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To: Pontiac
About 1807 land in the United States went from being something of marginal value to being absolutely worthless.

It was all the gub'mnt could do to get people to buy any of it. Eventually, by the time Lincoln was President, they started giving it away!

Obviously linking voting to land ownership in the early 19th century was ridiculous and a concept readily abandoned.

I'd suggest you re-read some of the speeches where property is mentioned because THEY DON'T MEAN LAND ~ they mean SLAVES!

22 posted on 01/19/2013 10:01:43 AM PST by muawiyah
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To: muawiyah
I'd suggest you re-read some of the speeches where property is mentioned because THEY DON'T MEAN LAND ~ they mean SLAVES!

The property requirement was pretty broad, and included livestock (which slaves essentially were under the law at the time). Benjamin Franklin opposed the property requirement, and made the famous observation:

Today a man owns a jackass worth fifty dollars and he is entitled to vote; but before the next election, the jackass dies. The man in the meantime has become more experienced, his knowledge of the principles of government, and his acquaintance with mankind, are more extensive, and he is therefore better qualified to make a proper selection of rulers-but the jackass is dead and the man cannot vote. Now gentlemen, pray inform me, in whom is the right of suffrage? In the man or the jackass?

No state other than the original thirteen ever had a property requirement because, as you point out, all those states were on the frontier and property ownership was laughably easy to come by. The only effect of property requirements on the frontier would be to punish shop owners and town doctors and pastors and anyone else who might rent space in growing towns -- essentially discouraging any form of commerce other than farming.

24 posted on 01/19/2013 6:29:34 PM PST by ReignOfError
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To: muawiyah
Obviously linking voting to land ownership in the early 19th century was ridiculous and a concept readily abandoned.

I am talking in regards to voting in the states you are talking about territories.

Yes land in the territories was cheap because improving the land to the point that it could be farmed was a long and laborious process that killed many of the men that tried.

Land in the 13 original states was not cheap and no one was giving it away. Also remember that who could vote and even who could own land was in the hands of the states.

25 posted on 01/19/2013 6:58:13 PM PST by Pontiac (The welfare state must fail because it is contrary to human nature and diminishes the human spirit.)
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