good land, which would at a later period be required for settlement.[1]
The first sale of public lands in Oregon by proclamation of the president took place in 1857. Only ten or eleven thousand acres were sold, netting the government little more than the expenses of surveying its lands in Oregon.[2] The homestead law of 1862 conferred benefits on actual settlers nearly equal to those of the donation law, though less in amount. The later arrivals in Oregon had only begun to avail themselves of its privileges, when the president again offered for sale, in October 1862, 400,000 acres, by which act the public lands were temporarily withdrawn from preemption and homestead privileges, and preemptors were forced to establish their claims and pay the price of their lands immediately in order to secure them against the danger of being sold at auction by the government. This was felt to be a hardship by many who had before the passage of the homestead law been glad to preempt, but who now were desirous of recalling their preemption and claiming under the homestead act; especially as the more honest and industrious had put all their money into improvements, and could only meet the new demand by borrowing money at a high rate of interest. But as only about 13,500 acres were sold when offered,
- ↑ Land Off. Rept, 1869, 225. There were surveyed, tip to June 1878, 21,127,862; there remaining of unsurveyed public lands and Indian reservations 39,849,498 acres. In the remainder was included the state swamp-lands, of which only a portion had been selected. U. S. H. Ex. Doc., ix. 18, 45th cong. 3d sess. Of the surveyed lands, 139,597 acres were either sold or taken under the homestead or timber-culture acts from June 30, 1877, to July 1, 1878. Ibid., 146-160. Dept Agric. Rept, 1874-5, 67; see also Zabriskie's Public Land Laws of the United States, containing instructions for obtaining lands, and laws and decisions concerning lands, where are to be found many descriptions of the country, with the resources of the Pacific states, collected from official reports. San Francisco, 1870. Compare U. S. H. Ex. Doc., i. pt 4, vol. iv., pt i., 32-6, 156-60, 290-319, 452-8, 504-8, 41st cong. 3d sess.; U. S. Sec. Int. Rept, pt i., 44, 58, 268-76, 42d cong. 2d sess.; U. S. H. Ex. Doc., 170, x., 42d cong. 2d sess.; U. S. Sec. Int. Rept, pt i. 11, 16-17, 226-37, 280-99, 313-14; Salem Willamette Farmer, Aug. 2, 1873; Salem Unionist, Dec. 17, 1866.
- ↑ The expenses of the year 1857, for surveying the public lands, were $11,746.66, and the returns from their sale, $13,233.82. Land Off. Rept, 1858, 43-9.
