ALIEN LANDOWNERS IN AMERICA.

Auckland Star, Volume XIX, Issue 195, 20 August 1888, Page 4

ALIEN LANDOWNERS IN AMERICA.

A committee of the United States Congress which recently sat to consider the revision of the land laws brought up their report and submitted a bill for approval. The dis. turbing ' element that caused the appointment of this Committee was the monopolisation of large blocks of American land by British noblemen and capitalists. The Committee in their report say that "they have ascertained with reasonable certainty that certain noblemen of Europe, principally Englishmen, have acquired and now. own about 21,000,000 acres of land within the United States." From tne wording of the report io would appear that the Committee only turned their attention to ascertaining the size and value *of the blocks of land owned by noblemen,' for it goes on to( 3ay "the Committee has not sufficient information to state. the quantity of land owned ; by untitled aliens, nor doss it consider that important." The j report does not convey any information as j to why it is more objectionable lot1 a titled j alien to monopolise American soil than for j an untitled one, but the fact is simply aa we give it. . ' ; However, the Committee has submitted a .bill to the House in which "all foreign j persons who have not been naturalised" are. declared " incapable of taking the title to lands anywhere within. the United! States, except a leasehold for not exceeding j five years." The bill deala entirely with] tho future and not with the past, as the;; Committee seems to have been at a loss how ! to deal with the present monopolisers, and , in this we can hardly blame them, as our own Parliament appears to be in precisely the same fix. Even Sir Harry Atkinson, New Zealand's only Treasurer, when asked i£ it was not possible to tax our absentee landowners, replied that the true definition of 'an absentee landowner had yet to be explained to him. ; The American Committee give the names of several alien absentee landowners with the amount of. revenue derived by them from American tenants and. American' toil and industry, and ceitainly the facts and figures given warrant the United Statosin taking action to arrest the evil. But, as an American paper very justly remarkß, '' This Bill. in. its discrimination agaiiiHt aliens is utterly unworthy of. the; great republic. • But,;its introduction and the accompanying reports are gratifying evidences of the growth of the sentiment which questions the right of any man to compel another man to pay tribute tohim for the use of the natural elements,neqessary to all. The attempt to prevent aliens in future from acquiring title to American .land is merely, a tub to the wliale. Alien landlords yet to be, have no friends, and American landlordism is quite ready to throw them over in the hope that that may quiet thorising sentiment. But it will not." . .. f • : . Whether intentionally.or accidontally,the Committee in referring to these noble aliens drop their titles. For instance, Lord Scully is spoken of " as a Mr, Scully who lives in England and is a subject of the' Queen." The Committee also refer to the enormous investments made by alien capitalists in railroad and land 'bonds, amounting to many millions, and which they recognise as a future great danger to the State; These investments cover . 100,000,000 acres, * which enormous territory, the Committee say, .will, "under foreclosure sales, most likely before many years become the property of these foreign bondholders, in addition to their present princely possessions. Tliia! aggressive foreign capital is not confined to lands it has purchased, but, overlapping its boundaries, has caused hundreds of. male's of« the public domain to be fenced up for the grazing of vast-herds of ; cattle, and set at defiance the rights: of the honest but humble settler." - . '

These gigantic speculative, operations in the United States, vast and almost limitless as is that country, are beginning! to be felt as a great evil, no douot. owing to the enormous increase of the population and the rapid spread of settlement. It is a fact now that very little land lemains in the hands of the American Government. The settler has to deal at second hand with syndicates and private land speculators. \ -