of public lands to non-resident purchasers; (3) The exemption of homesteads, and (4) The restriction of the purchase of any other land to a limited quantity. This was the year in which President Polk was elected. In four years from that time, land agitation had become a potent factor in American politics. A party called "Free-Soil Democracy" now appeared. This party consisted of two elements, political Free-Soilers and conscientious Free-Soilers. The former were confined to the State of New York, and were called "NightSoilers" by an opposing party. The latter were found in every Northern State; scattered also through Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and Kentucky. The conscientious FreeSoilers were frequently called "Abolitionists."

In 1848, the Free-Soil Democracy held a National Convention at Buffalo, and nominated John P. Hale, of New Hampshire, for President, and Charles F. Adams, of Massachusetts, for Vice-President. The Free-Soilers seceded from the Democrats, but did not join the Whigs. They determined to secure free soil for a free people, and to restrict slavery to its State limits. They said that "Congress had no more power to make slave than to make a king." So they refused to introduce slavery into new Territories. In the Thirty-First Congress, the Free-Soilers were represented by only two Senators and only fourteen Representatives. In the Thirty-Second Congress, the Senators increased in number to three, and the Congressmen to seventeen. Charles Sumner was then a Free-Soil Senator.2

In the Presidential year of 1852, the Free-Soil Democracy held a National Convention at Pittsburg, and nominated John P. Hale, of New Hampshire, and George W. Julian, of Indiana, for President and Vice-President respectively. They inserted the following clause in their platform: "That the public lands of the United States belong to the people,

1 Meyer's Heimstätten und andere Wirthschaftsgesetze, 403.

2 * See Free-Soil Party, by Alexander Johnston, in Cyclopædia of Political Science.

and should not be sold to individuals, nor granted to corporations, but should be held as a sacred trust for the benefit of the people, and should be granted in limited quantities, free of cost, to landless settlers." Thus the free-soil or homestead movement became a national question.

Mr. Seward was then advocating in the Senate a homestead law. In his speech on the public domain which was delivered in the Senate February 27, 1851, he said: "The gratuitous distribution of public lands to actual settlers is marked by equal humanity and good sense." Again, he said: "All will admit-all do admit that the power over the domain should be so exercised as to favor the increase of population, the augmentation of wealth, the cultivation of virtue, and the diffusion of happiness." He further argued, from the point of industry, that "the first and fundamental interest of the Republic is the cultivation of its soil. That cultivation is the sole fountain of the capital or wealth which supplies every channel of industry.""

In the Presidential year of 1856, there arose the new Republican party, which grew out of the Free-Soil Democracy and the Whigs. From that time no more was heard of the Free-Soil party, but its principles were represented in the platform of the new party. Free homes and the restriction of slavery were the main issues of the Republicans, as previously of the Free-Soil Democracy.

HOMESTEAD BILLS IN CONGRESS.

In 1859, the struggle for a homestead law began in Congress. The bill passed the House of Representatives by a majority vote of 120 to 76; but it failed in the Senate. It was the Cuban bill that obstructed the passage of the Homestead Act. The two bills were of opposing character, one pro-slavery, and the other for free soil. On this point Mr. Seward said in the Senate: "After nine hours' yielding to the

'Seward's Works, I. 156-162.

discussion of the Cuban question, it is time to come back to the great question of the day and the age. The Senate may

as well meet face to face the issue which is before them. It is an issue presented by the competition between the two questions. One, the homestead bill, is a question of homes, of lands for the landless freemen of the United States. The Cuba bill is the question of slaves for the slave-holders of the United States.""

Although the friends of the Homestead Act did not then succeed in passing it, yet it was destined to come up again, and that soon. The following year Mr. Grow, of Pennsylvania, introduced the bill in the House. On March 12, it passed the House and went to the Senate. In the Senate, however, Mr. Johnson's substitute for the House bill was adopted, and this, after a protracted conference with the House, was finally accepted. Mr. Johnson's bill differed from the original House bill in not allowing pre-emptors to enjoy the benefit of the homestead law. The Senate bill also confined its provisions to lands which were subject to private entry. It limited the minimum age of settlers to twenty-five years. There were also some other differences in the Senate bill as distinguished from that of the House. Suffice it to say, through the efforts of the members of the House Committee, a compromise was effected, and much of a restrictive character in the Senate bill gave way to the more liberal. elements of the House bill. The compromise was by no means satisfactory, even to the members of the committee, but it was the best they could obtain from the Senate. On this point, Mr. Colfax, a member of the Conference Committee, said to the House: "We regard this as but a single step in advance toward a law, which we shall demand from the American Congress, enacting a comprehensive and liberal homestead policy. This we have agreed to as merely avant- 1 courier."" Mr. Grow also said that they agreed with the

Senate bill on the principle of "half a loaf is better than no bread."

PRESIDENT BUCHANAN'S VETO.1

The compromise bill passed both Houses of Congress by a large majority; but on June 23, President Buchanan vetoed the bill and returned it to the Senate. The first objection of Buchanan was based on constitutional grounds. The vetomessage dwelt particularly on this point, and urged that Congress had no power to give away public lands either to individuals or to States. This was an old objection which had been raised against the policy of internal improvement by its opponents. There were too many precedents in the way of Buchanan's constitutional objection. A second objection was partiality. The message urged: "It will prove unequal and unjust in its operation among the actual settlers themselves." The point was that if the new-comers were allowed to acquire land free or at the insignificant price of twenty-five cents per acre, the old-comers would suffer from the reduction of the price of their real estate. The same objection was raised also in behalf of old soldiers who received Government lands for their services in the Army. Again, the homestead law was unjust because it favored only one class of people-namely, the agricultural class at the expense of other avocations. It was unjust, moreover, to the older States of the Union, because, first, it would deprive them of their just proportion of the public revenue; and, second, it would deprive them of population through the encouragement of free farms. A third objection was that the homestead law would open a vast field for speculation. Buchanan was afraid that homesteaders would become the mere tools of capitalists. His fourth objection was that the law did not extend the same privileges to native and naturalized citizens. The latter, though not heads of families, were assured of a free farm, while the former had to be masters of

For the text, see Public Domain, 342–345.

households in order to secure the benefits of the law. A fifth objection was that partiality would be shown among the preemptors themselves. The existing pre-emptors could secure the lands at the reduced price of 62 cents per acre, but future pre-emptors would have to pay the full minimum price. The sixth and last objection was that the homestead law would deprive the Government of a source of public revenue. The message said the bill "lays the ax at the root of our present admirable land system." In conclusion, the message declared: "The people of the United States have advanced with steady but rapid strides to their present condition of power and prosperity. They have been guided in their progress by the fixed principle of protecting the equal rights of all, whether they be rich or poor. No agrarian sentiment has ever prevailed among them. The honest poor man by frugality and industry can, in any part of our country, acquire a competence for himself and his family, and in doing this he feels that he eats the bread of independence. He desires no charity, either from the Government or from his neighbors. This bill, which proposes to give him land at an almost nominal price out of the property of the Government, will go far to demoralize the people and repress this noble spirit of independence."

The veto thus unfortunately deprived the Democratic party of the honor and merit of passing the homestead bill. The two great parties kept their party lines with regard to the public land. It was the Democratic party that secured the acquisitions, and it was the Republican party that passed most of the settlement laws. Each party has done its peculiar service to the country.

FINAL PASSAGE OF THE HOMESTEAD ACT.

On July 8, 1861, a homestead bill was introduced in the House of Representatives. The bill received the immediate attention of the whole House, and after being referred suc