Our Landed Heritage; The Public Domain, 1776-1936
New York, N.Y. Peter Smith, 1950. Second printing [stated]. Hardcover. x, [2], 450 pages. Some cover wear and soiling noted. Includes Preface, as well as Part 1, The Settler Breaks the Way; Part 2, The West Welcomes the Corporation; Part 3, The Corporation Triumphs; Part 4, The Government Forces Conservation. Also includes 12 black and white illustrations/maps, Selective Bibliography, and an Index. This is a valuable book... It tells for the first time with any completeness the history of the disposal of our public land. It brings to our attention many fresh facts, presents many new interpretations. It is, on the whole, vigorous and interesting. Among the grievances listed in the Declaration of Independence was the complaint that the King of Great Britain endeavored to "prevent the population of these States" by "obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their emigrations hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands." For over one hundred and fifty years the colonies had enjoyed the privilege of molding their own land systems, but the Proclamation of 1763, and subsequent Orders in Council leading up to the Quebec Act of 1774, served notice to Americans that frontier policy was no longer a matter for colonial initiative but had become an imperial problem of first order. This interference with the free movement of colonists into the country west of the Appalachians was resented by southern and New England colonies alike, and constituted one of the major causes of the American Revolution. With the executive withdrawals of all public lands from private entry in 1935, the opportunity for individual settlement on the public domain officially came to an end. For the future there remained only the consideration of the permanent national domain -- national parks, forest reserves, game reserves, grazing and mineral lands. The time is thus ripe for a synthesis on the history of the public lands of the United States. This volume presents perhaps the first attempt to integrate American land history with the other forces that have shaped our civilization. It is not all political, economic and legal; considerable social history is inextricably bound up with public land settlement, which helps to make the whole story livelier and more interesting. This volume therefore constitutes not only a study in history and in public administration, but also a study in American democracy. Hence it is hoped that the research in this book will help to sustain within certain stipulated limitations that portion of Frederick Jackson Turner's frontier hypothesis as stated in 1903:
"Whenever social conditions tended to crystallize in the East, whenever capital tended to press upon labor or political restraints to impede the freedom of the mass, there was this gate of escape to the free conditions of the frontier. These free lands promoted individualism, economic equality, freedom to rise, democracy. ... In a word then, free lands meant free opportunities." Condition: Good.
Keywords: Public Lands, Public Domain, Land Use, Settlers, Frontier, Free Soil, Conservation, Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, Land Claims, Indian Cessions, Land Grants, Reclamation, Irrigation Projects, Federal Dams, Horace Greeley, Mineral Lands, Pre
[Book #82369]
Price: $125.00