BANCROFT LIBRARY <> THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Our Land Policy Ms Evils and their Remedy, IB: , HON. GEORGE W. JULIAN, OF C DIANA, fa the House rf Bepresenlatives, March 6, 1868; Vl&e ISonse tia-vinsr can<3f , to present oJti of itwn a*tc azul saiinei-stl lands. L WABHTNOTOIfi Printed at the Office f TUB CHEAT RBPCBUC, 499 llth Street. 1868. Our Land Policy Its Evils and their Remedv. \ .2J Mr. JULIAN Mr. SrEAREn : Perhaps tnere is no ques- tion affecting the civil administration of tho Government which more deeply concerns the people of the United States than that which is submitted in the bill I have hud the honor to report from the Committee on Public Lands. It touches all the springs- of our national life and well-being. It raakes its appeal to every landless citizen of the Republic, and to every foreigner who comes to our shores in search cf a home. It reaches down to the Very foundations of democratic equality, and takes hold on the coming ages of industrial development and Christian civilization in tho rapidly multi- plying States of our Union. Had the pol- icy now proposed beon accepted by the nation a generation ago, before its magnifi- cent patrimony had been so grievously marred and wasted by legislative profligacy and plunder, the gratitude of millions would have attested the blc?scd results, the. failure of which m.liior.s must, deplore. Not a sin- gle hour of further delay should stay the friendly hand of Congress in rescuing the Remaining heritage of a thousand million acres Jfrom the improvident administration of the past. THE MEASUBE F.XPLATXRD PRE-EMPTION AND irOJILSTEAD LAWS. Before proceeding to the general discus- sion 'of Ihia measure it m;:y be well briefly to re for to its particular provisions, and their effect in modifying the action of its con- trolling principle. It forbids the further Bale of the public lands, except as provided for in the pre-emption and homestead laws. These laws have been improved by repeat- ed amendments, which have been by experience, and their machinery is un- derstood by the people. Under the pre- emption laws the settler may select hie home on the surveyed or unsurveyed lauds, and perfect his titleon the easy conditions of settlement and improvement, and the pay- ment of $1 25 per acre. Under tho home- stead laws like conditions of settlement and improvement arc required, but the claimant is restricted tothesurveyedlands ; and. the payment of $1 25 per acre is only required where ho shall decide to perfect' his title at once by the purchase of his homestead, which he may do after 'the re- quired improvement has been made. Tht- purpose of both the pro cmption and home- stead laws is the settlement and tillage of tlie public domaia by those who need h. mcs, and the option is given to every set- tler to determine Bunder which class of laws he can best subserve his interest. COLLEGE SCRIP AND COUNTY-LAND WARRANTS TO DE LOCATED. The bill reserves to the holders of military bounty-land warrants, agricultural college scrip, and other land scrip, the right to lo- cate the same. This could not be other- wise. However mistaken, .or pernicious the policy of issuing these warrants and this scrip may now be regarded, the faith of the nation is plighted that they may be located according to the terms prescribed by Congress. Lands selected for town sites are likewise expressly cxcepted from the opera: ions of tho bill, because their disposition is already provided for. An act tor the disposal of coal lands and town sites on. the public domain, approved July 1, 18G4, and the act amendatory thereto o'f March 3, 18G5, make special provision for '.he disposition of such lands, and properly withdraw them from the scope of this bill. MINERAL LANDS EXCKPTED SOME FACTS STATKD. Mineral lands are also excepted, and for kindred, though less conclusive reasons. The pot-ali?!! 1 character of these lands calls for peculiar legislation; and the act of Congress of July 2G, 18GG, undertook to deal with them. The act is singularly crude and clumsy, and very few persons thus fur have even attempted to assert title under it. Its history is not less remarkable. It pasr.cd tic Senate near the close of the first session of the Thirty-Ninth Congress, without any previous general discussion by the members of that body.. On reaching the House it was referred to the Committee "on Public Lands, which at once proceeded to consider it, and to reconstruct its !cad- tng'fcaturcs. -This did not suit its friends in the Senate, who caused it to be attached to tJK3 enacting clause of a bill then pend- ing in that body, entitled "An act granting the right of way to ditch and canal owners over the public lands in the. States of Cali- fornia, Oregon, and Nevada." Under this strange title it was re-enacted in the Sen- ate; and on finding its way to the Speak- "cr's table during the closing hours of the session, it was hurried through the House in utter disregard of the rights of the com- mittee having it in charge, without any op- portunity whatever for general discussion, without oven the pretense that its provis- ions were understood, and by parliamentary tactics, which, if generally adopted, would convert the business of legislation into a system of gambling, in which the very ti- tles of our laws would brand them as the progeny of knavery and fraud. The re- markable decline in the product of bullion during the past year is undoubtedly due, to a considerable extent, to the uncertainty of titles in the great mining regions, and the need cf a fixed code of laws ; and since there is a bill now pending here amendatory of the law under notice, and its manifest faults mast lead to ite perfection, thews is no occasion to deal with the question in the . measure now before the House. GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF THE BILL STATED THE GOVERNMENT BOUND TO RKNDER ITS DOMAIN AS PRODUCTIVE AS POSSIBLE. With those qualifications, M r. Speaker, the bill I have reported withdraws from further sale the public domain of the Uni- ted States, and dedicates it, in reasonable homesteads, to actual settlement and pro- ductive wealth ; and it is this fundamental and far-reaching principle to which I now invite the attention of this House and of the country. Mr. Speaker, I hold it to be a clear prop- osition that the Government, as the servant of the people, is bound to render the terri- tory under its control as productive as pos- sible. Both political economy and the law ' of nature sanction this principle. The Gov- ernment has no right to withhold its vacant lands from tillage, while its own citizens desire them for homesteads, and are willing to make' them contribute to the general wealth. ''Nothing." says Locke, "was made by God for man to spoil or destroy." Valtcl declares that the cultivation of the soil is ' a profession that feeds the human race ;" that it is " the natural employment of man," and "an obligation imposed by nature on mankind;" and that therefore it " deserves the utmost attention of the GOT- eminent" He says, u The sovereign ought to neglect no means of rendering the land under his jurisdiction as well cultivated as possible. He ought not to allo\v either, communities or private persona to acquire large tracts of laxd and leave them uncul- tivated.". He adds, " The whole earth is destined to feed its inhabitants ; but this it wculd be incapable of doing if it were un- cultivated. Every nation is then obliged by the law of nature to cultivate the land that has fallen to its share." ' The earth," says the Westminster Review, "is the great mother which all should regard with filial reverence. To the earth we owe alike our lives and our pleasures, and it there be aa excess of poverty and misery among men U is because the earth is 'not tilled in soch a manner as to yield the maximum of the necessaries of life." "Nomnn," says Join Stuart Mill, "made the land. It is the original inheritance of the whole species ;" and he declares that "wherever, in any country, the proprietor, generally speak- ing, ceases to be the improver, political economy has nothing to say in defense of landed property, as there established." These authorities, which couid readily be multiplied, are simply the echo of common sense. They are the voice of reason and justice, affirming, in different forms of speech, the scriptural truth that tho earth belongs "to tho children of men." PROFITABLENESS OF SMALL OWNERSHIPS OF LAND, WHEN TILLED BY TUEIR PROPRIE- TORS. If, then, the Divine command to " sub- due the earth," that is, to improve it, and compel it to yield of its abundance, is bind- ing upon the Government as well as the citizen, we are naturally conducted to the inquiry, what policy ought it to pursue in order to secure the maximum of produc- tiveness ? And my answer is, the policy of resisting, by all practicable methods, the monopoly of .the soil, while systematical-ly aiming at the multiplication of small homo- steads, which shall be tilled by their pro- prietors. On this subject, Mr. Speaker, we aro not left in the dark. I shall not now dwell upon the negative side of the argument. I shall not stop to portray the evils of land monopoly, winch, in the words of a celebrated French writer, u hasknawcd social order from the beginning of the world." Tb.o subject is an inviting one, but I propose here only to consider the profitableness of small landed proprietor- ships, in the light of known facts. I be- lieve political economists are agreed that the true interest of agriculture is to widen the field of its operations as far as practi- cable, and then, by a judicious tillage, to make it yield the very largest resources compatible with the population-of the coun- try. Experience has abundantly shown that the system of small proprietorships can best secure these results, while itbrin^ with it great Moral and social advantage? which are unknown in countries that arc cursed by overgrown estates. I regrc't that any argument or elucidation of this point should bo deemed necessary in a Govern- ment which recognizes cqiuil rights and equal laws as the basis of its .policy; but the manifest tendency, in multiplied forms, toward land monopoly in our country, ane! especially in the V/cst and South, must excuse some little particularity f state- ment. AUTHORITIES CITED. One of the highest authorities on this subject is Mr. Kay's book on "The Social Condition and Education of the People in England and Europe." He speaks from personal observation and travel in many countries in different parts of the conti- nent, and declares that " the peasant farm- ing of Prussia, Saxony, Holland, arid Swit- zerland, is tho most perfect and economical farming I have ever witnessed in any coun- try." He quotes with favor the decided opinion of another writer, that ' not only arc the gross products of any given number of acres held and cultivated by email pro- prietors greater than the gross products of an equal number of acres held by a few great proprietors, and cultivated by tenant farmers, but that the net products of the former, after deducting all the expenses of cultivation, are also greater than the net products of the latter." Mr. Laing, another writer of authority, in his "Notes of a Traveler," says : ' ' We see, and there is no blinking the fact, better crops on the ground in Flanders, East Friesland, Ilolstein, in short, on the wholo line of the arable land of equal quality on the continent, from the Sound to Calais, then we see on the line of British coast opposite to this lino, and in the same latitudes, from the Frith of Forth all round to Dover." And ho adds that '"minute labor on small portions of arable ground, gives evidently, in equal soils and climate, a superior productiveness, whe& these small portions belong to the farmer." Mr. Kay says that "In Saxony it is a no- torious fact that, during the last thirty years, and since the peasants became the proprietors of the land, there has been a rapid and continual improvement in the aondition of the houses, in the manner of living, in the dress of the peasants, and particularly in the culture of the land.'' He observes that " The peasants endeavor to outstrip one another in the quantity and quality of the produce, in the preparation of the ground, and in the general prepara- tion of their respective portions. All the little proprietors are eager to find out hew to farm so as to produce the greatest re- sults; they diligently seek after improve- ments ; they send their children to the agri- cultural schools ia order to fit them to as- sist their fathers ; and each proprietor soon adopts a new improvement introduced by any of Ms neighbors." Sisinondi, in his "Studies in Political Economy," says : ''It is from Switzcr'und we learn that agriculture, practiced b) the very persons who enjoy its fruits, suffices to procure great comfort for a very numerous population ; a great independence of charac- ter, arising from independence of position ; a great commerce of consumption, the result of the easy circumstances of all the inhab Hants, even in a country whose climate is rude, whose soil is but moderately fertile, and where late frosts and inconstancy oi seasons often blight the hopes of the culti- vator.'' Speaking of small land-holders generally, ha sjys : "Wherever we fine peasant proprietors we also find the com fort, security, confidence in the future, am independence, which assure at once luippi ness and virtue. The peasant who, will his children, docs all the work of Lis littl( inheritance, who pays no .cut to any on< above him nor wages to any one below who regulates lua production by his con sumption; who oats his own cJrn, drink; his-ownwiuc, is clothed in his own hemp and woo^ ures little for tho prices of the market ; for 'he has little to Fell and little to my, and is never mined, by revulsions of rade." And he insists that ** the .peasant >roprietor is of all cultivators the one v;ho gets most from the soil, fur he is the one vho thinks most of tho future, and who has >ecn most instructed by experience. lie is also the ond who employs the human powers o the most advantage, because, dividing lis occupations among all the members of lis family, he reserves some for every day f the year, so that nobody is ever out oi work." Mr. Tlowitt, in his "Rural and Domestic ife of Germany," saj'S: u The peasants arc not, as wjth us, for the most part, totally ut off from property in the soil they culli vate, totally dependent 0:1 the labor afford d by others they are themselves the pro [)rietors. It is, perhaps, from this caus< that they arc probably the most inJu-striou peasantry in the world. They labor busily early and late, -because they feel that thev are laboring for themselves. Every ma; lius his house, his orchard, Vis road-sid trees, commonly so heavy with fruit thath is obliged to prop and secure them always: , or they would be torn to pieces. lie ha his corn-plat, his piat for inongel-wurzc Cor hemp, and ao on. lie IB his own mat ter ; and ho, and every member of his fan ily, have the strongest motives to labor. lie contrasts him with the E.iglish pcasan who " is so cut off from the idea of proper! that he comes habitually to look upon it ; a thing from which he is warned by the lav of the largo proprietors, n^d becoircs, . consequence, spiritless, purposeless. Tl German bauer, on the contrary, looks ( the country as made for him and his fcllo' men. He feels himself a man; he has ;. s'.akc in the country as good as that of t' bulk of his neighbors; no man can threat him with ejection or tho work-house BO lo: as he is active and economical. lie wall therefore, with a bold f top ; he looks y i in the face with the air of u f;*eo man, b t of a respectful one." Small farming in Franco forms no ex*c * cion to these strong testimonies. Arthur Young, in his "Travels in France,'* says : 'An aolivity has been here that has swe t away all difficulties before it, and has Coined tho very rocks with verdure. It would be a disgrace to common sense to /isk tha cause; the enjoyment of property must have done it?. Give a man the sure possession of a bleak rock, and he will turn ife into a garden ; give him a nine years' lease of a garden, and he will convert it into a clesert." Spealang of the country at the foot of the Yv r estern Pyrenees, he says : "It is all in the hands of little proprietors, without the farms being so small as to oc- nisioii a vicious and miserable population. An air of neatness, warm'Ji, and comfort, breathes over the whole. It is visible in their new-built houses and stables; in their ^ardena; ki their hedges; in the courts be- fore their doors ; even in the coops for their poultry and the sties for their hogs." SAD COMMENTARY N THESE PRINCIPLES LAND SPECULATION EXPOSED AJ*D REPRO- BATED. But T need not further multiply authori- ties in support of my position ; nor shall I 'tttompt to demonstrate, what is quite appar- ent from the quotations I have made, that the policy of small homesteads, on which tho' man who holds the plow is the owner of the soil, is favorable to the highest de- grcoof industry and thrift; that it becomes the instrument of popular education, through the self-dependence of the, cultiva- tor, whose mental faculties are thus natu- rally stimulated and developed by the cares and responsibilities brought to his door; and that it favors, also, the moral virtues of prudence, temperance, and self-control. All this is asserted by our ablest political econ- omists. Nckbor shall I dwell here upon tbe fact that it supplies the strongest bond of union between tho citizen and the State, and is absolutely necessary in a well-ordered Qommon wealth. Putting all this aside, and coming back to my two cardinal principles duty of the Government^ in behalf of the people, to make its lands as product* ve as possible, and the necessity of accom- plishing this end by small holdings, tilled by their proprietors I proceed to notice the startling commentary upon these prin- ciples which Has been furnished by the(rov- crumcnt of the United States. Tho Commissioner of the General Land Office estimates that from the foundation of the Government to the present time more than thirty millions of acres of the* aggregate amount of public lands sold have not been reduced to occupancy as farms. This would have made one hundred and eighty-seven thousand five hundred home- steads, of one hundred and sixty acres each, and should have been disposed of by the Government to actual settlers only, as fast as it was needed, instead of being hand- ed over to speculators and locked up from tillage and productive wealth. Just to tha extent that this has been done the Govern- ment has been the plunderer of the people. It has gone into partnership with the speculator in cheating the pioneer and the producer, while robbing the nation- al Treasury. During the last fiscal yeaar nearly two millions of acres of homestead entries have been made, of which over tw* hundred and sixty-four thousand acres have been entered in the southern land States under the act of June 21, 18613. The total area of the public domain absorbed under the homestead laws up to the 30th of June last exceeds seven millions of acres, represented by over fifty-nine thousand farms. This policy creates national wealth, and gives homes to the laboring poor. It most righteously fosters the pursuit which Vattel declares to be "the natural employ mentof man," and which ''foods the human race.'"' Every new farm that is snatched from the wilderness adds to the wealth of the nation, while the monoply of millions of acres which are withheld from cultiva- tion is a positive public curse, It is com- puted that in tho year 1835 alone about eight millions of acres of tho public domain parsed into the hands of speculators. The money thus invested was withdrawn from praiseworthy entc* prices and the ordinary 3e of commerce, and sunk in the fruits of the West, which were allowed to 3"ield no return. Great, stretches of these wild lands tlwis intervened between settlements which wore afterward formed, since the poor pio- neer could not. puy the price at which they were held, and was forced still further into flic wilderness, where he was compelled, by h's toils and privations, to add to the wealth of these remorseless monopolists. This system of legalized landlordism in tiiesc States, and has sinoe been gradually reduced to cultivation by paying their tariff for the privilege. Nothing could be more vicious in principle or more ruinous to the public interest than has been this policy. The Government, since its formation, has- sold more than one hundred and fifty-fora- millions of acres ; and I think I am safe in asserting, after careful consideration, that the nation has derived from these lands less than one half the agricultural wealth which hey would have yielded under the policy for which I now contend, if it had beeii adopted in the beginning. Sir, I ask gen- tlemen to ponder those facts, and say whether the land policy f the United Statee has not been a policy of systematic mprovideoce and spoliation. Every one remembers the saying of Dean Swift, thai, whoever could make two eare of eorc or 9 two blades- of grass to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before, would deserve better of mankind, and do more essential service to his country, than the whole race of politicians." Has not cur Government supplied a new and striking commentary on this saying in sporting with one of the grandest opportunities the world has seen for the creation of wealth and the establishment of democratic institutions? One of the charges againa tthe British king- which our fathers preferred in their great Declaration was, that "he has endeavored to prevent the population of these States ; for that purpose obstructing the laws ol naturalization of foreigners, refusing to pass others for their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations f lands." Is not our Government guilty, substantially, of this same charge ? Has not its policy tended strongly " to prevent the population of these States/' by abridging the inducements of our people to seek homes en the public domain? And, as to foreign- ers, has not its policy of speculation and monopoly amounted to a refusal " to pass laws to encourage their migration hither," while " raising the conditions of new ap- propriations of lands?'' Sir, lot us eman- cipate the public domain yet remaining un- der our care. Lot us dedicate it to honest toil, to American homes, to productive wealth, and thus complete the work so nobly begun in the pre-emption and home- stead laws. Let us remember that in set- ting free the public lands of the Govern- ment, and placing them beyond the power of monopolists, we shall become the crea- tors of wealth and the benefactors of com- ing generations ; and that \he ablest politi- cal economist cf our time declares the ac- quisition of a permanent interest in the eoil by the cultivators of it to be as real, and as great an improvement in production, as the invention of the spinning-jenny or the steam-engine. GKANTS OP LAND FOR RAILROADS THEIR FRIGHTFUL CHARACTER AND MAGNITUDE, But I pass to a separate, though kindred topic, namc'y, the grants made by Gougreas to aid in building railroads. These bave been exceedingly munificent, aiul have be- come a most formidable barrier to tl* set- tlement and cultivation of onr' great do- main. Congress has granted ia all, t various Western and Southern States, over (iffy-seven millions of acres for these pus poses. These grants have been madt?o< such conditions that tlie companies to wliaH the alternate odd-numbered sections url entrusted can hold them back from caf* and settlement till such time, and for such price, as may best subserve their interest. The lands become at once a monopoly, and the rights of settlers are perfectly su- bordinated to its purposes. The company may sell or refuse to sell ; it may seH to individual settlers or to a single purchaser. No restraints are imposed in those particu- lars. The even-numbered sections are like- wise reserved from Bale, except for the price of $2 50 per acre. Unless, therefore, the road is between points and t-hrangh a country rendering its speedy construction very important, both the cdxl and even numbered sections are kept bacJi from set- tlement^ and the further effect of this wUI be to hinder settlements which otherwise would be formed adjacent to the interdicted belt. This policy builds roads, which are highly important ; but it often inflicts great mischief upon the country by its discrimi- nations against our pioneer settlers. Besides these grants to the States we have donated, on similar conditions, fop the construction of canals and other improve- ments, over seventeen millions of and we have granted to the d-iffereat of the Pacific railroad the estimated a*gre gate of one hundred and twenty-fair mfl lions of acres. T>ese roads are of tin greatest national importance, and therefore have a very strong plea to make in justifc cation of the grants made by Congress-; but they constitute a fearful monopoly "and may hinder, far more than help, the actual settlement of our groat western territory. The several grants I have named 10 to Bttfe short of two hundred millions of awes; au if we add to this the even num- bered sectiwis along the lines of the Pa- eific road, which are excluded from settle- ment under a reoent ruling of the Interior Deparfenrent, wo shall have an aggregate of about one-third of the nation's entire pub- lic domain committed to the keeping of railroad corporations. "The quantity of lands conveyed by these grants," says the Commissioner of the General Land Office, "is of empire extent, exceeding in the ag- gregate, by more than five millions of acres, the entiro areas of the sis New England States, added to the surface of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Dela- ware, Maryland, and Virginia." He eays the grants to thie Pacific railway lines alone "are within about a fourth of being twice the united area of England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Guernsey, Jersey, the Isle of Man, and the islands of the British seas, oad less than a tenth of being equal V> tifre Freaofe empire proper." HRAOT1GAL MISCHIEFS OP THE SYSTEM JIE- POKMS SUGGESTED. These are significant, if not startling, {sicts, al tfeey naturally awaken alarm iniong the multitudes of our people now seeking settlements under the pre-emption and homestead laws throughout the West. I have recent letters from intelligent men in the Topeka land district in Kansas, who say that, owing to the land grants referred to and the Indian reservations as adminis- tered by tire Government, it has become next to impossible to spcure a homestead that is at all desirable in v that portion of the State, and that many settlers who have traveled hundreds of miles to find their homes, on which they have settled in good faith, are being driven out by railroad gents. I believe the time has come to sound the ory of danger, and to demand, in ihe name of our pioneers and producers, a radical reform in the policy of the Govern- ment as to any future grants it may make in aid of these enterprises. AH such grants should be rigidly subordinated to the pa a mount purpose of securing homes for t people, the settlement and improvement > the public domain, and the consequent i crease of national wealth. A bill inaugi ating this principle has already been ported to this House from the Commits on Public Lands, and I earnestly hope will become a law. It provides that in future grants to aid in building railroc the odd-numbered sections shall be sr only to actual settlers, in quantities t exceeding one hundred and sixty acres, t a price not exceeding ihe maximum of $2 per acre, and that any even sections whi shall remain undisposed of at the expii tion of ten years, shall be subject to t same disposition as all other public lane In addition to this greatly needed chan of policy Congress should provide for t> other reforms. In the first place, the ror asking the grant should be an importa thoroughfare, and especially in the matt of extending settlements and civilizatii more rapidly than otherwise would practicable. Such grants are only speci; ly needed in the case of long lines of roa which connect distant points, and pass ov thinly inhabited sections of country. E perience has shown that roads will not 1 built exeept through settlements which w supply a local business, or as connectii links between important centres of tra< and population. The Commissioner of t' General Land Office, in his report for tl year 1865, justly remarks that if upon ai part of the line a road gets less land it because there is larger population, and co sequontly more local business ; and if up< any part of the line more land is obtaine it is because the reverse is true. Yet every instance it will be found that tl road is first constructed, and best compe sating to the stockholders, along that pa of its lino on which litttle or no public lac is obtained. A road passing through region of country which invites setflemen will bo built, if needed, without any gnu 11 frf lands, because settlements will be form- ed and the wants of the people wifl. necessi- tate it. The actual settlement of a new country is, after all, tho paramount con- eern both of the Government and the peo- ple. With this, capital will gradually be summoned in es- caping jr. m their thraldom, without de- ploring the mistake of the (Joverumont in failing toco-. lisuate the great plantations of the rebels durhig the war, and decimal- ing them in the interests of loyalty and re- publicanisiii. INDIAN RESEKVATIONS TREATIES WITH THE DELAWARE, T11K SAC AiND FOX, AMD OSAGE INDIANS. The action of the Government in dealing with our Indian lands has been equally sub- gervieut* to the interests of monopolists. Under our treaties with the Delaware In- dians, made in I .SCO and 1801, some two hundred and thirty-four thousand acres of surplus Indian lands were sold to the Leav- en worth, Pawnee, and Western Railroad Company, instead of being oprned to ac- tual bcttlers. Under another treaty, con filude-j in l&C'J, ho residue of liiuso lauds, amounting to over ninety-two thousand ftares, was BO Id to the Missouri lliver Rail- road Company in tho latter year, thus cro- t'ng anotbcr monopoly. By virtue of a reaty with the Sac and Fox Indians, con- cluded in the year 1869, the trust lands of hese Indian*^ amounting to two hundred and seventy-eight thousand two hundred acres, have been sold tj thirty-wix different purchasers, thus creating numerous though considerable monopolies. As examples, I may mention that John MuManus bought one hundred and forty-two thousand nine inndred and fifteen acres; William R. Mo- Kean twenty-nine thousand six hundred ind seventy-seven acres; Fuller and Mc- Donald thirty-nine thousand and iifty-cighi acres ; Robert S. Stevens fi;ty-onc thousand six hundred and eighty-nine acres; Hon. Hugh McCulloch seven thousand and four- een acres. By virtue of a treaty concluded wi;h i he Kickapno Indians in lilG2, the Atchis.;nand Pike's Peak P v aulroid Coin- pjiny, in the year 1865, became the pur- ,-lmMT of the lunds of these Indians, ilmounting to one. hundred and twenty- three thousand eight hundred and thirty- two acres. By vir.uc of the first articlo of a, treaty between the United States aixl the Great and little Osugc Indians, con- cluded in the year 18&3, the said Ind ana sold r the United States a tract of cmatry embracing one million tv,- hundred and twenty-five thourand fix hundred and two acres; and under the second ranicle of .the treaty they sold, in trust, the further quan- tity of one million nine hundred and ninety- six thousand eight hundred ares, making the total of three million two hundred and twenty-two thousand four hundred and two acres. The treaty, in strange disregard ef the rights of settlers, and of the true interests of the country, provides that this vast area of land shall not be subject to entry under tho homestead or pre-emption laws, but ahall be sold to the highest bidder; and, of course, following the examples already set in other cases* a swarm of greedy monopolists, inoro or less uumeroua, will get the entire amount. The land is already advertised for sale in May next, and several thousands of settlers who went upon it before the treaty was proclaimed, many of them .having made valuable im- provements in good faith, will be driven out by speculators, with whom their small means will not enable them to compete at the sale. Of course it is not strange that these settlers are now greatly alarmed and distressed by tho situation in which they find themselves; and the joint resolution I reported this morning, which passed this House, was intended as some little relief, and perhaps all that Congress can afford, under the shameful treaty to which I have referred. CHEROKEE NEUTRAL LANDS MONSTROUS MAL- ADMINISTRATION. The Cherokee neutral lands consist of a tract fifty miles long and twenty-five miles wide, embracing eight hundred thousand aorea. By treaty with these Indians, con- cluded in Ihe year I860, the Secretary of the Interior is authorized to sell these lands in a body, for a price not less than rno dollar per acra in oash, except such tracts as were settled upon at the date of the treaty. Accordingly, in October last, a contract was made for a sale of these lands to one James F. Joy, in the inter- est of the Kansas and Ncosho Valley Railroad Company, for the price named, and the directors of the company, at a re- cent meeting, have resolved that such of the lands as are now-occupied by bonaflde settlers shall be valued at from three to ten dollars per acre, and be sold to said settlers at an average of six dollars per acre. This outrage upon these people, who h&vc settled upon thc.se lands in good faith. aixl in many cases made valuable improve- ments, is simply monstrous. Even the treaty, which no man can defend, and could Lave had no honest parentage, does not warrant it These settlers, in all conscience, ehould have their lands at $1.25 per acre. The treaty could easily have been so matfc as to secure to them this right beyond que&- tion, and the lands themselves, as I am we!) assured, could have been disposed of di- rectly to the United States, and subjected at once to our ordinary policy of sale an! pre-emption. No man can approve the con- duct of the Government in thus joining hands with monopolists in squandering thle public domain and conspiring against the productive industry of the country; and since there yet remain largo quantities of other Indian lands to be disposed of, all of which are threatened by the nek less policy I have exposed, tho voice of the people should be earnestly invoked in their behalf before it shalllje too late. A SIGNAL OUTRAGE AGAINST PRTC-KMPTOR3 EX- POSED UNWELCOME FACTS REFERRED TO. One remarkable instance of tho espousal by the Government of the claims of mon- opolists against those of our pioneer set- tlers remains to be noticed. It is of re- cenf occurrence. A disputed question involving the title to certain lands in Cali- fornia was properly brought before the General Land Office for decision. The parties en the one side were pre-cmptors, claiming title as such under the laws of the United States. The chief party on the other side was a perfectly unprincipled monopolist, who had succeeded by false representations in procuring the paseageof an act of Congress under which ho and hi* assigns claimed title to on invalid Spanish grant of ninety thousand acres, including the very Kinds of tl:e pre-emptors rufe; r< d .o. After a Cull and careful hearing the Go'm- missioner of the General Lund Office de- cided in favor of tho sctilers. The Cali- fornia monopolists thereupon prevailed upon the Secretary of the Interior to ask the advice of the Attorney General cf the United States upon the points of law iiv vulved, and they procured fn in him a& Opinion, declaring, among other things, that pre-emptors on the public lands acquire n$ right-3 by their preliminary acts of 15 rant and improvement, and are mere ten ants-at-will, whom the Government may eject at any time before they huve com pleted the conditions of title. The Attor- ney General dtd not controvert the fact that the pre-emptors wereswh, under the laws of Congress, but he denied their right to the land ; and the Secretary of the Interior acquiesced in the decision, although he knew it was not law. and allowed the land department of the Goveinrncnt to be used in dispossessing these settlers, in violation of the plainest principles of justice as well as law, in oppo^iuon to numerous and uni- form decisions cf our Federal courts, and to the whole spirit and policy of the Gov- ernment. This mling, still adhered to by the Secretary of the Interior, strikes at the homestead settler as well as the prc- emptor, and is a mean and wantorv insult to both. Should it be applied in all cases, as it was cruelly done in this, it would kindle a fire throughout the West which it might cost the Government some pains to quench. Sir, in the name of our grand army of pioneers, whether native or f;reign born, I denounce it. As I have said here on another occasion, it mocks justice, sets common sense atdrfiar.ce, and insults judi- cial decency; nmlthe men who procured it, in behalf of soulless speculators and land- sharks, were engaged in a most unworthy service. I must add, as the saddest fact of all, that this foul plot of thieving monopo- lists received the sanction of the House of Representatives of tfie United States, as ihown by its rcccrdcd vote on the 7th day of July, in theyeur 18GG. EVILS OF OL'lt LAND POLICY GENERALLY THE FINANCIAL QUESTION. Mr. Speaker, the facts I have submitted should alarm every real friend of our coun- try. This wholesale prostitution of the people's heritage, this merciless crusade the ri^hrta of coming generations, * insumtly. It will tax all . our rulers to heal the wounds upoa our country, and which have laid hold on its very lift. Whii the power of Government to do good is limited, and negative at best, its capacity for evil is practically infinite. It has bean said truly that the influence of the laws under which we live pervades the national character, is felt in every transaction of ear social existence, and is seen, like the frogs of Pharaoh, "in our houses and in. our beds, in our ovens aad in our koeadkig- troughs." Our land policy will have its enduring monument in the very cinrses which it plants in its footsteps, and writes down upon the soil. It poisons our social life by checking the multiplication of American homes, and the growth of the domestic virtues. It tends to aggregate our people in towns and cities, and render them mere consumers, instead of dispersing them over our territory, and tempting them t become the owners of land and the creator} of wealth. It fosters the tiiste for artificia ife, and the excitements to be foand ii ircat centers of population, instead of hold ^ng up the truth that "God made thx ountry," and intended it to bo peopled and enjoyed. It dries up tke sourees of ^rodtfctive wealth, as I have already shown, nd thus fatally abridges the revenues, now so much needed in meeting our national obligations. As a mere scheme of finante, believe the passage of the bill now be- bre us would be decidedly the boat of the muny which have been proposed and de- bated. The great want of the country to- day is more producers, and to this end a >olicy which shall draw from the older States and from cur overcrowded cities the millions of unemployed men who arc seek- ng to live by their wits, and to evade the command that "in the sweat of thy face .halt thou cat thy bread." This, sir, is my )olicy of finauco. Tho money whioh ia to pay our debt must be dug from the soil, and rom our mines ; and whatever decision Congress may make as to the taxation ef uur bonds, or the kind of money in which hey shall be paid, or the further contra*- tion or expansion ef the currency, or the 16 rcadjustroont of our tariff and internal fpvorme system, our national debt, after all, ransC bo paid. That hard duty I* un- avoidably laid upau us, aad there ia no royal road to its performance. In the broadest and best sense of the term, there- fore, this bill is a measure of financial re- lief; and should it become a lu\v, it will stand forth a* a great landtnark in the legis- lation f the country, and as the crowning aotef a policy which has sought to find expression for more than fifty j ears. In the oariy period of the Government settlements the public domain were forbidden by law. In the year 1807 Congress even provided for the removal of persons who should at- tempt settlements wit Lout authority oflaw. this illiberal treatment of our pioneers was )f short duration, but the policy of prc- imptiaa was of slow growth, and was only finally perfected in the year 1841. Twenty- one years later the homestead' law was enacted, recognizing still further the jusfc claims of settlers ; but it allowed the Rpec- uUtor to cripple and harass them at every step, and thus seriously to frnslrate the great and beneficent ends which otherwise it would have perfectly accomplished. It way a half-way measure of relief, pointing as naturally to the complete remedy now proposed as did the prc-eir.ption laws point tothofar broader policy of the homestead act. Lei us now apply it, and thus extend the Kordcrs of our civilization, increase our na- tional wealth, curb the ra-vagcs of .monopo- lists, satisfy the earth-hunger of the multi- tudes who arc striving for homes on our soil, and thus practically reassert the righ* of people to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 1