Land cession

“ And since a great number of the Western farmers had simply taken up their lands, before they were thrown open to sale, and made improvements on them without procuring titles, they feared the enforcement of the federal law against them and clamored for a preëmption system which would secure them their land, when the day of sales did come, at the minimum price, $1.25 per acre. A still better plan was already strongly urged, the free gift of small tracts of land to all who would go West and build homes. ”

“ Even when the credit or installment feature was abolished in 1821 and the price of the land lowered to a cash price of $1.75 an acre, the opportunity for large speculative purchases continued to attract capital to land ventures.
The Development of the Small Freehold.—The cheapness of land and the scarcity of labor, nevertheless, made impossible the triumph of the huge estate with its semi-servile tenantry. For about $45 a man could get a farm of 160 acres on the installment plan ”

“ Added to this outlay, large sums have been expended in boring wells, building reservoirs and establishing water stations on cattle and sheep ranges. Buying land from landowners controlling large tracts, obtained by devious means in the early stages of the country's development, is still another heavy national expense. This land, when allotted to small farm settlers, is leased. Leasing the land, instead of granting the freehold, does not augur for a rapid increase in the rural population. ”

“ As the embargo and the War of 1812 cut off men from employment on the sea and along the coast, their attention was directed to the possibilities of the public lands. Between 1800 and 1820, nearly twenty million acres were sold, bringing in cash receipts of over forty-five million dollars. After 1806, the old certificates and other forms of government paper were no longer received in payment for lands. The credit system had been adopted to allow poor men to purchase farms and pay for them from the products of the land. But it tempted many to purchase more land than they could pay for. ”

“ Such purchases, however, are almost everywhere extremely desirable, there being hardly any country in which landed property is not either too much or too little subdivided, requiring either that great estates should be broken down, or that small ones should be bought up and consolidated. To make land as easily transferable as stock, would be one of the greatest economical improvements which could be bestowed on a country ”

“ Though the government had arbitrary power to take almost any lands it wanted, the number of forced sales was not very large. The presence of the law on the statute books and the realization that the government meant business resulted in offers of great tracts of land for sale. Almost every year nearly twice as much land was offered to the government as it was prepared to buy, and it was thus able to pick and choose such lands as were best suited by location and quality for settlement. ”

“ As we view the policy from the year 1903 and from the midst of a populous valley, in which land values have risen from one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre to a hundred or two hundred dollars in most fertile farm tracts, and to thousands in urban centres, we can but regret that these lands themselves had not been held inviolate, and can but wish that only their rentals had been devoted to the high uses to which the nation and State had consecrated these lands. ”

“ Land monopoly—in the hands of individuals, corporations or syndicates—is at bottom the prime cause of the inequalities which obtain; which desolate fertile acres turned over to vast ranches and into bonanza farms of a thousand acres, where not one family finds a habitation, where muscle and brain are supplanted by machinery, and the small farmer is swallowed up and turned into a tenant or slave. ”

“ I consider the production of food the primary trust upon the land, that rapid transit over it is a secondary object; and as all experience shows that the division of land into small estates leads to a more perfect system of tillage, I think it would be of vast importance to the entire nation if all tenants who were, say, five years in possession were made "promoters" under the Land Clauses Act, and thus be enabled to purchase the fee of their holdings in the same manner as a body of railway proprietors. ”

“ As a substitute measure which arose over the problem of land taken up in Pamunkey Neck and on the south side of Blackwater Swamp, the Governor and Council in 1699 authorized the acquisition of land by "treasury right," stating that title to fifty acres of land would be granted for the payment of five shillings sterling to the auditor. Thus during the terminal year of this study, we find the significant reappearance of sale of land by "treasury right" which increased in importance as the eighteenth century progressed. ”

“ It is thought, however, that the process of disintegration is too slow, and provision has been made in a Land Bill just passed to allow the Government to make purchases of land where the owner is willing, and then to lease or sell it on long terms in small farms to persons who will put it to a profitable use. ”

“ In so far as the defects of legal arrangements are a mere burthen on the landowner, they do not much affect the sources of production; but the uncertainty of the title under which land is held, must often act as a great discouragement to the expenditure of capital in its improvement; and the expense of making transfers, operates to prevent land from coming into the hands of those who would use it to most advantage ”

“ And the irony of this is, that whenever small holdings are mentioned, we are told that the peasant is too poor to farm to advantage—he will not get out of his land what could be got out of it by a man able to spend money as well as labour on it; and the very persons who think this a good reason for extinguishing small holdings are the most anxious to prevent the bankrupt owner of half a shire from selling one of the acres, which he is too poor to farm to advantage.
But the evils of our land system are not confined to entail. The transfer of land has long been crying out for reform. ”

“ Those settlements, or revenue contracts, were ordinarily sanctioned for periods of thirty years, and the landholders, whom the author calls 'lessees', have gradually changed into 'proprietors', with full power over their land, subject only to the State lien for the 'land revenue' (Crown rent, or State share of the produce) , and to the laws of inheritance and succession. The 'resumption of rent-free lands' simply means the subjection of those lands to the payment of 'land revenue'. It is inaccurate to say that the lands are become 'the property of Government' by reason of their being assessed. ”

“ The removal of restrictions upon buying and selling would merely permit the ownership of land to assume more quickly the form to which it tends. Now, that the tendency in Great Britain is to concentration is shown by the fact that, in spite of the difficulties interposed by the cost of transfer, land ownership has been and is steadily concentrating there, and that this tendency is a general one is shown by the fact that the same process of concentration is observable in the United States. ”

“ Until the good land is sold there will be no purchasers of the bad; for, as has been stated in the report of the committee of manufactures, a discreet farmer would rather give a dollar and a quarter per acre for first-rate land, than accept refuse and worthless land as a present. ”

“ We can thus concentrate upon land as the representative of the free gifts of nature, which are of economic significance. Land in modern communities is for the most part privately owned. It can be bought and sold for a price, and acquired by inheritance. Moreover, it is a common practice, particularly in the United Kingdom, for an owner who does not wish himself to cultivate or otherwise use the land, not to sell it to the man who does, but to lease it to him for a term of years for an annual payment which we term rent. ”

“ The object of this provision is to prevent existing landowners from aggregating large estates by the purchase of Crown Lands. Cash sales are effected at a price of not less than 20s. and 5s. per acre, respectively, for first-class and second-class land, and entitle the selector to a free-hold title upon the expenditure of a prescribed amount on improvements. Land selected under occupation with the right of purchase is subject to a rental of 5 per cent. upon the cash price, under lease in perpetuity, which is for 999 years, to a rental of 4 per cent. ”

“ Then the government marks on the map that this land has been apportioned to the applicants, and it is set aside for them accordingly. The land is given free up to 275 acres per head. Each man thus has his own land. He cannot sell it, and it cannot be mortgaged either, though he get into debt. The land is his as long as he cares to work it. For special purposes, horse and cattle breeding, the government now permits larger areas up to 10,000 acres to be acquired, [Pg 154] and helps settlers in this connection by providing, for breeding purposes, thoroughbred stallions and Jersey bulls. ”

“ Yet, though the quantity of land has been thus increased, the rent, which is the price of land, has generally increased at the same time.
That more land is appropriated to tillage, is a proof that more corn is raised; and that the rents have not fallen, proves that no more is raised than can readily be sold.
But it is urged, that exportation, though it increases our produce, diminishes our plenty; that the merchant has more encouragement for exportation than the farmer for agriculture. ”

“ The price of public lands ranges from twenty-two cents to eighty-eight cents per acre, to those making an independent purchase. To those without the means of buying land, or of supporting themselves separately, one hundred and fifty acres of land will be provided, under the regulations of the government, in one of their colonies—to be paid for at the rate of one dollar and thirty-three cents per acre, one-third at the end of two years, one-third at the end of four years, and the last third at the end of six years. ”

“ Taking the above unity as a basis, and observing the distinction which must be made between grazing land, or that which is proper for raising stock, and farming land, without the facility of irrigation, this law grants to the contractor or contractors for the establishment of a new settlement, for each hundred families which he may introduce and establish in the state, five sitios of grazing land, and five labors at least, the one-half of which shall be without the facility of irrigation ”

“ Any person who paid the passage of a laborer, either bond or free, to the colony, received fifty acres by "Head Right," and after 1618 this became the common method of obtaining land. As labor was in great demand, the practice became a system of investing in labor and having a piece of land thrown in to make the bargain a good one. Finally the payment to the Secretary of an amount equal to the passage money of a laborer would secure title to a tract of land and "Head Rights" passed by purchase. ”

“ Second, mere land ownership is only a part, though a vital part, of the problem. Many other important things have to be considered.
If a man has land, but lacks capital or credit, he is unable to make economic use of his land. If he has both land and capital, or credit, or in other terms purchasing power, but lacks access to sources of supply in which to buy seeds, breeding stock, and implements, he still is unable to make use of his land. If he has at hand all the needed implements, seeds, and stock, but lacks knowledge and experience in farming, he might entirely fail in his enterprise. ”

“ If the land became national property—landlordism being abolished, and full State protection and encouragement given to the produce of industry and capital—it would be no exaggerated estimate to put down the yearly value of cereal wealth at double the present amount—that is, £60,000,000. ”

“ The Government have been authorised by the Agricultural Land Purchase Act of 1894, to expend a sum not exceeding £100,000 a year in the purchase, under voluntary agreement, of land suitable for agricultural settlement which is to be offered for selection in agricultural farms, and have made considerable use of their powers, but the system has not been sufficiently long in operation to enable an estimate to be formed of its results. ”

“ This evil might easily be avoided by retaining the present bona fide price of the land per acre, qualified by an arrangement that one-half of the purchase money should be expended in the formation of roads from the land in question. This would be of immense assistance to the planters, especially in a populous planting neighborhood, where the purchases of land were large and numerous, in which case the aggregate sum would be sufficient to form a carriage road to the main highway, which might be kept in repair by a slight toll. ”

“ The alteration in the price of land, the large quantities lately offered for sale, with the shortness of money, will, I think, prove {270} extremely hurtful to some of the large speculators; but, in my opinion, will in the end be beneficial to the country at large, as it will oblige those who enter land to bring it into cultivation, instead of taking up large quantities, as it will now require a greater capital to speculate than it has hitherto done. ”