Excerpt from Disposition of the Public Lands of the United States: With Particular Reference to Wage-Earning Labor The public domain has at one time or another covered three-fourths of continental United States, or all of the territory outside of the 13 original States, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Texas. The area of this territory is acres. In addition, the public domain included, when Alaska was purchased in 1867, the whole of that Territory acres. The public domain developed by a process of gradual accession, having its origin in concessions made by the States Of the early Confederation. It was then extended by the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the Florida Concession in 1819, Oregon Territory in 1846, the Mexican Purchases and Cessions made between 1848 and 1853, and the Alaskan Purchase of 1867. N 0 public land over which the Federal Government has proprietary jurisdiction was acquired with the annexation Of the Philippines, the Canal Zone, and the lesser islands of the Pacific, and the purchase Of the Virgin Islands. There is national park land in Hawaii and in Porto Rico certain Spanish Crown lands were made into a national forest. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.