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Show Acreage Limitations One common feature of all agricultural settlement laws is some form of statutory limitation on the acreage any one person can acquire. The maximum acreage an individual may obtain ranges from 160 under the general homestead laws to a combination of desert land and enlarged homestead entries of up to 480 acres. In the Reclamation Act of 1902,19 Congress set a maximum limitation of 160 irrigable acres of land for a farm unit established on public land within a reclamation project, but the Secretary of the Interior was given authority to limit the individual public land farm unit to a lesser amount. The size of the farm unit is based upon the sufficiency of each unit to support a family and repay to the reclamation fund the charges apportioned to the land. The contractor study prepared for the Commission provides data concerning the changes which have taken place in the size of farms in the 17 western states since about 1935, and the picture that emerges is not at all consistent with the restrictions in the land laws that limit the acreages made available to an entryman. Between 1935 and 1964, the percentage increase in farm size ranged from 71 percent in Nebraska to 742 percent in Arizona. Farm size doubled in virtually all of the 17 states studied, and the increase in four states was about threefold.20 In 1964 Oklahoma had the smallest average farm, 407 acres, followed by Washington with 418 acres and California with 458. In all other states the average farm totaled at least 500 acres, and in six of the 17 states the average was more than 1,000 acres. Moreover, the average size of irrigated farms demonstrated the same characteristics. Although, as a general rule, only a small part of irrigated farms was actually irrigated, 10 of the 17 western states had irrigated farms averaging more than 1,000 acres, ranging up to 4,706 acres in Arizona. The sizes of these farm enterprises are consistent with agricultural technology today but will probably be too small in the near future. Modern labor-saving machinery is costly and must be applied to larger acreages in order to achieve reductions in unit costs. A substantial increase in the size of the farm and a significant decline in the number of farms are the inevitable results of improvements in technology. The Commission recognizes the desirability of permitting relatively small farmers and potential farmers access to Federal lands. But this objective requires more imaginative solutions than simply limiting the total amount of acreage that can be 19 n. 4, supra. 20 University of South Dakota, Federal Public Land Laws and Policies Relating to Intensive Agriculture, Vol. III. PLLRC Study Report, 1969. owned by a single person or firm. The amount of land transferred for intensive agricultural use should not be subject to such restrictions. However, this recommendation is conditioned by two important qualifications: Federal lands, if suitable for allocation to agricultural use, should be sold in units small enough to allow relatively small farmers entrepreneurs and potential farmers to compete for them on a meaningful basis. If Federal land disposal policy for lands potentially useful for intensive agriculture is designed so as to avoid excluding smaller enterprises, then lands must be offered in units that will permit bidding by others besides large firms and wealthy persons, but will still be large enough for efficient operations. Because the minimum farm size necessary for efficient operation will vary from region to region, the final determination of optimal size offerings should be made regionally. In some situations, disposal units of 80 acres might be appropriate; in other cases, because of the physical and hydrological characteristics of the region, 640 acres might be the optimal size of land offerings. To assure that the limitations imposed in each area are consistent with the realities of farming, we suggest that state and perhaps local governmental institutions be involved in the determinations. The agricultural experiment stations of the land grant universities would be particularly useful, as would the extension agents located in each county. Secondly, the amount of land acquired by a single buyer in a single sale of Federal lands should be limited to an appropriate percentage of the total offered. The objective of allowing small enterprise to acquire some of these Federal lands could still be frustrated if an affluent buyer simply outbid all others. Consequently, there should be a limitation on the number of acres a single buyer or consortium of buyers could purchase at a single sale. Residency Requirements Residence on farms should not be a prescribed condition for intensive agricultural use of Federal lands. The homestead laws require that the entryman construct a habitable house upon the land, establish residence within six months, and, except for certain circumstances, maintain his residence there for at least seven months out of each of the next three years. Desert land entrymen must have established a residence in the state in which the desired desert land is located. Because settlement objectives, as noted previously, can no longer be of major importance to public land agricultural policy, residence as a condition of eligibility to acquire agricultural lands is anachro- 183 |
