XVIII H. SPENCER ON THE LAND QUESTION 343 



and this can never be the case under a system of land- 

 lordism and unlimited bequest. 



Mr. Spencer's fundamental principle of social justice, 

 therefore, logically implies that the power of free gift and 

 bequest should be placed under strict limitations, the State 

 taking to itself all above the amount which may be judged 

 necessary for providing each heir with such ample 

 education and endowment as may give him or her a 

 favourable start in life — after which they must be left to 

 receive the results of their own nature and actions ; while 

 the surplus property thus accumulated will form a fund 

 out of which to endow in like manner all those whose 

 parents are not able to provide for them. This branch of 

 the subject however does not directly concern us here 

 except in so far as it leads us to consider the application 

 of the Spencerian principles of Justice to the land 

 question.^ 



We are told distinctly that no landowner should be 

 allowed to leave his land in such a way as to permanently 

 alienate it from the community to which it rightly belongs. 

 But to concede the right of unlimited gift or bequest does 

 so alienate it; therefore no such right should exist. 

 There is another principle, which was asserted by the 

 great jurist Jeremy Bentham, and which is of some 

 importance as a guide : — That laws should never be such 

 as to disappoint "just expectations" — expectations which 

 people had been brought up to consider both legal and 

 equitable. Such an expectation, in our country, is that 

 of succeeding to one's father's property. But no one can 

 have such an expectation till he is born, nor even for some 

 few years afterwards. We may therefore, from every 

 point of view, equitably enact that, from the date of the 

 law, no land shall descend to any person then unborn. 

 We may also rightly add that it shall descend only in the 

 direct line — that is to children and children's children 

 living at the time of passing the Act, because no collateral 

 relatives have any just or reasonable claim or expectation 

 of succeeding to the land. 



1 This problem is more fully treated in chapter xxviii. of this 

 volume. 



