Speech #490078401

Certainly there is great difficulty in accomplishing public land entry. that object. certainly ithas never yet been fully accomplished. France "In many sections of the country. notably throrghout regions dominated by has come nearer to it than any other people. and there is a greater e tlerasing Intereststie vast ara lying west of the ninetyninth meridianexaminations. wherever made. had developed at all points that entries were amount of prosperity in that country than is to be found anywhere. not chiefly fictitious arid fraudulent. and made in bulk through concerted methods excepting our own country with its vast amount of virgin land now bedopted by organizations that had parceled out thre country among themselves and were maintaining seized possessions of unentered lands by boundaries and coming exhausted by these lavish grants to corporations. Up to this Inelosures defended by armed riders and protected against immigration and time with this vast amount of virgin land free to everybody. with its settlement by systems of espionage and intimidation. forests open and furnishing a subsistence almostwithout labor to an im"In other cases. as in farming regions approximate to the cattle belt. It was fense n fupeoplegma of wh o haegoup fro gnerashown that individual speculation. following tire progress of public surveys. .ense number of people. many of whom have grown up from genera was covering townships of agricultural land with entries made fur the purpose tion to generation upon tire public domain without ever having owned of selling the claims to others. or by entries procuredfor the acquisition of lands a foot or an inch of the soil. But France with her limited area and In large bodies. "Again. in timbered regions. the forests were being appropriated by domestic with her lands almost entirely in quantities of from 20 to 160 acres160 .and foreign corporations through suborned entries made in fraud arid evasion acres being a principalityis certainly the most prosperous people in of law.