I'm never studied American History thoroughly, so that's my reasoning behind this question. Why did the American government encourage people to move west and civilize the lands? (Great Plains, California, Oregon etc.) Was it simply because these lands boasted large amounts of agricultural land or because the population in the east coast was booming?
Is there a more complex reason for the expanision and colonisation of the West?
If someone could explain to me, I would be extremely happy!
Unused or unsettled lands invite incursions by other nations.
Homesteading and similar programs promised a better future for new immigrants or growing populations faced with subdividing family farm holdings in the East or South.
Agriculture, mining, forestry, and eventually, industry in the newly settled areas would make the nation wealthier.
Manifest Destiny, which was the idea that the US was destine to expand all the way to the Pacific, was a pretty wide spread belief during the early to mid 1800s, and was a major reason for the rapid westward expansion at that time. A lot of Americans at that time felt that westward expansion was something of a mission that they were responsible for seeing through. Of course, not all Americans felt that way, and there were plenty who were opposed to the idea of Manifest destiny, but there were plenty who fully believed in it too. It's kind of a strange concept to think about now, but at the time it was a very common way of thinking.