New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1858-01-23
SCHOOL LANDS or THE NORTHWEST.
Of TheN.Y. Tribune.

NEBRASKA CrTT, Jan. 4, 1853.
Permit me through the columns Of TIKI TRIBUNE TO
call public attention to very great evil which unless
checked By timely Legislation, will inevitably work
gres, injury to the educational interests Of the North
West. To the citizen of the United States who is DOS
sessed of true patriotism il needs no array of logic to
prove that the educational interest of the country
should take precedence over every other they came
in collision, both possessing equal claims to privilege
Most enphaticaly this important interest here in
the Northwest, where demagoguism using ignorance
a. tool has for the last three years arayed two sec.
tions of common country in hostile attitude 10.
ward each other, and opened wider breach between
brethren than many years can heal In these schools,
TOO are to be educated the voters who will soon cast
the balancing vote in Congress. If their influence il
expected to be conservative how important that they
should be intelligent
AT the last session of Congress an act was passed
ostensby for the relief ofthose who, settling on Gov
eminent lands before they are surveyed, find them
selves the school sections when the lines run.
The Territorial Legislature had in my opinion, pro-
vded adequate relief for the e1igenees of the
before. The peculiar hardshps of these settlers are
lust these that instead of purchasing their claims di
rect of Government, and paying 81 - per acre cash
down and IN a very great many instances borrowing
the money at from 20 TO 50 per cent Interestingly
purchase of the School Commissioner (some of their
neighbors having appraised their land, if il is first
rate, nj from ana get long cfe,ilt
upon it for paying simple interest. Not unrequently
the principal Is not called for, only the interest Ii
they had made any improvements on their lands the
appraisers were directed by the Territorial law not Ia
regard them i'll the appraisal. l think the cases
very rare in which the school lands ever cost an
actual settler before survey, reckoning Improvements
and appraisal, 30 per cent of what he would be willing
TO sell for. II from proximity to promising town,
or any such cause, the appraisers set higher vaua
ton than ordinary, think it would be found gen.
era rule that the higher it is appraised the better
bargain il is for the settler. In no country and upon
no subject are mans interests safer IN the hands OF
friendly and conscientious nelghbors, than on the
frontier in settling questions Of the right TO home
| care not bow many enemies he may have. On this
subject all feel alike that they are bound up in one
bundle. Their interests are similar, and these inter
tsts are dependent on and guarded by one OF
the strongest instincts OF our nature and IN
their defense we have seen men constltutionally
the most timid, and by education the most
-crupulous, ready to use deadly weapon at a
moments notice. But supposing the hardships of
these settlers all they sometimes represented are
they any greater than of those settling the mineral
and saline lands which Government reserves for itself
Shall we rob our own children Is the education Of
unborn generations, III whose keeping we are to con-
fde the destines of this republic, of less moment than
few thousands Of revenue Nebraska will feel this
injury much than any other Territory Her best
lands lie along her navigabe streams. The progress
Of settlement ten years since no test OF that OF To-
day Steam has impaired its own peculiar qualities
To emigration expansveness, s swlltness, Its oil
peryadpg influence The numbering wagon aud the
patient OK will not bear the pioneer to the immense
and fertile valleys of the Yellow Stone and Upper
Missouri As the rush of steam at the sliding of the
valve so will be the movement of emigration, the in
slant tie inerdict of Indian ownership Is removed.
No such useless formahty rs the removal OF the In
dians will be waited for gaudy colored blanket, or
few handfuls of beads carried by each settler VIII
entitle him to choose claim. Boat after boat freight
ed with eager emgrants will push tar up toward the
Rocky Mountains The mass of her most valuable
school lands will be seized long before surveying
parties be organized and brought on to the ground
1t is safe to predict that her school fund will be re-
duced from One-third to one-haf by this bill.
be right (which cannot we should feel Obliged
to dissent from loose and vague an instrument a.
this. allowing of so great latitude OF construction
viz: Resolved, by" DC, I" that, when any settle
"ment by the erection OF dwellng-h9use, or inc
cultivation of any portion of the land shall have
been or shall be made upon the sixteenth or thirty
sixth sections before the said sections shall have
leen or shall be surveyed, when such sections
have been may be selected or occupied as town
sites :" &C., then other lands shall be selected by
tie proper authorities in lieu thereof, &c. A
high authority as we have in the Territory hos de-
decided that the above part of the bill stands as al
enactment by ITSELF and that any settlements
before survey on sections 10 and 3D. places them al
once and forever out of the pale OF school lands
whether or not followed up by continued effort on the
part OF the settler to acquire them, and whether moi
he is successful in his efforts. So too il selected
or occupied town site, it is sliesated 1t need
not be selected and occupi.1 it needs only to be Sc
hcted. No necessity for even making and recording
town plot. Selection the only weapon needed to keep
of inpertinent and intrusive School Commissioners.
No provision for any notice /, be served on any school
official TO appear at the Land Office snd test legality
of proceedings, as there always must bebetweeh tw!
| contes,ing claimants but the whole thing managed
clandestnty and parte. BE ii known, too, that
the small portion of Kansas and Nebraska which Is yet
settled has more land "0lectcf for cities than the
New England States have yet used for such purposes
In the school district in which reside an attempt Is
being made to plaster city upon part OF school
section onehalf of which undoubtedly lost to Us by
this bill already, and the remaining half, in the opln-
ion of good judges, if properly managed should
within ten fifteen years, afford respectable toun-
dation for college fund, which is much needed here
am satisfied that not not one settler IN fifteen IN
this Territory desires any interference between the
settler the School Lands and fair appraisal; not
one in hundred desires any such bill as this. WIN
defer to no man in appreciative sympathy for the
Western squatter A large portion of my life since
bOyhood have been one myself and am one now
know from experience all the hardships and priva-
tons of frontier life, and if it has impressed any one
lesson ndelbly on my mind it is this: That cduca-
ton is better than houses and lands. have no per-
sOna or partisan interest to serve accuse no lndl-
yidual aud arragn no political party; but presume
this bill was voted for by of all shades OF politics.
We to have important decision soon under tAlS
law, and will send you the result. A. bowen