-95- 



suffl of of ten thousand dollars, and the latter in the sum of five thousand 

 dollars, conditional to render a true and faithful account to him or 

 his successor in office, quarter yearly accounts of all moneys which 

 shall be by them received by virtue of the said office, with sureties 

 to be approved as sufficient by the Solicitor of the Treasury; which 

 bonds shall be filed in the office of the First Comptroller of the 

 Treasury, to be by him put in suit upon any breach of the conditions 

 thereof. 



Approved, May 15, 1862. - statute s at Large, 12:387-388. 



HOMESTEAD ACT OF 1862 



On May 20, 1862, Lincoln signed the Homestead Act. During the course 



of its operation, approximately 234,000,000 acres of the public 



domain have been transferred to private ovmership. Its 



exact title is "An Act to secure Homesteads to 



actual Settlers in the Public Domain," 



and its text is as follows; 



Be it enacted by the S enate and House of R epresentatives of the 

 United States of America in Congress assembled . That any person who 

 is the head of a family, or who has arrived at the age of twenty- 

 one years, and is a citizen of the United States, or who shall have 

 filed his declaration of intention to become such, as required by the 

 naturalization laws of the United States, and who has never borne 

 arms against the United States Government or given aid and comfort to 

 its enemies, shall, from and after the first January, eighteen hundred 

 and sixty-three, be entitled to enter one quarter section or a less 

 quantity of unappropriated public lands, upon which said person may 

 have filed a preemption claim, or which may, at the time the applica- 

 tion is made, be subject to preemption at one dollar and twenty-five 

 cents, or less, per acre; or eighty acres or less of such unapprop- 

 riated lands, at two dollars and fifty cents per acre, to be located 

 in a body, in conformity to the legal subdivisions of the public lands, 

 and after the same shall have been surveyed: Provide d, That any person 

 owning and residing on land may, under the provisions of this act, 

 enter other land lying contiguous to his or her said land, which shall 

 not, with the land so already owned and occupied, exceed in the ag- 

 gregate one hundred and sixty acres. 



Sec. 2. And be it further enacted , That the person applying for the 

 benefit of this act shall, upon application to the register of the 



