THE IRISH LAND QUESTION AGATN.
MBROUGHOUT the long and most interesting discussions JL upon Mr. Gladstone's Irish Land Law, we maintained that the single defect of that law was that it did not go far enough, that the true Irish idea of tenure was the Asiatic one,—per- petual right of occupancy, subject to a payment to the over- lord, and varying with the profits of agriculture,—that the chronic agrarian troubles of Ireland would never be cured without fixity of occupation, and that the compensation to landlords in increased rent-roll, new security, and cordial acquiescence in their leadership, would ultimately induce them to vote for the scheme. It is therefore with no surprise that we find the House of Commons on Wednesday discussing fixity of tenure for Ireland, and with much pleasure that we see the debate ranging round that principle, to the disregard of minor details. The words of Mr. Butt's Bill do not signify. His adversaries all alleged, his friends, such, for instance, as Mr. Courtney, all admitted, and he himself did not deny, that the true object of his Bill is explained in Part III., and is per- petuity of tenure, or to use a more accurate form of words, fixity of occupancy, subject to payment of rent according to valua- tions modified every twenty-one years. That is a definite and a broad proposal, and it was treated as such, and argued out in a fashion very different from that to which we are accustomed in Irish debates. Of course the Irish friends of the Bill told melancholy stories of the misery caused by evictions—misery probably equalled in England by evictions from houses under the law of distraint—for Irishmen are only just beginning to recognise that plaintiveness lends no force to reasoning, and only diminishes the readiness of Englishmen to do justice. And also, of course, some of the opponents of the Bill, especially Mr. Plunket. drew splendid pictures of the good which can be effected by landlords who sacrifice all their rents to the happi- ness of their people; for Irishmen still cannot rid themselves of the feeling that to show that a man uses power nobly is to show that he ought to have it,—that the Man of Ross has, by the laws of nature, a right to take all the powers he, in his benevolence, thinks good. There was, too, here and there a repetition of the ridiculous old assumption that only a landlord or a tenant can have a right to argue about tenure, but the assumption was met this time by an indignant repartee from Mr. Sullivan, which, we hope, disposes of it for ever. " He and other Irish Members had been taunted on a previous occasion with not being landowners. It was true. He did not own so much land as would sod a lark. But when the noble Ashley advocated the cause of the factory-hands, was he put to shame because he did not own a single spindle V When Wilberforce pleaded for the slave, was he asked by a Jamaica planter whether he owned a single pound of human flesh ? The Irish Members had a broader and a deeper stake in the country than those who owned thousands of acres on which they never set foot." And of course there was the usual nonsense on one side about ab- sentee landlords, as if the Ecclesiastical Commission, Guy's Hospital, and the City Corporation were not among the best landlords in the world ; and on the other, the usual rubbish about agitation got up for political purposes, as if tenure questions were the sole questions upon which mankind needed neither mouthpieces nor guides. But the general debate was as good in tone as, amid the discreditable silence of the political chiefs on both sides, could have been expected. It turned on the two grand points really involved,—that is, on the questions whether fixity of occupancy involves confiscation, and whether the existence of a landlord class is good for Ireland.
We may say at once that if we thought fixity of tenure in Ireland involved confiscation, we should never advocate it. The law of property is a human law, and there may be extreme cases in which it is right to violate it, or in which the State's ultimate right of ownership should be enforced ; but as a rule its violation is theft, and we are unable to believe that any country is ever seriously advanced by legalising theft. The right of Irish landlords to their rent is based on a contract with the State, sanctioned by a thousand Acta passed by a free Par- liament, and if the rent is taken away, the moral right to com- pensation is nearly irresistible, is, in fact, only to be denied on the plea of a social necessity, which does not exist. But no- body is proposing to take away anybody's rents, either now or in future. The object of the proposers of the Bill is to secure rents, to make non-payment the only reason for eviction, to deprive the tenant of every excuse for evasion, to place the owner of land in the position of the one man who is always paid to the moment,—the owner of English Consols. Every speaker in the debate agreed that fixity of tenure would increase the desire for land, one speaker even basing his resist- ance to the Bill upon the extent of that desire, which he said was worth cash to the landlord, and increased desire for a thing can in no way lower its price. The laws of political economy work even in Ireland, and in this particular matter they work with even oppressive force. Agriculture being the one occupation in three out of the four Irish provinces, the competition for it is so sharp, that landlords, under the present laws, can take every sixpence the land will yield, leaving nothing to the tenant but his bare keep, and when he has capital, or can borrow it, not always even that. There is no danger .of the demand for farms ceasing because tenure is more attractive, while there is a certainty that with every revaluation rents will rise, the secure tenant having a new temptation to make the improve- ments which send up the value of his holding, and make him, even when he can get compensation for his visible outlay— and he gets no other—eager to retain it. The landlord will not lose sixpence, either now or in future, by fixity, while he will gain by all that increase in values which follows from more order, more content, and more regularity in the management of the great business of agriculture. He will, in fact, be in the position of the landlord in Bengal who just one hundred years ago found the land-tax more than he could bear, but now, though he has only a quit-rent, finds that quit-rent so risen that the tax is scarcely a burden interfering with the selling value of his estate.
Power, no doubt, is confiscated by a Bill establishing fixity of tenure, but then all parties admit that power may justly be confiscated—Sir Michael Hicks Beach admits that as fully as Mr. Gladstone, whose statement he endorsed—and the only ques- tion is as to the expediency of the change. Mr. Gladstone said once it was inexpedient, because a landlord would be a mere fundholder, relieved of duties as well as devoid of rights, but then that is the position of every holder of a mortgage in the world. Is Society demoralised be- cause the rents of the Duke of Hampshire are really paid as interest on mortgages to the Equitable Insurance Office, or other such great investing Company ? What rights or duties has the mortgagor, or how is Ireland injured, because 292 indivi- duals who own a third of her soil are placed in the position of owners of mortgages on it ? Sir Michael Hicks-Beach says the change is inexpedient, because it will decrease " the number of permanent residents, who are unquestionably the great source of civilisation and real improvement in Ireland." We hold it to be expedient, on the contrary, because it will increase the number of permanent residents who are wealthy enough to help on civilisation, and who are not crippled in every effort they make to lead their countrymen by the permanent social barrier which a tenure unsuited to the history, the wants, and the prejudices of Irishmen has hitherto created. The Irish landlords fear for their power over the people if deprived of their right of eviction, but dentists might as well fear for their " power " when deprived of their right of tooth-drawing. What is the value of power which, when dormant, excites nothingbut distrust, and when active nothing but hate ? So far as it is needed to extract rent, the Bill gives it in full measure, but beyond that the power, hated as it is by the people, is to the landlords not a beneficent, but a malevolent agent, a power which deprives them of all the leadership which with- out it they could claim. Influence derived from the power of eviction! Why, an evicting landlord is the one man in Ireland who never can get himself returned to Parliament, and the most dangerous libel which can be circulated about an Irish land- owner is that he uses the " power " of which he is, from traditional prejudice, so jealous. A long history of wrong has made the Irish tenant regard a landlord, unless so exceptionally friendly that, like Mr. Plunket's specimen, his landlordship yields him no pecuniary return, as a potential enemy, as a man to be dis- trusted and disregarded, as the last leader he would volun- tarily choose in any social or political difficulty, till in the most aristocratic country in the world, the heads of the ancient and the wealthiest families constantly find themselves paralysed by poor, obscure, and occasionally rascally adventurers. It is all creed ? Stuff I Half the rebel heroes of Ireland have been Protestant, and the leader of the popular party, who would defeat any Catholic but evicting candi- date he opposed, is a Protestant now. The State has a right to confiscate power, but in this especial case it is not power, but unpopularity which it will confiscate. There will be no aris- tocracy in Ireland, no class wealthy enough to raise the standard of living, yet popular enough to furnish political leaders to the people, till this power of eviction from caprice has been finally abolished. When that happens, we will ask Mr. Sullivan, one of the most popular and eloquent men in Ireland, whether at the next election he will prefer an eldest son or a demagogue for his opponent I
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