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THE NEW IRISH LAND BILL.

THE RESERVE which is observed in each House of Parliament upon the subject of measures which are before the other, made it impossible for me, in speaking in the House of Lords on the 8th of April, to do more than indicate in the most general terms the principal objection which I entertain to the Irish Land Bill of the Government. The same reticence need not be observed in discussion out of doors;' and indeed it seems to be almost the duty of those who have given much attention to an important subject, that they should contribute what they can to the public consideration of it.

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Let me in the first place deprecate the attitude of mind which is impatient of all argument on the subject. It is an attitude not only common: it is prevalent. Something must be done, never mind what.' The weary cycles of Irish discontent, the savage and too often the disgusting crimes, the odious requirements of repressionall these may well drive us, at moments, into conduct born of mere recklessness and despair. There is, indeed, a time for everything. There are moments in politics, as in other affairs, when ordinary rules must be suspended. But no time can ever come when in the work of permanent legislation we can afford to forget what that work involves for the future as well as for the present. Least of all can such forgetfulness be afforded when one of the greatest evils we have. to deal with is a chaos of opinion-a confounding of the plainest distinctions not only in matters of fact and of policy, but in morals. Simply to yield without caring to think what is yielded-is not the way to mitigate but the way to aggravate that most fruitful kind of mischief. Neither the peculiar social problems of Ireland nor those of any other country can be solved in such a spirit. It is one thing to act upon a real political necessity; it is another thing to go beyond the action which that necessity requires. It is yet another thing-and a very different thing indeed ourselves to create or to aggravate the necessities to which we profess to yield, and to raise a new crop of such necessities for those who come after us.

No politician who was responsible for the Land Act of 1870, and who defended the Disturbance Bill of 1880, can be accused of being insensible to the demands of circumstance or to the exigencies of

the moment.

On the other hand, those who have agreed to exceptional measures can never justly be accused of inconsistency because they decline to advance farther and farther upon divergent paths. There were in the Land Act of 1870, as there are in every part of our constitution, a great many so-called principles' involved which, if carried farther, would effectually destroy other principles' of far more fundamental obligation. It must never be forgotten that in politics, as well as in higher matters, the limits within which a principle is applied are, or may be, an essential part of that principle itself. The whole system of government under which we live depends on our constant recollection or on our instinctive sense of this truth.

In the present paper I wish to put on record some of the principal objections I entertain to the proposals of her Majesty's Government for the further alteration of the law affecting the Ownership and Occupancy of land in Ireland.

The fundamental principle of these objections may be stated in a few words. Every measure which can be prudently and justly taken with a view to increase the number of the Owners of land in Ireland is a measure tending in the right direction. On the other hand, every measure which tends gratuitously to impair or destroy Ownership altogether, by cutting out of it some of its most essential elements, and by reducing all Owners, more or less completely, to the position of mere rent-chargers, must be a measure tending in the wrong direction, not only at the present moment but for all time to

come.

It has long been one of the professed aims of the Liberal party to modify or remove the restrictions which constitute what is called 'limited Ownership' in land,--with the great object of making every Owner as immediately and as directly interested as possible in the good management of his property. Legislation-however exceptional, provided only it be just—with a view to increase as rapidly as possible the number of persons who own land in Ireland, is, in my view, most expedient. Legislation tending unduly and needlessly to limit the freedom of such Ownership, when it has been acquired, is, in my view, not only inexpedient, but mischievous in the highest degree.

These two lines of legislation are not only different, but they are opposite in direction. Tenants may well refrain from buying those incidents of ownership which they expect, by agitation, to get for nothing. Capitalists who are not tenants will be little tempted to invest their money in land if they cannot buy with it the powers essential for its management. Thus the value of the Purchase Clauses will be destroyed, or much diminished, by the Occupancy Clauses. It will do little good to multiply the number of Owners in Ireland if they are to be deprived of the powers which are essential to the discharge of those functions in which the whole virtue of Ownership consists. The thoughtlessness prevalent on this subject is astonishing. VOL. IX.-No. 51. 3 N

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In Ireland it is now commonly laid down as an indisputable proposition that if a landowner receives a certain annual rent it is all he requires, and that everything else he values in Ownership is a 'mere sentiment.' This is true only in the same sense in which it is true that sentiment' is the one great power which gives force and dignity to all the pursuits of life. Even in those callings in which the love of money seems to be predominantly concerned, men can and do get deeply interested in better things. In the excellence of the products in which they deal-in the skill of their workmen-in the satisfaction of customers-in the contribution they make to the wants of others and to the material progress of the world,-in one or other of these ways all men in all callings do contrive to cherish and to be impelled by 'sentiments' other and better than those which are inspired by the mere enjoyment of money. The Ownership of land may at least be credited with some share in this higher savour among the pursuits of life. The management of an estate is, or ought to be, as much a business as the management of any other concern. The sentiment' which delights in seeing the improvement of a landed property is a sentiment of the highest value to the State. No man could count the millions which, under the stimulus of this sentiment,' have been laid out on the improvement of the soil in these kingdoms. And yet it is a kind of outlay which those who are not concerned in it may never see. In other branches of industry capital takes a more visible form. Great buildings, forests of chimneys, miles of houses, the confused noises of machinery--these are all evident to the eye or to the ear. But the investments of capital in the soil often, like the dead, lie silent underground,' or are visible only in changes of vegetation which the mine-owner or the mill-owner would never notice. Not, generally, in great works which catch the eye; not in gigantic reclamations which are trumpeted in newspapers; but in the ceaseless outflows of continual interest and attention—now on this farm, now on that; now on one field, now on another-has this sentiment' of Ownership been fertilising and reclaiming land for generations past. It has at least as high elements in it as the sentiment which prevails in any other secular pursuit whatever. It may pay, but it never pays highly. Men are not incited to it merely, or even mainly, by the love of money. The doctrine that they ought to be contented with the position of mere rent-chargers is a doctrine founded on the ignorance or the prejudices of those who know nothing themselves of the management of land. Every act of legislation which is inspired by this doctrine will not only be unjust as regards the present time, but most injurious for all time to come.

This would be true anywhere. But it is even more true of Ireland than of any other country in the world. If the unfortunate history of that country has led, and indeed has almost compelled, many landowners there to be contented with the position of mere rent-receivers,

or has discouraged or prevented them from having any other, there is all the more reason and necessity for favouring the change in this matter which has undoubtedly been in progress. If there has been one fact brought out more clearly than another by the evidence taken before the Commission, it is the large and unacknowledged share which landowners have frequently contributed to the improvement of Ireland. There is, indeed, an immense range of variation as to the practice in this respect a range of variation which all the more condemns legislation which is founded on general assumptions and which gives indiscriminate rights. I doubt whether in any part of England or of Scotland an instance could be found of more spirited outlay than that which has been detailed before the Commission as the outlay of the Duke of Leinster and of some other landowners on the main drainage of an important district. Only one general assumption on this matter would be safe, and that is, that the 'sentiment' of Ownership should be encouraged and developed to the highest possible degree. Ireland needs, above all things, an active and enterprising Ownership in land. In most parts of England the land has been under cultivation for centuries. Its condition has been the result of the outlay of many generations of Owners, and of the labour of many generations of tenants. In such cases, the existing Owner may have comparatively little to do except to keep buildings and other improvements abreast of the science of the time. But Ireland is, as regards a large portion of it, a country in a backward stage of agricultural industry. There is a vast amount of land which may be reclaimed. There is another vast amount of land only half cultivated, which requires to be thoroughly improved. Above all, in a large part of Ireland the tillage of the people is so rude, their habits so antiquated, and their holdings so scattered and so miserable, that it is very often an indispensable preliminary to all improvement that they should be rearranged and more or less consolidated. Every sentiment' which can induce capital and enterprise and knowledge to come to the help of sluggishness and ignorance and poverty, in such a country, ought to be stimulated and encouraged, instead of being checked by legislation and denounced in speeches.

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There is, therefore, obviously the strongest objection in principle to every limitation on the Ownership of land in Ireland which is not justified or demanded under one or other of these three following categories:

1. Limitations arising out of rights, legal or equitable, acquired by existing Occupiers from contract, or from usages capable of being supported by reasonable evidence before a Court.

2. Limitations which can be honestly said to be essential to the conduct of agriculture as a business.

1 Bessborough Commission Report, vol. iii. Q. 40, 528.

3. Limitations intended for the exceptional protection of extreme helplessness and poverty.

These are limitations which give the widest scope to the recognition of every local circumstance, and all the special conditions of Ireland.

Under the first of these heads came all the limitations imposed by the Act of 1870 in clothing with legal force the Ulster custom and all other similar usages wherever their existence could be proved, as applicable to each individual case. In doing this the Act went ery far: because many of the usages thus legally enforced had never been of the certain and accepted character which alone constitutes a legal custom in England. Many of them were nothing more than the rules or allowances of individual liberality on the part of owners -allowances which were thus entirely changed in character.

Under the second of these heads came all the limitations imposed by the same Act, securing compensation for improvements, and for the encouragement of leases.

Under the third head came the Disturbance Clauses, which were avowedly of an exceptional character, and were carefully framed, and as carefully explained, so as to exclude the idea that they were intended to acknowledge a divided Ownership, and to make it plain that they were intended simply to compensate for disturbance in a profitable business. Nothing could be more definite and precise than the language of Mr. Gladstone in 1870 in explaining the 'Disturbance' Clauses:- "That which is our main contention is this-that the great remedy which, apart from custom, ought to be provided for the Irish Occupier, should be provided for him in the shape of a shelter against eviction, but not on the footing of a joint property in the soil. When he has paid his money that gives him such a property-inconvenient as it may be with the consent, or the fairly presumed consent, of his landlord, he is entitled to be protected. But I am not prepared, nor are any of my colleagues, to admit that the just protection of him affords either an apology or a reason for endowing him with a joint property in the soil.' And, be it observed, this disclaimer did not rest only, or even mainly, on the declarations of the Government. It rested on the structure of the Act. If the compensation for disturbance had been intended as the price of a right of property, that price would have been higher in proportion to the size and value of the holding. But, on the contrary, the rate of compensation was graduated on a scale decreasing with size and value, and increasing with smallness and poverty.

It is now proposed to confer by law upon every tenant in Ireland (except existing lease-holders), indiscriminately, and without the least reference to the fact whether he has ever acquired it, or had the smallest reason to claim it, a right to sell his holding for the best price that can be got'—that is, to the highest bidder, unless the Owner can object to that bidder on some specified ground proved

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