The Economic Position of the British Labourer. II community. The theory of our constitution as it now exists, is based upon the supposition that it is desirable that one of the powers in the State should be an hereditary aristocracy, and it is assumed. that an hereditary aristocracy cannot be maintained unless they are the owners of large landed estates. Our law therefore confers on a landed proprietor facilities for preventing the subdivision of his estate, and everything is done to encourage the feeling that it is desirable that landed property should not be subdivided. If a man dies without a will his landed property passes intact to his heir, whereas his personal property will pass in part to his widow, and the remainder is divided equally amongst his children. If he had no children, his property would be distributed in certain fixed proportions amongst his relations. We must therefore inquire what are the effects which these laws of property produce upon the general interests of the nation.

I am desirous to make my remarks as little political as possible, and I will therefore assume that we unanimously admit the impolicy of making any radical change in our constitution. We are anxious that our Parliament should continue to consist of two assemblies, one elected and the other permanent. The history of the past has repeatedly shown that if legislative power is en

tirely confided to an elected assembly, there may be no influence to withstand the outbursts of popular passion. We will therefore admit that nothing ought to be done to jeopardize the existence or to weaken the influence of the House of Lords, so that there may be always a power in the State to exercise calm and deliberate wisdom, if the representatives of the people, reflecting the excitement of their constituencies, should be hurried into hasty and unjust legislation. But if we make these admissions, does it follow that in order to have an assembly which shall possess the functions of the House of Lords, we must maintain laws whose avowed effect is to keep intact the estates of our landed aristocracy? Every feeling in our nature is opposed to the idea that one child in a family should be selected for special favour, and that he should be enriched, whilst his brothers and sisters are made comparatively poor. If a man had £100,000, and left £90,000 to his eldest son, and divided only £10,000 amongst his four remaining children, every one would denounce such a disposition of property as most unjust and most unfair; but if a man had an estate worth £100,000 and left the whole of it to his eldest son, he will do exactly what our law would do for him, if he died without a will; for the law of England intèrprets a man's natural desire to be,

that all his landed property should pass to his eldest son, even although his other children may be left entirely unprovided for.

Since the inheritance of landed property by one child to the exclusion of others, although encouraged and facilitated by our law, is manifestly opposed to all our conceptions of justice, it follows that primogeniture cannot be defended, unless it can be clearly proved to bring to the State some decidedly compensating advantages. Those who assume that the House of Lords cannot exist without primogeniture, may argue that our constitution cannot be preserved unless this institution is maintained. But I believe that the assumption implied in this argument is not correct. In order to secure the permanence of the House of Lords, nothing is so important as that there should be in this assembly some of the ablest men in the country. The intelligent people of England would quite as soon place faith in the divine right of kings, as they would be induced to believe that a man inherits by birth any claim to The existence of the House legislate for them. of Lords will never even be threatened as long as it can be shown that its functions are exercised wisely and efficiently. At the present time 428 peers have a right to sit in that assembly. And yet out of that number perhaps not more than

40 or 50 have either the taste, or the inclination, or the capacity to take the slightest part in its deliberations, even when the gravest political questions are discussed. If hostility should ever be shown towards the House of Lords, it will not be because the English nation desires the abolition of a permanent legislative assembly; but no one need be surprised if the day should arrive when the nation will not tamely submit to see the fortunes of the state controlled by the votes of men who give their proxies to a party leader, because they are too careless or too indolent to be present, when questions of the gravest importance upon which they have to decide are discussed. The House of Lords would have been long since destroyed by those peers, who either from indolence or incapacity do not perform their hereditary legislative functions, had not that assembly been constantly renovated by illustrious commoners who have achieved distinction either in arms, literature, politics, or science. In a free and enlightened country no body of men will be permitted to exercise legislative power simply because they have inherited rank and wealth. The friends of an hereditary aristocracy advance a dangerous argument, if they assert that the existence of the House of Lords depends upon the maintenance of the large landed estates of our peers. Edu

cated people will rebel against such opinions; it will reasonably be said, that ability, education, and leisure, may give a man a claim to be a senator; but that any principle of inheriting political power, unless it secures these qualities, cannot be advantageous to the State. The remarks which have just been made may, I think, be considered to lead to the two following conclusions: first, the maintenance of the House of Lords does not depend on primogeniture; secondly, our laws of real property which facilitate the inheritance of land entirely by the heir, cannot be maintained upon the plea that they tend to preserve the constitution in its present form; for our House of Lords would be more permanent and more efficient if such a large proportion of its members were not placed there simply because they inherited rank and property.

I think therefore enough has been said to justify the conclusion that no political considerations of paramount importance demand that our present laws of real property should be maintained. As we have now disposed of the political part of this question, we have next to investigate the economic consequences which result from permitting such a disposition of land as now prevails in England.

I have already referred to the extraordinary circumstance that if a man dies without a will,