Arizona weekly enterprise., 1890-12-06
Land and Poverty.
From the San Francisco Chronicle

From the San Francisco Chronicle.
 It has been asserted time out of mind by English writers and by many of their American admirers that the contrast in the situation of the masses in Great Britain and in the United States was due to the vast amount of land in this coun- try which offered itself for agricultural uses. Macaulay in 1858, in letter pre- dieting the downfall of the American re- public, saw safety only until the vacant land should be settled, and then the end was to come.
 Naturally, the conversion of this prop osition has also been asserted, that is, that the poverty of the masses in England was due to the difficult or impossibility of obtaining farming land there on such terms as should leave a margin of profit for the farmer. The overcrowding of the great cities has been attributed directly to the scarcity of agricultural land, and the pinehing, grinding poverty of the poor of London to their inability to pro- cure land for cultivation.
 In each case the generalization has been nasty and incorrect. It is a fact that to-day in some portions of England farming land can be bought more cheap ly than the same or similar quality of land in the United States, and that acre upon acre of arabic land lies untouched by the blow from one year to another. On the other hand the movement in the United States for several years has been to the cities, not from them, as the census figures show, and farms have not been in active demand as compared with the agri- cultural situation at the time of taking the previous census.
 It is, therefore, incorrect to assert a necessary connection between land and prosperity, or between landlessness and abject poverty. Gen. Booths book, "In Darkest England" which has just been published, throws more light on the sub ject of poverty in England than all the essays of the theorists on the question. It deals with facts, and stern, cruel facts at that, and it proves beyond question, though such is not it's purpose, that to the poor of London a gift of land cap- able of producing food would be as useless as to give blind man a li- brary, The London pauper would not know what to do with land if he had it.
 The poor of London are growing poor CT, Gen. Booth concludes, and his solu- ton is to take them by main strength and lift them up to a higher level. His plan seems crude, but 1t may be the only one which would be effective.
 But to return to the question of land, the reason why lands have become com paratively valueless in England is be- cause legislation has been against its in- terests ever since the passage of the Corn Laws. It is true that the virgin soil oi the United States has been able to pro. duce more wheat. or, rather, wheat al lower prices, than Great Britain; but had Great Britain pursued similar policy to that of the United States agriculture in the United Kingdom wouldlhold itssowr To-day, if Parliament should adopt 6 modified system of protection, English land would at once rise in value and the streams would ebb from the cities London particularly; for while the Lon- don pauper could make no use of land as it's owner, he could work under super vision; and his exit would relieve the congestion of the great city and possibly do more for the poor than Gen. Booths plan of relief.