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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Wright, Augustus Romaldus, 1813-1891 "Distribution of Public Lands"

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC02691.11.004 Author/Creator: Wright, Augustus Romaldus, 1813-1891 Place Written: Washington, District of Columbia Type: Printed document Date: February 2, 1859 Pagination: 8 p. : Height: 24.7 cm, Width: 15.9 cm Order a Copy

Speech given by Rep. Augustus Wright in the House of Representatives on the 'distribution of the public lands.' According to the speech, the government held about a billion acres of land at the time. Wright believed that the best candidates for the acquisition of the land were individual farmers who would settle and work the land themselves, rather than corporations or prospectors.

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