Factors encouraging people to go West
The Homestead Act, 1862
This allowed Settlers without the money to pay for land, who live on and cultivate land acquired under the Homestead Laws from the United States public lands. to claim 160 acres of land free if they lived and worked on it for five years. The prospect of free land was very attractive to people who could never have afforded a farm back home.
Railroads
The Pacific Railway Act was signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1862. It provided government support for the building of first railroad to link the east and west coasts of the U.S.A.
In order to encourage the railroad companies to build the transcontinental railways, the government gave them 6400 acres of land (10 square miles) and $16,000 in government bonds for each mile of track laid. Part of the companies' profit came from selling this land. Therefore they launched a massive sales campaign, offering a settlement package
, which included:
- a safe, cheap and speedy journey west
- temporary accommodation in 'hotels' until the families had built their own home
- other attractions such as schools, churches and no taxes for five years
Manifest destiny
The term A phrase coined in 1845 which came to sum up the belief that it was America's mission to expand westward across the North American continent and to establish democratic and Protestant ideals. is thought to have been originally used by John L O'Sullivan, the editor of both the Democratic Review and the Morning News at the time. He first used it to invoke the right of America to To take possession of a territory or area of land. Often this refers to an act that takes place by force. Texas and expand its territory without the interference of European coutries, such as Britain and France:
other nations have undertaken to intrude themselves ... for the avowed object of ... checking the fulfillment of our manifest destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions.
Expanding territory had been an ongoing part of the colonisation of North America. But the O'Sullivan's phrase was taken by some to mean that it was America's manifest destiny to expand and encourage the American way of life
on the Great Plains.
Politicians felt that it was part of God鈥檚 plan to take over the whole country. This belief they felt gave them the right to take land from the Native Americans. The writer Horace Greeley, who popularised this idea, advised Americans:
Go West, young man.
Tall tales
Once the population of an area reached 60,000, it could apply to become a state of the USA. Local governments therefore could benefit from encouraging more settlers to move to their areas.
They attracted people using publicity campaigns which claimed, for example, that farmers in the west could grow pumpkins as big as barns and maize as tall as telegraph poles. Many people moved west thinking they would make a fortune.