THE TEST CASES OF THE LAND LEAGUE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XI, Issue 22, 21 September 1883, Page 21

THE TEST CASES OF THE LAND LEAGUE.

(The Nation, July 28.) The Irish Land Commissioners have issued a pamphlet, containing a series of observations upon the fourth report of the cSnStto of the* House of Lords on the Land Act of 1881. In our last issue we eave copious extracts from the report to which the commSners nO w reply In these observations the four chief commissioners Weed on the plan of taking extracts from the Lords' report and the^nswe? ing each m detail At the outset the commissioners complain of the course of proceeding adopted by the Select Committee .On this subject the commissioners say : — umunn.ee. Un cms «. i." M / -?" dle y> th f secretary of the commissioners, and Mr O'Brien the head of the purchase department, were examined as were also ?n succession Mr. Litton, Mr. Justice O'Hagan, and Mr. Vernon The examination seemed to the commissioners to be chiX pointed towards the eliciting of opinion on the extension of the pSrchase 3 tt^Sft aPP r 6d to be - the idea theQ dominant In the minds of the committee. Some questions were put as regards the amendment of the procedure and practice, but they were asktfd as nnnn matters on which minds might fairly 'differ, and the commiSoners showed every disposition to enter into, and as far as tL^y thought practical or prudent to adopt, the suggestions of the cbmmSfee Nothing wap-said which gave the iaintest idea that an attack upon the honour or integrity, either of themselves or of the assistant oSm jmasionerß, was contem P raled. When Jthe committed was re-apS. convenience which might arise from summoning assistant LmmE* iioners engaged in the performance of their funcS^ rZ £„ mittee declined to accede to the reauest • WJnfcvS c m ; ,' JJ UU * h t • L °I dß ' "P ol .* com P laint is ma le that althou-h Parliament -^sr^rs assaaswasssa: The Act contemplated the Cation oi * thl ™- W * ho ?7* commissioners to the sub-comSoners • nfl i \ V ? ?£? £ the reservation could hav d been iJSS^tA^f^^ of appeals) the commissioners cannot even conjecture The com in a space of less than two months comnlp MZtll T rnavmg their rules and forming and oiSKb 'thll «Sf ™ ° f * ram - Dg

the case, holding, and diatrict. Farther enactments are contained in 2?h»T!?S, lllg 8ub \ se< ? fcioQa oE the cj ghtb section. What power 0? right had the commissioners to add to the statute by layine down extra-jadicially principles, general or special, according to which the assistant-commissioners were to act in their judicial capacity ? If they hal attempted to do so, they might have been justly accused of (meeting a court of first instance how to arrive at decisions which atterwards might come before the commissioners themselves a? an appellate tribunal. It has been entirely left out of sight in the proceedmgs of their lordships' committee that the Land Commission does not form the sole court for the fixing of fair rents. The tri- » a U o na l ?? rr fcA fc f^r ia J £ c Btatute is the civil biU coc rte. Can it b« asserted that the Land Commissioners should have laid down a code of instructions or general principles according to which the judges of the civil bill courts were to act in fixing fair rents? Such aa attempt would have been properly treated as ridiculous by tha eminent ]udges in question. A sub-commission once constituted and empowered to hear cases, pursuant to the statute, is as independent and as free from any control of the commissioners over its decisions (save on rehearing) as the county court." w^mmhis «m, Xhe . Lords having alleged that specific questions were put to the commissioners as to the manner which the sub-commissioners should act, but were not answered, the following statement of the commissioners is given in reply : wmiu» * n ir-!L? he T- Dly Witne ? 8 * bo depoßes t0 these specific Questions is Mr Baldwin. Tne commissioners have no recollection of the questions having been asked, but they do not dispute Mr. Baldwin's statement " The first question was how we were to deal with the Healv Clause toIZSSS WU S *&* %T , the daty would be ver y difficult and most important, and the difficulty was realised when the case of Adams v. Dunseath cropped up.»-(Baldwin, 1033.) The commissioned deem it right, in the first place, to make the following otaervatS?™ They are an administrative as well as a judicial body, and it is their r L gh^ d d ? ty . to direct in what wav in P°i»t of procedure the Ac J shoud be administered. When, therefore, the commissioner are assailed for not having given instructions to the assistant-commis. sioners, it is quite possible that the ground might be shifted and it might be asserted that the fault lay in not giving them instruSons m point of mere procedure. But this question of Mr. Baldwin puts the matter beyond the possibility of a doubt. The complain! made by him and now adopted and enforced by the committee of the House of Lords, is this-That the commissioners upon a leeal oW S5 °L % Ut r 1 ***"*&. aDd com P lexiry- a Ration so 5 fficult that the Court of Appeal in Ireland, after the fullest and most elaborate argument, were unable to concur in an unanimous opinion and only decided by a mapnty-that upon such a question th? com! mis^ioners did pot m the first instance, before the matter had arisen for decision, without having litigants before them, or hearing aS ment on either side, instruct the assistant-commissioners in the interpretation of the statute. To have done so would, in their opinion, have been grossly culpable. That the witness, who is not a law >e r, should make this complaint does not surprise the com missioners, but that it should have reoeived the sanction of such a bX as the committee of the House of Lords is a thing they would not have deemed possible until they read the report " According to Mr. Baldwin, his second question was whether the Ulster tenant-right was to be brought in an element, or rather a factor, m the determination of the rent. This was also a q £! of law, not to be decided untU it arose for decision. The third wa? whether it was meant that the Act should apply to all estate? Ind that we should be turned into a court of valuation, or whether any class or classes of farms or estates would be excluded from the operations of the Act; whether, for instance, rents, dating from a certain point, should be excluded-in other words, whether aly fSnt won d be excluded, and for what. A simple perusal of the IS would show that as to estates, no class of estates was excepted on the ground of the rents dating from a certain period. Several classes of Mdmjg are excepted in terms of the Act. No instruction could possibly be given on this point beyond repeating the words of the statute. Whether in any, particular instance a holding came within the exception must of course await the evidence and areument in each- case. c Dealing with the accusation that a hard-and-fast rule seemed to be laid down for the fixing of a judicial rent, because in the first place some of the reductions have been greatest where the improvements of the tenant have been least, and because little or no difference appears to have been made whether the rent was an old one and had been regularly paid, or whether it was a modern rent the commissioners say :— cul) wie "It is, of course, perfectly possible that reductions may have been sometimes the greatest where the improvements of the tenants were the least. The commissioners cannot enter into any discussion as to the propriety of judicUl decisions, but they may remark that it is possible that in some cases the former rents may have weiehed heaviest upon tenants whose poverty debarred them from improvine As to the haphazard and irregular manner with which it is said thp improvements have been dealt with, the commissioners observe that the committee rely upon the evidence of Mr. Wm. H. Gray, who was attached as a valuer to one of the sub-commissions during the time that system was adopted, but whose evidence they have not till this I moment had an opportunity of seeing. This gentleman will not j they trust through identity in sound" of the name, be confounded I with Mr. Charles Groy Giey, of Dilston, the head of the staff of valuers who value for the commissioners on rehearings • neither he nor any one of his most competent staff, was examined or summoned by the committee. The commissioners hare laid down in the clearest and most unmistakable language on repeated occasions that the regular payment of an old rent fur a number of years was primafaeie evidence that it was a fair rent. It is prima fade evidence, but not conclusive. They have no reason to believe that the sub-commissions have ever departed from this principle The cvi dence may show that the old rent so paid never was a fair one or it may show a change of circumstances which would render what was

once a fair rent no longer so. As to the statement of Mr. Gray that he was in the habit of deducting about 15 per cent, from the letting value to represent the tenant's right of occupation, the commissioners can only say that they appointed Mr. Gray upon the evidence of what they deemed satisfactory testimonials, as well as upon his own oral statement of his qualifications ; that not only this principle of deducting 15 per cent, did not emanate from any instruction given to him by the commissioners, or by any sub-commission to which he was attached, but that it was never communicated to them, and was reserved to be stated after he had ceased to hold his office in order to form an item in a concerted attack upon others iv no way responsible for his methods. The commissioners have looked into a number of Mr. Gray's reports, and in none of them have they been able to find a reference to this alleged deduction of 15 per cent.