Land Tenure Quotes
Fixed tenure meant leases for a significant period of time. For various reasons, Irish landowners were reluctant to invest in improving property in any way. It the tenant invested his own sweat or resources to improve the property, the landlord would evict him and rent to someone else for more money for the “improved” property. So no one would ever improve property until there were laws requiring tenants to have rights of transfer, inheritance and reasonable fixed lease terms.
There had been a Chinese Revolution in 1911, but although there were changes at the seat of government and in urban areas, the rural areas where most of the people lived changed little if at all. The revolution failed as a result of it became a revolution without reform.
In England when a landowner died, the eldest son inherited all the land. In Ireland at that time, the land was equally divided among all the sons. This subdivision over several generations produced smaller and smaller land holdings at the same time when new agricultural technology was making the smaller farm an uneconomical entity. Although the Irish system was fairer, it destroyed Irish agricultural productivity.
In every society where there had been past unjust ownership of land, all efforts of land reform were faced with the problem of having to dispossess the current “owners” who themselves had not been guilty of the crimes of their ancestors in unjustly obtaining the land originally. In America land reform was unworkable in most cases and the solution was usually a large monetary payment as compensation for the land.
Landlords would abuse tenant farmers {639644}, and then evict them from their home and farm when they could not pay the rack-rents. The Land League fought back. When a landlord evicted a tenant, they would “urge” all other farmers not to rent that farm. If they did, they might be identified and bad things might happen to their livestock or crops. Few would rent a farm where the previous tenant had been evicted after this “program”.
