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One of the unforeseen results of the homestead legislation was a high rate of employment among builders of birdhouses. In most instances, you were required to display an “erected domicile” on your land. The Congress, after all, was much too smart to give people land without requiring them to live on it. In a number of instances, the erected domicile was a birdhouse, put there to satisfy a paid witness with a tender conscience. It is quite possible that the greatest opportunity offered by the homestead legislation in the West was the opportunity to earn a little honest graft. By conservative ...more
Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water
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