The Happy Family were obeying the land laws implicitly, except as their real incentive had been an unselfish one.

He could not feel that it was wrong to try and save the Flying U; was not loyalty a virtue?
And was not the taking of land for the preservation of a fine, fair dealing outfit that had made itself a power for prosperity and happiness in that country, a perfectly laudable enterprise?
Andy believed so.
Even though they did, down in their deepest thoughts, think of the Flying U's interest, Andy did not believe that Florence Grace Hallman or anyone else could produce any evidence that would justify a contest for their land.

Though they planned among themselves for the good of the Flying U, they were obeying the law and the dictates of their range-conscience and their personal ideas of right and justice and loyalty to their friends and to themselves.

They were not conspiring against the general prosperity of the country in the hope of great personal gain.

When you came to that, they were saving fifty men from bitter disappointment--counting one settler to every eighty acres, as the Syndicate apparently did.
Still, Andy wondered why he had represented himself and his friends to be such bloodthirsty devils.