Passage of The Kinkaid Act
Moses Kinkaid, a congressman from the sixth district of Nebraska, introduced a bill “to amend the homestead laws as to certain unappropriated and unreserved lands in Nebraska” on April 6, 1904. The original bill provided for 1,280 acre homesteads, but the Committee on the Public Lands limited the size to 640 acres. The committee felt that 640 acres would be a good initial experiment size, and the act could be amended in the future if more land were needed.
Kinkaid stated that the bill had three primary purposes: to get the lands into the hands of individuals and thus make the land taxable; to end the fencing and claim fraud controversies over the land; and to build up the communities and homes in the region. It was a bill meant for “the disposition of sandy and arid lands in western Nebraska,” which were too difficult to irrigate. It specifically applied to the Sandhills region of Nebraska, which is approximately the northwestern two-thirds of the state. All of the land was west of the 98th meridian. Only non-irrigable lands were open for entry; those that were deemed irrigable were not eligible.
The bill passed on April 28, 1904. Approximately 11,000,000 acres (4,500,000 ha) of land was made available within the area of the Kinkaid Act. An additional 1,000,000 acres (400,000 ha) of land was withdrawn due to potential irrigability.
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