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Show 506 HISTORY OF PUBLIC LAND LAW DEVELOPMENT The Department of the Interior, which had not been imbued with some of the newer conservationist views that had influenced the Forest Service of the Department of Agriculture, was responsible for designating such public lands as were not suitable for irrigation for entry under the Enlarged Homestead Act. The Department's authority was minimal, for Congress had not intended to do more than exclude from entry under the act lands for which there might be a better and higher use. Interior officials welcomed the act and seemed to have little doubt that it was certain to play a major role in furthering the agricultural development of the High Plains country. As late as 1915 Franklin K. Lane was saying, "The most valuable discovery made in recent years as affecting the public domain is that the semi arid regions may become abundantly productive under dry-farming methods."22 That the discovery was not so recent and that the enlarged homesteads in the range country were showing signs of failure did not appear to be recognized by the Secretary. Possibly because he was aware that the Enlarged Homestead Act was being criticized for contributing to the breakup of the public range and thereby harming the livestock industry, Clay Tallman, Commissioner of the Land Office, began collecting data in 1915 concerning the amount of acreage in cultivation and the value of the improvements on 10 randomly selected homesteads reaching final entry in each of 05 land offices. He found that on the 950 homesteads selected-most would be 160-a-:re homesteads with a possible maximum of sixty 640-acre homesteads and a few 320's -that the average acreage in cultivation was 27 acres and the value of improvements, $790. He concluded this substantial development was "a fair demonstration of the general good faith of claimants. ..." A 22 Secretary of the Interior, Annual Report, 1915, p. 7. year later he repeated the same data in his report and held that but one deduction cculd be drawn: "the general good faith of the small homesteader and his bona fide intention of making a permanent home for himself on the public domain." That Tall-man's data was only from successful homesteaders who had reached the final entry stage and that he gave no attention to sales after the final entry makes his generalization of little meaning. He went on to comment on the successful operation of the Enlarged Homestead Act, though he did concede that "here and there is encountered an expression of opinion that the law has been made use of for speculative ends, but this is the exception." Similarly, Tallman assembled statistics to show how favorably the Kinkaid Act was working. On the basis of all this analysis it was possible for him subsequently to lend his support to the Stock Raising Homestead Act.23 Three studies of Stanley County, South Dakota, and Williams County, North Dakota of 1908 and an account of a trip in western North Dakota in 1916 brought out evidence that quite contravenes Tallman: In Stanley County all good land had been homesteaded but a large number of settlers had moved away; nearly all Williams County had been homesteaded but only 3 percent was plowed; in western North Dakota the homesteaders were not seeking a home but a speculation in land.24 In response to many requests for information as to where suitable land might be acquired for farming the Department of Agriculture brought out a pamphlet offering descriptions of the different parts of the country such as the cutover area of the Lake States, the Pacific Northwest, drain-able and irrigable lands, and the semi-arid lands where dry farming was being tried with the aid of the 320-acre Homestead 53 Secretary of the Interior, Annual Report, 1915, p. 281; and 1916, pp. 156-58. 24 Hargreaves, Dry Farming, pp. 380-81. |