New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1860-01-26
from cur Federal Government chiefly derive, it's


10 draw the attention of the opponents OF Land
Reform. They uniformly assume-se, for OK
annie the late Report of the Secretary OF the In
teriOr-tlat the ten York sbilliugs per acre which
the Government charges for it's lands is the limit OF
their cost to the actual settler and they scott at the
idea of bis regarding the payne mt of this patry sum
AZ hardship. Yet not one Of the millions Of acres
of wild land within reach of a schooLhouse, grist.
mill, or even decent highway, can now be obtained
for the Government price; while in every State
carved out of the National Domain-eyen 10 Ohio,
the oldest of a-hundreds of thousands OF acres,
having long ago been bought up by Specializing fore
s,allers have been held out of reach OF the great
mass of pioneers, and are today valued at live to
fifty dollars per acre. They lie there right In the
way Of settlement, progress, Improvement prevent
ing the construction of roads, mills, school houses,
churches; and they who have kept them thus in the
way for ten or twenty years insist on being pad ten
or twenty times their original cost before they VIII
allow them to be settled. Is this system which
Republic based on the intelligence and independence
of the masses ought to uphold and perpetuate
If to-day young farmer from the Old States
were TO journey to Iowa or Wisconsin in quest of
| new home, expecting to find quarter-section
| whereon to locate his landwarrant and make his
future home he might travel month without lind.
| inc The object of his search. Though there are
| still millions of acres of Public Land in either
State he would find it all but mpossibility to
reach any such, unless he struck off into the track
less wilderness days journey from any sign OF
civilization. Every approachabe, accessible, eLgi-
BILE tract not claimed by a settler is already the
property of some specuator who holds 1t for an
enhanced price, expecting to make his fortune by
standing between the land and its future cultlya-
| tors We have passed over miles after miles OF
| such land. whereon no blow had ever been struck,
which was held at thirty dollars per acre-a price
for which very fair farms can to-day be bought in the
heart of New-York or New-England, surrounded
by roads, mills stores, markets, schools churches
and every incident of civilization Only by leaving
all these behind and plunging at least days jour-
ney into the wilderness, can man hope to obtain
land at Government price. Here his children must
grow up unschsOed; he must dwell for years in .
cabin of rough orhalEhewn logs, wtha spt-log floor
or one of earth with no mill, or store, or post Office
within fifteen to thirty miles, in order to secure
cheap land 1t seems to us that he who creates
farm out of such materials deserves well of his
country, and should be encouraged and aided, not
taxed and fettered in his laudabe enterprise.
For, in fact, most of those who do thus pass
beyond the bounds of civilization and pitch their
tents resolutely in the wilderness, are poor men,
many of whom never possessed hundred dollars
each at any one time in the of their previous
lives Many Others have seen hard times, and been
stripped of their all by the Sheriff. turned naked
on the world by fire, or rendered bankrupt by
some other form of sudden calamity. Gathering up
their little remnant of household goods, they have
plunged into the deep woods to be out OF the reach
of writs and duns, out of sight of those who knew
them in the day of their comparative prosperity.
They take fresh start in life squatters, each on
quarter section that he hopes some day to swn,
but cannot now pay for; and for years, what with
the necessity of subduing rugged Nature fencing,
fighting off wild beasts and destructive vermin,
working with rude implements and inadequate
team, he manages to live, and that is about all.
Meantime, his tract is proclaimed for sale; but he
can no more pay for it than pay for the Astor
House. He can only avoid being turned out 0
house and home BY getting some capitalist to bid of
his tract, and give him an article or agreement that
he may have it two or three years hence by paying
up the principal and twenty-five to fifty per cent.
interest. Tens OF thousands have thus paid the
Government price of their quarter-sectiOns twice or
thrice over before they could call them their own;
hundreds of thousands are thus paying enormous
interest for them to-day, and hoping to pay up the
principal some tme--as perhaps they will. But If
there ever was device to enrich the wealthy and
keep the poor penniless for ever this Government
charge on the settlement of wild lands is One
AT length the children of the pioneers grow up to
manhood, and want lands of their own, and would
naturally settle around the humble homes of their
parents. But nO-thOse lands have risen in price
in other words, spectators have cutched them al
ask ten or twenty times their original cost They
have done nothing to enhance their value; but those
who want to settle and improve them have killed
off or driven away the wild beasts, and opened
roads, and built bridges, and melted the cOnstruc
ton Of mills, the opening of stores, the establish
ment of post-olices, &c, within few miles; and
for this they must pay the spectators roundly or
plunge deep into the savage wilderness as their
fathers did. Look where you may throughout the
West, you find each settlement surrounded, miles
Deep with spectators land, which can only be had
by paying SPECTATORS prices-for what Was
there ever system so calculated to dispense, i'm
poverisb, shroud in mental night and every way
barbarize civilized people
Men and brethren let us relax no effort till We
Al. Mill