Roy M. Robbins, Our Landed Heritage: The Public Domain, 1776-1936 (1942).

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Part II

The West Welcomes the Corporation

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CHAPTER VIII
LURING THE EUROPEAN

Until the 'forties, the public domain of the United States had been settled primarily by a native population from the Atlantic States. Economic and social conditions in the East together with the attractions of cheap and good lands and more liberal institutions in the Mississippi Valley had impelled the migration westward. However, as the middle of the nineteenth century approached a new set of conditions came into being, which not only affected the settlement of the vacant lands but also influenced the legislation passed by Congress.¹

Men have always come to America as foreigners, but their sons have called themselves Americans. Many reasons may impel a man to migrate. On one hand, the existing conditions of life have been too difficult to cope with; nature, perhaps, has been harsh, or fellowmen oppressive. On the other hand, distant lands have seemed to beckon to him especially when he had a friend or relative there. Undoubtedly cheap land directly or indirectly attracted many foreigners to American shores. But it must be remembered that the public domain and the American way of distributing the public land among the people did not constitute the only factor which affected foreign migration.

The century from 1750 to 1850 saw improvements in the conditions of life for the people of Europe. Yet in spite of these improvements and the great revolutions that had taken place, there was still much of the old system that was harsh, and there were many new evils accompanying the new order of things. There were still vast areas where men of the lower classes might never hope to own land. Most of those who worked the land in these regions gave much of their time to others, working hard and receiving very little in return. The Industrial Revolution in England, the potato famines in Ireland, the Revolution of 1848 in Germany -- all resulted in conditions which were humanly [120] unbearable, and hundreds of thousands were thereby forced to leave their homelands for a new world.

England, in this century between 1750 and 1850, underwent the most stupendous industrial revolution the world has ever known. Unfortunately, the great majority of the people reaped few economic advantages from the new system; many were thrown out of work with the consequent evils. In Manchester, in 1826, a city of approximately 120,000 inhabitants, there were about 14,000 dependent upon the poor rates.² The English could point with pride to the fact that the looms of England were capable of producing enough goods for 62,700,000 people.³ But this new efficiency in machinery produced a sharp decline in textile prices. Low prices and overproduction, with subsequent unemployment, brought large reductions in wages.

Concurrent with the industrial revolution came a revolution in agriculture. The Board of Agriculture established in 1773, with Arthur Young as its secretary, fostered improvements in farming methods, such as crop rotation and scientific fertilization of soil, the introduction of farm machinery, and an extension of farm markets. Ultimately this technological advance lessened the demand for farm labor. Conditions in England were alarming; conditions in Ireland became deplorable. It was not uncommon for hundreds to be ejected at one time from a single Irish estate.⁴ To make matters worse, the population of Ireland doubled between 1800 and 1840.⁵

The advent of steam transportation between Ireland and England and Scotland lowered the fares and brought many Irish agricultural workers into the English and Scottish cities, increasing the labor supply there and bringing on a further reduction in wages. Furthermore, there was no opportunity for labor to organize, for such organization was held illegal under the Combination Act of 1800. Thus for the excess laboring population of the British Isles, agricultural and industrial, there seemed but one way out -- migration; yet, exile was considered the punishment for crime! Moreover, if migration was the answer to the problem, the government of England would have to furnish the means. [121]

During the Napoleonic wars the situation in the United Kingdom was held somewhat in check by the great demand for both manufacturing and agricultural products. But after peace came in 1815, prices crashed, farm values depreciated 50 per cent, wages declined, and there was unemployment everywhere. To aggravate the situation, between 1812 and 1817 over 121,000 men were released from the navy alone. Many of the leading men of thought and action became convinced that these ominous conditions were no longer of a transient character but were fundamental and required drastic action. While politicians toiled with the economic problem many people of the United Kingdom became imbued with the idea of emigration. The people of the United States of America were kindred in blood, language, and institutions. In their country across the Atlantic there was a definite need for capital and labor. The new American transportation system was connecting the Atlantic Coast with the greatest valley in the world. A myriad of British travellers were sending back glowing reports of this land of opportunity -- opportunity for those interested in an industrial order and in building an empire out of the wilderness. The effect of these reports was undoubtedly considerable.

Immigration to America from the United Kingdom was moderate down to 1845, but after that date it increased with great rapidity. The reasons for this large migration are of great interest to the student of land history. The Reverend T. R. Malthus at an early date had sensed the depth of the population problem. He became convinced that England, Ireland, and Scotland were greatly overpopulated. In pondering upon the subject of population, Malthus came to believe that the food supply of a country tended to increase according to an arithmetical progression, while the population tended to increase according to a geometrical progression. Eventually the growth of population would be checked by the comparative limitations of the slower increase in food supply. The hardships of the masses of the people in an overpopulated country might be mitigated to some degree by foresight. Since it was not probable that human industry would reach its greatest productivity in all parts of the earth at the same time, "the natural and obvious remedy" in the "case of a redundant population in the more cultivated parts of the world," according to Malthus, was migration to those parts that were "uncultivated."⁶ This proposal inaugurated a train of thought which became increasingly important during the nineteenth century, [122] not only to Britain, but to the United States. One American authority writing in 1876 believed that, "But for the theory of Malthus and its influence in shaping the policy of the British and their governments in favor of emigration, we should have lacked a very powerful agency in our national development which European emigration supplied.⁷

Doubtless the hundreds of thousands who migrated to America had no understanding of the play of economic forces. But on the other hand, no great migration of the redundant elements could take place until the official mind of England became aware of the necessity for migration. In this conditioning process the philosophers played their part. Beyond this point, great migration required preparation in the form of capital -- money to get the emigrants across the ocean, and money to establish their economic existence in America. A consideration of the more practical aspects of the problem is therefore necessary.

One of Malthus's disciples in the 1820's, Robert John Wilmot Horton, pressed the redundant labor subject before Parliament. In the years from 1823 to 1825, experiments in colonization were carried on in Canada, which were successful within certain limitations. But with the 1830's came a new theory of colonization which was to have widespread effect in the English-speaking countries of the world. Under the inspiration of that fiery Scotchman, Robert Gourlay, Edward Gibbon Wakefield began to preach within the academic walls of Newgate prison a new gospel of systematic colonization. Wakefield had studied Robert Gourlay's three volumes entitled Statistical Account of Upper Canada, and Stuart's Three Years in North America. Before writing his account, Gourlay had travelled, though not extensively, in the United States. The resultant elaborate theory on colonization was not unlike the land policies of Hamilton, Adams, and Clay. It seems fair to conclude that since Wakefield was acquainted with many English economists who were friends of his father, he was at least indirectly acquainted with American experience. As time passed, Wakefield enlarged and perfected his theory in various publications, among which were England and America and A View of the Art of Colonization.

Wakefield disagreed with Adam Smith with regard to the influence of free land on the prosperity of colonies. The lack of labor in countries such as the United States was due, Wakefield insisted, to the abundance [123] of free land which attracted men to enterprises of their own. The ideal method, said Wakefield, would be to place a price on the land just high enough to prevent too much from being taken at any one time, and just low enough to cause an acceleration of activity at a reasonable rate. The right price thus would be just "sufficient" to adjust properly the supply of land to the supply of labor.

Like Alexander Hamilton, this great English theorist overlooked the significance of frontier attitudes and behavior patterns on the one hand, and the human weakness for speculation on the other. Self-government and controlled economic action did not synchronize. Nevertheless the theory had a great influence on English minds and called attention to the possibilities of colonization as a solution for the social and economic difficulties which the United Kingdom was experiencing. Because of youthful indiscretions in social life, Wakefield could not obtain a public office, hence Charles Buller represented him in Parliament. After the Canadian Rebellion of 1837, he and Buller went to Canada with Lord Durham, and together they compiled the monumental report on affairs of Canada.⁸ The Wakefield theory was written into the report, although some modification in regard to the price of land was necessary because of the low prices prevailing in the United States.⁹ When carried into practice Wakefield's scheme was not successful in relieving England either of redundant capital or of surplus labor.

The prime importance of Wakefield's theory of colonization appears not so much in the realm of actual colonization as in its influence upon other movements. While Wakefield, Buller, and Durham worked for free trade, it was the activity of men like Richard Cobden, John Bright, and Sir Robert Peel that secured the repeal of the corn laws in 1846. This latter group of men was in reality at odds with the Wakefield school in that they, remaining true to Adam Smith's philosophy, preached an abundance of cheap land. The tariff on the importation of grain into England had raised grain prices and thereby caused the cultivation of inferior lands. The rent paid was beneficial only to the owners of the land. With the repeal of the corn laws and the improvement of ocean and land transportation, America and the colonies could produce grain at a lower price. They felt that the repeal of these obnoxious [124] laws would bring about an extension of the field of production, would release large numbers for emigration, and, by promoting emigration, would greatly expand the market for Great Britain's manufactured goods.

The repeal of the corn laws meant that the small agricultural capitalist in the United Kingdom could no longer compete with foreign grain. Thus he took his small stock of capital and went to America. Henceforth both capital and labor found an attractive field of employment in the United States of America. The migration of capital and labor was facilitated by the improvement in transportation and the cheapening of transport rates which came after 1840. The passage of the Cheap Trains Act in 1844 brought third-class passenger service by rail in England to as low as one penny a mile. A revolution in transportation resulted. In 1845, third-class passengers numbered in round numbers, 13,000,000; in 1850, there were 35,000,000; and in 1860, almost 94,000,000.¹⁰ The improvement in oceanic transportation after 1838, with an increase in the number of ships, brought not only faster and better service but also lower rates on the seas. In the United States, too, the railroad building era was just at hand. Chicago was connected by rail with the Atlantic Coast in 1853. American shipping on rivers, canals, and oceans was rapidly improving, and all this improvement in transportation and communication made for ease of emigration. It also increased the demand for laborers for further river, canal, railroad and oceanic improvements.

Several other events accelerated the emigration of British capital and labor. The Irish famine brought on by the failure of the potato crop in 1845 was probably the most serious in English economic history.¹¹ Starvation covered the whole island and tragic repercussions were felt all over the world. The British government made some attempt to help the Irish, but it amounted to little. At the very time that the Irish were dying by the thousands, foodstuffs were being imported by the shipload into England from Ireland. This was due to the fact that some 8,000,000 Irish people were landless; the whole island was owned by about 1200 persons, many of them residents of England.¹² With the repeal of the English corn laws further havoc was wrought upon the Emerald Isle. [125] That the flour shipped over the New York canals had increased from a little less than two million barrels in 1840 to nearly four million in 1847 was a fact that no Irishman could fail to comprehend.¹³ Where England refused to lend a helping hand, America came to the rescue, first, by direct relief in the form of breadstuffs, later, by the raising of money to bring the Irish to America. Actual donations from America up to December 4,1847, were estimated at more than a million dollars.¹⁴

Irish farmers who could muster from two to twenty pounds made ready to start for America.¹⁵ In fact it is said that nearly every family sent at least one member to America with the expectation that money would be sent back to take others across the Atlantic.¹⁶ Glowing accounts of success in America were received by the thousands, and more important still, they were accompanied by remittances. It is claimed that over a period of three years no less than ,£1,250,000 were sent annually to pay passage for emigrants to America.¹⁷ The letters might well have given the impression that if the entire population of Ireland were to emigrate to America there would be work for all.¹⁸ Thus to the Irish peasant America was the promised land.

Emigrants from Britain in 1845 totalled 93,501; in 1852, 368,764.¹⁹ In 1846, 45.1 per cent of the emigrants went to the United States; in 1849, 73-3 per cent; in 1851 over 80 per cent.²⁰ Had the Irish migration continued for twenty years, the Celtic race might have vanished from Ireland. During the year 1849 when the British emigration reached the then unprecedented number of 279,498 persons -- nearly twice the largest number that had emigrated in any previous year -- 219,450 went to the United States and 41,367 went to Canada. The migration continued almost unabated until the Panic of 1857. In 1856, the number of emigrants leaving Great Britain and Ireland was 176,554. In the six months ending June 30, 96,770 persons left Liverpool alone. In the three months from March to June 1856, 48,000 sailed in 135 ships for the United States; 10,505 in 25 ships for Victoria; 6,778 in 25 ships for Canada;

[126] 2,032 in 5 ships for New South Wales; 604 in 2 ships for Tasmania; 160 in 4 ships for New Brunswick; 33 in 6 ships for South America, etc.²¹ Most of those going to Canada were re-migrating to the United States. Of the 21,982 arriving at Hamilton, Ontario, January to June 1856, 19,432 went on to the United States.²²

These figures are indeed impressive, but even more significant are the amounts of capital that left Great Britain for the United States.²³ The higher interest rates in America, both in the East and West, had attracted enormous quantities of British capital by 1840.²⁴ In 1858, a contemporary authority estimated that immigration had given to America three-fourths of the farm implements, three-fourths of the cities and towns built and three-fourths of the railroads constructed. Calling attention to the fact that the immigrants were of the proletarian or working class, this authority estimated that the three million immigrants arriving in this country brought two hundred million dollars in coin to American shores.²⁵

The same economic conditions which led to migration from the British Isles existed to a lesser degree on the continent of Europe. Following the Napoleonic wars, Germany underwent a long period of economic distress; the land was devastated and many were out of employment. The rise in the cost of living, crop failures, and the industrial revolution all had their effect. The failure of the potato crop in parts of southwestern Germany in 1846-47, and the failure of vintage in Wurttemburg in 1850-53, added to the prevailing distress.

But more important to American settlement were the political ideas that emanated from the French Revolution. It is not the purpose here to trace the growth of the liberal ideas in Prussia. Suffice it to say that the Revolutions of 1830 and 1848 encouraged the democratic movements.²⁶ The example of the United States of America tended to promote the movement for a more liberal form of government. But always the answer was repression. The struggle had religious aspects, for many [127] of the Old Lutheran congregations were subject to discriminations. By 1848 many German liberals were ready to migrate. This great German migration after 1848 was conditioned by the reports of Germans who had gone to America at an earlier period. Their letters were filled with glowing descriptions of the land of freedom. Newspapers contained accounts of immigrants, and books of travel appeared from time to time such as those by Arends, Eggerling, Brauns, Bromme, and Duden.²⁷

Although there had been a fairly steady stream of immigrants from Germany all through the nineteenth century an increase in numbers became manifest in the 'thirties and 'forties. In the 'twenties, 5,753 Germans came to this country; between 1830 and 1840 the number mounted to 124,725. The wave of immigration which began in 1846 with 157,500 Germans reached its crest of 215,004 in 1854.²⁸

Thus America became an asylum for the oppressed of Europe. The autocratic governments of northern Europe looked with indifference upon the rapid migration of their surplus population and capital to America; England actually encouraged it. But this rapid influx of population and capital changed the whole economic structure of this country. A plentiful labor supply in the East made it possible for the moneyed class to think of the West as a vast home market for manufactured goods. The pressure of immigration hastened the settlement of the remaining vacant lands of America. Moreover, it lent encouragement to those forces who looked beyond American boundaries, ever anxious to add broad acres to the public domain. The demand for wheat, resulting from British conditions in general and from the Crimean War in particular called forth an agricultural revolution in America. Besides expansion onto new soil, for the first time considerable thought was given to more intensive cultivation of all land, a process in which farm machinery was to play an important part. Irrigation and conservation became encouraged. Altogether Americans began to sense the possibilities of their own country. Statisticians were calculating the power of America fifty to a hundred years hence, and the figures were impressive.

As there was unloosed in Jefferson's administration a modest agrarian imperialism which ultimately culminated in an uncontrollable clamor [128] for Canada and Florida, so in the 'forties there appeared a strong demand for the annexation of Texas and the occupation of Oregon. This movement soon reached a crescendo, and under the watchword of "manifest destiny" the cries went up for the conquest of the North American continent and even of the regions beyond.

Expansionist Americans faced England in the Aroostook Valley of Maine, in the Columbia Valley and perhaps in Texas. In northern Maine the United States secured in 1842 a potato-patch one hundred miles in length, from which the Irish could later be fed, and still later, the Italian workers who flocked to New England's factories. As for Texas, Andrew Jackson had sent Anthony Butler to Mexico in the 'thirties to procure not only Texas but California. But Jackson's real-estate agent was not sufficiently adroit to break the "sales resistance" of the suspicious Mexicans, and Jackson was forced to recall the "scamp." Presidents Tyler and Polk, however, understood the principles, if not the terminology of "high-pressure salesmanship," and in 1845, the United States annexed the Lone Star State with its 61,892,480 acres of land.²⁹

It soon proved convenient for our manifest destiny that a dispute should arise over this state's boundaries, and soon war existed "by the act of Mexico," in "shedding blood on American soil!" A little over a year later the roll of American drums was heard on the streets of Montezuma's capital, and Nicholas Trist, who had accompanied the American army, was able to secure Mexican signatures to a carefully prepared treaty, by which the Mexicans ceded to the United States for the consideration of $15,000,000 a clear title to Texas, New Mexico, and California. The American field of production was thereby expanded to the extent of 334,443,520 acres.³⁰ Meanwhile, even England had considered it expedient to divide the Oregon Country at the forty-ninth parallel, thus conceding to the United States the Columbia River Valley. And in 1853, Gadsden's purchase from Mexico of 29,142,400 acres of land, rounded out the American domain to its present boundaries.

Such was the official course of empire. However, the real thriving, throbbing spirit of this rampant, agrarian imperialism is hardly sensed until one turns to the countryside to sample the flavor of public opinion. [129] In June 1838, the editor of The Boston Courier, commented upon a resolution introduced by Caleb Gushing of Massachusetts into the House of Representatives, which provided for the erection of a post on the Columbia River for the defense and occupation of the Oregon Country. "Which shall it be?" he asked, "Can the sense of our true interest, can the honor and pride of the nation hesitate? It is a country ours by right; ours by the necessities of geographical position; and ours it will be in tranquil possession, if we temperately but firmly assert our rights. The world is wide enough for England and for us."³¹

Newspapers and magazines throughout the country brought clearly before the public the advantages and agricultural possibilities of Oregon.³² Before 1842, the occupation of this region had largely been one of fur traders and missionaries, but beginning with that year hundreds of settlers left Independence, Missouri, headed for the Far Northwest. Fremont's expedition of 1842, Parker's ^Travels, T. J. Farnham's ^Travels of 1843, Irving's ^Astoria -- all served to advertise the region. A convention of citizens of the Mississippi Valley assembling at Cincinnati in 1843, urged immediate occupation of the Oregon region by "the arms and laws of the United States of North America." They boldly declared their belief "that it is for the benefit of all civilized nations that . . . [Britain] should be checked in her career of aggression with impunity, and dominion without right"; and they concluded by asking: "Had not the Monroe Doctrine definitely stated That the American Continents were not thenceforth to be considered subjects for future colonization by any foreign power'?"³³

The demands for the acquisition of Texas were of the same tenor. Then, having established the significance of Texas, it was not difficult to press the importance of California. "It is not much farther off than Texas," declared the family Magazine in 1840, and continued, "The fact is becoming obvious that Mexico cannot long retain a hold of her unwieldy domain. Great Britain or France will ere long be stretching their hands toward California, if we do not. The plan of a colony on the Gulf, we think, is not a bad one."³⁴ By 1845, it was being pointed out [130] that California was even more desirable than Oregon, "especially since the annexation of Texas." Furthermore, it was observed that many persons headed for Oregon had dropped down into northern California and that already the province was "in a state of revolution -- even the natives wishing to expel the Mexicans, and having every prospect of success."³⁵ In fact, the acquisition of California was well under way before the Mexican War even began.³⁶

In the Congressional chambers, the expansionist enthusiasm drowned out all opposition. The remark by Mr. Rufus Choate of Massachusetts in the Senate in 1844 to the effect that the annexation of Texas would so seriously disturb the balance of the country that it would not be the same country, that the United States would be merged and lose its identity, was so significant that it was seized upon and widely circulated in the campaign of 1844. But the cries of the Democrats for the "Reannexation of Texas and Reoccupation of Oregon!" and "Fifty-four Forty or Fight!" transcended the opposition. Buchanan after mapping the progress of the nation during its past fifty years asked impressively: "What is a century in the lifetime of a nation?" As for the fear that expansion would endanger the union, there was even deeper conviction "that the spreading of our people, and the extension of the number of unfederated states" did not "weaken, but rather" gave "strength to the American Union. Like the enduring and increasing strength of the concentric arch, the pressure from without" gave "firmness and solidity and harmony to all within. The West, with its increasing greatness and overshadowing weight," was "gradually drawing together the East, and the center, and the South, with a power" that became "more and more irresistible."³⁷

Once the boundaries of the United States were extended to the Pacific the nation immediately undertook the task of settling its new possessions. At once there arose the struggle between the free-labor interests of the North and the slavery forces of the South over the settlement of the domain. In 1845 under the caption of "California Next" the editor of the Cincinnati Herald commented on the interest in California displayed by the Nashville Union. He could not refrain from noting that [131] slaveholders were already settling in that region and cotton of the finest quality could be raised there abundantly. The soil was adapted to all staples of slave-labor and slavery would be "planted there." Slaveholders would "strive to make it all their own," and would "enlist on their side the national passion for territorial aggrandizement." The editor of the Herald concluded by pointing out that the nonslaveholders of the country had the power in their hands, but "let them not waste their efforts . . . in opposing the extension of our territory. . . . Let them devote all their energies to the limitation and ultimate extinction of slavery."³⁸ Thus agrarian interest in the expansion of national boundaries was found to be closely linked with the rising slavery issue just as it was in Missouri a generation earlier.

The slavocracy, at first interested in expansion, shortly reversed their position, becoming less and less interested in the West, for the West acquired in the 'forties was not as desirable for slavery as first appeared. But until the slavery issue entirely eclipsed the expansionist issue, the latter was to be regarded as a very important stimulant to the settlement of the West.³⁹

In those areas where the land speculation of the 'thirties was the most extensive, the ensuing depression was the greatest. In the three years, 1835 to 1838, over thirty-eight million dollars of capital had been applied to the production of cotton, bringing into cultivation over twelve million acres of most fertile land.⁴⁰ Extending the period to embrace the years 1833 to 1848, it appears that in the five southwestern states alone, over twenty-one million acres had been taken up. While a great deal in Louisiana had gone into sugar production, nevertheless, most of the area was planted in cotton. Production of this crop increased during the panic and depression period.⁴¹ The large purchases of lands apparently reached their maximum effect in 1843, when the new states alone produced 1,703,048 bales of cotton, and the total national crop of 2,300,000 bales surpassed all previous records. By 1848, the production of the older plantation-states, that is, the South Atlantic States, was not much larger than in 1833, but that of the Gulf States had tripled.⁴² [132]

It is clear then, that nearly the whole increase in the production of cotton had taken place in those states where immense sums of borrowed and subscribed capital had been invested in virgin soil of most fertile character, putting in motion the industry of thousands of blacks drawn from the more sterile soil of the old states. As a result, production outran consumption and prices dropped so low that the Atlantic planters could no longer make a profit. Not until the period 1843-45 was the vastly accelerated production overtaken by consumption and the South enabled to look forward to better times.⁴³

The concentration of vast tracts of lands in the hands of speculators during 1835 and 1836 had the disastrous effect of excluding great numbers of settlers. As prices on speculative holdings crashed, settlers rushed into the choice locations.⁴⁴ In Mississippi, as a result of bankruptcy and repudiation, some of the finest portions of the domain became depopulated.⁴⁵ In fact, interest in Mississippi subsided and settlers were "turned aside in the pursuit" of the "rich loam of Louisiana, the new regions of Arkansas, and the varied expanse of the young republic of Texas."⁴⁶ Even Alabama attracted more settlement than Mississippi in the 1840's. Not until 1849 could it be said that: "The old regime of Mississippi has passed away. . . . Our lands are now in the hands of earnest cultivators. The banking system is no more."⁴⁷

While the South was searching out opportunities in the West for the extension of its cotton empire, other interests were also establishing their spheres of influence.⁴⁸ In the period, 1839-41, New York State yielded its control of the wheat empire to the regions farther West.⁴⁹ In 1842 observers pointed out that the six northwestern states and territories, "to which channels of communication" were "now being opened," were already producing twenty-five of the eighty-four million bushels of wheat raised in the United States, and that this region was capable of raising enough to feed fifty millions of people. Should England repeal her corn laws, thus opening her market to American grain, in exchange for which the northwestern farmer would buy manufactured [133] articles, the western states would be able "to liquidate the load of debt which they now have," and there would be "a great increase in business in the Atlantic States."⁵⁰ In 1844, it was observed that settlers were preferring oak-openings to prairie land, and that if this preference continued, Wisconsin could expect to become a great wheat-producing region.⁵¹

With the repeal of the British corn laws in 1846, the way was thus paved for a great wheat boom in America. In 1853 the English and French markets could have taken three or four times the amount of breadstuffs that American farmers were able to furnish.⁵² By 1858 it was openly declared that the grain fields near the Atlantic seaboard had given out, and that "Genesee wheat, formerly the finest in the world," was now "of little account." Speakers at the meeting of the Seneca County New York Agricultural Society in 1848, pointed out that the American grower had a margin of thirty-nine cents over the English grower, and paid considerable attention to the fact that with the increased means of transportation, such as the Erie Railroad, the western free and fertile lands could in the future greatly increase the American advantage on the foreign market.⁵³ With the running of railroads into the Northwest, America would control the wheat market of the world. In America itself, by the late 'fifties King Cotton was passing his scepter to King Corn.

In addition to the repeal of the corn laws and the revolution in transport, a number of scientific factors contributed to the rapid expansion of the grain frontier into the Northwest and beyond.⁵⁴ The introduction of the improved plow, the McCormick reaper, the horse rakes, the baler, the drill, the seeder, and finally the harvester, not to mention scientific fertilizers, brought about before 1860 a virtual revolution in the agricultural industry. What this meant to the prairie country of the West is attested by an observer of 1860 who with the aid of a spyglass counted 146 reapers at work at one time.⁵⁵ Advancing with the corn frontier was the pork frontier, and the cattle frontier was not far behind. By 1865 Chicago was a great stock market center. With the development [134] of agriculture came a growing interest in agricultural education -- agricultural journals and newspapers, fairs, agricultural societies, and finally agricultural colleges. The rise of this great western agricultural industry was without doubt one of the most important factors in bringing about the Homestead Act of 1862.

The appearance of a cheap and democratic press in America and abroad was a powerful influence on the emigration from the East and from Europe. Information about the American West was to be gleaned from literary travel accounts, letters, guide books, and from newspapers and magazines. Horace Greeley might be noted as a prominent example of the eastern forces -- newspapers and miscellaneous agencies -- which were striving to protect the emigrant, to guide him to the West, and to aid him in establishing civilization on the vacant lands. Very early in his career Greeley assumed the role for which he later was to become famous, that of handing out helpful hints to those interested in becoming farmers. By the 1850's his New York Tribune was regarded as an authority next to the Bible in most agricultural sections of New York and the Great Lakes country. As early as 1836, he advised would-be emigrants to buy the published guides on the West, declaring: "If there are not more adventurers exploring the far West, there will at least be fewer unfortunate ones."⁵⁶ Nearly every published work on the West -- exploration, travel account, or economic treatise -- received a careful review in the ^Tribune's columns. Very early, too, Greeley encouraged the formation of immigrant associations to protect those coming from foreign countries, and to aid them "in procuring suitable employment, or direct them to that part of the country" where they would "be most certain of employment."⁵⁷ Swarms of "land-pirates," he declared, guising themselves as "transportation-agents, runners or forwarders" were succeeding "in robbing the poor immigrant often of his long-hoarded gold." He dedicated himself to expose all these frauds,⁵⁸ and even better, he advocated the establishment of one great "Intelligence Office" in New York City similar to those already established in Albany and Boston to supplant the existing philanthropic societies that were too often "partial in character."⁵⁹ [135]

To obviate one of the chief objections to migration to the frontier -- that of being deprived of society and nearly all the comforts of life -- this enterprising editor proposed "that a number of persons should unite and purchase contiguous tracts."⁶⁰ At another time Greeley favored the plan of organizing companies to populate the West. Commenting on the efforts of one C. Oakey of Illinois who had organized an immigrant company in England to settle lands in Illinois and the upper Mississippi Valley, Greeley said: "This, at least, is a species of emigration to which even the most fastidious will hardly object."⁶¹ In 1847, he proposed that the government furnish ships to aid the Irish to get to America, and when the idea went begging he came out with a very denunciatory editorial under the label of "murder."⁶²

From humanitarian as well as antislavery motives, Greeley lent much support to the Kansas Emigration Society which was organized in 1854.⁶³ Why not, he conjectured, form an emigrant association that would buy up a county at a cost of say half a million dollars, and by the guarantee of roads, mills, schoolhouses, etc., the country could be settled with "homogeneous and brotherly love."⁶⁴ And finally, he heralded the act of the New York Legislature incorporating the American Emigrant Aid and Homestead Company, which was to buy up land in the State of New York for resettlement purposes. "He who seeks land at government price, under the present system," Greeley contended, "must go out of the pale of civilization, out of the sight or hearing of neighbors, to find it."⁶⁵ Notwithstanding, the plan of orderly and controlled settlement with which Wakefield and others in the 'fifties were experimenting in the settlement of Australia was hardly a feasible plan for America, although there was some experimentation with group settlement in Kansas. However, no one can doubt Greeley's sincere desire to aid in the building-up of the West, though in truth his interest was national.⁶⁶ It was evident that a genuine spirit of cooperation was beginning to manifest itself in place of the older sectionalism of East versus West, or established order versus frontier.

Considerable information on the American West could be picked up from other agencies more peculiarly western. As early as 1852 Wisconsin [136] passed a law providing for the appointment of a commissioner of immigration who was to reside in New York City.⁶⁷ It was the duty of this officer to give out information to immigrants concerning Wisconsin. Wisconsin's example was followed by Iowa in 1860. The Wisconsin commissioner of immigration soon discovered that numerous agencies were bidding for the immigrant trade, especially railroad agents. The New York and Erie, for example, attempted to start the immigrants for the West immediately for fear that they would buy their tickets elsewhere.

When a ship docked it was overrun with agents, runners and peddlers. Gysbert Van Steenwuck, immigration commissioner for Wisconsin, discovered that forwarding agents favored Wisconsin because it was so far west, that it was possible to overcharge for passengers and baggage.⁶⁸ Steenwuck made it his business to become acquainted with those persons who were connected with immigration -- federal officials, consuls from foreign countries, steamship lines and railroad companies -- in order that he might print pamphlets setting forth Wisconsin's advantages, and advertise in the newspapers, particularly those in the German language. In addition, since most German immigrants went to Wisconsin he employed a German assistant, Herman Hartel. Hartel who became the commissioner in 1853, advertised the advantages of Wisconsin in both New York and European papers. His report, which covered a period of eight months, stated that he had received 317 letters from Europe, and that many immigrants, mostly Germans, had visited his office. Hartel was ably assisted by Dr. Hildebrant of Mineral Point, Wisconsin, who was United States consul in Bremen at the time.

The report records the distribution of 30,000 pamphlets, half of which were sent to Europe.⁶⁹ Hartel's office in New York was visited by about three thousand people, two thousand of whom were recent arrivals in America. These visitors consisted of Germans, Norwegians, Swedes, Irish, English, Scotch, and Hollanders. During the year he received in the neighborhood of three thousand dollars in five and ten dollar amounts from settlers in Wisconsin for the use of their friends and relatives upon their arrival in New York. Hartel's estimate of the [137] number of immigrants arriving in Wisconsin for the year 1853 is as follows: Germans, 16,000 to 18,000; Irish, 4,000 to 5,000; Norwegian, 3,000 to 4,000; others, 2,000 to 3,000. While the total immigration for the United States in the year 1853 actually fell below diat of the year preceding, the immigration to Wisconsin increased 15 per cent.

Another state which aided the emigrant considerably was the Mormon state of Deseret. These Mormon people, who first migrated to the Great Salt Lake in 1847, established a fund known as "The Perpetual Emigration Fund." The "Saints" of both America and Europe made liberal donations to this fund which provided that those who were otherwise too poor to help build up the "valleys of the mountains" might be aided in so doing. Converts to this faith were made throughout Europe, and many were induced to migrate and settle in Utah. The Mormons wished to increase the population of their territory as rapidly as possible in order that they might be taken into the Union as a state at an early date. Land was plentiful, of course, even though it had to be irrigated, and it is probable that land as well as religion influenced people to move into the region.

Wherever the immigrants went they retained their contacts with friends and relations left behind. Correspondence was made easier by the reduction in postage rates in Europe and America. The thousands of letters which have been preserved attest the importance of the immigrants themselves as an advertising agency. Professor James F. W. Johnston stated the importance of this sort of advertising in his Notes on North America: "A letter from a connection or acquaintance determined the choice of a place to go to, and, without further inquiry, the emigrant starts. Thus for a while emigration to a given point once begun, goes on progressively by a sort of innate force. Those who go before urge those who follow by hasty and inaccurate representations; so that the more numerous the settlers from a particular district, the more numerous also the invitations for others to follow, till the fever of emigration subsides."⁷⁰ Of the peoples from foreign countries who had settled in the West there were many who wrote to their friends in Europe of the wonders of the new country. In 1847 a certain Van Raalte wrote from his frontier home in Michigan to his friends and relatives in Holland. His letter was published under the name of Holland in America, or the Dutch Colony in the State of Michigan, and it [138] was circulated throughout the country. Another letter was published in the same country the following year from Henry Peter Scholte of Iowa. These letters together with money sent back to Holland to help friends brought many Dutch to America in the 'fifties.

Scandinavians who had settled in America, or who had travelled there, wrote many interesting letters to their old friends in Europe giving glowing accounts of the advantages to be found in America. One such account, published and widely circulated, stated that land was so plentiful that cattle and pigs were permitted to run at will, and moreover that title to the land could be secured with ease. This made a strong appeal to the peasant who gave his labor for two or three days a week to his landlord in return for the use of a small strip of land. (He could seldom hope to own that land himself.) Many Scandinavians came to America in the following decades because of the influence of such letters.

The activities of the various church organizations in the West cannot be overemphasized. Wherever population went, there also went religion. In the many church periodicals one finds a wealth of material on frontier America. Letters and reports published in religious magazines and newspapers undoubtedly attracted many from the East and from Europe.

Lastly, in the 'fifties, with the organizing genius behind the Illinois Central Railroad came one of the most powerful advertising agencies in all the West.⁷¹ Many of the western railroads secured tracts of land from the public domain for their right of way and in addition for eventual sale to settlers. They were also interested in the rapid settlement of the lands in the hands of the government in order that the country might develop to the point where they could do a profitable business. The part played by the railroad in building up the West, however, will be dealt with more completely in the next chapter. Suffice it here merely to call attention to the railroad as a pioneering agency.