Go West: U.S. Westward Expansion

During the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln approved a law which would further fuel westward expansion. The Homestead Act (this is the original two-page document) allowed U.S. citizens (and those who had declared their intent to become a citizen) to acquire a 160-acre tract of surveyed public land (these surveyors were at work in Iowa) in the western territories.

The head of a family, who had never borne arms against the United States government, could take title to the land in one of two ways:

• Build a home on it, farm it, and pay a minimal registration fee after occupying the land for five consecutive years; or

• Make minor improvements to the land, live on it for six months, and pay the federal government $1.25 per acre.

Union soldiers, who wished to go west after the war between the states was over, could count their time in service toward the residency requirements. Confederate soldiers were not given that option.

Millions of acres of land in the western territories were dispersed by the General Land Office between 1862 and 1904. Because the Homestead Act was worded so ambiguously, however, the process was tainted with fraud. Attempting to eliminate such problems, Congress amended the law but those efforts did nothing to improve the situation. Less than one-quarter of available land went to individual homesteaders. The rest was picked up by speculators, cattlemen, miners, lumberman, and railroad developers.

Despite its importance, the Homestead Act was not the reason Americans and U.S. immigrants first "went west." People had started that process years before the Civil War began. But the way was difficult, the journey was treacherous, and the most popular trail to the Pacific Northwest - the "Old Oregon" - took people through the heart of Indian country.