Page:U.S. Department of the Interior Annual Report 1880.djvu/60

58 Evidence increases that these natives need only to be instructed in letters, industry, and conduct to become useful members of the community. They will care for themselves, preserve the peace, and aid in the material development of their country. The Commissioner states that all efforts in their behalf at present are made under the most discouraging circumstances, there being no law for the protection of life or property, and no authority to organize schools. He appreciates the difficulties which beset the organization of any local government for Alaska; but from information received believes that if proper laws were passed by Congress, it would suffice to provide for their temporary execution by a governor, a judge, a superintendent of instruction, and a secretary of the Territory, who jointly should constitute a council of administration and be held to proper accountability.

The papers accompanying the Commissioner's report comprise abstracts of all State, Territorial, and city school reports published during the time covered thereby, and statistics collected by the office directly from 8,000 schools and institutions of learning of various grades and kinds.

Since the last annual report of the department, tbe Tenth Census of the United States has been taken.

The provisions of the acts of March 3, 1879, and April 20, 1880, have been found very efficient in securing a prompt and exact enumeration of the people, while the various classes of vital, social, and industrial statistics, which are gathered in connection with the enumeration of inhabitants, have been very satisfactorily obtained through the special agencies which have for the first time been put in operation under the above-mentioned acts.

Much surprise has been created, and not a little unfavorable criticism excited in the newspaper press, by reported gains of population in certain States which were far in excess of what was anticipated from the known conditions of settlement and occupation in the regions concerned.

Wherever the face of the returns afforded good reasons for doubting the accuracy of the enumeration, an investigation under competent agents has been had, and in some instances a thorough re-enumeration has been ordered of the district or districts in question. Thus far these investigations have shown that the original enumeration was substantially correct, and that the apparent cause for complaint was largely due to defects in the census of 1870; arising partly from the disturbed state of society existing at that time, and partly from the insufficient and inappropriate agencies then in use, which have now been superseded by the more efficitent agencies established by acts of Congress of the present and the past year. I am satisfied that the enumeration conducted during the present year has been more thorough and exact than any taken under the act of 1850 could be, and that no reason exists for distrusting its essential soundness. The letter of the Superintendent concerning