THE TRADE-UNION CONGRESS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
Six,—With regard to your criticism of Mr. Shaftoe's presi- dential address, in the Spectator of the 8th inst., if the President, instead of saying that overcrowding " is the sin of the landlord class," had said, ' is due to the system of private property in land,' he would have said what is generally believed by land-reformers ; and, moreover, this is, it is to be supposed, what he really meant. Again, speaking from a knowledge of the proposals and arguments of the land- nationalisers, I believe that he referred to country landlords only. Their argument is that crowding into towns, and the sweating consequent thereon, is caused by the unwillingness of country landowners and agents to cut up their land into such small portions as would suit the working classes in the country. And Mr. Shaf toe saying, as quoted, " This general disregard of the sufferings and privations of defenceless workers by so many of the landed class," &c., confirms the interpretation I have put upon his words, for holders of house- property in towns are not thus generally described. And it is not because the land does not belong to private individuals that land-nationalisers—and, it is to be presumed, Mr.
Shaf toe complain of the present system, but because it does not belong to the nation. What they propose is that the property in the land should be resumed by the nation,—should belong to it in common, as it was formerly, and be rented out to individuals (by locally elected Land Boards), so that mortgaging the land to money-lenders would" be impossible. Employment of the cottagers by the holders of farms (which would, of course, go on), and increase in the number of neighbours, would prevent the monotony of the country and of the petite culture.
I may add that, according to the proposals of the most advanced land-nationalisers, the present landlords would, in exchange for their land, be given land-bonds bearing interest (till redeemed at par) equal to the net average income they at present receive from their landed property. A similar system with large landed properties is being at present acted upon in New Zealand.—I am, Sir, &c.,
Amroth, September 131h. A. BOYLE.
[The system was tried in Madras for a century, with the result of pauperising the whole people. If the State paid interest on the land-bonds, what would it gain P Land does not yield 3 per cent. to an inactive landlord.—ED. Spectator.]
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