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What's disgusting is not whether or not John Wayne said it, but how ingrained it was in the language in the late 1800's. Such that it 'good Indian" was used as a euphamism for a deceased Native American.
“I don’t go so far as to think that the only good Indian is the dead Indian,” he said in 1886, “but I believe nine out of every ten are, and I shouldn’t like to inquire too closely into...
"The Only Good Indian Is a Dead Indian" History and Meaning of a Proverbial Stereotype There exist numerous stereotypes and slurs against Native Americans, but the proverb "The only good Indian is a dead Indian" is a particularly hateful invective. It has been in use in the United States since the 1860s, and General
The bigot accusation hinges to a great extent on the notorious remark ‘The only good Indians I ever saw were dead’, honed (according to Dee Browne) into an American aphorism, ‘The only good Indian is a dead Indian’.
In his oft-referenced 1892 speech, Pratt stated, “A great general has said that the only good Indian is a dead one, and that high sanction of his destruction has been an enormous factor in promoting Indian massacres.
Through an interpreter, Roosevelt told Geronimo that the Indian had a “bad heart.” “You killed many of my people; you burned villages…and were not good Indians.”
Biographer Roy Morris Jr. states that, nevertheless, popular history credits Sheridan with saying "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." This variation "has been used by friends and enemies ever since to characterize and castigate his Indian-fighting career."
