Landed proprietor

“ It really seems to me that you regard our position as landed proprietors in the light of a mere stewardship, and that it is our bounden duty to expend upon the tenantry the proceeds of the estate, reserving a scanty percentage, perhaps, for ourselves to live upon. ”

“ If any of their remote grandchildren are collecting large ground rents from the success of the family in compelling other people to go out of their way and improve less desirable land, the legality of their claim may be undisputed, but its justice is more than doubtful. I should be much surprised to learn of an economist today so mortgaged to tradition as to believe that our present system of landed proprietorship corresponds with the largest interpretation of equity. ”

“ Landed proprietors are the only class, of any numbers or importance, who have a claim to a share in the distribution of the produce, through their ownership of something which neither they nor any one else have produced. If there be any other cases of a similar nature, they will be easily understood, when the nature and laws of rent are comprehended. ”

“ That the present proprietors would gain, he asserts, is proved from the fact, that in the long run, the tenant-at-will is able to produce and to pay less than he who has a long lease, the latter less than the hereditary farmer, and the hereditary farmer less than the proprietor. ”

“ The purchaser draws boundaries, fences himself in, and says, “This is mine; each one by himself, each one for himself.” Here, then, is a piece of land upon which, henceforth, no one has a right to step, save the proprietor and his friends; which can benefit nobody, save the proprietor and his servants. ”

“ Toullier: "Property is a right, a legal power; possession is a fact." The tenant, the farmer, the commandite, the usufructuary, are possessors; the owner who lets and lends for use, the heir who is to come into possession on the death of a usufructuary, are proprietors. If I may venture the comparison: a lover is a possessor, a husband is a proprietor. ”

“ What is, essentially, a farm-lease? It is a contract by which the proprietor yields to a tenant possession of his land, in consideration of a portion of that which it yields him, the proprietor. If, in consequence of an increase in his household, the tenant becomes ten times as strong as the proprietor, he will produce ten times as much. Would the proprietor in such a case be justified in raising the farm-rent tenfold? His right is not, The more you produce, the more I demand. It is, The more I sacrifice, the more I demand. ”

“ But since all have an equal right of occupancy, every man is by the same title a proprietor. Every man has a right to an income equal to a fraction of his product. If, then, the laborer is obliged by the right of property to pay a rent to the proprietor, the proprietor is obliged by the same right to pay the same amount of rent to the laborer ”

“ What is it to consume as a proprietor? It is to consume without working, to consume without reproducing. For, once more, that which the proprietor consumes as a laborer comes back to him; he does not give his labor in exchange for his property, since, if he did, he would thereby cease to be a proprietor. In consuming as a laborer, the proprietor gains, or at least does not lose, since he recovers that which he consumes; in consuming as a proprietor, he impoverishes himself. To enjoy property, then, it is necessary to destroy it; to be a real proprietor, one must cease to be a proprietor. ”

“ This can be done either when the seller retains a claim upon his property in the shape of a mortgage, etc., or when he loans out the purchase-money under the supervision of the state. He is not absolute proprietor of his money so long as it is his only sustenance, he being responsible to the state for his ability to make his living. ”

“ The purchaser, or purchasers, shall receive during the unexpired part of the term of the lease of the farmer, whatever such proprietor shall have been entitled to receive in virtue of his, or her, proprietary rights, on account of the lands so purchased, and such purchaser, or purchasers, shall engage to pay, at the expiration of the lease of the farmers, such assessment on account of the lands as Government may deem equitable. ”

“ In prescribing the mode in which the freeholders appointed to ascertain the damages payable to the proprietor of the lands, by reason of the condemnation thereof for the use of the company, should act, it declares that 'they shall consider the proprietor of the land as being the owner of the whole fee-simple interest therein ”

“ The laborer, in his relation to society, is a debtor who of necessity dies insolvent. The proprietor is an unfaithful guardian who denies the receipt of the deposit committed to his care, and wishes to be paid for his guardianship down to the last day. ”

“ The proprietor, having estimated from his own productive capacity the number of laborers which his property will accommodate, divides it into as many portions, and says: "Each one shall yield me revenue." To increase his income, he has only to divide his property. Instead of reckoning the interest due him on his labor, he reckons it on his capital ”

“ Such estates are ever more and more frequently becoming the property of the merchant or manufacturer from the town, or perhaps of the neighboring proprietor of the same inferior rank, who has lately settled in the country, and become entitled to the exercise of equal rights with the hereditary owner. ”

“ In fact, revenue can increase only as productive soil increases: it is useless to build walls of marble, and work with plows of gold. But, since it is impossible to go on acquiring for ever, to add estate to estate, to CONTINUE ONE'S POSSESSIONS, as the Latins said; and since, moreover, the proprietor always has means wherewith to capitalize,—it follows that the exercise of his right finally becomes impossible. ”

“ The proprietor of an absentee estate is necessarily entirely in the power of his manager; and whatever the number of accounts, reports, and returns may be is of little consequence, as the proprietor cannot get behind them, i.e., he cannot count the coolies that enter the estate in the morning, and that being the case, he is wholly dependent on the honesty of the manager. But the proprietor, it might be urged, can call for the check-roll of people. ”

“ If he is not the proprietor of the field, if he is only a tenant, he pays the proprietor for the productive service of this tool. The tenant is reimbursed by the purchaser, the latter by another, until the product reaches the consumer; who redeems the first payment, PLUS all the others, by means of which the product has at last come into his hands. ”

“ THE INCREASE PAID TO THE PROPRIETOR BY THE OCCUPANT IS A DEAD LOSS TO THE LATTER. For if the proprietor owed, in exchange for the increase which he receives, some thing more than the permission which he grants, his right of property would not be perfect—he would not possess jure optimo, jure perfecto ”

“ Of course if a man requires the money to clear his way with the proprietor, it answers that end. If not, then the proprietors pass over the money to him.
658. Do you really think that if the proprietor had no store there, and you could buy your dry goods and provisions from anybody you like, you would be better off with respect to what you buy?- No; we could not do without the proprietor's store, because, if we have to give our earnings to the proprietor, we are obliged to take goods from his store in return. ”

“ Thus, a mortgage on land is personal property, also the shares of stock in a corporation, although the corporation may be organized to engage exclusively in the ownership of real property, is personal property. Where a person dies leaving a will, his real property goes directly to the persons to whom he leaves it in the will. In the case where he dies intestate, his real property passes directly to his heirs at law, who are designated by statute. ”

“ A tenant at a quit-rent is, to all intents and purposes, a proprietor; a copyholder is not less so than a freeholder. What is wanted is permanent possession on fixed terms. "Give a man the secure possession of a bleak rock, and he will turn it into a garden ”

“ In addition to all this, the proprietor frequently mortgages his real estate to obtain means to advance to the laborers supplies on their portion of the crop yet to be grown, thus mortgaging what he actually possesses, and taking a security not yet in existence, and which depends not only upon the vicissitudes of the seasons, but the faithfulness of the laborers themselves. ”

“ The old proprietor would receive back his land in an improved condition, and the usurper might fairly be considered to have reimbursed himself for all his outlay. The old proprietor should be required to pledge himself to respect the rights of all new tenants. ”

“ An administrator of landed estate who should [Pg 15] sell the property belonging to his master, make money out of it for his own enjoyment, and leave the rightful owner in the direst poverty, is a criminal difficult to imagine. For who would buy a property without the signature of the owner? ”

“ The right to dispose both of the possession and estate follows necessarily from the ownership of the property, and, this being so, no valid objection can be urged against incorporating the contract and power in the same instrument with the mortgage. ”

“ A party may deal with a corporation, in respect to its property, in the same manner as with an individual owner, and with no greater danger of being held to have received into his possession property burdened with a trust or lien. ”

“ The acquisitions of real property by a trading corporation are commonly made upon a bargain and sale, for a full consideration, and without conditions in the deed; and no conditions are implied in law in reference to such conveyances. The vendor has no interest in the appropriation of the property to any specific object, nor any reversion, where the succession fails. ”

“ As the company may not be protected in its actual investment, if the value of its property be plainly less, so the making of a just return for the use of the property involves the recognition of its fair value if it be more than its cost. The property is held in private ownership, and it is that property, and not the original cost of it, of which the owner may not be deprived without due process of law. ”

“ The vendee is treated as the owner of the land and the vendor as the owner of the money. The vendor is deemed in equity to stand seised of the land for the benefit of the purchaser, and the trust attaches to the land so as to bind the heir of the vendor. ”

“ A person’s estate is made up not merely of his valuable claims against other persons, but of such of his powers and liberties, as are either valuable in themselves, or are accessory to other rights which are valuable. A landlord’s right of re-entry is proprietary, no less than his ownership of the land; and a mortgagee’s right of sale, no less than the debt secured. A general power of appointment is proprietary, but the power of making a will or a contract is personal. ”

“ The expediency of making inquiry into the vendor’s title before completing a purchase of land (and the case of a mortgage is precisely similar) is obvious. In the case of goods possession may ordinarily be relied on as proof of full ownership; in the case of land, the person in ostensible possession is very seldom the owner, being usually only a tenant, paying rent to someone else. ”

“ It cannot be denied that inheritance, assessment, commerce, industry, labor, and wages require the most important modifications.”
You wish, proletaires, to regulate property; that is, you wish to destroy it and reduce it to the right of possession. For to regulate property without the consent of the proprietors is to deny the right of domain; to associate employees with proprietors is to destroy the eminent right; to suppress or even reduce farm-rent, house-rent, revenue, and increase generally, is to annihilate perfect property. ”

“ It is true that the shareholder has no right to the possession of any part of the corporate property while the corporation exists and its affairs are honestly managed. He has committed his interest, for a time, to the possession and control of the corporation of which he is a member, and he has only a member's voice in the management of it.
So a man who has leased a farm has no right to possession or control during the lease ”

“ Where a company is authorized to mortgage its franchises and rights, these may be sold and the purchaser acquire title thereto at the foreclosure sale, although the corporate right to exist may not be sold. ”

“ It can hardly be stretched to warrant the plaintiff in making to a single corporation an absolute transfer, or a long lease, of all that might be comprehended in the words 'personal property' in their widest sense, including not only goods and chattels, but moneys, credits, and rights of action. ”

“ He may hold the property only as a trustee, or in a corporate or official character, and be unwilling, for that reason, to assume any personal responsibility as to its title or freedom from liens, or he may be unwilling to do so from notions peculiar to himself; and the purchaser may be unable to secure a conveyance of the property desired in any other form than one of quitclaim, or of a simple transfer of the grantor's interest. ”

“ The right of a factor to hold property against the owner in satisfaction of a demand, is called lien; and the factor may sell the goods to satisfy his claim; but he must pay the surplus, if any, to the principal or owner. A factor can not pledge goods intrusted to him for sale, as security for his own debts. ”

“ In the first place, the original property is in most instances granted out upon long leases, or upon lives, for a mere nominal premium and nominal rent, to the tools and dependents of the Corporation. In truth, almost all the Corporation, all their dirty instruments, and the major part of the parsons and lawyers, are tenants. Large sums of money are lent by the Corporation, to the members of the Corporation, at mere nominal interest. ”