ZELL MINISTERIAL TENANT-LAW FOR IRELAND.
Mn. NAPIER'S set of Bills to improve the relation of Landlord and Tenant in Ireland are well meant. They will be useful in more than one respect ; though they rather mark out ground, or remove obstacles for future legislation, than effect their professed pur- pose. They constitute a transition state, through which, perhapak not only Ireland but legislators for Ireland must pass. Even the candour which dictates them is curiously tinged by a spirit ad- verse to that which is the life of the measure. Mr. Napier "would candidly say, that his sympathies were much more with the industrious tenant than with the ..improvident landlord." Thus we find the man who is legislating to establish a wise relation between landlord and tenant, making it his boast that he sympathizes more • with a meritorious tenant than with a landlord of no merit ; and to achieve that extent of sympathy for the tenant, is a proof of an enlarged mind in the legislator. It is evident, therefore, that the legislator has not passed through his transition state ; and Mr. Napier's set of bills will facilitate him in his lesson.
The set consists of four. The first bill is constructed "upon the basis of the act of 1846," called the Estates Improvement Act, for the lending of 2,009,000/. for the purpose of drainage ; 1,000,000/. of which was offered by Sir Robert Peel to Ireland under the dis- tribution of the Commissioners of Public Works : the new bill "proposes to make the advances payable in twenty-two instal- ments." The second bill is " to facilitate the making of beneficial leases and agreements for compensation, for the improvement of lands in Ireland ": it attempts to get rid of sixty scattered and special statutes which give or regulate leasing-powers, and to re- duce them all to one plan for giving such powers on a uniform principle. The third. is " for consolidating, simplifying, and amending the existing laws which regulate the relation of landlord and tenant in Ireland, so as to enable those who had made con- tracts to secure their enforcement ": this bill "would dispose of from one hundred and fifty to two hundred statutes." The fourth and last bill is "to simplify, consolidate, and amend the existing laws which regulate the relation of landlord and tenant in Ire- land." To sum up the general effect of the bills, it may be said that they are permissive; that they codify old and various sta- tutes; that existing law is simplified for practical application ; and that they will facilitate improvements, agreements, and "good feelings " between landlord and tenant. The important bill of the set is the last, vaguely described as allowing the tenant to make improvements should the landlord "not stir." But this permission is encumbered with preliminary expenses and inquiries, under regulations hitherto applied for im- proving landlords, but now extended to improving tenants. The expense of these preliminaries sometimes amounts to 31, per cent ; for which a guarantee must be given in limine ; moreover, the im- provements must have a clear probability of realizing 6 per cent. Now these provisions may apply to landlords of wealth or to tenants of substance • but, unluckily, neither class is very nume- rous in Ireland, and conditions bid, fair to render a well-inten- tioned measure so far inoperative.
Mr. Sharman Crawford's Tenant-right Bill proposed compensa- tion for the tenant on going out voluntarily, and also contained a clause adjusting compensation for past improvements. The Protec- tionist Attorney-General scouted this last provision, and placed the compensation under strict limits. The tenant quitting. his farm by his own will cannot demand compensation; • he can only do so on dispossession by the landlord. Whether he will be enabled to ex- act improvements made before or after the act, is not clear; but in either case Mr. Napier is right in supposing that the provision may operate as a check on evictions. On the other hand, the power of the landlord to step in by the law of" distress," is re- stricted to rent due within a year and a half, and to a sum not less than five pounds value ; a restriction preventing vexatious and retrospective suits, but also curtailing the kind landlord's indul- gence.
To encourage improvements, Mr. Napier proposes to "facili- tate "—we use his own vague expression—the borrowing of money by landlords : the loan to be a first charge on the land, and the money to be expended under Government inspection. Now, pri- vate persons have already the power to lend money to landowners through the Board of Works on these very conditions ; yet few loans have been offered. Legally the landowner can transfer his investment; but as there is no market for the transfer of such stock, the practical effect is, that the money once sunk in that manner becomes inextricable, and the lender is fain to be content with the interest for his money.
Several other provisions of the joint bills are not less questionable in their effect, though well meant in purpose. For example, the landlord is enabled to stop "waste or burning," by obtaining a magistrate's order, which in Ireland means a landowner's order; while the tenant must wait perhaps for three months to obtain an order from the Quarter-Sessions to remove the restriction ; although the removal of that restriction may be necessary to improvement; and we all know that in agriculture three months may be equiva- lent to twelve. On the other hand, a separate provision " facili- tates " the making of mutual agreements, with a pattern contract for landlords and tenants ; a benevolent suggestion, but scarcely needed in the form of statutes.
But besides collecting together and compressing into a whole a great number of scattered statutes, some two hundred or more, the code, if we may call it so, presents other advantages. It lays down the principle of " cooperation " between landlord and tenant. In introducing it, Mr. Napier enunciated the not less important principle, that "families may hold land, but it should be for useful public purposes." The code recognizes the common interest of the landlord, the tenant, and the state, in the productiveness of the land. It recognizes the necessity for thoroughly revising the whole class of subjects that come under the code. In this manner, as we said at the beginning, it marks out the ground and clears it for future legislation. The immediate practical operation of the measure cannot be expected to be very great.
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