Not only does Unionist policy for Ireland involve considerations of national safety and national honour, but it is also necessary for the economic welfare of both countries.  The remarkable success which has attended Mr. Wyndham’s Land Act of 1903 has alarmed the political party in Ireland, which depends for its influence on the poverty and discontent of the rural population of Ireland.  Mr. Wyndham in his article upon Irish Land Purchase shows clearly the blessings which have followed wherever his Act has been given fair play, and the evils which have resulted in the suppression of Land Purchase by Mr. Birrell’s Act of 1909.  The dual ownership created by Mr. Gladstone’s ill-advised and reckless legislation led to Ireland being starved both in capital and industry and brought the whole of Irish agriculture to the brink of ruin, and under these circumstances, Conservative statesmen determined, in accordance with the principles of the Act of Union, to use a joint exchequer for the purpose of relieving Irish distress.  Credit of the State was employed to convert the occupiers of Irish farms into the owners of the soil.  The policy of the Ashbourne Acts was briefly that any landlord could agree with any tenant on the purchase price of his holding.  The State then advanced the credit sum to the landlord in cash, while the tenant paid an instalment of 4 per cent. for forty-nine years.  It is important to notice that the landlord received cash and that the tenants paid interest at the then existing rate of interest on Consols, namely, 3 per cent.  The great defect in these Acts was that they applied only to separate holdings and not to estates as a whole; but their success can be estimated by the fact that under them twenty-seven thousand tenants became owners by virtue of advances which amounted to over ten million pounds.  Under Mr. Balfour’s Acts of 1891 and 1896, the landlord was paid in stock instead of cash, and the tenants still paid 4 per cent., the interest being reduced to the then rate on Consols—­2-3/4 per cent.—­and the Sinking Fund being proportionately increased.  It will be noticed that these Acts began the practise of paying the landlord in stock, though at that time Irish Land Stock with a face value of L100 became worth as much as L114.  The exchequer was, moreover, permitted to retain grants due for various purposes in Ireland and to recoup itself out of them in case of any combined refusal to repay on the part of tenants.

The Irish Land Act of 1903 was the product of the experience gained during eighteen years of the operation of the preceding Purchase Acts.  It was founded upon an agreement made in 1902 between representatives of Irish landlords and tenants.  Cash payments were resumed to the landlords, the tenants’ instalments were reduced to 3-1/4 per cent., and a bonus, as it was called, of twelve millions of money was made available to bridge the gap between the landlords and the tenants at the rate of 12 per cent, on the