The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 2

Land Laws of Germany

Land Laws of Germany.

Even Prussia, and others of the German states, felt something of this impulse. The first sign they showed was by secularising, as it was gently called, the vast possessions of the Church; and later, when Prussia was at its lowest ebb, the legislation of Stein and Hardenburg did much to renovate

Land Laws of Germany.

her and reanimate her people, by modernizing her land laws, favouring the creation of absolute owners, and substituting full ownership for feudal dependency.

It may be worth while to dwell shortly upon the changes which occurred in Prussia, 1 as they were the model on which many other states have subsequently acted. Indeed it may be said that two methods have been followed by Europe, in getting rid of the feudal land system—the French method of the Revolution, where little regard was paid to private interests, where feudal services and dues were abolished without compensation, and feudal tenures were converted into absolute ownerships; and the Prussian method, or the legal method, by which the values of feudal rights were commuted, or a partition was made of the land occupied by the tenants, a portion being awarded to their feudal superiors in compensation for the loss of rights.

In Germany, as in France, the feudal system had not extinguished altogether the anterior existing class of small proprietors. They were indeed brought within the feudal system, and were considered as serfs; but they continued in possession of their small holdings, and exercised the rights of property and of bequest in respect of them.

The subjection of the peasant to their lords

Land Laws of Germany.

was so great that "the air makes us serfs" became a common expression. The oppression of the serfs was carried to the utmost, and they were not unfrequently sold to foreign governments as soldiers; but notwithstanding this, the class continued in possession of their small holdings of land. The power of the lord did not extend to the appropriation of the peasant's lands. The lord cultivated his own demesnes, either personally or by his bailiffs, with the aid of the services of his feudal dependents, and by the labour of the serfs due in respect of their separate holdings.

At the beginning of this century Prussia had retained the feudal system in some of its most objectionable features. Her subjects were divided into three classes—Nobles, Townsmen, and Peasants. Each class was carefully restricted by law from mingling with the others in any way. The lands of each class were compulsorily maintained in its possession. The nobles' lands were for the most part the subject of unlimited entails. Freedom of commerce in land did not exist. Though the peasants were sustained and protected in their holdings, they were subject to the most arbitrary, capricious, and galling services and dues to their lords.

In the Rhine provinces and Westphalia, owing to the fact that they were subjected to the French laws at the beginning of the century, the land is even more distributed; with an area of about 11,000,000 of acres, there are said to be 1,157,000 proprietors, giving an average of 10 acres to each.

It has been thought well to dwell upon this Prussian legislation, because it formed the model which many other States have subsequently taken for their legislation with respect to land. Austria, Saxony, Hanover, Hungary, and Denmark, followed in the wake of Prussia; and the general principles under-lying the more recent changes in Russia and the abolition of serfdom in that great empire, have been to a great extent borrowed from the same source. Generally it may be said that the French Revolution gave the first impulse to these changes: a reaction occurred at the close of the war in 1814, which stopped further advance, and in some cases, caused a return to the old system; the revolution of 1848, as a rule, compelled a final change.

In Portugal, it is reported to our Government,

Portugal.

"that every opportunity is seized to necessitate the transfer of land. The extinction and dispersion of old estates ensuing from the laws now in force have been sought for rather than prevented; there is a direct movement towards democratic institutions, to which all measures of the legislature have for some years tended. Another blow dealt against the agglomeration of landed property is the abolition of Prasos de Vita, a sort of right of primogeniture which allowed property of a certain kind to be left as an undivided inheritance for three generations."

sicily.

Even in Sicily, one of the most backward parts of Europe, changes have been made in the same direction. Since 1812, when the feudal tenures which had their origin in the Norman Conquest, were abolished, the tendency of legislation has been to favour the alienation and division of landed property. In 1819 entails were put an end to, and the testamentary power of a father was limited to one-half of his property. In 1862 a law was proposed for the disposal of the Church lands, which amounted to one-sixth of the landed property in the island; by 1869 about 20,00 lots of 451,000 acres were disposed of, averaging 23 acres; yet we are told that, in spite of these legislative changes, the greater part of the soil of the island is still in possession of the few. It has not been found possible as yet to extirpate brigandage.

1 This account of the Reform of the Land Laws in Prussia is taken mainly from Mr. Harriss Gastrel's able report in the papers laid before Parliament in 1870