OUR LAND LAWS: WHAT SHOULD BE THEIR BASIS?

Evening Star, Issue 3979, 25 November 1875, Page 2

OUR LAND LAWS: W HAT SHOULD BE THEIR BASIS?

By C. W. Purnkll. 1 (Continued ) First, as to England.- When searching for the key to the Anglo Saxon tenures, which tire the oldest we can <L al with, the circumstances of the country must be kept in mind. The population ot England was very small then Comparer) with what it is now, • and there was consequently no Lick of j land. Forest and morass overspread | much of the country, and the open land was, as it were, cultivated in patches. Its full produce was not required for the support of the Home population, and an export trade in farm commodities scarcely existed. Nor was there any prospect of a lack of territory. Hence, if individuals had accumulated large freehold estates, it could not have exposed them to the charge that by so doing they were

likely to injure their poorer neighbors. Their greed r or land could scarcely result in driving hundreds of thousands of human beings into cities, there, at the best, to lose their independence, and, at the worst, to sink into the deeps of pauperism. It might have been contended, and justly, that no due man was entitled to monopolise a

larger area of that Earth which was given by its Maker for the use and enjoyment of all His creatures; but' that would have been an abstract idea, too refined to emanate from so rude i an age. Had our Anglo-Saxon ances j f ors only regarded.the rule that might ' is right (whether the might of the : sword or the might of gold) in the pos- i session of land, and admitted the priu- ' ciple that, because the earl was rich and powerful, he was justified in appropriating to himself us much land as ho pleased ; and that, because tlieceorl was poor and weak, he must go without any, or take whatever his lord might ! please to leave him ; still, that fact' would not be available as an argument for the adoption of the same or a kindred system now. The world since that period has rolled through many centuries; its .people have gathered, together vast stores of knowledge ; they I have mounted, with much toil and 1 struggling, from one lofty principle to |

another ; and are nearing the iummit whence they shall discern a new and glorious region of intelligence and ueauty. They will never go back. IS 01will they ever look back save for warning, and to rejoice over those few bright stars ot morality and genius, scarce heeded in their day, but now shining immortally through the darkness around the mountain’s base. If, 1 say, the Anglo-Saxons, just emerging from |!iarb;i-i m, had acknowledged to the full, the right of individuals to monopolise extensive tracts of land, it could not have been urged as a [dea tv justify such a practice at the present day ; but when on the contrary tin Anglo Saxon laws did not recognise I any such right, but created tenures

founded on principles entirely adverse to monopoly, it bcccmps an argument, of enormous weight agaiiist a British Colony, governed on p*-on'i l'\ democratic prii ci(. 1 . ■•, ii die nineteenth cen-ini-v, with all its tnb;V relincmcnts of human rich's, permit Hug individuals to engross snores of thousands of acres of and to their piivat* nsp, without being required to render any special lervice to the State for the pH. dege.

The notion lying at the bottom of the various Saxon tenures was that the land belongs to the entire community. That is the origin d, and 1 submit the just idea which man forms to himself of his claim to the soil. A nation holds a certain territory—in tin savage state, because it is strong enough to do so by force of arms j in the civilized, because one nation recognises the right of another to live as well as itself. The Saxons brought with them from Germany to England that custom of the

Village Community which Sir Henry Vlaino has shown t . haw- been with Iv distributed ov> r A -ia ,nn Knmpe; and which exists in full vigor in India, and toa lessdegrce in Rus ia. Sc-via. Croatia and Austrian Sclav onia a* the pre-ent day. A large portion of the soil of England was thus held und. r foh land * tenuie that is to sa\, it was the proi ]>erty of (la- > !e— 1 Commnni’.ics, ( " ho dealt v\ 11 1 1 o, a i.hter folk motes I according to tic ironn will, save that

1 tliey could not alien,hip it in perpetuity. ; They cmild and oil rn did grant leases of it (o indt»i u.d.s lor the lifetime of lh J iMitii's. fur convenient;*? of cultivation, bur , t tl, e death of the lessees it rev.ip,, o the community, which thus ivor lotiis inherit nice. Neither the (Town nor the nobles could tone!' :i, .01 i what in modern, days would be On „i d -‘public opinion” \\ as too stiO'ig to p mit, ol the display of such act.s of rapacious tyranny as were subsequ iitly eomnott'd by’ the Norman Linys ami oarats; nor were the people able' to diva .-t t heim-el ves of their birthright. They In lo the laud, .L I .. _ I . ’ . .. ?

not hy charU'i’ \ »v l»v hut hy CM ■'tom (loin:' 10 rhe remotest ‘da \ iimeed, in Ins learned "■ on< entitled. “An Inquiry ini., the His,, and’ Growth ”t the Roy a I Piar. g ,t,, vo,’’ expresses the opinion that fo'daml was assign able to thanes on nniila.y (enure,

wmch is an apparent contradiction of what i have ju..t staled ; out military tenure in those days always ended with the life ol tin? holder, and. it mav well he imagined that in disturbed tinif s a tolkmote might deem it necessary for the safety ol tin - community to ofla-r a portion o( its I,uni to a thane for life in order (0 gun his protection. feomc land was, however, private property, held hy virtue of written documents, unf hence called hocland. i his tenure se.( j tns to me to have been derived fiom the Homans. The Roman legions stationed in B.i-

tiin, like those posted in other outlying parts of the empire, held land upon miluai\ t«-ninv, that is to s.iy, they occupied it on condition of defending it, hut wit,’tout thereby guiding the fee

simple of the .-mil ; .iliti when, in course of lime, the egi' us were withdrawn f > oui the country, the Romanised Britons accepted the same (enure, and deemed all lands to he held of (he ►sovereign as para mourn lord, to whom they would revert in case ol the (enaut failing to fulfil the military conditions upon which ho held it. Air Fmlason ascribes the introduction of the manorial system to (he R .mans. Tracts of public land were granted to private individuals, nod, as in New Z aland now-a-days, to do what shey liked with, hut to allot amongst actual cultivators of the soil ; the grantee {kiss-ssiug superior privileges to his dep< ndents, but not being permitted to expel them from his domain ui eider to substitute sheep or cattle in their place ; and being, moreover, responsible for the safety of his manor against the onslaughts of the j.unlit: enemy. It may be presumed, however/ that during the 470 yeais over which the Roman rule -more or less ell-ciive

lasted in Britain, a native population, of Roman descent, arew up, who, with chance settlers, would foim a resident population looking to peaceful pursuits lor its support. We know, at any rate, that London attained a considerable size under Roman dominion. A population of this kind would not break up entirely on the departure of tin- legnms, and it, is to these peaceful settlers we must look for the origin of deeds of giant in England.

Bocland was devisable and alienable at the will of the proprietor, but the Crown retained control by subjecting the land to lovfeirure in ihe event of ceitam delinquencies on the pari, of the owner ; and the overgrowth of estatel was effectually cheeked by ihe Saxon law of succession, by which litnled pro perty was divided ' amongst the children This rule kept down the size of estates to Mich a degree .ts to become a matter of complaint. I To b<- '•uniiiiiiiiil )