New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1850-12-07

but the Treasury received only Two Mil
lions Six Hundred Thousand Dollars there
for, or a little over fifty cents for each acre
alienated, from which deduct twenty cents
per acre for Expenses. and the balance is
meager indeed. In 1349. over Five NIL
lions of Acres were disposed of, but the
Treasury received from all but One NIL
lion Seven Hundred and Fifty thousand
Dollars, or a little over thirty cents per
acre; and in the first three quarters of
1850, nearly Three Millions of Acres have
been alienuted, and only Eleven Hundred
Thousand Dollars realized, or probably
less than fftee', cents PEI. acre for all the
land disposed of, after the cost of our Land
selling system shall have been fully SUBJ
tracted. And the prospect to-day is that
this very Congress, which passed the most
~tupendous Pension Act ever heard of at
It's former session, will now consummate
its work by exposing all these Pensions, as
well in the form of Warrants as afterward,
to the clutch of Speculation and Monopoly,
The Commissioner forcibly remonstrates
against this, but he will not be needed.
The Members have pleased considerable
portion Of their respective constituencies
by granting them Land Bounties in consid-
Grafton of former Military service; but not
one-tentb of them want the Lands 10 settle
on and cultivate they want to sell their
claim, warrant, certificate, or whatever it
may be, for instant cash, and as much as
possible. What do they think or care
about Land Monopoly! They are greedy
for 'spoiIs, while the residue Of the Peo-
Pile are mainly ignorant and Indifferent.
SO the law will be amended, and Forty
Millions more of Public Lands viii be
thrown into Wall-street aud similar local
tiles, to be hawkcd about and blown upon
as if it were pack of cards instead of the
right to inhabit and cultivate Gods earth.
The first effect of this will be to stop
almost entirely sa!es of Public Lands for
many years to come. The enormous aud
utterly indefensibIe grant of amie square to
each settler in Oregon, with the immense
grants to local Improvements of all kinds,
will combine with this new Bounty Act to
glut the market for at least generation.
The new Warrants will be for sale below
hundred dollars for a quartersection il
they are but made out fast enough, and
very few will choose to pay twice that
sum into the Treasury for precisely the
same thing in effect. 1t is plain to our
view that the Public Lands will not more
than pay their own charges for at least
twenty years to come, provided the new
Warrants are made transferable and the
present system in other respects is main
tanned.
But why should it be maintained ? Why
keep up most expensive toll-bridse be-
tween the relatively destitute crowd press
ing westward to find lands on which they
may labor for themselves and their fami
lies, when the only result viii be to drive
the weary travellers across the spectators
bridge Just below and fill those spectators
pockets with gold Why not block their
game at once and forever, not by repeating
the Bounty Land bill, but by extending its
provisions TO all the Landlcss Millions =
by enacting not only that all who have
fought for the country, but that all who have
worked for it or aciA work for it likewise,
may have land whereon to live? A single
act prescribing that every one withoutland'
who wants it for his own use and susie
nance, may have quarter section (inalien-
able except to one otherwise landless)
would right many past wrongs, or divest
them of importance. 1t would give new
impulse to lndustry--a new prospect to
Poverty-a new hope to Despair. Not
merely the saving of the cost of Land
though that is heavy to those who have
more children than dollars, and only their
own hands wherewith to support the former
and win the latter--but the general compact
ness secured to settlement-the marching
abreast as it were, of the pioneer popula-
ton of the Great Wcst-would prove an in
calculabIe blessing. Now the poor man who
would buy quarter-section at Government
price, must go away beyond roads, schools,
mills, churches, &c. to locate, or he finds
himself on spectators lands, held at five
to Fifty dollars per acre. The moment a
spot becomes eligible for a settler, there is
a valuation placed ON il which Poverty CAM