LAND TENURE AND LAND POLICY 683 



as to rates. That any fixed fraction of the gross value of the crop 

 cannot be set up as the just rent in all cases, is apparent; for, aside 

 from all questions of evasion, rent must be reckoned on the basis of 

 net returns, after deducting expenses, while the crop (gross value) 

 does not indicate the amount of expense involved. What we need is 

 some system of arbitration between landlord and tenant some land 

 court, whose duty shall be to take into consideration the facts of each 

 case, including expenses and net return, and bring the parties to 

 agreement as to a just rental. 



One warning needed by the cursory student of the land problem 

 is that he should beware the glamour of the panacea. It is so easy 

 to say, "The whole system is rotten. Let us try a new deal." But 

 progress is rarely made by revolution. We must distinguish between 

 radical action and progressive reform. It is not necessary to overturn 

 all our institutions in order to remedy social ills. A logical program 

 of reform based on an analysis of causes would be in part as follows: 



1. Legislation and education to facilitate self-help and to remove barriers 

 to progress. 



a) Co-operative organization. 



b) Conservation. 



c) Better relations between owners and tenants. 



d) Modification of homestead law, etc. 



2. Taxation to socialize strictly unearned incomes and give equal oppor- 

 tunity. 



a) Tax on future increments in land values. 



b) Inheritance tax. 



c) Progressive tax on large holdings. 



3. Regulation of contracts in which experience shows one class is likely to 

 be overreached by another. 



a) Establishment of fixity of tenure (with reasonable safeguards). 



b) Establishment of land courts to arbitrate rents and tenure. 



c) Provision for compensation for improvements made by tenants. 



All these things, and more, have been tried and have attained a 

 measure of success. They are not based upon bitterness and class 

 hatred, and consequently are not so exciting as socialism and the 

 single tax. They proceed from a recognition of the fact that the land 

 problem is but one phase of a complex mass of imperfections and 

 maladjustments which make up the larger social problem a problem 

 that will always be with us as long as men so multiply as to press upon 

 the existing means of subsistence, however much we may minimize 

 it through the establishment of more perfect justice. 



