Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-06-28

they see ruin anedu "a thSiii II 'hoJ S"HAios
obtain relief from the burdens which the
existing system of land tenure entails. 1t
has in fact been demonstrated In the most
ncontestahle way that the British farmer
is now fatally handicapped by landlordism,
and that unless he is relieved he must sue
cumb to foreign rivalry and become extinct
The hereditary land. owners on their part
have many reasons for desiring some
cnange IN The system, though they nat
urally dread the radical reorganization
proposed by Mr.. Gladstone. The customs
of primogeniture and entail have operated
not only to tie up the land, but to load
down most noble families with rent
charges and jointures, endowments and
other burdens, which eat up all the profits
of cultivation. The same laws, therefore,
which vex and cripple their tenants, pre-
vent them from doing the best that can be
done with their estates, and apart from
the sentimental conservatism which clings
to old customs merely because they are ia
miliar and venerable, there is we'll
defined and growing opinion among the
land owners in favor of some change in
the system.
The radicals have doubtless done great
deal to strengthen the conservative opposi-
ton by their defiant and boastful declara-
tions of the extent of their programme.
The threats which have been freely made
of late years, to abolish the House of
Lords unless it refrains from opposing the
popular will as expressed through the
House of Commons, is i'll calculated to
effect its purpose when it is used in support
of measure which it is openly asserted
will probably result in the extinction of
landlordism throughout the country. When
men are told that unless they submit to
measure which is to deprive them of all
influence and consequence, they shall be
punished by abolition of their legislative
functions, the threat can have little force,
since the alternatives are too equal. 1t
would in fact probably be safer for the
Lords to risk the deprivation of
legislative power, in resisting the land
bill, than to accept that measure
and thereby lose all that gives
their legislative power significance Be-
sides, it must be remembered that the
House of Lords is after all coordinate
branch of the Government, and that it
has quite as much right to review the laws
introduced by the Commons as the latter
body has. The bullying tone lately
adopted toward the Lords is dangerous
indication. II appears to denote the
growth of democratic tendency too ultra
to be at all safe. 1t would be impossible
to abolish the House of Peers at the pres
ent time without changing the entire
form of Government into rabid and
anarchic democracy. If hereditary legis-
lators are to be got rid OF, as seems inev-
liable, proper substitute for them, in the
shape of an elective or appointed Senate,
will have to be created and as yet no
movement looking to that end has even
been suggested.
The land qestion, however, will have to
be settled, and there can be little doubt
that it will be settled on the basis laid
down by Mr.. Gladstone. Primogeniture
and entail must go, and the farmers must
be permitted to own the land they culti-
vate, or the landowners must themselves
become cultiyators. SO much is forced
upon the country by foreign competition
but while this is clear, it is equally plain
that the circumstances give the Irish bill
strength which it would never have had
but for them. Had such measure been
brought forward twenty years ago, before
American wheat raising had affected the
English market seriously, i. would have
encountered the most determined opposi.
ton from the British farmers as well as
from the British landlords, and it would
not have had the least prospect OF success.
Now, however, the Irish tenant farmer has
a powerful, though indirect, champion, in
the agrieulturists of our Western States,
and the solid arguments advanced by the
latter are proving far more persuasive
than anything else that could be brought
forward. There is not more disinterested
sympathy xith Irish distress in England
to-day than at any former time, but it is
the fact now that the Irish and English
farmers have common cause in many re-
specie, and that therefore the land bill is
assured of passage. The opposition of the
Lords, though pronounced, will not proba.
bly, be carried to extremes. Efforts may
be made to modify or even to emasculate
the bill, but they viii not be successful
There are plenty OF English peers who
are sagacious enough to read the handwrit-
ing on the wall, and they will rather adapt
themselves to changing circumstances than
undertake to hold back the stream of pro-
gress. The question moreover is so largely
one of the future well-being of the whole
country that any class which opposed itself
to reform the necessity of which has been
demonstrated SO clearly must thereby in
vite an unpopularity certain to crystalline
into deadly assault upon its very exist
ence. The Peers are proud and conserva.
tive, but they are sensible enough to real
ize that the inevitable cannot be resisted.
THE CHANNEL TUNNEL.
We do not understand why the English
engineers should so laugh TO scorn the pro-