In 1850, the United States passed The Oregon Donation Land-claim Act. This act gave American men 640 acres, one square mile of free land in Oregon, allowed other claims by wives (160 acres), and children, and proved up on the previous land claims of other Americans. A recent manuscript by Julius Wilm (2017) points out that the United States, previous to the Treaty of Oregon (1846), sidestepped the issue of claiming full ownership to Oregon, and risking the ire of Great Britain, and instead tried to pass an act to  “secure the persons and property of American Citizens”  which were … Continue reading Dart’s Instructions of Colonization and Assimilation in 1850