Year: 1879

| tenure and transfer OF land. 1t must not
be thought that this is new sub
! iect of controversy because the oc-
casion for it is fresh. Attention has
been directed to it more or less during
the last thirty years, and at times the
discussion has been animated and even ac-
rimonious. The famous personal quar-
rel between Richard Golden and Mr.. De-
lane, of the London Times, grew out OF
Misrepresentation by the leading journal
of Mr.. Cobden's position on the land ques-
ton. That was sixteen or eighteen years
ago, when Mr.. Golden and his still sur
yiving friend, Mr.. Bright, stood forward
as bold pioneers of this needed reform.
In the last public speech Mr.. Golden ever
made he declared his deep sense OF the i'm
portance of this subject in language which,
though it has often been quoted in England,
is worth repetition in America ut time
when the condition of English agriculture
has become topic of worldwide interest.


MIR. Cobden's matured views en- this sub
ject derive interest from the great part he
played as leader of the successful agitation
for the repeal of the Corn laws. He can
not be suspected of belittling his greatest
achievement, and yet this wise and clear
sighted statesman deemed a reform Of
the land laws even more important
than the free trade in food which
procured him SO much solid renown.
In that remarkable speech to his constit-
uents, fifteen years since. which proved
to be his last. Mr.. Golden said:-''If we're
fve-and-twenty or thirty instead Of, un-
happily, twice that number of years, /
would take Adam Smith in my hand and
would have a league for free trade in land
just as we had q league for free trade in
corn. You will find just the same author
ity jim Adam Smith for the one as for the
other; and if it were only taken up. as it
must be taken up to succeed, not as polit-
ical, revolutionary, radical, Chartist action,
but taken up on politico- economic grounds,
the agitation would be certain to succeed;
and if you can apply free trade to land an d
to labor too-that is, by getting rid OF those
abominable restrictions in your parish set
Elements and the like-then, say, the men
who do that will have done for England
probably more than we have been able to do
by making free trade in corn"


Mr. Bright's recent speech in Parliament,
when the present agricultural distress was
up for debate, shows that he adheres to his
former views with the same strong empha-
sis Is when he and Mr.. Golden were SO re-
lentlessly assailed by the London Times
and unjustly accused of favoring spolia-
ton of the landholders. The system of
land tenure in England is the last
stronghold in Europe of the feudal
| system. It's roots have struck SO deep
that it will not easily be abolished, but it is
surely destined to be eradicated if England
is to retain her great position among
modern nations. It is only in times of
severe agricultural distress like the pres
ent that arguments against the system have
any chance of hearing. Even the Corn
laws, which were less firmly entrenched,
stood their ground long after all the argu-
ments in favor Of them had been again
and again refuted, and only yielded at
last under the tremendous and appalling
calamity of the great potato famine, which
threatened to decmate the British people
by starvation. The present agricultural
| distress, heavy as it is, will not force q re-
form in the tenure Of land but it will Sc
cure attention, it will cause the discussion
to be listened to, and will permit the seed
to bo sown which must ultimately bear
fruit in the abolition of feudal tenures max
ing trade in land as free in England as it
is in the United States or the British
colonies. 1t is o noteworthy fact, showing
how little genuine conviction there is in
favor of the feudal tenure, that as soon as
British subjects get out of the British
Islands and cross the sea to any of the colo
nies they drop their antiquated pref udices
and establish land system in accoI dance
with modern ideas.


The chief faults of the English system are
prmogeniture, entails, mortmain and the
heavy legal expenses which attend the con-
veyance of real estate. The joint effect OF
these several distractions is to make the
soil monopoly in the hands of a few own
ers whose number is constantly diminish
ing. Capable observers who have had op-
portunities to compare the effect of large
and small holdings bear pretty unani-
nous testimony to the superior produc-
tiveness of agriculture in countries like
France, Germany and Belgium, where the
land is subdivided into farms of very mod
crate extent. But it must not be assumed
that large landed estate is always badly
and small one always well cultivated, for
there is no universal rule on the subject.
If a large landholder has capital enough to
make his whole estate yield to its full
capacity he may get as large crops to the
acre as the smallest cultivator, and, on the
o,her hand, the occupant of small
farm whose whole property is in his land,
without capital to make it productive,
may find his few acres miserably barren.
The present discussion in England as to