The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1912-03-19

F
iod there have been in round numbers
900, 900 homestead entries gone to
final patent, which have taken sub
stantially 125, 000, 900 acres Of the pub
lie domain. During the past thirty
FIVE years, since the enactment Of the
stone and timber law and the desert
land law, there have bee patented
under the former act 100000 acres
and under the latter about 100000,
and during the past forty years, under
the timber culture laws there were
patented about 1O,O 900 acres. There
have been in the neighborhood Of 500,-
600 acres patented as coal lands and
also some other dispositions of the
public domain in smaller amounts in
various ways
while there remains in the United
States, exclusive Of Alaska, approx
mately BIT, 900, 900 acres of public land,
and exclusive Of about 100, 000, 900
acres in forest reserves, the fact is
that these various entrymen who have
settled on the public domain during
the past fifty years have had the
choice of the public domain and have
naturally selected the most fertile and
productive land, AND the land most
easily cleared and cultivated.
CHOSE 600, 1000 homesteaders and the
entries Of thousands of presumption
claimants, desert land and stone and
timber entrymen, as well as the rail-
roads themselves, ave culled over the
lands Of the western states until to-
day there remain only the lands that
have been during all these years and
up to the present time passed ove
many times and rejected az unfit for
cultivation and not worth the effort re-
quired for their reclamation. The re-
suit is that at the present time our
h~omeseekers are not only becoming
more and more reluctant to take the
remaining isolated tracts Of land, but
the stringency of the rulings of the de-
partment Of the interior and the con-
struction placed upon the existing laws
are, in the opinion Of your committee,
seriously retarding the development of
the west. This statement is conclu-
sively borne out by the rapidly de-
creasing number Of original entries"
The report then quotes briefly from
the annual report of the secretary Of
the interior, as follows:
1.-THE total area Of public and Indian
land originally entered during the fs-
cal year ending June 80, 1911, is IT,
639, 099.54 acres, a decrease of $751;
1885 acres as compared with the
area entered during the year 1910"
Using these figures as a text, the
committee report vi
"This statement brings home to us
very forcibly, indeed, the fact that
a,-sA Al -o~k xxaon tho nTrrnhas IF
original entrymen, intending settlers
upon the public domain, has fallen off
33 Ia per cent That wildly discloses
the startling fact that $4,000 home
seekers and home builders who would
naturally, and have formerly, gone out
to select and settle upon our lands
have gone elsewhere during the past
year. And when the records show
that during that year $4,000 good
American citizens-the farmers and
backbone and sinew of this country
have gone to Canada, and not only ex-
patriated themselves personally, which
is by far the most serious loss, but
have taken with them at the least es-
innate, $125, 900, 600, the loss to this
country can scarcely be estimated.
| Canada offers them a three-year
homestead upon good land, easily re-
claimed and cultivated, with a six
months leave of absence each year
and most lenient regulations. while in
this country conditions have vastly
changed during the past few years.
This situation is very forcibly realized
in the west, and is also recognized by
the honorable secretary Of the interior
in his report to this committee.
THE many thousands Of government
contests and protests against all forms
Of entries Of public land and the pro-