Pacific Railroad Act

• The Pacific Railroad Act was passed


  1862
• The major goal of manifest destiny was linking east to west with a fast, reliable, and efficient transport method
• The new technology of steam locomotives and railroads offered a solution for the transcontinental railroad
• Building the transcontinental railroad

  1. Central Pacific Company began building from Sacramento, California heading east through the Sierra Nevada and the Rocky Mountains

  2. Union Pacific Company headed west across the plains from Omaha, Nebraska
• The 1851 Fort Laramie Treaty allowed prospectors under army protection to access Indian land
• The Pacific Railroad Act offered generous incentives for the companies building the transcontinental railroad
• Incentives for building the transcontinental railroad

  • Loan of sixteen thousand dollars for every mile built
  • Grant of ten square miles of land alongside the track for every mile built
• The effects of the transcontinental railroad connected east with west directly, representing the achievement of manifest destiny
• The economic benefits of transport and trade brought by the railways were huge
• The effects on the Indians were mostly negative, as they were moved away from the railroads and faced conflicts
• The decline of the buffalo was one of the negative effects on the Indians
• Trains brought hunters that disturbed the migration of the buffalo
• Indians attacked railroad surveyors and builders, leading to conflict with the US army
• Railroads led to increased settlement on Indian land
• The effects on the cattle industry included the ability to transport stock to big eastern cities, driving growth in the industry
• Traveling west was made cheaper, quicker, and easier for migrants on the railroads
• European immigration was encouraged by the railroads
• Transporting farm produce on and off the plains was made much easier
• Towns grew rapidly along the railroad routes
• Homesteaders could get new equipment and inventions from the industrial east
• National impacts of the transcontinental railroad

  • Connected east with west directly
  • Economic benefits of transport and trade
  • Negative effects on the Indians
  • Impact on the cattle industry
  • Settlement and farming
• The transcontinental railroad was a huge engineering achievement, making transport west faster, cheaper, and easier
• The Pacific Railroad Act of 1862 offered economic benefits and incentives for railroad companies, cattle barons, and settlers
• The transcontinental railroad led to increased conflict with the Plains Indians