Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Homestead

,, by Charles Scribner's Sons. HE laws of the United States give to every citizen who is the head of a family, or who has arrived at the age of twenty-one years, the right to a homestead of 160 acres, to be selected at will from any of the surveyed and otherwise unappropriated public lands, without cost, except entry fees. The tract thus taken as a homestead must be located in a compact body, upon land which is agricultural in character, and must conform to the legal subdivisions established by the official survey. It is set apart from the general estate of the householder as a sacred provision for the family, and is protected from alienation by the householder, and from execution for his general debts. The administration of the homestead and other land laws is committed to the general land office, a bureau of the interior department of the National Government at Washington, presided over by a commissioner, the secretary of the interior having appellate jurisdiction. For the convenience of applicants, the States and Territories where the public lands are still to be found are divided into districts, in each of which there is established a local land office, in charge of a registrar and a receiver, whose duty it is to attend to the disposal of the public lands.

To obtain a homestead the applicant must make an affidavit before the registrar or receiver that he is over the age of twenty-one years, or the head of a family; that he is a citizen of the United States, or has declared his intention to become such; and that the entry is made for

his exclusive use and benefit, and for actual settlement and cultivation. A homestead entry thus made vests in the settler an inceptive right only. He has a “claim” to the land which no one can dispute so long as he complies with the law requiring him to live upon and cultivate it for five years; but he has no title which he can convey. If he abandons the land, or remains absent from it for a period of more than six months, his entry may be contested and cancelled; and then the tract will be open to the first legal applicant. In such a case the original claimant will not be permitted to make another entry, as the law allows but one homestead privilege. It is essential that the person making a homestead entry should know that no one else has located upon the land and begun improvements as the foundation of a claim under the pre-emption laws, for such a claim would antedate his own. Having resided upon and cultivated his claim for five years, the settler is allowed two years more, but no longer, in which to make his “final proof.” Final proof consists in the affidavit of the settler and that of two disinterested witnesses, showing that the claimant is a citizen of the United States, that he has made actual settlement upon and cultivated the land in good faith for the time required, and that he has never perfected or abandoned an entry made under the homestead laws. This proof is then transmitted to the commissioner of the general land office at Washington, and if the entry is found to be in all respects lawful, a patent is forwarded to the settler, who thus acquires a permanent and absolute title to his homestead.

The public lands are held by the Government at the minimum price of $1.25 per acre; but where alternate sections have been granted to railroads or other works of internal improvement, the reserved sections are held at $2.50. Of this $2.50 or “double minimum” land, formerly only soldiers and sailors of the War of the Rebellion were allowed to enter as homestead claimants of 160 acres, other citizens being restricted to 80 acres. By the acts of March 3d and July 1st 1879, the privilege of entering 160 acres was extended to all citizens and made general; but there are still some portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and other States where no more than 80 acres of $2.50 land can be taken.

Where homestead entries are made by soldiers and sailors who served ninety days or more in the United States army or navy during the War of the Rebellion, the period of their service, or, if they were discharged on account of wounds or disability incurred in the line of duty, the entire term of enlistment, not to exceed four years, is deducted from the five years residence required by law. But no one can receive a title to his homestead under any circumstances without having lived upon it at least one year.

For homestead entries on lands in Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Minnesota, Kansas, Nebraska, Dakota, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Florida, commissions and fees are to be paid according to the following table:—

On lands in California, Nevada, Oregon, Colorado, and in the Territories of Arizona, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming, the commissions are 50 per cent. greater, but the fees are as given above.

{{EB1911 Fine Print|Mineral lands are subject to exploration, occupation, and purchase by citizens or those who have made declaration of intention to be come citizens of the United States. Indefinite occupation, without purchase, is secured under some circumstances by certain annual expenditures upon a mining claim. There is no restriction by United States laws of the number of locations one man may make or own by purchase from other locators.

The present area of vacant surveyed Government lands in the United States is about 134,600,000 acres, the area unsurveyed being 1,080,000,000 acres.

The public lands referred to in this article are found only in the States of Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, Wisconsin, and the Territories of Arizona, Dakota, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. Throughout these States and Territories the land laws are uniform. When Texas was admitted into the Union the disposal of its public lands was reserved to the State, and it has therefore a land system of its own, which, although rather complicated, does not differ essentially from the land policy of the United States as indicated above. Under the laws of Texas, every person who is the head of a family and without a homestead may acquire title to 160 acres of land, by living upon it and cultivating it for three years; and every single man over the age of eighteen years may so acquire title to 80 acres. “Every person over the age of eighteen years, who is a citizen of the State of Texas, and who shall hereafter in good faith settle upon and occupy any part of the unappropriated public domain, not exceeding 160 acres, shall have the right to purchase the same at the sum of $1 per acre.” But this right of pre-emption is not conceded to any one who is the owner of 160 acres of land in Texas, or who abandons a residence on his own land in that State to take up a residence on the public lands. The extensive school lands of Texas are purchasable by actual settlers in tracts of 80 to 160 acres at their actual value, to be determined by appraisement, “but in no case for a less price than $1.50 per acre.” {{right|{{nowrap|({{sc|e. p. h.}})}}}}

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