The Superior times. [volume] (Superior, Wis.) 1870-1912, 1871-12-16
OUR LAND GRANT.


of market. 1t is reserved for the purposes
of a grant originally made to the State of
Wisconsin to aid in the construction of
railroad from St. Croix Lake to Superior
and Bayfield,, on Lake Superior.
The State early bestowed the lands upon
corporation known as the St. Croix &
Lake Superior r. r. Co., subject to the
conditions of the grant About the time
when that Company might have been ex-
pected to undertake and prosecute in ear
nest the work of construction throughout
their whole line, the country was engaged
in the war of the rebellion, and capital
could not be easily obtained to build rail-
roads in a frontier region, between termini
so remote from business centres as were the
termini of this line.
When at length after the war the fnan-
ces of the country became so settled that
such enterprises seemed practicable, so lit
tie of the time limited in the grant, for the
completion of the road, remained, that a
moderate land second) extension of time
was necessary, In order to make the grant
fully available as security for capital that
should be invested in the work.
But the application for this extension en-
countered the opposition of powerful as
sociation already committed to the project
of railroad in Minnesota, to connect the
Mississippi river with the head of Lake Su-
perior.
And this opposition it is, which, under
the guise of patriotic solicitude for the
due and proper disposition of the pub
lie lands, has been able hitherto to pre-
vent the extension Of the grant. We mean
to say that such is the guise-the livery--un-
der which the measure has been assaulted in
Congress, before the country.
The real motive of this opposition has,
however, been well understood in this
quarter, and doubtless also in Congress,
and would have been more apparent to the
country at large, but for the fact that the
recent development in the Eastern States
Of a sentiment adverse to further donations
of land in aid of railroads, furnished con
venient ground upon which, under stan
dard popular perhaps, but in reality alien
70 the views Of this class of adherents,
rival railroad interest could be crushed.
And it will be the work of those who are
charged with the protection OF Wisconsin
interests in the national Legislature, to show,
as they easily can, that the proposition to
bac
connection with the new policy of hence
forth reserving the public domain for other
uses than those of railroad construction.
Whatever may be said of that policy per
Sc, the grant in question, is affected by pc
culiar and far different considerations.
is an old grant bestowed originally
while the government was con the giving
hand,n and makes for Wisconsin a compile
ment not larger than was ruleably accorded
TO other new states and territories at the
time. The faith that it would subslst un-
impaired to fulfil ultimately its proper ends,
has for half generation, influenced large
". the course in life and the business plans
and prospects of thousands of pioneers IN
Northwestern Wisconsin.
The precise location of the grant has
been for many years fixed, and several
hundred thousand acres of the alternate
even sections, have been purchased from
the government and paid for by settlers and
others at a price double that which would
have been asked had there been no grant.
And these purchasers have an equitable
claim on the government, tor speclhc
performance, that cannot be satisfied by
restoration to thonl of one half their pur-
chase money with interest. Such mode
of adjustment would take no account OF
the labors and hopes of lite's term OF ac-
tiyifv. nor of enhanced values and advan-
taoes W .ich the settler in choosing his To-
cation, had a right to anticipate, as the re-
suit of railroads whose construction the
GRANT should secure. And the question
which now arises is, whether these men and
these interests shall be left prey to the
selfish creed and monopolizing designs OF
another and foreign railroad combination
that would prevent if possible the building
of the roads contemplated by this grant,
offer bavino secured for itself on It's own
Ground in its own region, IN another otate'
the full benefits of similar though larger
grant.
Upon this question, Wisconsin, whose
people are so vitally concerned IN the mat
ter and whose prosperity and interest are