Chief Joseph Quotes

Good words will not give me back my children.

– Chief Joseph

Good words do not last long unless they amount to something. Words do not pay for my dead people. They do not pay for my country now overrun by white men. They do not protect my father’s grave. They do not pay for my horses and cattle. Good words will not give me back my children. Good words will not make good the promise of your war chief, General Miles. Good words will not give my people health and stop them from dying. Good words will not give my people a home where they can live in peace and take care of themselves.

– Chief Joseph

When the white men were few and we were strong we could have killed them off, but the Nez Perce wishes to live at peace.

– Chief Joseph

It is cold, and we have no blankets; the little children are freezing to death. My people, some of them, have run away to the hills, and have no blankets, no food. No one knows where they are – perhaps freezing to death. I want to have time to look for my children, and see how many of them I can find. Maybe I shall find them among the dead.

– Chief Joseph

Our fathers gave us many laws, which they had learned from their fathers. These laws were good. They told us to treat all men as they treated us; that we should never be the first to break a bargain; that it was a disgrace to tell a lie; that we should speak the truth; that it was a shame for one man to take from another his wife, or his property without paying for it.

– Chief Joseph

I am ready to talk today. I have been in a great many councils, but I am no wiser. We are all sprung from a woman, although we are unlike in many things. We can not be made over again. You are as you were made, and as you were made you can remain. We are just as we were made by the Great Spirit, and you can not change us; then why should children of one mother and one father quarrel? – why should one try to cheat the other? I do not believe that the Great Spirit Chief gave one kind of men the right to tell another kind of men what they must do.

– Chief Joseph

I believe much trouble and blood would be saved if we opened our hearts more.

– Chief Joseph

I only ask of the Government to be treated as all other men are treated. If I cannot go to my own home, let me have a home in a country where my people will not die so fast.

– Chief Joseph

The earth is our mother. She should not be disturbed by hoe or plough. We want only to subsist on what she freely gives us.

– Chief Joseph

When I think of our condition, my heart is heavy. I see men of my own race treated as outlaws and driven from country to country, or shot down like animals.

– Chief Joseph

War can be avoided, and it ought to be avoided. I want no war.

– Chief Joseph

I see the whites all over the country gaining wealth, and see their desire to give us lands which are worthless.

– Chief Joseph

The earth and myself are of one mind.

– Chief Joseph

I have asked some of the Great White Chiefs where they get their authority to say to the Indian that he shall stay in one place, while he sees white men going where they please. They cannot tell me.

– Chief Joseph

We do not want churches. They will teach us to quarrel about God, as the Catholics and Protestants do. We do not want to learn that. We may quarrel with men about things on earth, but we never quarrel about the Great Spirit.

– Chief Joseph

I am tired of talk that comes to nothing. It makes my heart sick when I remember all the good words and all the broken promises.

– Chief Joseph

I never said the land was mine to do with it as I chose. The one who has the right to dispose of it is the one who has created it. I claim a right to live on my land, and accord you the privilege to live on yours.

– Chief Joseph

The earth was created by the assistance of the sun, and it should be left as it was.

– Chief Joseph

I did not want bloodshed. I did not want my people killed. I did not want anybody killed.

– Chief Joseph

The country was made without lines of demarcation, and it is no man’s business to divide it.

– Chief Joseph

Say to us if you can say it, that you were sent by the Creative Power to talk to us. Perhaps you think the Creator sent you here to dispose of us as you see fit. If I thought you were sent by the Creator I might be induced to think you had a right to dispose of me.

– Chief Joseph

We were taught to believe that the Great Spirit sees and hears everything, and that he never forgets; that hereafter he will give every man a spirit-home according to his deserts: if he has been a good man, he will have a good home; if he has been a bad man, he will have a bad home. This I believe, and all my people believe the same.

– Chief Joseph

There has been too much talking by men who had no right to talk. Too many misinterpretations have been made; too many misunderstandings have come up between the white men and the Indians.

– Chief Joseph