FOOTNOTES:
[63] Adam Smith, in speaking of the class of merchants and manufacturers, says:—“Their superiority over the country gentleman is not so much in their knowledge of the public interest as in their having a better knowledge of their own interest than he has of his. It is by this superior knowledge of their own interest that they have frequently imposed upon his generosity and persuaded him to give up his own interest and that of the public from a very simple but honest conviction that their interest, and not his, was the interest of the people.” (Wealth of Nations, Bk. I. Chap. XI.)
How true in the case of Free Trade!
[64] The landlordism of the days before Famine (1847) never “recovered its strength or its primitive ways. For the landlord, there came of the Famine the Encumbered Estates Court. For the small farmer and tenant class there floated up the American Emigrant ships.” (‘History of Our Own Times,’ Justin Macarthy.)
[65] New Ireland, by A. M. Sullivan, p. 133.
[66] Adam Smith contradicts himself about rent—in one set of passages he says it is the cause, and in another the effect, of prices.
[67] Macleod’s Economics, p. 117.
[68] Political Economy, by J. S. Mill, Bk. II. Chap. XVI.
[69] Profr. Bonamy Price.
[70] Profr. Bonamy Price.
[71] Political Economy, Bastiat.
[72] “Legal plunder has two roots. One of them is in human egotism, the other is in false philanthropy.” (Political Economy, Bastiat.)
[CHAPTER XIX.]
ODIMUS QUOS LÆSIMUS.
Your friend, John Bright, with his usual disregard for accuracy, describes the large landlord as the “squanderer and absorber of national wealth,” but seeing that the total rent of land in Great Britain and Ireland is less than 5 per cent. of the whole national income,[73] and that of this less than one-seventh is in the hands of large landowners, it would require a more able statesman than Mr. Bright to show how he can squander that, of which such a very small proportion passes through his lands.
No? friend Bright. You and your fellow free-traders are the real squanderers of national wealth, and you seek to shift the blame from your own shoulders, by dishonestly laying it on those of the landowner. I command to your perusal the graphic description of a large landowner—the Duke of Argyle—who states that, in Trylee, by feeding the tenantry in bad times, by assisting some to emigrate, by introducing new methods of cultivation, by expenditure of capital in improvements, by consolidating small holdings when too narrow for subsistence, he has raised a community, from the lowest state of poverty and degradation, to one of lucrative industry and prosperity.
The prosperity these tenants enjoy is due to the beneficial and regulative power of the landlord as a capitalist. The greater the wealth of the landlord, the greater is his beneficial and regulative power. There were thousands of landowners who acted up to the limits of their power in this way, until you, friend Bright, ruined them and deprived them of the power of helping their tenants.
No, doubt, there are bad landlords, as there are bad men in all classes, but the interests of the landowner and those of the tenant are inseparably bound together; and the landlord is shrewd enough to see that it is to his own interest to improve the property if he can afford to do so.
The old classic, with his insight into human nature, in odimus quos læsimus, shows that human nature has not altered, and it does not surprise me that you should hold up to execration the class you have so cruelly injured.
You, my Free-trading Fanatic, have (thanks to Mill’s unfortunate sophisms and your leaders’ persistent misrepresentations) such a very hazy view about landowner’s rights and duties, that I think a few words on the subject may clear the atmosphere.
(1.) Landed property is the capital of the landlord.
(2.) Interest on capital is fair, reasonable, and consistent with general good.
(3.) Rent is interest on the capital of the landlord.
(4.) The landlord may sell[74] his land, invest the proceeds in any other way, and thus get interest on his capital.
(5.) The tenant can get rid of rent, either:—
(a) by borrowing money to buy land, in which case he has to pay interest on the loan;
(b) by saving sufficient money to purchase land, in which case he might, instead of purchasing, invest the money, so that its interest would pay the rent.
(6.) In any case the whole question of rent resolves itself into a question of capital, and interest thereon.
(7.) Law, from time immemorial, has recognised the right of property in land.
(8.) In most cases the owner has paid hard cash both for the land and for the improvements of it.
(9.) Land is therefore actual capital just as much as money, coal, iron, cattle, or any other disposable commodity.
It is absurd, therefore, to say, that a man possessing capital in land may not act in the same way as the owner of any other form of capital. (Of course he has his moral obligations, but those are applicable to the possession of any other form of capital.) If the tenant desires capital, he must work for it, or obtain it in some legal manner. If he get it in any other way, it is theft; and any legislation that transfers the capital of the landlord to the tenant without due compensation, is legalized theft.
As regards absentee landlords, I admit it is desirable, on many grounds—on the ground of his own personal interest—to put it on the lowest ground, that he should not be absent; but if the life of the landlord and his family be at stake, is he to be blamed if he declines to take the risk of being boycotted or shot? You argue that he does nothing for his money which he draws, and spends away from the place in which it has been produced, thus impoverishing the district.
Is he different in this respect from the capitalist who invests money in colonial or foreign funds, who does nothing for his money, and spends it away from the country in which it is produced? Is he different in this respect from the London banker, who lends money to the manufacturer in the provinces, or abroad? He does nothing for his money, but spends it away from the locality in which it has been produced. Would you argue on this ground, that the railway shareholder, the foreign bondholder, the London banker ought, in equity, to receive no interest on their money, and should be held up to public execration? If you place any value on the laws of political economy, which you are so fond of quoting, my Fanatical Friend, drop your absurd arguments about landlords. Land is a commodity to be bought, sold, improved by the capital of the landlord, and if you treat it otherwise, you violate every principle of sound political economy.
Admitting that land is capital, and the landlord is the capitalist, what does Political Economy say?—
“If a man has not wealth himself, but only his labour to sell, what is most to his advantage? Why, of course, that there should be as many rich men as possible to compete for his labour.... Nothing can be more fatal than the cry against capital so often unthinkingly uttered.... It would be impossible to conceive a greater benefactor to his country than the one who would permanently reconcile the interests of masters and workmen, and put an end to the internecine wars of capital and labour.”[75]
Verily! Friend Bright, the cry against the landlord is a “cry against capital unthinkingly uttered.” Verily thou encouragest the “internecine wars of capital and labour.” Verily thou art the reverse of a benefactor to thy country.
The verdict of Political Economy condemns thee!!