The correct answer as A) the government gave land to the railroads to spur the development of a transcontinental railroad.
The federal government used land grants in the West in the 1860s in that the government gave land to the railroads to spur the development of a transcontinental railroad.
The federal government supported the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad and gave the project to two companies with the Pacific Railroad Act of 1862: the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific Railroad. The idea was to connect the East with the Pacific Coast. So they started the construction from Omaha, Nebraska to the West, and from Sacramento, California to the East. The rails met each other in Promontory, Utah on May 10, 1869.
The other options were B) the government used land grants to relocate American Indians onto reservations. C) the government slowed settlement of the west by withholding land grants until the Civil War was over. D) the government offered land grants to free African Americans after the end of the Civil War.