When Cowboys and Indians were friends
 

David Payne's most powerful adversary in opening the Unassigned Lands was, by far, the cattle lobby in Congress.  Indeed, the cattle lobby was an obstacle in several openings, most notably the final opening in the Kiowa-Commanche-Apache lands. (click HERE to learn how Oklahoma came to be).

As with most events in the late 1880's, the Civil War started things off.  Before the war, cattle roamed the southwest on unfenced public land.  The war’s most tangible impact on Texas was to deplete the territory of white men, which was perfectly fine with the Indians.  A somewhat less tangible effect, but one that came to have an enormous impact, was that without any limiting influence by white men, the wild cattle herds in Texas and New Mexico grew to enormous levels. 

Those cattle were valuable.  A three-year-old steer purchased in Texas for $9.50 could be sold in New York for an astounding $70.58.  Anyone who could get Texas beef to market would get rich.  The fastest way to market was by railroad, and the closest railheads were just across the Indian Territory in Kansas, where they could be shipped to Chicago, New York and Boston. 

A man didn’t even need to purchase the cattle, either, because they were literally roaming the countryside.  The first northern cattle drive out of Texas occurred in 1866 and was so profitable that an entire industry was instantly born.  (The wild cattle were called “Mavericks”, supposedly jab at a San Antonio man named Samuel A. Maverick.  It was said that Maverick had accepted four hundred of the wild cattle as payment for a debt.  Not being a cattleman, he never bothered to claim them by branding them, thus all unbranded cattle on the range were “Maverick’s” and free for the taking.)

Ranches were established to manage the cattle and organize the drives, and to house the men who dealt with the animals, a sturdy new creature dubbed a “cowboy”. Cowboys would round up wild cattle, brand them, and eventually drive them to market, which were the Kansas railheads in Dodge City, Abilene, Hunwell, and Caldwell.  

A key step in the cattle drives was to pause in the Indian Territory to fatten the cattle on the vast grasslands covering every reservation. Every tribe made grazing deals with Texas ranchers and even allowed some ranchers to erect fences and build structures.  As they rested, the cattle added pounds and the ranchers added dollars to their wallets, far more than it cost for the grazing rights.  

When Payne began agitate over opening the Unassigned Lands, the cattlemen instantly understood that if the Indian Lands were opened their grazing deals would be in danger.  They opened their wallets to Congress to prevent, or at least to delay, the disposition of the Indian Territory.

Payne and Couch made dozens of trips to Washington to lobby for their side of the argument and in the process became aware of outright bribes and slush funds.  When confronted with those details, D.C. officials would shrug their shoulders and claim Payne didn't understand what he was seeing.

Only after Payne's death was Couch able to present his evidence after he challenged Senator Henry Dawes to convene a hearing in Kansas and collect evidence first-hand. (Dawes was leader of Senate Committee on Indian Affairs and authored the Dawes Act which governed how Indian Land would be distributed. It actually delayed the opening of Payne's Unassigned Lands.)

The cattlemen suffered a set-back with the opening of the Cherokee Strip because the Cherokees did their best to manage the theft of their lands.  They understood that it was going to happen, so they negotiated fiercely with the Jerome Commission (the official body responsible for getting tribes to agree to "sell" their land to the Government) and not with Congress, thus the cattle lobby had no influence there.

After the Cherokee Strip run was completed, the only grassland remaining for the cattlemen to fatten their herds were the Kiowa-Commanche-Apache lands in the southwestern corner of the territory.  The cattle lobby renewed their efforts and met a willing partner in the form of Quanah Parker.  (Parker is an absolutely fascinating character.  See Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History by S. C. Gwynne.) 

Parker established an extremely close relationship with the cattle lobby, so close that he was able to convince them to finance his large house and provide him a stipend.  In exchange, he agreed to resolve the "Indian Problems" that inevitably arose when it was time for the herds to graze.  It was during this period that the cattle lobby pulled off a truly amazing stunt.

Parker had been negotiating with the Jerome Commission, too, and having some success.  Like the Cherokees, Parker understood that his tribe's land was about to be stolen and he used the negotiations as a delaying tactic.  After the Cherokees came to terms, the focus was squarely on him, though.

Parker made the best deal he could with the Jerome Commission, who went back to D.C. waving their fresh agreement with the Commanches.  Parker then told the cattle lobby that as long as they kept Washington at bay, they would have unlimited access to his grass.  The Cattle Lobby had lots of congressmen in their pockets by then and even though there was a deal, it wasn't ratified on its first vote.  Or second, third, and fourth.

Finally, in 1895, The House Committee of Indian Affairs officially took up the issue of purchasing the Kiowa, Apache, and Commanche lands.  Superficially, it was an enormous step forward – if the Committee approved the measure, it would go the floor for a vote and then to the Senate.  After the Senate’s inevitable approval, it would be signed into law by the President and the land would open in, perhaps, weeks.

The committee was dominated by the cattlemen’s representatives and they had something else in mind.  Instead of voting on the agreement, they altered its terms, thus requiring it to be sent back to the Indians, namely Quanah Parker, for their agreement.  

Their agreement with the Jerome Commission’s allowed the Indians two full years to consider and negotiate the changes, and then to push out the opening for another three years after that.  It was a brilliant move, and even though everyone knew it was the cattlemen’s doing, there was nothing to be done about it.  The editor of the Daily Oklahoma State Capitol summed it up perfectly:

The intention, of course, is to tie up the reservation for five years to come.

Which is exactly what happened.