Beschreibung:

Title: Organization, acts, and regulations of the U.S. Land Commissioners for California; with the opinions of Commissioners Hall and Wilson on the regulation to allow adverse claimants to intervene in the original cases, and Commissioner Thornton's opinion dissenting from that regulation; also a list of land titles presented to date Author: ** Place: San Francisco Publisher: Monson, Whitton & Co. Date: 1852 Description: 43 pp. 21.5x14 cm. (8½x5½"), 20th century ¼ pigskin & boards. First Edition. Rare and important review of early California land claims and land law. This is the Thomas W. Streeter copy, and he comments on the work, "[Robert Glass] Cleland, The Cattle on a Thousand Hills... devotes Chapter III to 'The Land Act and its Aftermath' under which the United States land commissioners passed on all California titles held under Spanish or Mexican grants and settled private land claims in California. As Cleland says, 'the act constituted one of the most important legislative measures in the history of the state' and the American government 'instead of carrying out its definite pledges to protect the native landholders [in] its later policy actually challenged the validity of every title in California, reduced many legitimate landowners to bankruptcy, and sowed the seed of innumerable economic ills throughout the state.' This pamphlet states the first official acts of the land commissioners. The list of land claims at the end gives the names of the attorneys, on which a former owner has penciled in many instances the final action of the commissioners." Greenwood adds that "This list, the first to be printed, shows that 247 cases were present before the courts." As noted by Streeter, there are the pencil notes on pages 25-32. Cowan p. 374; Greenwood 364; Streeter 2725. Book labels of Thomas W. Streeter and John C. Broome. Lot Amendments Condition: A few stray fox marks, very good or better. Item number: 232078