In a March 20, 1935 article in The Nation, James Rorty describes a connection between American hopes, dreams and land speculation at Grand Coulee during the construction of the dam:

Grand Coulee

. . . Have you ever seen the American Dream walking? . . . The dream is a town. It calls itself Grand Coulee; it is built of faith, hope, barn siding, and paper board; when I was there it was inhabited by about 1,500 people. . .

. . . "Buy at the fringe and wait," said John Jacob Astor. Believe it or not, this slogan was selling house lots and business sites in Grand Coulee as fast as the notaries could stamp the papers. In a few weeks' time a corner lot 120 feet deep changed hands six times, and the final owner refused $2,250. This for a microscopic piece of desert gumbo which sold at around a dollar an acre three years ago and which, there being no logical reason to prevent it, will probably be relaimed by the sagebrush, the rattlesnakes, and the jackrabbits four or five years from now when the dam is completed.

I cornered one of the realtors and asked him to explain the miracle. But at the fringe? The fringe of what? Whose fringe? Whose $63,000,000 to $393,000,000 was being spent? What for and whom for? Who owned this land and how had they got hold of it? What will this huge expenditure of government funds net the consumers who need cheap power, the 40,000 farmers who are expected sometime to make the wind-drifted desert of the Columbia Basin into a modern Eden, the 120,000,000 people whom government is supposed to represent, and whose economic and social condition must be improved if this project is to make sense?

. . . The successive steps of the exploitative cycle are as follows:

1. The homesteader goes broke and the bank or mortgage company forecloses him.
2. The mortgage company can't sell the land. It too goes broke and the land becomes tax delinquent.
3. The county takes it over and sells it, on the terms already described, to the big speculators.
4. The big speculators wholesale the land to the small speculators, who in turn sell it to a new crop of settlers. When I was in Grand Coulee several land companies were selling tracts of from ten to forty acres, both around the dam site and in the basin, at from $12.50 to $17.50 an acre. One realtor estimated that about 50 per cent of the land affected by the irrigation project was still in the hands of the earlier settlers. But it was being picked up fast, and the picture I obtained later of land ownership in the basin indicated that speculators had more than 50 per cent of it. . .

In justice to the patriots of the Inland Empire--some of them, by the way, appear to have abstained from speculation and to have worked disinterestedly for years in behalf of the Grand Coulee project--it should be said that government condemnation and sale of the reclaimed land at fair prices are part of the official plan. . .

What is meant by "present values"? The speculative build-up has been under way since 1928. When the land companies at Grand Coulee are selling land--most of it bought for resale--at from $12.50 to $17.50 an acre, what is the meaning of the statement, found in the promotion literature issued by the Spokane Chamber of Commerce, that land will be available to settlers at from $5 to $15 an acre? And in any case, why weren't condemnation proceedings initiated early and why weren't they based on the $1.25 an-acre price at which my realtor friend bought back his old homestead?

But maybe that wasn't the idea. Maybe the idea was to create a new frontier, an artificially made, publicly financed block of exploitable resources so that the American Dream of Get Rich Quick and Something for Nothing might be dreamed all over again. In that case it is proper to remark that the American Dream is obsolete; that there is nothing in it any more except headaches, ultimately, for everybody.
Rorty, James, "Grand Coulee," The Nation 140, no. 3637 (March 20, 1935) : 329-331.

In response to Rorty's allegations of land speculation, R. Insinger, director of a number of private Inland Empire corporations, responded:

. . . As your magazine seems to be interested in the private affairs of the corporations of which I am a manager, allow me to state that I have sold land in the Columbia Basin district for $3 an acre, and it has been bought by resident settlers for pasture. Right near the dam there is of course speculation for town sites and lots, as is usual near any new enterprise employing a large number of men. . .

Mr. Rorty asks why condemnation proceedings were not initiated early? If he had taken the trouble to investigate he would have found that at the request of the state of Washington passed some legislation to prevent speculation whenever an irrigation district should be formed. But the irrigation district has not been formed, and if a high dam is ever built it will be probably ten years or even more before there is a chance to form such an irrigation district, in which case the United States government will presumably take good care that the land speculators are not allowed to play their game. . .

Isinger, R, "The Grand Coulee Dam," The Nation 141, no. 3655 (July 24, 1935): 101 - 102.

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Anti-Speculation Act

May 27, 1937 [S. 2172] [Public No. 117]

An Act

To prevent speculation in lands in the Columbia Basin prospectively irrigable by reason of the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam project and to aid actual settlers in securing such lands at the fair appraised value thereof as arid land, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That no part of the funds heretofore or hereafter appropriated or allotted for the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam project (authorized by section 2 of the Act of August 30, 1935, 49 Stat. 1028, 1039, entitled "An Act authorizing the construction, repair, and preservation of certain public works on rivers and harbors and for other purposes", and by the Act of June 22, 1936, 49 Stat. 1757, 1784, entitled "An Act making appropriations for the Department of the Interior for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1937, and for other purposes") or for the reclamation of land in connection with said project shall be expended in the construction of any irrigation feature of said project, exclusive of Grand Coulee Dam and appurtenant works now under construction, until after the following provisions have been complied with:

(a) The privately owned lands proposed to be irrigated under said project (including county lands and such State lands as the State may desire and be able to subscribe for irrigation under said project and to subject to the terms of this Act) shall have been impartially appraised in a manner and to the extent prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior for the determination of their value at the date of appraisal without reference to the proposed construction of the said irrigation works and without increment on account of the prospect of the construction of the said project.

(b) A contract or contracts shall have been made with an irrigation or reclamation district or districts organized under State law providing for payment by the district or districts of that part of the cost of construction of the project allocated by the Secretary of the Interior as the part thereof properly chargeable to irrigation, the said cost of construction to be repaid within such term or terms of years as the Secretary shall find to be necessary, not to exceed the maximum term permitted under the Federal reclamation laws, the payments to be made in the manner and subject to the terms and conditions provided in the said reclamation laws and subject to enforcement by all of the means and remedies provided in the Reclamation Act of June 17, 1902 (32 Stat. 388), and Acts supplementary thereto or amendatory thereof: Provided, That every such contract with any district shall further require that in all irrigable land held in private ownership by any one owner in excess of forty irrigable acres and all county and State lands which may be subscribed to or irrigated under the said project shall be designated as excess land and as such shall not be entitled to receive water from said project. The contract shall provide further that no owner of such excess lands in the said project shall receive water therefrom for any part of the lands owned by him if and so long as he shall refuse to sell any excess lands owned or held by him under terms and conditions satisfactory to the Secretary of the Interior and at prices fixed in the appraisals made and approved as hereinabove provided. The Secretary of the Interior may require each landowner, as a condition precedent to receiving water from the said irrigation works, to execute a valid recordable contract wherein he shall agree to dispose of excess holdings then or thereafter owned by him in the manner provided in this Act and in the contract between his district and the United States, and wherein the said landowner also shall confer upon the Secretary of the Interior an irrevocable power of attorney to make any such sale on his behalf. For the purpose of determining excess lands under the provisions of this Act husband and wife shall be considered separate persons and each may hold not to exceed forty irrigable acres as nonexcess lands or husband and wife together may hold eighty irrigable acres of community property as such nonexcess lands: Provided further, That in addition to the foregoing provisions, every such contract with any district shall also provide, with respect to all irrigable lands whether initially excess or nonexcess, that whenever any land is sold at a price in excess of the sum of the appraised value of the arid land, the appraised value of improvements made theron after the date of the original appraisal, and the amount of irrigation construction costs actually paid for that land, then, before the new owner shall be entitled to receive water from the project, a proportionate part, of the said excess or incremented value shall be paid to the United States as follows: If such payment is made to the United States more than fifty months after such sale at an excessive price has been made, then as a prerequisite to the right to receive water all of the incremented value shall be paid to the United States to apply on construction installments to come due on such land in inverse order of their accrual; if payment is made in less than fifty months but more than forty-nine months after the date of such sale, then 99 per centum of such incremented value or excess of sale price shall be thus paid and applied; if payment is made in less than forty-nine but more than forty-eight months after the date of such sale, then 98 per centum of such incremented value or excess of sale price shall be thus paid and applied, and so on for earlier payment allowing an additional reduction of 1 per centum for each month, so that in the event that such payment is made to the United States within one month after the date of such sale, then the percentage of the incremented value required to be paid to the United States for application to construction costs as a prerequisite to the right to receive water shall be 50 per centum thereof: Provided further, That each district contract may include a provision which, subject to authorization and validation thereof by the State of Washington, shall require that all irrigable lands which are allowed by the owners thereof without objection to remain in such district until after the judicial confirmation of the organization of the district and of the regularity and validity of said contract and the proceedings authorizing it shall be considered as automatically subjected to the provisions of the excess land clauses and incremented value clauses hereinbefore provided for, such obligation to be impressed on the title to the land and to be considered equivalent to a covenant running with the land. The said provision, however, shall not apply to any landowner who, prior to the entry of the judicial decree of confirmation, shall file with the district and duly record as an instrument affecting title to his land, a notice of his objection to the said obligation and of his renunciation of the right of the said land to receive water through, from, or by means of any works constructed by the Untied States in connection with such project: And Provided further, That the foregoing four provisos shall not apply to any lands in the State of Washington which have already been developed and are now being cultivated with the aid of water from sources other than the said Grand Coulee project and for which additional water may be desired.

(c) The State of Washington by appropriate legislation shall have authorized, adopted, ratified, and consented to all the provisions of this Act insofar as such provisions or any of them, in whole or in part, may come within the scope of State jurisdiction or authority or be applicable to State lands.

SEC. 2. The Secretary of the Interior is authorized to use not to exceed $350,000 of the funds hereafter appropriated or allotted for the fiscal year 1938 for the said project for the purpose of the survey, investigation, and appraisal of the irrigable lands of the said project and for surveys, investigations, plans, and designs for the irrigation works therefor.

SEC. 3. The Secretary of the Interior is authorized to make such rules and regulations and to include in the contracts hereinbefore provided for such provisions as may be appropriate and useful for the purpose of carrying out the purpose and provisions of this Act.

SEC. 4. The consent of the United States is hereby given to the sale of school lands and any other public lands of the State of Washington which may be included in any irrigation or reclamation project to which this Act is or may be applicable at prices not to exceed the appraised valuation thereof determined as herein provided.

Approved, May 27, 1937.