Man’s right to life, according to Evans, logically implied his right to use the materials of nature necessary for being.  For practical reasons he would not interfere with natural resources which have already passed under private ownership.  Evans proposed instead that Congress give each would-be settler land for a homestead free of charge.

As late as 1852 debaters in Congress pointed out that in the preceding sixty years only 100,000,000 acres of the public lands had been sold and that 1,400,000,000 acres still remained at the disposal of the government.  Estimates of the required time to dispose of this residuum at the same rate of sale varied from 400 or 500 to 900 years.  With the exaggerated views prevalent, it is no wonder that Evans believed that the right of the individual to as much land as his right to live calls for would remain a living right for as long a period in the future as a practical statesman may be required to take into account.

The consequences of free homesteads were not hard to picture.  The landless wage earners could be furnished transportation and an outfit, for the money spent for poor relief would be more profitably expended in sending the poor to the land.  Private societies and trade unions, when laborers were too numerous, could aid in transporting the surplus to the waiting homesteads and towns that would grow up.  With the immobility of labor thus offering no serious obstacle to the execution of the plan, the wage earners of the East would have the option of continuing to work for wages or of taking up their share of the vacant lands.  Moreover, mechanics could set up as independent producers in the new settlements.  Enough at least would go West to force employers to offer better wages and shorter hours.  Those unable to meet the expenses of moving would profit by higher wages at home.  An equal opportunity to go on land would benefit both pioneer and stay-at-home.

But Evans would go still further in assuring equality of opportunity.  He would make the individual’s right to the resources of nature safe against the creditors through a law exempting homesteads from attachment for debts and even against himself by making the homestead inalienable.  Moreover to assure that right to the American people in perpetuo he would prohibit future disposal of the public land in large blocks to moneyed purchasers as practiced by the government heretofore.  Thus the program of the new agrarianism:  free homesteads, homestead exemption, and land limitation.

Evans had a plan of political action, which was as unique as his economic program.  His previous political experiences with the New York Workingmen’s party had taught him that a minority party could not hope to win by its own votes and that the politicians cared more for offices than for measures.  They would endorse any measure which was supported by voters who held the balance of power.  His plan of action was, therefore, to ask all candidates to pledge their support to his measures.  In exchange for such a pledge, the candidates would receive the votes of the workingmen.  In case neither candidate would sign the pledge, it might be necessary to nominate an independent as a warning to future candidates; but not as an indication of a new party organization.