LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
THE FUTURE OF PROPERTY.
[To THE EDITOR or TIIE "SPECTATOR."] Sin,—It has long been evident to any one who has watched the signs of the times, that an attack upon property by the proletariat is imminent. The two articles on the subject in your last number are convincing on this point. The land agitation in Ireland and in Wales, the attacks on capital and on land at the Trade-Union Congress, and the demand that picketing during a strike should be allowed in such a form as to intimidate those willing to work, all point in the same direction. What can property do to defend itself P Is it to wait to be bled to death, like a whale waiting for the harpoons P
The key to the defence lies in what you say last week,—
"Every man who owns a field is on the landlord's side, nor will any man who owns a house bear laws which leave the tenant free to refuse both rent and surrender of the tenement." In other words, the number of owners, and therefore the army of defence, must be increased. And all true Conservatives will welcome any measure that will effect this without con- fiscation or plunder. It is not enough to increase the number of occupiers. Occupation does not necessarily involve any- especial love for the. Eighth Commandment. The Irish Nationalists and the moonlighters are mostly occupiers. And it must not be forgotten that the majority of occupiers—viz., those who live in cottages—whether in town or country, pay no rates at all, and are therefore indifferent as to the pressure of local expenditure. The rates of small tenements are, as a. rule, paid by the landlords, and on the large estates the rent is certainly not raised because the rates are higher. We have in this respect altogether dissociated taxation and representa- tion, since the small householder levies the rates, and the big property-owner pays them. How, then, can occupiers be turned into owners, and so ranged on the anti-socialist side P There are two ideas in the air which, though seemingly radical, are, I venture to think, eminently conservative, and which if adopted, would secure this end :--(1), To allow occupiers, under certain restrictions, to enfranchise their holdings, as if they were copyholds ; and (2), to enforce some kind of subdivision of real (not personal) property at death,—allowing the possessor of real property to leave the family house and demesne to one child, so as to maintain a locus standi for the family, and retain the race of county gentlemen in the country. By this means a quantity of land in every parish in England would be continually in the market, small owners would soon begin to abound, and there would cease to be any temptation to start philanthropic schemes of land and house tenure, to be carried out at other people's expense.—I am, Sir, &c., G. It. P. [We do not quite see why distribution at death, if that system is as wise as Continentals think, should be limited to- land.—En. Spectator.]
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