TBAXSACTIONS OF SECTION V. 843 



TUESDAY, AUGUST 9. 

 The following Papers and Report were read : — 



1. Illegitimacy in Lcmfshire. Bij Wm. Cramoxd, A.2L, LL.D. 



I. Maps, diagrams, and tables exhibited to show the relative position of 

 Banffshire for the last tive years (1887-91) : Banffshire, 14*8 per cent, of ille- 

 gitimacy; Shetland, 3'9 ; Midlothian, 7'5 ; Wigtown, 16 6. Percentage of ille- 

 gitimate births to total births in Scotland for the last thirty-four years, 8 per cent. ; 

 Banffshire, IG per cent. Since 1858 Banffshire has had the highest percentage in 

 Scotland thirteen times ; "Wigtown, fifteen times. Distribution of the population 

 and other county statistics. 



II. Registration districts of the county classified according to percentage of 

 illegitimacy for period 1868-91 (inclusive). One district — Seafield, 7 per cent. — 

 is below the average for Scotland ; all the other twenty-three districts are above. 

 Highest, Kirkmichael with 2-1 per cent. Seven of the eight lowest districts are 

 seaboard parishes with a fishing population. The twelve districts with the highest 

 percentages are all purely rural. 



Table showing in parallel columns for each of the tweirty years, 1872-01, the 

 percentage of illegitimacy in Scotland, Banffshire, Seafield, Marnoch, and New 

 Byth. New Byth is believed to have the highest percentage in the three kingdoms. 

 It reached 42 per cent, in 1889 (36 legitimate births, 26 illegitimate). 



Table showing percentage of each registration district in the county for the 

 live years, 1882-86, and for the five years 1887-91. Result : all towu districts 

 show improvement, purely rural distiicts, as a rule, getting worse. Comparative 

 statistics of birtlis, deaths, and marriages for twenty years in a district with a very 

 low percentage (Seafield) and in a district with a very high percentage (Marnoch). 



III. Tables showing the occupations of fathers of illegitimate children — they 

 are mainly farm servants. ' Although the agricultural class does not number one- 

 half of the community by some 1,800 persons, it contributes almost double the 

 number of illegitimate births that all other classes of the community taken to- 

 gether contribute.' 



Tables showing the occupations of mothers. -Iverage number of legitimate 

 births in the county for seven years, 1,655 ; of illegitimate, 319. Of these 319 the 

 mothers of 262 were domestic or farm servants. 



IV. The causes are not (1) Want of education ; (2) poverty or pauperism -, 

 (3) excess of female life ; (4) one-room houses ; (5) race ; (6) religion ; (7) 

 heredity, &c. Proofs of these assertions. 



V. Analysis of 200 opinions given by representative persons in the county as 

 to the causes. The one main cause is want of dwelling-house accommodation on 

 farms for married servants and for servants inclined to marry. 



VI. liemedy. — Provide cottages proportionate to size of farms, granting com- 

 pulsory powers to county councils. Table showing illegitimacy was much less 

 in the early part of this century, prior to the system of joining farm to farm and 

 demolishing cottages. 



2. Taxation of Building Land. Bg Maek Davidson, 



The subject of the paper is taxation of building land. It deals with three pro- 

 posals: (1) the taxation of ground-rents, (2) assessment of unoccupied land 

 capable of yielding ground-rent, and (3) acquisition by the couununity of the 

 unearned increment of land. The chief question of economic interest concerning- 

 the first is whether, according to the present system of rating, ground-rents are 

 taxed for local purposes or not, for no problem is to be met with in regard to the 

 levying or incidence of such an impost. The question is one of assessment, and, 

 according to the method of as.^essment adopted, rent of ground already pays rates 

 equally with rent of houses. To tax it additionally would be to alter the principle 

 on which rating proceeds, and would tax lands of identical values at difforcnt rates. 



