Were there any good guys at all?
Anything Goes
If early Oklahoma had a motto, it would have been "Anything Goes". Beyond overt political corruption, both normal citizens and lawmen routinely crossed the line. There were so many corrupt officials in the Oklahoma Territory that it would be easy to believe that Oklahoma's overall culture encouraged and rewarded criminality. Indeed, before it was the Oklahoma Territory, the Indian Territory was a playground for corruption. (Look HERE to learn about cattle in the Indian Territory and HERE to learn about David Payne's Boomers and Oklahoma's creation. The two are closely connected)
We're going to look a just a handful of questionable characters (they're not questionable at all, really...) and a group that that closely resembled an organized crime syndicate. That group would be the Oklahoma Territory's Deputy U.S. Marshals. You'd think the Territorial Marshal would keep his people under control, but he is one of the first questionable characters we're going to look at: E. D. Nix. One of his deputies, Chris Madsen, stands out in particular. Finally, we have two judges that deserve attention: H. W. Scott and Harrison Finley.
The blur between "good guy" and "bad guy" started with the first land run. The idea of the opening was pretty simple: they thought the fairest way to throw open the lands was to just throw them open. There would be a race and it was first-come, first-serve. Whoever claimed a plot first could own it. That seemed like a grand idea and people, mostly very poor farmers, gathered at the northern border in Kansas and the southern in Texas, waiting for the magical gunshot that would end their troubles.
Turns out it wasn't that fair, which is how the troubles began. Before there could be a run, there had to be something to claim. An army of surveyors carefully divided the territory into 160-acre plots and the railroads laid out towns around their water stops. Another small army of Deputy U.S. Marshals was distributed through the Territory to provide security and keep the public out until the appointed moment.
The surveyors, deputies, and railroad agents were all keenly aware of how valuable those plots were, particularly those in the new towns they'd just laid out, and decided they'd make their own claims in advance. So when the Boomers came rushing into the countryside and towns they discovered that all the good claims were already occupied. Armed Deputy Marshals, many of whom had claimed multiple plots, basically dared the Boomers to try and move them. The Boomers also discovered regular people who'd simply snuck into the land in advance and made claims. The Boomers dubbed the miscreants 'Sooners' and complained loudly, mostly to no avail. Lawsuits clogged the courts for a decade.
The government did notice, though, and began tweaking the rules. The next opening (about a year later) was a similar race for the quarter-section plots, but the town-site plots would have their own smaller rushes later. That sort of worked, but not really. The opening after that (the Arapaho lands) was less of a success because the land was very arid and 180 acres could not support a living, but the Sooners still got away with it. Then came the debacle.
The crown jewel of the Indian Territory was the Cherokee Strip - roughly the width of the entire Kansas border and 60 miles deep. Negotiations with the Cherokee Nation finally concluded and the land was scheduled to be opened on September 16, 1893. The government went to extraordinary lengths to prevent the Deputy Marshals, who at this point were very firmly "not good guys" when it came to land rushes, out of the picture. While they largely succeeded with the deputies, they failed spectacularly with ordinary citizenry. Despite the army deployed at the borders, thousands of individuals snuck into the territory in advance and simply waited for high noon when they planted their stake and claimed their own little bit of stolen land.
That was just the beginning. Denied their chance at outright thievery, the deputies were no where to be found, although they later were caught charging settlers to enter the territory. Once a Boomer managed to get to a land office, they discovered that they often needed to bribe the clerks to file the necessary paperwork. It turned out that wasn't enough - it was discovered that federal officials were using their influence to simply steal claims by throwing out Boomer deeds and filing their own. The New York Times opined that Oklahoma statehood might be the only thing that could protect the people from the government.
As each opening occurred, various arms of the government moved into what was now the Oklahoma Territory. Courts were formed, police forces of various jurisdictions organized, and all the government apparatus necessary to keep the peace in America. One of the most desirable offices in the new territory was that of U.S. Marshal, which is when E. D. Nix enters the picture.
Nix lobbied for the position and despite no experience in anything related to law enforcement he was, inexplicably, granted the appointment. Nix had materialized in Guthrie at just the right moment of the 1889 run and had, somehow, secured an excellent town-site lot and opened a store in Guthrie. Clearly a Sooner, and obviously getting away with it, the Territory rolled its collective eyes. Business as usual.
Nix's first move was to hire most of his friends and family as Deputy Marshals, which was another 'plum' job. Deputies earned their pay through reimbursed expenses and per diem, for arrests, mileage and court services. Arrests for things like cutting Indian timber or minor liquor offenses were common, but the hard-core criminals still had the run of the territory. The newspapers noticed and began asking questions.
When the Cherokee Strip opened and the Deputies were missing in action, the editor of the newspaper The State Capital pointed out the marshal service was virtually invisible, and asked, “Where were the police Saturday?” He then wondered if Marshal Nix “had taken a lot or a claim?”
Things went down hill. Some actual good guys began looking into Nix's records and found enough to begin asking uncomfortable questions. Hunting some good press, Nix secretly negotiated with Bill Doolin, the territory's most notorious outlaw. Nix offered Doolin a sweetheart deal and Doolin accepted. Bill Tilghman, a deputy, (who also operated a brothel) was dispatched to "arrest" Doolin in Arkansas. Unfortunately, the news learned about the arrangement and Nix's reputation was all but gone.
About that time, Nix and his deputies were ignoring an actual crisis, since dubbed "The Railroad War". The Rock Island railroad ran through two new towns in what used to be the Cherokee Strip. The railroad refused to acknowledge the towns, though, and refused to stop the trains there. They also refused to even slow down, despite requests from every direction. The people took matters into their own hands and began a shooting war with the Rock Island. Just like the previous land run, there were no deputies anywhere. Late to the game, Nix sent Chris Madsen to fix the problem.
Madsen was an ex-soldier who spoke higher of himself than his records indicate. Virtually every story he told (he loved talking to reporters) had several versions, often contradictory. He made the outrageous claim that he'd survived the night at The Little Bighorn battlefield when Custer was annihilated and claimed to have been in the Dutch Army when he was actually a Dutch convict. Madsen successfully claimed homesite in the first land run when he was still in the army, a blatant Sooner. (Sadly, many of Madsen's and Nix's claims have been accepted as fact and are responsible for much of the misinformation surrounding early Oklahoma.)
Madsen made things much worse by openly siding with the railroad. He arrested most of Enid's city council (no warrant or charges, he just arrested them) and assaulted a citizen, bringing more unwanted attention to Nix and, this time, a federal investigation.
The investigation was instigated by U. S. Attorney Brooks and this excerpt from his request to the Attorney General speaks volumes:
"There is some ugly work going on in the issuing and sale of witness rolls before U.S. Commissioners in this territory, and I have as yet been unable to get onto the facts or just how it is done. It requires considerable ingenuity and time to keep up with the workings of these fellows out here, and I am unable to get the time from court business to give it the attention that it should have. I am of the opinion that there are U.S. Commissioners and Deputy U.S. Marshals interested in buying the witness rolls, and making a regular business of it, and I believe they are also speculating in U.S. Grand and Petit Jury fees."
The investigation focused on Nix and a very unpopular district judge, H. W. Scott. Like Nix, Judge Scott's records were highly suspect (the expenses in his court were higher than the other 3 districts combined) and Judge Scott had a tendency to arrest editors and journalists that had the temerity to call him out. He also used his power to have several attorneys disbarred, so he and Nix were obvious targets.
A federal investigator, Willoughby Newton, was dispatched from Texas and quietly began his investigation. He'd been at work for over a week before his presence was noted and his mission merely a rumor. Newton completed his work and disappeared as quietly as he'd arrived.
His report made plenty of noise. His mission had been to audit the books and he discovered that hundreds of thousands of dollars were missing, more than enough to have both men dismissed and thrown into jail. But it was the Oklahoma Territory, so none of that happened. Judge Scott had very powerful friends (one of them possibly President Cleveland himself) and they managed to stonewall his dismissal (which ended up dying ignored on Cleveland's desk...). Newton's report wasn't quite as hard on Nix, Newton claiming that Nix had "a difficult district", but Nix was relieved without even a hearing. When it came time to charge him, though, the D.A. decided it wasn't worth the trouble. Nix was free to go.
Our final miscreant, Judge Finley, played a more direct role in The Unassigned Lands, specifically the organization of Cooperton in Kiowa County. The good news is that he didn't get away with it.
After the chaos of the Cherokee Strip opening, the Feds completely discarded the 'horse-race' method of opening new territory. The Deputy Marshals were the driving force behind that decision (which probably should have happened after the first run). The new method was by lottery and the next section of land was the Kiowa, Commanche, and Appache lands.
Settlers would register in advance and basically fill out a card that was dropped into a big drum and mixed with all the others. As names were drawn, the lucky winner would select the plot he wanted and file the necessary paperwork to settle it. Ironically, there was a different kind of Sooner that time - gold prospectors. The area was rumored to hold gold deposits and prospectors had been sneaking into the Territory making illegal claims for years (click HERE to learn about the Wichita Mountain Gold Rush).
Towns were laid out in advance and the lots sold by developers after the lottery. After a lot was purchased, the new owner was obligated to improve it - build a structure, dig a well, stockade livestock, etc. They'd then submit an application with the county to file their deed, then wait for the county's Probate Judge to 'prove' their town, which is where Judge Finley enters the story.
The process of 'proving' a town was straightforward: The county's Probate Judge would give notice in the newspapers he was ready to prove a town and a send a team of commissioners to confirm the improvements and the town's layout. Once the commissioners approved all the deed applications the settlers were free to file their deeds and pay a nominal filing fee and the expenses incurred by the 'proving' commissioners.
Finley's racket was to grotesquely inflate the proving fees on each lot and withhold approving the application until the fees were paid. Cooperton was one of the first towns Finley proved, but ran into stiff opposition in the form of J. B. Cooper, the "town father". Cooper told the papers what was going on and also revealed that Finley's commissioners included both his son and son in-law.
Finley doggedly stuck to the words of the law: he was allowed to collect proving expenses and he was legally doing so. Cooperton's residents (as well as many other towns in Kiowa County) ended up paying the inflated charges in order to file their deeds on time. Finley kept the funds, which was his undoing.
When Cooper had cried 'Foul!' to the newspapers, all the other towns discovered they were in the same boat and appealed to the governor. The governor handed it over the Attorney General, who told Finley to knock it off. Finley replied with his original claim that he was following the law and the A.G. could pound sand. The A.G. then presented a little bit of law that Finley wasn't aware of: Salaried judges were not permitted to keep anything beyond their official pay. Since Finley had not missed a paycheck, the county was entitled to everything he'd collected.
Finley appealed to the Supreme Court, where he lost. He was removed from office and disbarred (along with the other two new judges from Commanche and Caddo counties who were running similar schemes).
The above is a microscopic snippet of the amazing corruption of early Oklahoma. While there were many honorable and honest people working for the public good, the majority were trying to figure out how to leverage their power into either political or monetary pay-back. Two of our characters above were part of the legendary (and please keep in mind that legends are mostly untrue) "The Three Guardsmen": Chris Madsen, Bill Tilghman, and Heck Thomas, who were deputies reporting to E. D. Nix. They deserve a few words of their own.
The Three Guardsmen are, literally, legendary figures in Oklahoma history and that legend is almost completely false. The legend was created between 1915 and 1920 when Nix, Madsen, and Tilghman formed a movie company and made a movie about...themselves. "The Passing of the Oklahoma Outlaws" painted a heroic picture of the three men (Heck Thomas died in 1912) protecting Oklahoma from bandits of every stripe. That is provably untrue, but Madsen and Tilghman toured the country promoting the movie. With no counterpoint, it was taken at face value. Each of them also wrote about themselves and toured across the country, reinforcing the lies. More books were written after they died, their survivors enhancing the myth and ignoring the facts.
Nancy Samuelson debunks their legend thoroughly "Shoot From the Lip: The Lives, Legends, and Lies of the Three Guardsmen of Oklahoma and U.S. Marshal Nix". Of the three, Heck Thomas stands out as the only full-time law man. While far from squeaky-clean, he is absolutely brilliant compared to the other three. Judge Scott's antics appear in newspapers across the state and the connections leading to his escape are telling. Judge Finley was a typical political grifter, his story can be found in early Kiowa County newspapers.
