These provisions, with occasional enactments in behalf of special
interests deemed entitled to the favor of the Government, have in their
execution produced results as beneficial upon the whole as could
reasonably be expected in a matter so vast, so complicated, and so
exciting. Upward of 70,000,000 acres have been sold, the greater part of
which is believed to have been purchased for actual settlement. The
population of the new States and Territories created out of the public
domain increased between 1800 and 1830 from less than 60,000 to upward
of 2,300,000 souls, constituting at the latter period about one-fifth
of the whole people of the United States. The increase since can not
be accurately known, but the whole may now be safely estimated at
over three and a half millions of souls, composing nine States, the
representatives of which constitute above one-third of the Senate and
over one-sixth of the House of Representatives of the United States.
Thus has been formed a body of free and independent landholders with a
rapidity unequaled in the history of mankind; and this great result has
been produced without leaving anything for future adjustment between
the Government and its citizens.
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