PUBLIC LANDS.

BY HON. LEWIS E. PAYSON, M. C. FROM ILLINOIS.

THE Republican party is entitled to the entire credit for the adoption of the Homestead Law.

No public question considered in recent years exceeds in importance that of the proper management and disposal of the public domain.

When the Republican party was organized, the vast area of arable land in the Mississippi Valley in the West and Northwest, as well as that greater area of territory lying westward and southwesterly to the Pacific Ocean, was largely the property of the government, undisposed-of public lands.

Besides these were lands in many localities in the South in like condition.

In a general sense, the only method of disposition of these lands had been by sale by the General Government, to realize money from them as an asset, as its necessities required and as capital would invest.

For many years the minimum price was two dollars per acre; all sales were at public auction, and only the remnants, after the close of the public sale, could be purchased at private sale.

Hence there was very little chance for a poor man to procure the desirable land for a home. However, beginning with the act of March 3, 1801, and ending with the act of March 27, 1854, various "pre-emption" acts were passed by Congress, giving a settler the first right or preference to purchase, as against one desiring to buy for investment or speculation.

The principal acts of this character were those of 1830 and 1841, known as the Pre-emption Laws.

These laws required not only settlement upon and improvement of the land, but a cash payment therefor of not less than one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre. So that the public

land system was managed upon the principle of realizing as much revenue as possible from it.

In view of the fact that the settlers, as a rule, were poor but industrious men, carving homes for themselves and their families out of the wild, unbroken lands, the Republican party, at the very outset of its career, adopted the principle of giving small areas of public lands to actual occupants for homes. The history of the movement for " free homes for the people," for "lands for the landless," is both interesting and significant.

Whatever of credit grows out of the inauguration, maturing, and administering the Homestead Law of this day, the Republican party is entitled to it all.

Moreover, the results attained have been secured only by the most persistent efforts and against the earnest opposition of the Democratic party during all these years.

The Pre-emption Law, giving, as stated, a prior right of purchase to a settler, was in force when, in the Thirty-fifth Congress, Mr. Grow of Pennsylvania introduced in the House a bill providing in substance that no public lands should be sold at public auction until, at least, ten years after the same were surveyed and due return thereof made to the General Land Office.

This gave the settler ten years of preference over the speculator; but it was defeated by a vote of 73 for to 78 against. Not a Republican voted against it.

Again, on a bill relating to the then existing Pre-emption Law, in January, 1859, an amendment in substance like the bill just named was moved by Mr. Grow; this amendment was adopted by a vote of 97 to 81, every Republican voting for it; but the bill as amended was defeated by a vote of 91 for to 95 against. Every Republican, with a few Douglas Democrats, voted for the bill.

At the session of 1858-59 Mr. Grow re-introduced the Homestead Law, which is the basis of the Homestead Law now in force.

He had the same measure pending in the preceding Congress, but failed to secure consideration then; but the bill came

up for consideration on February 1, 1859, and met with the earnest opposition of the Democratic party in the House.

Parliamentary tactics were resorted to to defeat its consideration, but uselessly; and after a long debate upon it, it passed.

In advocating the passage of the bill, Mr. Grow asserted the Republican doctrine that the government should cease to look to the public lands as a source of revenue, and that they should be set apart and secured in limited quantities as free homes for actual settlers, instead of being left, as they were under the practice then, to be absorbed by the capital of the country in a vast system of land monopoly.

In earnest words he denounced the system of sales, and pleaded for free homesteads. After repeated attempts by the Democrats to smother the bill and failing, it passed by a vote of 120 to 76.

Every Republican save one voted for the bill, and the party policy on the question was established.

The bill went to the Senate; its consideration was antagonized there by the Democrats; it was in charge of Senator Wade of Ohio, and by a vote of 25 to 23 was taken up.

Under the rules the time limited for debate expired before a vote was had, and the pending subject then was a bill for the purchase of Cuba, and the contest was between these two bills. -the one to acquire territory for the extension of slavery, the other to secure free homes for free men. The consideration of the Homestead Law was defeated, every Republican voting for it.

Senator Wade again presented the bill, and was defeated by a vote of 24 to 31, every Republican voting for it; and a week later the attempt was again made, with the same result.

After one more unsuccessful attempt that session, the matter was abandoned in the Senate for that term.

Public sentiment had been freely expressed as to the meas ure now, and in the Thirty-sixth Congress Mr. Grow again introduced the bill, and it was favorably reported by the Committee on Public Lands, and, after stubborn resistance and over dilatory motions by the Democrats, it was pressed to a vote and passed

by 115 to 65, the Republicans unanimously for it; all against it, Democrats.

The bill went to the Senate, a committee of which reported a substitute for the Grow bill, in substance fixing a price for the lands at 25 cents per acre, and excluding settlers then on the public lands from its benefits. Various unsuccessful efforts were made by the Republicans to substitute the Grow bill. The Senate bill finally passed; the House refused to accept it. Conferences were had, and finally, because the Senate would not yield, the House receded and accepted the Senate bill, but with the clear statement that the principle was not to be abandoned, and that the effort would be kept up until the freehomestead principle was established and all the public lands opened to the people for homes without cost.

This was on June 19, 1860; on the 23d, President Buchanan returned the bill to the Senate with his veto.

Except as to details not necessary to notice, he bases his objection to the bill on Democratic grounds of strict construction of the Constitution; that the small price fixed on the lands made them practically a gift, and certain other provisions of the bill, providing in contingency for donation of lands to the States, and that Congress had no power to dispose of the public lands by gift or donation as proposed.

The issue was clearly made; and the attempt to pass the bill over the veto failed, not receiving the necessary two-thirds vote.

But the great fight for free homes was not to end here; a great deal of feeling was exhibited throughout the North on the question.

The National Republican Convention met in Chicago and adopted this principle, in response to a clearly-understood sentiment of the membership of the party, in this form:

"Resolved, That we protest against any sale or alienation to others of the public lands held by actual settlers, and against any view of the free-homestead policy which regards the settlers as paupers or suppliants for public bounty; and we demand the passage by Congress of the complete and satisfactory homestead measure which has already passed the House."