Chapter 395.
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/statutes-at-large/vol-25/chapter-395-3578157·A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.
CHAP. 395.— An act to restore to the public domain and to regulate the sale and disposition of certain lands east of the Mississippi River in the State of Louisiana.March 2, 1889. *Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled*,Louisiana. Land in restored to public domain. That all lands lying in the rear of eighty arpents from and east of the Mississippi River and south of the Bayou Manchac and Amite River, within the limits of townships eight and nine south, of ranges one, two, three, or four east, and township ten south of ranges two. three, and four east, in the late southeastern district in the State of Louisiana, which lands have been reserved from sale because claimed to be embraced within certain French or Spanish land grants, but which have been, or may hereafter be, decided by the courts of the United States not to be legally embraced within any such land grants claimed to have been granted by the French or Spanish Governments within the said limits, shall be restored to the public domain and shall be surveyed;Surveys. and that so soon as said surveys shall have been made, all persons who have in good faith settled upon said lands within the limits of said townships at the time of the passage of this act. and who occupy the same, shall be entitled to enter the same, not exceeding one hundred and sixty acres each, under the provisions of the homesteadHomestead entries. laws, and shall be admitted to make their proofs and complete their titles in the same manner as if the said reservation. because of said grants claimed, had not been made; and all lands embraced within said townships not covered by actual settlers shall be subject to 878 entry, under the provisions of the homestead laws only: *Provided*,*Provisos*.
Lands excepted That this right of entry shall not extend to any lands within the limits of eighty depth from the Mississippi River, nor to any confirmed land grants within the limits of said townships; *And provided further*, That all lands disposed of under the provisions of this act shall Drainage.be subject to all existing servitudes for drainage recognized by the laws of the State of Louisiana: *And provided further*, That neither the claimants under this act as homesteaders nor the State of Louisiana No indemnity.shall be entitled to indemnity from the United States by reason of the passage hereof or of any action under it.
That the provisions of this act shall be and are hereby extended to embrace all settlers upon public lands and for the disposition of all public lands embraced in the grant to Daniel Clark so far as decreed invalid by the Supreme Court of the United States and the unconfirmed Conway claim: *Provided*, That the provisions of this act shall be limited to the lands claimed by actual settlers for purposes of District included in this act.cultivation whose titles are now incomplete, within the limits of the Donaldson and Scott.
Daniel Clark, and Conway grants, and that after setting apart to each of said settlers, not to exceed one hundred and sixty acres, the residue of the public lands within said grants shall continue to be, as they are now. a part of the public domain: *And provided further*Swamp lands Louisiana., that nothing in this act shall preclude the State of Louisiana from enforcing its claim to said residue of public lands under the acts of Congress granting swamp lands to the several States of the Union.
Approved, March 2, 1889.