Essay 13-C: The Homestead Act And The Founding Documents

Essay Read by Constituting America Founder, Actress Janine Turner

President Abraham Lincoln once said, “I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence.” We readily can see those political feelings play out in his “House Divided” speech and the “Gettysburg Address.” Those political feelings shined forth in the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment. 

However, we should not neglect a lesser-known action of our famous sixteenth president: signing into law the Homestead Act of 1862. The law took effect on January 1, 1863—also the first day that the Emancipation Proclamation was implemented. 

As with the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln’s support for the Homestead Act flowed from the sentiments of the Declaration of Independence. The Homestead Act furthered two core principles of the Declaration: human liberty and human equality. 

The Declaration declared that all men possessed the “unalienable” right to liberty. But what conditions helped persons live freely? One important way involved owning land and a home of one’s own. Owning land provided the opportunity to make a living. Given a sufficient amount of workable land, a person could grow the food, keep the livestock, and undertake other efforts to care for him or herself and a family. That is what the Homestead Act did. For a small fee and an agreement to live on and cultivate the land for five years, a person could receive 160 acres from territory owned by the national government.

By making a living on one’s own property, persons would experience an important kind of personal and political liberty. One would not be as dependent on others for daily needs and thus susceptible to coercion by them. Others, thus, could not try to control one’s political and social views, much less one’s vote, by threats to undermine one’s means of subsistence. In addition, Thomas Jefferson had argued that farmers should be the bedrock of the American republic because farmers possessed a particular set of virtues—courage, determination, industriousness, and self-sufficiency—especially needed in a popular form of government. They made the best citizens, and the Homestead Act made more of them. 

Owning one’s own home also bolstered liberty. The phrase, “a home is a man’s castle,” went back at least to 1604 in the writings of English jurist Sir Edward Coke. The legal concept developed as an affirmation of the sanctity of one’s home. Its owner possessed particular control over it. He could say much about how it was built, how it was furnished, and how particular rooms were used. He could control, for the most part, who was welcomed or barred from entrance. It was a place of refuge, of safety, and a place where the joys of family life could thrive. In many ways, the Homestead Act made this possible. Because persons were required to live on the property for most of the year during their five-year probationary period, this law strengthened the culture of homeownership among Americans. 

This homeownership supported personal and political liberty as well. Persons could exercise the virtues of self-government in the home and teach them to their children without outside intrusion. They could meet with others, too, cultivating the habits of listening, persuasion, and community bonding so crucial to a democratic society. 

In addition to liberty, the Declaration famously asserted that “all men are created equal.” The Homestead Act aided this sentiment as well. In the distribution of its land, the Homestead Act established a large class of Americans holding a relatively equal amount of physical property. This general equality in land fostered kindred feelings among Americans having similar experiences and making use of similar means. It helped many have similar social and political interests that they could band together to support in local, state, and national elections. 

The Homestead Act also fought slavery. The slave system had depended in large part on extensive plantations, or like agriculture, owned by a small set of oligarchs and operated by those in bondage. That system competed with “free labor,” which involved independent families on smaller properties working for themselves. Lincoln, a long-time advocate (and past beneficiary) of this system, saw the Homestead Act as a way of strengthening free labor against the slave system. 

As we celebrate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, we also should remember the actions taken to better implement its principles. The Homestead Act should be among those remembered actions. It furthered the sentiments of liberty and equality. In doing so, it built up an essential concept accompanying those sentiments: self-government. In the liberty and equality it fostered, Americans learned better how to think, act, and live for themselves. Thus, more than 160 years later, we still experience the goods that came from a lesser-known act of Abraham Lincoln: the Homestead Act of 1862.

Adam Carrington is the Associate Professor, Archer Endowed Position in History & Political Science and Co-Director, at the Ashbrook Center of Ashland College! 

Professor Carrington specializes in American Political Institutions, the American Judiciary, and the intersection of Politics and Religion. He earned his B.A. from Ashland University before completing his M.A. and Ph.D. at Baylor University.

Professor Carrington served as the Garwood Visiting Fellow at the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University during the 2020–2021 academic year. 

In 2018, he was honored as Hillsdale College’s Professor of the Year by the graduating class, a testament to his dedication to teaching and mentorship.

He is the author of Stephen Field’s Cooperative Constitution of Liberty: Liberty in Full (Lexington Books, 2017), which explores the jurisprudence of one of the most influential 19th-century Supreme Court justices.

Now a faculty member at Ashland University, Professor Carrington’s favorite part of the job is working closely with students both inside and outside the classroom. 

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