LETTER TO THE EDITOR.
THE IRISH LAND BILL.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR:]
am much amused by the letter of Mr. Bear on the Irish Land Bill, published in the Spectator of April 20th. Mr. Bear is an old antagonist of mine on the point be dis- cusses,—namely, the respective just rights of owner and occupier in the ultimate results of "permanent improve- ments "on a farm. He knows the subject well from practical points of view, and is deficient, as I venture to think, only in that power of the logical analysis of facts and phrases which is very rare indeed among practical men. In this case, I find myself in hearty agreement with him in protesting against that formula of defence for the owner which consists in asserting for him an exclusive claim in something separable from the land as a whole, called the "inherent properties or capabilities of the soil." I entirely agree with Mr. Bear that all ordinary rent for tillage land is paid for nothing else than those capabilities. They constitute the whole value of agricultural land in a thousand cases, and in all cases,— even where interest on equipments is inseparably connected with them. But does not Mr. Bear see the effect of this argument on the question of improvements? If the prin- ciple he laid down, that a tenant must get "the whole results" of an improvement of one kind, why ought he not to get the whole, also, on improvements of another kind ? Costly tillages are as purely a ad as exclusively the work of the tenant, as draining or trenching may be in certain cases. There is no distinction in principle whatever ; and the theoriser who separates them altogether, admitting the justice of rent in the one case, and denying it in the other, must be the victim of some great confusion of thought. Nor is it difficult to point out where this confusion lies. The formula adopted by Mr. T. W. Russell, and which he has merely repeated from a hundred others, is a formula which only makes the confusion worse confounded. The principle aimed at is sound enough, but the definition of it is as bad as bad can be. Mr. Bear's criticism upon it is perfectly just. But unless some new and better definition is given, Mr. Bear is landed in results which common-sense and the universal practice of mankind condemn as obviously absurd.
But cannot we analyse such a simple fact as the legal ownership of land known and familiar to men since civilisation arose ? Is there anything very mysterious about it ? Nothing whatever as to facts. Ownership means the right of exclusive use—exclusive of all other men, and inclusive of all the " utilities " in the thing owned. Any separate enumeration or classification of these utilities is as absurd as Mr. Bear perceives it to be. In like manner the occupying tenancy of land is precisely the same thing, only hired for a time, and upon conditions. When a man hires land he hires it presumably because he cannot afford to purchase it—that is to say, he can afford to purchase the exclusive right of use for a limited time only and for a yearly rent, instead of paying down a larger capital sum. But the thing he hires is, of course, precisely that which the proprietor owns. It is the right of exclusive use over all the qualities of the soil, unless restrained from particular uses by his special bargain. It is the security of exclusive use that he pays rent for. That right is the landlord's, and he alone can give it. It is upon that right the farmer trades. It is the basis of all his calculations, and the one indispensable condition of all his returns. It follows him in all his work—whether " per- manent " or superficial—in an infinite variety of degrees. Not one of his results could be attainable without it ; and he ought to pay for it wherever its presence exists. No work ever can be his own exclusively so long as this element is contributed by another man. How much he ought to pay for it can never be settled on any abstract principle whatever.
Mr. Bear admits that this must be a matter of skilled and experienced calculation. And here I must point out that landlords never do and never can claim what is blunderingly
ascribed to them as the result of the Irish "Dunseath" decision. This is commonly represented to be the whole proceeds of an improvement after the lapse of a certain specified time. This is naturally regarded as very unjust. But it is an entirely; erroneous representation of the real claim, another invariable practical result where there is no interference with free- trade in land. Rent—the fullest rent—is never more than some lesser part of total results. In the Middle Ages, one-third of the produce was generally held to represent rent. In our times, it is rarely more than one-sixth, often not more than one-eighth. The common bargain in what are called "im- provement leases" is that the tenant gets the whole produce for, say, twenty or thirty years, and after that pays the one- sixth or one-eighth, as the payment due for that one funda- mental and invaluable right on which his whole venture depends. But this rent will still represent a large profit- fairly divided between the two parties who have both contri- buted elements indispensable to the common results.
In some former arguments with Mr. Bear, I think I recollect- that he admitted fully the justice of this principle of equitable division in all cases where the works done by the tenant were specified in the original bargain. Bat he seemed to dis- pute it in cases where no such specification had been made. But a moment's consideration must show that this distinction cannot be defended. A landlord may often assume that he knows best what particular improvements will certainly pay beet. But another landlord may select a tenant so skilled and so experienced, that he will do best by giving him the unimproved land at a nominal rent, and leaving him to decide on the nature and extent of the improvements which will pay both parties best in the end. It would be an absurd con- clusion, indeed, that the State should step in between two- such men, and fine or mulct the landlord of all his interest merely because he had selected a good tenant and trusted him to do the best for both. I believe that both Mr. Bear and Mr. T. W. Russell wish to do justice. But neither of them see the " unseen " rights and facts on which the whole principle of rent depends.—I am, Sir, &c., ARGYLL.
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