Settlers Rise Against Railroad Land Grab
Kittitas County citizens demand the federal government forfeit Northern Pacific railroad land grants, accusing the monopoly of stifling settlement and hoarding millions of acres of land.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Adopted by the citizens of Kittitas county, in mass meeting assembled, praying for a forfeiture of the Cascade division of the Northern Pacific Railroad Land Grant. Whereas, by an act of Congress in 1864, half of a strip of land 80 miles in width was granted to the N.P.R.R. Company, to aid in the construction of a railroad from Lake Superior to Puget Sound; and whereas, the original grant was large and valuable enough to build the road, yet eight years have elapsed since the grant expired; and whereas, by one half of the land being withdrawn from settlement the growth of the country has been retarded, immigration checked, and settlers on such lands handicapped; therefore, Resolved, that the lands lying along the Cascade division of the N.P.R.R. have unjustly been held from settlement for a period of twenty years, thereby filling the coffers of a predacious monopoly at the expense of the frontiersman. Resolved, that we are opposed to any further time being extended to the N.P.R.R. Company, or of Congress fixing any price per acre upon railroad lands.
“Resolved, That these lands belong, and of right ought to belong, to the people, and that we most emphatically condemn the policy of Congress in taking away the poor man's heritage and giving it to stock gamblers and railroad sharks.”
This 1884 protest over land-banking and corporate control of public resources directly mirrors modern Seattle debates regarding developers holding onto vacant land or properties while the city faces severe housing shortages and affordability crises.
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