Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1904-02-05
EVICTED IRISH TENANTS.
Many Residing in the United States
Will Try to Recover Their
Old Farms.

Perhaps the most novel feature of the
Irish question which has ever presented
tself to the people of America is the
movement now on foot in various parts
of the United States among the people
who were evicted from their former
homes in Ireland in the course of the
land struggle of the last twenty-five
years, to get back their former places
and return to the old country to live, says
the Boston Globe.
The passage of the new Irish land act
has proved that there are hundreds of
such people scattered all over America,
most of whom are anxious to secure re-
instatement in their old homes Some
desire it as a matter of poetic justice and
for the satisfaction they would feel at
returning to the homes from which
they were driven ruthlessly forth by
irish landlordism.
Others believe that under the altered
condition of affairs life in the old coun-
try would be more pleasant for them
than that which they have been expert
encing here. Others still think they are
entitled to some compensation for the
loss of their property in Ireland, and
reinstatements to their farms being the
only means of securing it, they are de-
sirous of trying that method.
The new land act empowers the newly
formed land commission to take meas
ures for the reinstatement of people
thus evicted where the eviction has TAX
en- place since August, 1878, or the be-
ginning of the Land league agitation.
This can only be done, however, in cases
where the landlords property is put up
for sale under the act. But the national
leaders believe that within few years
the entire land of Ireland will have
been thus disposed of by the landlords.
The land commission is authorized by
the act to advance to the evicted tenants
money for the purchase of their former
holdings with the consent of the present
occupier where the land is occupied, and
provide compensation for those who now
occupy it. Where the land is still on
the landlords hands the process of re-
instatement will be much simpler.
In practically every instance where
negotiations have been going on for the
purchase of their holdings by the Irish
farmers since the passage of the act they
have demanded wherever evictions had
taken place on their landlords property
that the evicted tenants must be re-
stored to their former holdings before
any purchase is effected. Some of the
landlords at the outset held out against
this proposition, but as in the case of the
Knight of Glin, son-in-law of Lord Dun
raven, they later on acceded to the de-
mand of the tenants.
The officials of the United Irish League
of America and the officers of its
branches all over the country have for
several months past been actively en-
gagged in bringing the cases of these
evicted tenants to the attention of the
organization in Ireland, and since the
land bill went into operation on Novem-
ber l, to the attention of the land COM
mission itself, with the promise Of excel
lent results.
The United Irish League in Ireland
has taken steps to secure the best legal
assistance in behalf of all the evicted
tenants as part of the programme of the
national organization. Should the
movement toward reinstatement prove
success 1t will not be the least of The
revolutionary steps which have beer
taken in regard to the Irish Land league
and carried on to-day by the United Irish
league.
Some so cases have already beer
brought before the land commission by
the officials of the United Irish League
of America, and of that number abou
one-half of those affected are at presen
residents of Massachusetts. particular
ly in the vicinity of Boston