Correspondent

Feilding Star, Volume XIII, Issue 128, 26 April 1892, Page 2

Correspondent

LAN® NATIONALISATION . 10 THB EDITOR OF THK STAR. Sir, — In continuing the subject of my last letter I would say the Reformation took away all the great tithes" and the vents from the monasteries, and gave them to the king who gaye them to individuals. This transfer with the change of religion caused the tithe owners and ■ the new abbey land holders to disregard their duty of relieving the poowXhe people complained of the robbery committed upon them, and an Act was, passed m the 43rd year of Elizabeth providing effectually for the relief of the poor by parochial rates. This Act of Elizabeth, provided no gift to the pobrV it tfnTylfapplied to them, in another shape,* -that which the law of the land gave to them before and exacted again from the land what it had been charged with at the time of the Norman conquest And what, in fact, it has been charged with- ever since England had been England, and was no more than a compensation for what had been withheld from !the people und to which they had a much older and : r clearer title than any man had' at has to v his landed estate. As Dr Paley say* "The poor have a claim- founded on the law of nature which may be thus explained : All things were originally <;om>i* mon. No one being able to 1 produce a charter from heaven had any better title to a particular possession than' another. Tnere are reasons for mankind agreeing upon a separation of this common fund, . but this separation was made and coniaented to upon the expectation that every one should have a sufficiency forhisisubsistance or the means of procuring itv therefore when the partition of property is rigidly maintained against the claims of indulgence it is maintained uropposfci ■ tion to the intention of those whomade ; it, and to his who is the Supreme i?rdprietor of everything and who has filled the world with plenteousness for, the sustentation and comfort of all. whom he scuds into it. When Cromwell seized the reins of power and established a Commonwealth he released the land-owners from" all forfietures, fines, and -tributes, as also; their knight's service and escuaga, but having relieved the land owneraof their just burdens, and wanting money to carry on the Government with, he .wrung it from the. people, and m the year 1643" be instituted, the - Excise laws putting a' duty on beer, cider and perry? and extend* it the following year to flesh, wine, sugar, tobacco, and such a - number of other* commodities that it may be denominated general. At the restoration Charles the. Second passed an Act in. the first year of his reign, continuing the tax and thus were the holders of estates freed from the charges due upon those estates and the burden laid upon the people, and from that day to this not only have the people beentaxed but the onus of defending the country has fallen upon labour. So nOw that ths responsibilities winch' rig-h'tf tilly balong to the land, and the strictness -with which those responsibilities were enforced* ■ in the earlier days, and 'the causes which led to the evasion of them, in later ones, have been plainly exhibited t» those large land holders who are now complaining so loudly at haying a alight part of those duties revert to them, they will probably be more resigned to their burden and sobmit more cheerfully to it conscious that they still enjoy great exemptions from . duties they should rightly bear. What those exemptions have enabled the land . holders to do and the effect it has had and still has upon society must be left toa future letter, - : - •, : : lam, etc., " 1(i - S.KNIGH*. i