WRITINGS OF 5AM HOUSTON, 1860
401
mentary to and amendatory of an act entitled an act to provide relief for pre-emption settlers and t~eir assignees, under the act of 22nd January, 1845, the act of 7th February, 1853, and the act of the 12th February 1854, and actual settlers in the Missis- sippi and Pacific Railroad Reservation. The Executive in declining his assent to this bill would state that his objections are solely confined to the 2nd section of the act, which reads as follows: "Section 2nd. That the Commissioner of the General Land Office is hereby required to issue patents to all assignees who are entitled to pre-emptions under the act of the 12th of February, 1854, entitled an act donating 160 acres of land to settlers on the public domain, provided said assignees shall return to the General Land Office their pre-emption certificates proving that he or she, and those under whom they claim, have resided on said pre-emption for three years, continuously, from the date of tak- ing said pre-emption, and have otherwise complied with the act granting said donation." Considering the misfortunes which have attended a large por- tion of our pre-emption settlers, arising from a failure on the part of Government to afford them protection from Indians and those acts of Providence which have deprived them of the benefits of good crops, I think they are justly entitled to relief; but that relief should be confined to those who have acquired pre-emption rights under the laws cited in the caption of this act. The second section extends the _rights to individuals who have up to January l, 1860, lived but two years on the public domain and allows them now to come in and perfect pre-emption. Had the bill so confined the relief granted that only those who have completed their term of occupancy would be benefited, it would have met my approval. To allow persons who will on the first day of January, 1861, have resided on said pre-emption for three years continu- ously from the date of taking said pre-emption will not, in my opinion, be in accordance with the pre-emption laws or sound policy. It will furnish room for fraud and misconstruction. The proof should be required that the residence of three years was prior to the expiration of the time provided by the acts under which the pre-emption was taken, and not prior to the 1st day of January, 1861. Sam Houston. 1 Jom--nal of the Texas Senate, Eighth Legislature, pp. 245-246; Executive Reconla, 1859-1861, p. 67, Texas State Libra1·y.
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