ould be the policy of this committee of Congress to allow an expendiire for that purpose, why then that is in a different situation and if is for the latter purpose that you ask money, I think you should ask or it on that basis.

Mr. JOHNSON. I think from what the gentleman has said and in iew of the fact that the Indians have half a million dollars in their ust fund and also in view of the fact that counsel will be paid out f the trust fund of the Indians and the contract has been O. K.'d by he Secretary of the Interior, that we are morally obligated to make at appropriation.

Mr. LEAVY. Has the Secretary of the Interior O. K.'d the contract? Mr. WILKINSON. Oh, yes.

Mr. LEAVY. For 3 years?

Mr. WILKINSON. Yes; we have been operating for some time. Mr. ZIMMERMAN. I am not a witness, and I hesitate to butt in where I am not invited.

Mr. JOHNSON. You may consider that you are invited.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. I might clarify the position taken by the Depart

nent.

ATTITUDE OF DEPARTMENT ON INDIANS EMPLOYING COUNSEL

I think that the Department is practically experimenting. There seems to be some grave doubt as to the desirability over a period of years of employing counsel on an annual basis, even though those expenditures are being met out of tribal funds, but in this particular instance there are various administrative matters that might at some future time be the subject of litigation or be the subject of claims against the Federal Government.

It is my opinion that the Klamath Indians were influenced very largely in their desire for private counsel by the possibility that such claims might arise.

The same situation developed in Wisconsin among the Menominee Indians.