SMALL HOLDINGS.
MR. JESSE COLLINGS is to be warmly congratu- lated upon his Bill for providing small holdings. It is without question one of the most statesmanlike and practical measures for dealing with the Land Question ever introduced into the House of Commons. That so satisfactory a Bill should have been drafted, is doubtless duo in no small degree to the long and patient delibera- tions of the Committee over which Mr. Chamberlain pre- sided. That Committee took more than ordinary pains to find out the exact aspirations and requirements of that por- tion of the labouring class which desires to cultivate small holdings, and to discover the conditions under which such holdings could be created. The knowledge thus col- lected from expert witnesses of all kinds enabled Mr. i Jesse Collings to make his Bill, instead of an ill-digested mass of philanthropic good intentions, a working scheme capable of being successfully applied wherever a demand for the form of tenure it provides can be shown to exist. After the Bill passes, as it is pretty certain to do—the Gladstonians will hardly dare obstruct, and the Liberal The best way of exhibiting the excellence of Mr. Jesse however, with, say, £9 a year,--i.e., the interest on £225 Collings's Bill is to point out the initial difficulties that at 4 per cent. It will be said, no doubt, that this is all attend upon any scheme for providing small holdings very well ; but where is the small freeholder going'to live F through the intervention of a local authority. First, there If there is not a cottage already attached to the ten acres, is the difficulty of keeping the small holding, when created, the following provision is intended to meet this difficulty: from being snapped up by the land-jobber or great land- —" Loans may be made by the authority to the owner of owner, and so merged again in ordinary agricultural land. a holding for buildings or other improvements, the holding Next, there is the difficulty of preventing subdivision of the being at the time free from mortgage, and the time for kind that is so injurious in France, sub-letting at an enor- repayment being made not more than thirty-five years. In mous rack-rent, such as tends to exist in Ireland, and wort- ease any one should establish a title to the land paramount gaging to usurers at very high rates of interest, after the to that of the local authority, he is to be entitled, not to manner of Russia and South-Eastern Europe. It is neces- possession, but to damages from the authority." Perhaps sary, too, to find some way of strongly interesting the small even more valuable than these provisions are those holder in his plot, so that he shall not be tempted to which provide for the case of persons occupying existing throw up his small holding after he has had it created small holdings, under which they will be enabled. to for him. Again, and most important of all, there is the turn tenancy at rack-rent into freehold. The Bill enacts difficulty of devising some plan for so imposing the that, " where a sale of a holding, agricultural or pastoral, restrictions we have mentioned that they shall not or partly agricultural and partly pastoral, is about to be be onerous enough to make the would-be freeholder made in consideration of the payment of a principal declare that he cannot expose himself to the worry of sum, the local authority may advance to the purchaser -observing a hundred minute and tiresome clauses of an any sum not exceeding three-fourths of it. Such an Act of Parliament. Lastly, there is the difficulty of so advance, however, may only be made where it is for 'arranging matters that the undertaking shall have a the purpose of occupying and farming the holding." 'reasonable prospect of being a commercial success, both The restrictions upon alienation, transfer, and transmission as regards the cultivator and the local authority by will, we do not doubt, prove effectual. They provide that whose means the Act is to be put in operation. Yet, for- a holding can only be disposed of—(1), By registered midable as are these rocks in the path of any one attempting mortgage of the entire holding ; (24, by registered transfer -to create a peasant-proprietary by Act of Parliament, to one person of the owner's entire interest ; and (3), by Mr. Collings has managed to pass them in safety. The devise of the entire interest in favour of one person. The clauses of his measure meet and turn every objection that Bill provides for each local authority establishing its own can be urged against the scheme in the abstract. Shortly, register for the registration of titles to its small holdings. the Bill proposes to enact as follows. Any Urban or Rural By another portion of the Bill, the local authority, after Sanitary Authority in England and Wales will be enabled to purchasing land, is empowered, if it chooses, to hire out purchase, and then to sell or hire out land, for the purpose small holdings instead of selling them, under conditions, of establishing small holdings, either within or outside its however, which would prevent their being either badly cul- -own district. The freedom given by this last condition is tivated or held as portions of largo farms. Among the useful most important. It will allow the authorities a far greater miscellaneous powers conferred by the Bill is the following : -choice as regards the lands to be acquired, than if they " Each small holding let to one person is to consist of not were tied down to operations within their own areas. more than ten acres ; but the local authority is to have power 'There is, it should be noted here, to be no compulsory to let one or more small holdings to a number of persons purchase. This we conceive to be right and reason- working on a co-operative system, provided it be approved by able. We do not entirely share the fears entertained in the local authority." Lastly, there is a clause under which, some quarters as regards " the blessed word Compul- instead of either selling or letting their small holdings at sion ;" but we cannot help thinking that in the present rack-rent, a public authority may use the land they have instance, no compulsion is required. Compulsion always acquired as "a public pasture." This vision of a return to means buying dear, and this the local authorities ought to a quasi-manorial system under which residents in cottages avoid. In cases where compulsory powers are bestowed, owned by the local authority will possess rights of coin- • there is always a danger that the local body may contain mon appendant to their cottages, is not a little curious. hot-headed men, who, having once determined that they Under certain circumstances, we see no reason why it should must have a certain piece of land, may declare that they will not prove a very useful provision. As we have said above, spend the last penny of the ratepayers' money to force the the Bill, as a whole, strikes us as one likely to produce ex- owner to sell. Railway Companies are not always above ceedingly beneficial results. The English as a people do insisting upon having their own way, even though it not feel the land-hunger of the Celt, but in all rural costs them heavily ; and Local Boards are still less to communities there are a number of persons who are be trusted not to take unreasonable likings to par- intensely eager to acquire small holdings. At present ticular plots. A "small holding" under the Bill is not their desires are, as a rule, unfulfilled, for though they to be under one or over fifty acres, but may be any- will give large rents, the fear of extra outgoings prevents thing between. To understand the modus operandi of the landlords cutting up big farms into small holdings. the Bill, we had better take a particular case such as might Lord Tollemache no doubt did so, and, what is more, made arise under it. Let us presume that there exists a con- it pay ; but the ordinary owners dare not run the risk siderable demand in Little Peddlington for small holdings. Hence, though existing small holdings are never unoccupied One or two village tradesmen, who have saved a little money, for a moment, they do not multiply. If it is fairly worked, want to retire partially from business on to small farms, we believe Mr. Jesse Collings's scheme will do away with leaving the shop to be mainly managed by a married son a condition of things so paradoxical. Under its provisions, or daughter. Again, there is a carrier who, wanting ground it will soon become impossible for an unsatisfied demand for his horses to run in, thinks he would be able to make for small holdings to exist, as at present, in districts where a small holding pay him well. Next, there are three or four the land is well-nigh going out of cultivation. labourers of a superior kind, head-men on large farms, who have done well, and want to set up for themselves. Say these men induce the Little Peddlington Rural SanitaryAuthority to come forward and buy up some eighty or ninety acres of THE death of Prince Jerome Napoleon, now daily land suitable for carving into small holdings. The local 1 expected, though it will not be a great event, may authority next cuts up the land into convenient plots, and have a considerable effect on internal French politics, by offers them to the public on the following conditions :— dividing the Monarchists, who return a third of the French (1), An absolute title against the whole world ; (2), the Chamber, by a little deeper ditch. It will clear away a great buyer to pay down one-fourth of the purchase-money ; obstacle in the path of the Bonapartist Party. After the (3), the other three-fourths to remain a permanent charge death of the Prince Imperial in South Africa in 1879, the Unionists and Conservatives are alike eager for its enact- on the land, the purchaser paying thereon a charge ment—the remedy for the grievance that the honest poor equal to 1 per cent. more than the interest paid by the man cannot get a bit of ground to keep a cow on, will be in local authority to the Treasury in respect of the money the hands of the people themselves. It will only be neces- advanced to buy the holding. For example, the local sary to put a comparatively simple piece of legislative authority offers to sell a plot of ten acres, which costs it machinery in motion to secure an adequate provision of £30 an acre. The purchaser pays £75, and then re- small holdings for those that desire them. ceives the freehold of the holding, permanently charged, The best way of exhibiting the excellence of Mr. Jesse however, with, say, £9 a year,--i.e., the interest on £225 Collings's Bill is to point out the initial difficulties that at 4 per cent. It will be said, no doubt, that this is all attend upon any scheme for providing small holdings very well ; but where is the small freeholder going'to live F through the intervention of a local authority. First, there If there is not a cottage already attached to the ten acres, is the difficulty of keeping the small holding, when created, the following provision is intended to meet this difficulty: from being snapped up by the land-jobber or great land- —" Loans may be made by the authority to the owner of owner, and so merged again in ordinary agricultural land. a holding for buildings or other improvements, the holding Next, there is the difficulty of preventing subdivision of the being at the time free from mortgage, and the time for kind that is so injurious in France, sub-letting at an enor- repayment being made not more than thirty-five years. In mous rack-rent, such as tends to exist in Ireland, and wort- ease any one should establish a title to the land paramount gaging to usurers at very high rates of interest, after the to that of the local authority, he is to be entitled, not to manner of Russia and South-Eastern Europe. It is neces- possession, but to damages from the authority." Perhaps sary, too, to find some way of strongly interesting the small even more valuable than these provisions are those holder in his plot, so that he shall not be tempted to which provide for the case of persons occupying existing throw up his small holding after he has had it created small holdings, under which they will be enabled. to for him. Again, and most important of all, there is the turn tenancy at rack-rent into freehold. The Bill enacts difficulty of devising some plan for so imposing the that, " where a sale of a holding, agricultural or pastoral, restrictions we have mentioned that they shall not or partly agricultural and partly pastoral, is about to be be onerous enough to make the would-be freeholder made in consideration of the payment of a principal declare that he cannot expose himself to the worry of sum, the local authority may advance to the purchaser -observing a hundred minute and tiresome clauses of an any sum not exceeding three-fourths of it. Such an Act of Parliament. Lastly, there is the difficulty of so advance, however, may only be made where it is for 'arranging matters that the undertaking shall have a the purpose of occupying and farming the holding." 'reasonable prospect of being a commercial success, both The restrictions upon alienation, transfer, and transmission as regards the cultivator and the local authority by will, we do not doubt, prove effectual. They provide that whose means the Act is to be put in operation. Yet, for- a holding can only be disposed of—(1), By registered midable as are these rocks in the path of any one attempting mortgage of the entire holding ; (24, by registered transfer -to create a peasant-proprietary by Act of Parliament, to one person of the owner's entire interest ; and (3), by Mr. Collings has managed to pass them in safety. The devise of the entire interest in favour of one person. The clauses of his measure meet and turn every objection that Bill provides for each local authority establishing its own can be urged against the scheme in the abstract. Shortly, register for the registration of titles to its small holdings.
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