ission to be higher than the price
paid by the owner for the land.

AN OKLAHOMA SETTLEMENT

On February 12, 1919, in Cincinnati, Ohio, sixteen land swindlers of the
McAlester Real Estate Exchange, of McAlester, Oklahoma, were found
guilty by a jury in Federal court. The company's land-advertisement
literature was so worded as to convey the impression that the McAlester
company was acting as an agent of the government in the sale of Indian
lands. The prosecution was largely centered on the distribution among
the customers of a tract of 41,000 acres in Oklahoma. It was charged
that the president of the company secured an option on these lands when
he found that he was unable to buy sufficient land at the government
sale of Indian lands to fill his contracts.

It was also charged that the company perpetrated a fraud on its
customers when it took $135 as a fee for locating and purchasing land,
agreeing to act as attorney and agent for the customer, and then sold
the land that it had bought privately at a profit. These contracts were,
in the opinion of the government, so worded as to convey the impression
that in paying for the locating and bidding the "party of the second
part" was also making a payment on the land and was encouraged in the
belief that his land would be in the midst of areas yielding oil and
other mineral products as well as timber. Timber-right frauds also were
alleged. The company had during 1917 collected from its victims, who
lived in all parts of the country, nearly $1,000,000. It was revealed
also that given plots of land had been sold to more than one buyer.

The foregoing instances indicate that companies formed for the purpose of
exploiting and deceiving land settlers have succeeded. With the increasing
tide of new immigration, it may be possible to ensnare even more unwary
persons. But there have been a sufficient number of exposes, as well as
court decisions, to make the business of fraudulent land promotion a
dangerous one. All types of real-estate dealers are increasingly realizing
the need for making their transactions aboveboard and honest. Steps to this
end are being taken by the better class of dealer.

[6] _California Commission on Land Colonization and Rural Credits_,
1916. pp. 50-53.

IV

INDIVIDUAL LAND DEALERS

Except for government land grants and homestead acts, land dealing and
colonization in the United States have, up to very recent times, been
entirely in priv