8 
thousand acres of public lands passed through homestead forms ; 
but, so far as real homesteading is concerned, a large portion of 
that might as well have been cast into the ocean. The right of 
purchase lease under the settlement association plan proved to be 
the best adapted, and consequently the favorite, method for the 
exploitation of the public lands for private interests. The situa- 
tion was a difficult one, but during the last three years it has 
been met in part by refusing to open up lands under the settle- 
ment association plan and to some extent even under homestead 
leases without settlement associations. The recent amendments 
accomplish in part two objects. They impose certain restric- 
tions upon the granting of homesteads and their alienation 
afterwards, as, for instance, by preventing ''repeating," and the 
conveyance by deed, lease or otherwise of homesteads, whether 
before or after patent is obtained, to aliens, corporations and 
large landholders, and thus they remove to a considerable extent 
the inducements for acquiring lands ostensibly for homesteads 
but really for ulterior purposes. They also render unnecessary 
to a considerable extent the exercise of executive discretion by 
substituting therefor certain statutory provisions, which are de- 
signed to be self-operative in discriminating between bona fide 
and fake homesteaders. 
There has been and can be very little complaint in regard to 
lands not already under cultivation or improved, that is, lands 
which require pioneering work for their reduction to cultiva- 
tion, and which are the typical homesteading lands, for either 
people do not desire these or else, if they do desire them, they 
thereby show that they are bona fide homesteaders. 
The difficulty lies with the improved lands, because they are 
the lands which, if the law permits, can be at once exploited to 
good advantage at little or no cost in money, •time or labor. It 
may prove to be necessary to restrict the homesteading of cane 
lands, for instance, to the special homestead agreement method, 
in order to prevent the waste of such lands and to insure their 
best utilization. As to price, it is only right to the citizens at 
large, to whom the public lands belong, that any particular indi- 
vidual who obtains such lands should pay a substantial price, 
although not the full cash value for which they might be sold if 
there were no residence and cultivation conditions, but the terms 
of payment may well be made such as to be burdensome ; to give 
away for a nominal consideration valuable lands, made so by 
the expenditure of capital by others, would be both unjust and 
demoralizing. As to residence, this should be required to be of 
sufficient length and character to insure its genuineness. As to 
cultivation, this should be required to be begun and kept up on a 
sufficient percentage of the area to prevent the improved an<l 
valuable land from being allowed to go to waste. As to nrea, 
this should be no larger than the homesteader can cultivate and 
no larger than is sufficient to enable him to support his family 
