The Dawn of a New Constructive Era 



39 



the cash sale, whereby a man could get a preference right 

 by settlement. Time went on, and in the year 1862, in the 

 midst of the war, Congress woke up to the proposition that 

 the mere money we were getting out of these public lands 

 was the least consideration ; that the matter of cultivation, de- 

 velopment and homebuilding was the great big consideration 

 that we should look to ; and from 1862 on, you will notice, in 

 all the land laws, all the acts of Congress — that the controlling 

 and main thought has been, how can we dispose of these lands 

 so as to produce the most homes and the greatest development 

 and use. 



And so there was never any one act of Congress which so 

 well laid the foundation for the development of the Middle West 

 and the Far West as the Homestead law. We had disposed of. 

 roughly, under the old system, of from 80 to 100 million acres. 

 Under the Homestead law we have disposed of 150 million acres; 

 and under the Commuted Homestead law, whereby by a shorter 

 residence and a cash payment title could be secured to the land, 

 we disposed of 50 million acres more. The operation of that 

 legislation has swept from the Mississippi west to the Pacific 

 ocean, and no single act of Congress has ever been more con- 

 ducive to the upbuilding of a great empire than that legislation. 



The Homestead law meant homes, cultivation and crop rais- 

 ing. Then Congress went on and saw the transportation prob- 

 lem, and said, we must get railroads to this country in order to 

 get the homesteaders there. So we find Congress making great 

 railroad grants to induce the building of railroads. Probably 

 nothing in the way of land legislation has ever been the subject 

 of more controversy and argument, one way or the other, than 

 this railroad grant proposition. Congress has given away, as 

 donations to railroads, probably 160 million acres. Texas gave 

 away 25 million acres more. One thing certain the rail- 

 roads did conduce very much to the upbuilding of the 

 country. Whether the}- would have come eventually without 

 the grants, or if so, whether they would have come soon enough, 

 is a mere matter of speculation. Two years ago, when the ques- 

 tion of development in Alaska was up. Congress said, we will 

 not give away half of that territory to get railroads ; we will 

 keep the land and give it to settlers and build the railroad with 

 government money, carrying that controlling principle still 

 further, making it easier and more attractive and desirable for 



Homestead 

 Act Finally 

 Solves 

 Problem 



The Govern- 

 ment and 

 Western Rail- 

 road Build- 

 ing 



