Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1884-02-23
COMPENSATION TO GOVERNMENT IS
NEEDED IMPROVEMENT.
Isan Francisco Call, February 10th.

While there is very general opinion
that the policy of subsidizing railroads,
either with land grants or money, should
be discontinued, the reasons for declaring
land grants forfeited are less conclusive
Most of our roads have been built mostly
on credit, largely based on these land
grants. Bends have been issued in advance
of the work and sold on the representation
that the land granted was portion Of the
company's property. The action of Con-
gress declaring these grants forfeited can
hardly fail to affect the bonds Of the COM
panies interested. The loss, however, will
not fall so much on the companies as upon
the holders of the bonds. The most im-
portant condition for Congress to keep in
view in the disposal of public lands is that
they shall be held until sold in small tracts
1t is of less Importance who holds them
than that they ara available to settlers at
reasonable prices when wanted. 1t is bet.
ter to let the railroad companies have the
lands on condition that railroads shall be
built, with the condition annexed that it
shall only be sold in small lots, than to
sell outright in large tracts to spectators.
If Government sells million acres to
some foreign landowner, who will lay out
his estate in farms to be rented, little
complaint is heard. The foreign spec.
ulator usually lets his purchase lie idle un.
til native enterprise has doubled or trebled
IS valle, when he quietly takes posses
sion. He does nothing toward devel-
opiug the country or opening the lands to
settlement by building roads. In most
cases the foreign purchaser is a drone who
waits with a calculating patience while his
neighbors work. In the one case the Gov.
eminent receives a certain amount of
money for land disposed Of, but in the
other the compensation comes in the form
of needed improvements. Trunk lines OF
railroads now penetrate the country so
completely that new grants are unneces-
sary. Many of the grants already made
have done more for the people in the way
OF opening up new localities than could
have been done with the money they
might have sold it for. There is no need
to continue policy after the need for it
has passed. Railroads will now be built by
private enterprise as fast as they are need
ed. The great trunk lines have as yet dis.
posed of but small portions of their grants
The Union Pacific has sold | ,S59. AS acres
at sn average of 81 IL per acre. The
Southern Pacific has sold .OS7 $40 acres
at 81 80, and the Central Pacific has sold
l, 1913. $50 at 81 Al OF 80, 900, 900 acres
earned by various railroad companies, but
1872, $50 have been patented. Some com.
plant is made because the lands are not
patented in advance Of demand for them,
but there is some compensation for the loss
of taxes thereby involved in the fact that
the lands are not passing into the posses-
sion of spectators. The rule of the COM
psnies is to place lands in the market as
fast as there is demand for them by set
tiers. The companies themselves are inter-
ested in disposing of their lands to settlers,
bat not in large tracts to spectators who
will await developments.