<P> The Preemption Act of 1841, also known as the Distributive Preemption Act (27 Cong., Ch. 16; 5 Stat. 453), was a federal law approved on September 4, 1841 during the early presidency of John Tyler . It was designed to "appropriate the proceeds of the sales of public lands...and to grant' pre-emption rights' to individuals" who were already living on federal lands (commonly referred to as "squatters"). </P> <P> The Preemption Act of 1841 was widely utilized by settlers in Kansas Territory and Nebraska Territory (which were opened to settlement in 1854). When the Homestead Act was enacted in 1862, claims under the Preemption Act sharply decreased . However, preemption was still widely utilized and more land was transferred to private ownership through preemption filings than homestead types . In fact settlers would often utilize preemption, homestead and timber culture filings to establish their land holdings . This is often overlooked when viewing the homestead era in practice . </P>

Congress preemption acts of the 1830s and 1841 apush