Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - History of the University (Powell) [PAGE 151]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

Final Period Land Qrant BUI

125

of congress had done Minnesota so much injury. "Besides," he argued, " I greatly doubt whether the states receiving this grant will profit very much from the donation if it is made. Schemes will be set on foot by designing men to obtain the scrip, and the States themselves will realize but very little from it." 1 2 In addition he maintained that it would encourage fraud and corruption on the part of the men getting possession of this state scrip and that speculators would get the best land, to the detriment of the volunteers serving in the army at the time. The powerful combined effort of these two men at length succeeded in getting an amendment prohibiting the location of more than one million acres in any one state. The weight of influence of leading senators, such men as Wade of Ohio, Harlan of Iowa, and Trumbull of Illinois, was thrown in favor of this bill. They made no long speeches, probably realizing that they had a large majority and that speeches were unnecessary. Their remarks were brief and pointed. Senator Wade called attention to the fact that this bill, or one precisely like it, had been passed by both houses of congress, that it had been before the people and before congress for a long time and though vetoed it had, nevertheless, been very generally approved. He admitted he did not know what the situation was in Kansas in regard to her public lands. That she had been granted as much as, and even more than most of the new states, had been admitted. " I think," said he, "the General Government has a right to take all those lands wherever they may lie, and appropriate them to such purposes as in the judgment of Congress is thought best, and I do not think that the State has any right to complain of that. The Senator says it leads to a land monopoly. I cannot see that it does any more than the sale of the lands by the Government. The Government sells lands to individuals in any quantity without restriction, and that may lead to a monopoly just as much as this." 18 The discussions, occurring on May 21, 24, 28, 30, and Juno 10, were long and animated. On the latter day Senator Wade decided emphatically that he would give way to nothing, and

^Congressional Globe, 87 congress, 2 session, 2395. "Congressional Globe, 37 congress, 2 session, 2249.