7 NOVEMBER 1846, Page 11

THE LANDS OF IRELAND.

WHEN Parliament meets again it will take up the Condition-of- Ireland question at a more advanced stage. It will not be a ques- tion whether Government should interfere; for Government has interfered, to such purpose that it has unsettled all the relationsF of the labour-market, and is at this moment busy in coining silver at the Mint to provide for the novel practice of payment in. wages ; Ireland needing a special supply of coin for that inuova.... tion. Substantially, Government could scarcely go further in the way of unsettlement; and the remaining question is, whether the intervention shall be made effectual, so as to warrant itself,

and to place the economical state of the country on a better foot- ing when interference is withdrawn. In discussing the mode of doing so, likewise, opinion has made considerable progress. Men have become familiarized with the contemplation of measures of which the mere idea was until re- cently avoided. The blindest opponents of a poor-law now speak of it as imminent, and retreat to a threatened opposition against details.

A more instant and pressing question, the mode of bringing estates into better management,—which relates to the transition stage rather than to the permanent state of the country,—draws forth such an abundance of suggestions, as to show that the mind of the public and of public men is ripe for the discussion, if official men only have the courage to grapple with it. We have other suggestions to enumerate under this head since we last touched upon the subject; suggestions mostly, be it observed, originating in England. The Morning Chronicle adheres to its project—a compulsory cultivation of the waste lands ; a resource which it is most im- portant to keep in view, and our contemporary does so with great ability. But he appends to it another, which he has revived—a sort of "fixity of tenure." The landlords, he truly says, have no sort of claim to the aid which is now given to them for the sake of employing the poor on " reproductive labour" : let Go- vernment annex a condition to the boon—that the landlord shall "give to the tenants of the land so improved a permanent pro- prietary interest in the soil."

" The land would be given back to the landlord greatly increased in value. Let him rust content with that increase, and bind himself for ever that there at least his demands shall stop. Let him grant to every tenant a perpetual lease, on a fair valuation of the land after the Government has drained it. We should greatly prefer an arrangement much more liberal than this. We would require him to divide with the tenant the boon conferred on himself, and to grant a perpetual tenure at a rent much below the full value of the improved land. But we should hail with joy even the more niggardly arrangement; and so, we venture to say, would the tenantry. • • • We propose this plan as the supplement and com- pletion of that which we have already advocated with respect to the waste lands."

The anticipated advantage is, that the " permanent proprietary interest" furnishes the best stimulus to improvement : a conclu- sion which the experience of France hardly supports ; and that experience might suggest many doubts as to the incidental effects of establishing a small proprietary. For instance, in creating a numerous class of little proprietors, it creates an enormous class of pauper cadets—a surplusage which Algiers helps to keep down. We have already said that the advance of Prussia from villein- age to a sort of copyhold is no warrant for a British people in retrograding to a system of base tenures, that must impede the conveyance of land and diminish its marketable value. A correspondent of the Time$ proposes that Parliament shall pass two acts, one " for the appointment of trustees for the better management of estates in Ireland " ; the other, "to enable pro- prietors of estates in Ireland to vest the same in the Government trustees " ; the trustees also having the power in certain cases of assuming the management of overburdened estates, on demand by a majority of the tenants. This is very like a scheme to which we have before alluded—in the Supplement to our closing number for last year. A correspondent of our own, whose letter we publish in extenso, suggests a plan for vesting in the Court of Chancery the power of effecting sales of estates on the application of tenants for life and other owners of limited or partial interests ; the purchase- money to be paid into court ; claimants on the land to be satisfied from the fund in court; the land to be resold, with a clear Par- liamentary title for the new purchaser. There is much in this proposal worthy of consideration ; and, if we had not the fear of Conciliation Hall before our eyes, we should say that it is too good to be limited to Ireland alone. The titles to lands generally are on such a footing as to amount to a serious impediment in the improvement of estates. Where land is saleable, the uncertainty that lurks in almost every title breeds all sorts of devices for blocking out contingent claims, and occa- sions enormous expenses ; but in a vast majority of cases land is unsaleable, from the dread of claims founded on defective title. Not one in fifty or in five hundred of the claims might be made good ; but the substantiation of any one might ruin the present holder, and with that chance in terroreni each flaw is a lion in the path of the conveyancer. A system of insuring titles to land, indeed, is quite feasible, and would mitigate the evil, both in England and Ireland ; but for the immediate purposes of Ireland, our correspondent's plan is more promising, precisely because, being more general and trenchant, it is likely to be more effectual. The Court of Chancery would constitute in itself no innovation ; it already has machinery for dealing with titles to land judicially and ministerially ; and the Parliamentary titles would be a bless- ing imported into the country. All parties would gain ; for all would be enabled to realize their several interests, in a moving and improving market, instead of trading on the opportunities furnished by a long social decline ; and the soil would at last be put fairly in a way to yield its full value to the public. With this prevalent temper of active but comprehensive and dispassionate deliberation, it will be shameful if statesmen ne- glect to bring some efficient measure to bear upon Ireland. The Chancery plan shows a method of extricating all the lands of Ireland from their embarrassed tenure, rapidly but gradually. The waste lands we regard as capital anchorage-ground for a more summary measure of clubhauling, so as to get Ireland off the lee-shore which threatens instant wreck. With scarcely a single practical hardship, the State might assume the waste lands ; vest them in capable landlords, individual or associated ; protect the new occupant against the gun of the tenant until the wild state of the latter be subdued by kindness, training, and pro- sperity; establish a general system of labour for wages; and so practically institute a new system in Ireland, with a new life for the Irish.