Land question

“ In considering the land situation as it exists, it is true that the ownership of land or, rather, the access to land, is of primary importance. The question arises, Is there enough land in the United States for all citizens who desire to become cultivators? ”

“ And besides; the problem of land, at its worst, is a bye one; distribute the earth as you will, the principal question remains inexorable,—Who is to dig it? Which of us, in brief word, is to do the hard and dirty work for the rest, and for what pay? ”

“ Conditions here institute an incessant struggle between man and nature;596 but the rewards of victory are too great to count the cost. The construction of sea-walls, embankment of rivers, reclamation of marshes, the cutting of canals for drains and passways in a water-soaked land, the conversion of lakes into meadow, the rectification of tortuous streams for the greater economy of this silt-made soil, all together constitute the greatest geographical transformation that man has brought about on the earth's surface.597 ”

“ Hence we may lay down the rule that change in areal relations, both of the individual to his decreasing quota of land, and of the state to its increasing quota of the earth's surface is an important index of social and political evolution. ”

“ At present, our whole land system is constructed to prevent their working. It is Nature's way alternately to gather together and to disperse abroad Our land laws are all on the side of gathering together. ”

“ Society must first of all consider the land as a whole—its topographical qualities, its mountains, plains, woods, lakes, rivers, ponds, heaths, swamps, moors, etc. The topography, together with the geographical location of land, both of which are unchangeable, exercises certain influences upon climate and the qualities of the soil. ”

“ There a hilly or mountainous interior putting obstacles in the way of landward expansion, sterile slopes, a paucity of level, arable land, an excessive or deficient rainfall withholding from agriculture the reward of tillage—some or all of these factors combined to compel the inhabitants to seek on the sea the livelihood denied by the land. ”

“ Then it is the very land itself that he gives, the land of so many manses, ‘with all the appurtenances, fields, pastures, woods, marshes.’ It is no mere right over the land that he gives, but the very soil itself. ”

“ Permanent settlement encourages accumulation in every form, and under growing pressure of population slowly reveals the possibilities of every foot of ground, of every geographic advantage. These are the fibers of the land which become woven into the whole fabric of the nation's life. ”

“ It is no less a one than what proportion of the soil of England—of its commons, charts, and forests, its scars, fells, and moorlands—shall be retained to be used in common by her people as open unappropriated space both now and in the time to come. ”

“ Other hats, coats and chairs can be made without limit. But more land cannot be made, nor can anything be substituted for it. No human being can say that he exists independently of land. Land is literally the foundation of human life. ”

“ A few words may suffice as to what Nature has done towards the formation of nations and States by the configuration of the surface of the dry land—that is to say, by mountain chains and by river valleys. The only natural boundaries, besides seas, are mountains and deserts. Rivers, though convenient frontier lines for the politician or the geographer, are not natural boundaries, but rather unite than dissever those who dwell on their opposite banks. ”

“ There is a general and perfectly intelligible unwillingness to allow that scenery which now appears so complete and connected in all its parts was not the [Pg 56] result of one probably sudden or violent cause. Yet the simplest explanation is not always necessarily the correct one. In reality, the problems presented to us by the existing topography of the land, fascinating though they are, become daily more complex, and demand the whole resources of geological science. They cannot be solved by any rough-and-ready process. ”

“ Of the travellers who passed over the vast stretches of prairie or mountain or woodland, many saw the possibilities of this vast land, and prophesied as to what might be wrought here, when, in the dim and distant future, which none could yet foresee, settlements should have pushed out from the east and occupied the land. ”

“ So that the word "land" includes not only the face of the earth, but every thing under it, or over it. And therefore if a man grants all his lands, he grants thereby all his mines of metal and other fossils, his woods, his waters, and his houses, as well as his fields and meadows. ”

“ The vertical form of the land is also a very important element in estimating the natural fertility of the soil. In mountainous districts, the quantity of land which can be used (and with what labor!) is wont to be relatively smaller than in low lands. ”

“ Whether we examine the mountain or the plain, whether we consider the disintegration of the rocks or the softer strata of the earth, whether we regard the shores of seas or the central plains of continents, whether we contemplate fertile lands or deserts, we find evidence of a general dissolution and decay of the solid surface of the globe. Every great river and deep valley gives evidence of the attrition of the land. The purpose of the dry land is to sustain a system of plants and animals ”

“ In arcifinious lands, where the bounds are formed by nature, any gradual change in the course of the river makes a change also in the boundaries of territory, and whatever accession is given by the river to one side, it will belong to the possessor of the land on that side. Because the respective nations are supposed originally to have taken possession of those lands, with an intention of making the MIDDLE of that river, as a natural boundary, the line of separation between them. ”

“ As one effect of the subdivision of the land, the soil, so far as nature permits, is highly cultivated, its appearance fertile, finished, beautiful, and in striking contrast with the dominating vast, bare mountain rocks and snowbeds. The many towns and cities bear abundant signs of a general prosperity, their roads, bridges, stores, residences, and public buildings betokening in the inhabitants industry and energy, and freedom to employ these qualities. ”

“ Except in the immediate valleys of the larger rivers there is very little land that would be suitable for agriculture. From one hundred and fifty miles inland down to the sea, the country is of an entirely different character again; that is to say, it is country that is originally overlain by from a very few feet at its edge to one hundred feet or more, a very tough impervious boulder clay, which holds up the water, and on which the drainage, up to the present time, is of a very imperfect character. ”

“ From time to time it has been necessary to make changes in the land laws, as when the discovery of mineral lands, reserved by congress called for the substitution of lieu lands, but there has been no diminution in quantity or value. ”

“ I must think of my people! You see, if I put them on the other side of the ridge, they would be exposed to the east wind—and the more that every door and window would have to be to the east. You know yourselves how bitterly it blows down the strath! Besides, we should there have to build over good land much too damp to be healthy, every foot of which will be wanted to feed them! ”

“ Whether land is the site of a town, or of a farm, or of a mine, whether corn and grass grow upon it, or the traffic of a city passes over its streets, or coal and iron mines burrow beneath it, it belongs but as a temporary possession to those who are using it. ”

“ We have arid lands in the West, cut-over lands in the Northwest, Lake States, and South, and also swamp lands in the Middle West and South, which can be made available through the proper development. Much of this land can be made suitable for farm homes if properly handled. But it will require that each type of land be dealt with in its own particular fashion. The arid land will require water ”

“ Small naturally defined regions, which take the lead in historical development because they counteract the primitive tendency towards excessive dispersal, are in danger of teaching too well their lesson of concentration. In course of time geographic enclosure begins to betray its limitations. The extent of a people's territory influences their estimate of area per se, determines how far land shall be made the basis of their national purposes, fixes the territorial scale of their conquests and their political expansion. This is a conspicuous psychological effect of a narrow local environment. ”

“ In the valuation of land the next thing we have to consider is the steepness of the gradients on it. Now after having had much experience of steep land, land on moderate slopes, and land which might almost be called flat, I have no hesitation in giving a decided preference to the moderately sloping land. I object to the steep land, because it is troublesome to work and manure, and because the ridges on it are sure to be poor; and to the flat land, because the soil is apt to become sodden in our heavy monsoons, and because it is soon apt to harden, and thus is troublesome to work. ”

“ In continents and countries the anthropo-geographer looks to see not what reliefs are present, but how they are distributed; whether highlands and lowlands appear in unbroken masses as in Asia, or alternate in close succession as in western Europe; whether the transition from one to the other is abrupt as in western South America, or gradual as in the United States. A simple and massive land structure lends the same trait of the simple and massive to every kind of historical movement, because it collects the people into large groups and starts them moving in broad streams, as it were. ”

“ Subsequent alterations in its surface, due to erosion and other factors, gave rise to the present uplands and lowlands, which have been of determining influence in the peopling of the section, the rugged uplands offering so hard a subsistence that they were nowhere willingly chosen for settlement so long as land might still be had in the lowlands. ”

“ Situations more than five or six hundred feet above sea level are, in England, as a rule, too bleak and {80} exposed for the ordinary cultivated crops. Such land is, therefore, either grass land, moorland, downland or woodland. ”

“ It was necessary, of course, that the place to be selected should be pretty low land, and near the river; for if the land was high, the work of excavating the basins would have been so much increased as to render the undertaking impracticable. ”

“ A geographical location central to the Baltic and North Sea countries, and accessible to France and Portugal, combined with a position at the mouth of the great German rivers made it absorb the carrying trade of northern Europe.13 Land and sea coöperated in its maritime development.
Land and sea opposed.
Often the forces of land and sea are directly opposed. If a country's geographic conditions are favorable to agriculture and offer room for growth of population, the land forces prevail, because man is primarily a terrestrial animal. ”

“ All lands, including submerged lands, and all waters within the boundaries of this Monument are hereby appropriated and withdrawn from entry, location, selection, sale or other disposition under the public land laws, other than exchange. ”

“ Land, from the national point of view, does not seem to be a limiting factor in these industries, though occasionally, in the narrower limits of a single city, land becomes scarce even for these purposes. ”

“ Moreover, the water causes different degrees of separation between the land-masses, according as it appears as inlet, strait, sea, an island-strewn or islandless ocean; it determines the grouping of the habitable areas and consequently the geographic basis of the various degrees of ethnic and cultural kinship between the divisions of land. Finally, since the sea is for man only a highway to some ulterior shore, this geography of the land-masses in relation to the encompassing waters points the routes and goals of human wanderings. ”

“ For convenience the country may be said to be divided into sandy land, agricultural land, and mountain land, and still there remains the necessity of more special description, and to include desert land. ”

“ The boundaries of the National Forests also are constantly being examined to determine whether they include all the land, and only the land, to be contained within them, and whether they should be extended or reduced. ”

“ Therefore the highly irregular distribution of the land areas, here compactly grouped, there remote, deserves especial attention, since it produces far-reaching results. Finally, continents and islands, by their zonal situation, their land forms, rainfall, river systems, flora and fauna, produce for man varied life conditions, which in their turn are partially dependent upon the size and grouping of the land-masses. ”

“ It has never been disputed that my kingdom—that is, the forest territory—includes all the land within the limits of the forest, and the forest is held by our greatest fairy lawyers, beyond all doubt, to mean all the land upon and within which trees grow which are not separated from the bulk of the forest by any fence. ”

“ We suppose that the large holdings of land are the effect of wrongs and abuses now wholly in the past, and that the causes for their increase are no longer operative, but are something like those geological laws by which the strata under them formed themselves. ”

“ Yet we cannot refuse to admit that in the disposition of land and sea, in the form and trend of coast-lines, in the grouping of mountains, valleys, and plains, in the disposition and flow of rivers, in the arrangement of climates, and in the distribution of vegetation and animals, a series of influences must be recognized which have unquestionably played a large part in the successive stages of human development. ”