The son of a Virginia planter who freed the people he enslaved before the American Civil War, Painter served on the faculty of Fisk University, dedicated to the education of African Americans.
He was a prominent member of the Indian Rights Association,[1] working out of the organization's Boston office, and, with Samuel M. Brosius, had a long career as an IRA agent and lobbyist in Washington, D.C.
In 1884, the organization's founders, Herbert Welsh and Henry Pancoast, opened an additional office in the District of Columbia to act as a legislative lobby and liaison with the Board of Indian Commissioners and the Board of Indian Affairs in 1884.
Painter made frequent trips to reservations to investigate the actions of Indian Bureau agents and to observe the living and health conditions of Native Americans.
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