In formulating his Indian policy, Grant sought a precarious balance between the Christian reformers, whose support he sought, and the army officers, whom he thought best able to administer Indian reservations. Grant made his old aide-de-camp Ely Parker, a Seneca Indian, the commissioner of Indian affairs. Parker ultimately was a military man. Only soldiers, he thought, “when they make a promise will keep it and when they make a threat will execute it.” He believed that Indians did not respect the civilian Indian agents because “they neither kept their promises nor executed their threats.”
