Des obstacles que présente l'appropriation individuelle des fonds de terre.

CHAP. 11: On the obstacles that the individual appropriation of lands presents.

TOWARD the end of the fifteenth century, a new world suddenly opened to the eyes of the peoples of Europe, as a natural consequence of the progress of navigation. These peoples recognized rights only for Christians; they considered the men who were outside of Christianity as enemies of their cult, devoted to destruction or to servitude. Those among them who were the most skilled in the arts of navigation and of war thus rushed upon the most opulent nations that were not Christian, to enslave them, and to despoil them of their riches. The others seized the territory of a few small peoples who were just beginning to emerge from the savage state, and who lived, in large part, on the animals they took in the forests.

I do not have to occupy myself here with the riches or properties acquired at that epoch by the enslavement and spoliation of peoples who, by their industry, had already reached a certain degree of prosperity; it was an immense displacement of riches, and not a new formation of properties. The lands occupied by small peoples of savages were doubtless also their properties, since it is only by them that the men to whom they furnished means of existence had been formed and could continue to live; but these properties that formed their national territory had received from human industry no increase in value. They can therefore give us the means to appreciate the kind of services that the earth renders to man, in the countries where human industry has given it no utility, and the obstacles that must be vanquished to bring it into cultivation.

When America had been discovered, the navigators of all nations directed themselves toward this part of the world, and found there territories of an immense extent, which appeared to them entirely unoccupied. The land was in their eyes a thing as common as the water of the sea; each could, at his own risk and without harming others, go and cultivate as much of it as his needs demanded. No one, however, hastened to go make his fortune by establishing vast domains in countries where civilization had never penetrated. It seems that everyone foresaw that deserted countries could not be brought into a state of cultivation by individual efforts, and without the help of immense riches.

In 1663, the French government, seduced by the extent and fertility of these lands, took the resolution to establish in Guiana a powerful colony. It had ships prepared; it filled them with provisions, seeds of every kind, agricultural instruments, and tents to shelter the workers. Twelve thousand vigorous men, accustomed to fatigue and sobriety, were embarked, and, after a happy navigation, arrived at the place of their destination.

Placed in the presence of an immense territory that no one disputed with them, provided with victuals and agricultural instruments, they had only to divide the land among themselves to form vast domains. Yet what happened? In a short time, the rain, the fatigue, and above all the insalubrity of the air, had caused ten thousand men to perish in the horrors of despair. The two thousand who remained, discouraged by the excessive labors to which it was necessary to devote oneself to give the land some value, esteemed themselves happy to be brought back to France. They thought that it was more advantageous for them to practice the trade of a laborer in the midst of a civilized nation, than to appropriate a great extent of land in a savage country.

There was sacrificed, in this expedition, in victuals, in seeds, in agricultural instruments, a sum of twenty-six million livres tournois, which represents a value of more than fifty million francs in the time in which we live; ten thousand men lost their lives there, and, after these enormous sacrifices, there did not remain, in lands, a value sufficient to tempt men who had only their arms for their entire fortune[^44].

The English had already made, at this epoch, analogous experiments. Having discovered, in 1584, that part of America which today composes the state of Virginia, they wished to form an establishment there. Several persons powerful by their credit and by their riches sent there, under the direction of Ralegh, seven small ships and one hundred and eighty men, to cultivate the land of which they were going to take possession. After a sojourn of nine months, all were about to be carried off by famine, when a ship arrived from England and brought them victuals. They were brought back to their native country: among them, there was not found one man who was seduced by the hope of becoming proprietor of a rich domain.

Some years later, the same project was taken up again. Three ships were dispatched with a colony stronger than the first. The colonists were provided with arms, victuals, seeds, agricultural instruments, in short with all the objects necessary for their establishment. When they saw the labors to which they had to devote themselves to wrest from the earth products fit to serve them as food, they feared they would lack victuals, and they begged their commander to return to England to bring them some. He departed; but before his return, famine, diseases, and the savages had destroyed them all.

Twenty years passed without anyone being found who wished to form a new attempt. In 1607, a third expedition was sent to the same land; and like the preceding ones, it provided itself with everything it judged necessary for the establishment of a colony. Having arrived on the American continent, the colonists set to work; but, before the land had produced anything, victuals began to become scarce. The exhalations of a newly cultivated land, the heat and humidity of the climate, and the lack of subsistence, brought on diseases. Before the beginning of September, half of the colony had perished; the other half had neither strength nor courage left.

The chief of the colonists, named Smith, nevertheless managed to restore hope to them; but having been taken by the savages, the colony was almost entirely ruined during his absence. On his return, it consisted of no more than thirty-eight persons who wished to return to England. However, by his prayers, his caresses, his threats, he managed to retain them until the arrival of a ship that brought them provisions, and brought them a reinforcement of new colonists.

Hope returned with strength; they set back to work. The colonists having made peace with the savages, they determined them to sell them a part of their subsistence; for the savages devoted themselves to cultivation before the arrival of the Europeans. Disunion arose anew between the natives and the colonists: the latter ceased to receive help from the former, and famine was not long in manifesting itself. The colonists first killed the animals they had brought with the design of multiplying them: this resource exhausted, they fed on nauseating roots. Finally, they were reduced to eating the corpses of the Indians they managed to kill, and even those of their compatriots whom famine or diseases had carried off. The colony, which was of five hundred persons, was in a short time reduced to sixty, who had only a few days left to live, when new help arrived from Europe. The navigators who brought it to them, and who believed they would find a flourishing colony, on seeing the livid complexion, the emaciated bodies of this small number of individuals, took them for specters or walking corpses. However, since the taking of possession, two years had passed.Finally, the colonists managed to draw from the soil the food that was strictly necessary for them to live; but this was not until 1612, that is to say, five years after their establishment. Until then, it was the mother country that furnished them with means of existence. To put the land into a state of cultivation, they did not begin by dividing it among themselves; each of them did not cultivate a particular field. They pooled their strength and their intelligence, and the products of the earth were locked in a public granary. If they had divided the land, and if each had wished to work only for himself, they would never have succeeded in rendering the soil fertile.

The company that founded this establishment spent, in a space of sixteen years, a sum of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds sterling, and sent nine thousand people there. At the end of this time, in 1624, the colony was composed of only two thousand individuals; and, after having taken its subsistence, it exported only twenty thousand pounds sterling of its products. Thus, to obtain the food necessary for two thousand people, and the value of twenty thousand pounds sterling of exportation, it had been necessary to sacrifice an enormous capital, and the lives of seven thousand men.

If now one wishes to know the primitive value of the land of which the first colonists took possession, one must put on one side the capital employed in cultivation, the interest on this capital, and the price of the workers' labor; one must put on the other side the value of the subsistence consumed and that of the exportations, or rather, a capital whose interest would be equal to the exported values; one must then see by how much the second sum exceeds the first. If this calculation were made with care, one would find that the value of the land was excessively small [^45].

The religious persecutions of which England was the theater pushed into the northern part of America a great number of energetic and industrious men, who all possessed some riches, and some of whom even had great fortunes. The strength they found in religious enthusiasm, and the numerous resources they brought from their native country, were for them powerful means of vanquishing the obstacles that nature presented to them. However, the difficulties they found in putting the soil into a state of cultivation were so great that many of them succumbed without having vanquished them. In the first winter, half of the colonists who had crossed to New England perished from fatigue, from misery, or as a result of the rigors of the climate [^46].

When the English government wished, in 1788, to found a colony in that part of the world then called New Holland, and which is today named Australasia, it furnished the colonists in abundance with agricultural instruments, seeds, subsistence, and domestic animals of every kind. The first year, the colonists were fed at the expense of the metropolis; they then received a half-ration for eighteen months; finally, it was not until the seventh year after their establishment that they could provide for their own needs. The men whom the government had sent to this country the first year were, for the most part, people hardened to labor and accustomed to privations. Nevertheless, although the climate was very mild, they were obliged to devote themselves to excessive labors to give the land some value [^47].

The Dutch succeeded in founding a colony at the Cape of Good Hope only by making immense sacrifices. Not only did they offer land free of charge to the men who would go and settle there, they gave to those who accepted their offers agricultural instruments, seeds, and subsistence for a certain time. As their propositions could be accepted only by men who had no means of existence, they gave them for companions women taken from the workhouses. Finally, they made the commitment to them to bring them back to their homeland, if, at the end of three years, they judged it suitable to return; and, in this case, each was to have the faculty of disposing of the property he would have formed. It is proven, says a historian, that, to found this colony, forty-six million were spent in the space of twenty years [^48].

A French company, having obtained from the government the concession of Guadeloupe, Marie-Galante, and Saint Lucia, formed some establishments on these islands. It soon perceived that their possession was more onerous than profitable to it. In 1649, it sold them to a man named Boissent for the sum of 75,000 livres. The following year, Martinique, Saint Lucia, and Grenada were sold to Duparquet for the sum of 60,000 livres. The islands of Saint Christopher, Saint Martin, Saint Barthélemy, Saint Croix, and Tortuga were sold, in 1651, for the price of 120,000 livres. The purchasers of these islands were to enjoy the most extensive authority there; not only did they have the disposition of the terrain, but they had sovereignty over it. They appointed all civil and military posts; they could grant pardons to those whom their delegates had condemned to death [^49].

To get an exact idea of the value that the lands had in these islands, toward the middle of the seventeenth century, a simple operation suffices: one need only compare the extent of the lands sold to the price for which they were delivered. The three islands of Martinique, Saint Lucia, and Grenada were given for 60,000 livres. The extent of the first is 127,285 hectares according to Malte-Brun. Counting for nothing Grenada, and Saint Lucia which nevertheless has nearly fifty square leagues, a hectare of land was given for a few sous.

The Portuguese government has always been very liberal with land in Brazil; the colonists who have wished to obtain it have had no other expense to incur than to ask for it; it has never been sold to them [^50]. The French government followed the same conduct in Canada, as long as that country remained under its domination. The only condition it placed on the concessions it made was to require that the conceded lands be put into a state of cultivation within a given time; but it never held to the fulfillment of this condition [^51].

However, the government of the United States sells the lands that the natives have ceded to it. These lands are sometimes sold for as little as a hundredth of a dollar per acre (a little more than a sou [^52]). Sometimes also they are sold for a little more or a little less than a dollar an acre, according to whether they are more or less distant from cultivated countries. This value is, in large part, the result of the labors executed on the neighboring lands. We have already seen, in the preceding chapter, in effect, that uncultivated lands increase in value as civilized populations extend toward them. The reason for this is that their cultivation becomes less difficult, and that one finds it easier to exchange the products one draws from them for other products.

All these lands, which had almost no value when they were traversed only by savage tribes, have become precious properties as human industry has fertilized them. Martinique, sold in 1650 for a sum of thirty or forty thousand francs, exported in 1775 nearly nineteen million of its products. Lands that would have cost only a few centimes a century and a half ago, or which would not even have found purchasers because they were judged to have no value, would today be worth several millions. This phenomenon, which men still living have observed over a large part of America and in some other parts of the world, has manifested itself in the same manner among all civilized peoples. It has developed a little less rapidly in the European states, and its progress has been less well observed, for the reason that one is always less struck by what happens around oneself than by what happens far away; but, in all countries, the human species has followed the same laws in its development. The soil on which Paris rests and the various materials of which this city is constructed were, at one time, objects as devoid of value as were, two centuries ago, the land on which Philadelphia rests, and the materials that compose its riches.

When the Europeans transported themselves to America, Africa, or Australasia, and seized by force the lands occupied by savages, they evidently usurped properties; they despoiled the possessors of their means of existence. One must, however, be careful not to exaggerate the importance of these usurpations; one must appreciate them by the number of men that the usurped lands supported and by the means they furnished them. One would commit a grave error if one judged them by the value these lands have acquired since they were put into a state of cultivation. It is evident, for example, that, if the extent of land that is today worth a thousand francs was worth only five centimes when it was usurped, there has really been only the value of five centimes snatched away. A square league of land was barely sufficient to support a savage in distress; today it ensures means of existence for a thousand people. There are nine hundred and ninety-nine parts that are the legitimate property of the possessors; there has been usurpation for only a thousandth of the value; the surplus was created by industry [^53].

We have just seen how, with the aid of accumulated capital, Europeans have succeeded in forming properties in lands, on territories they had seized by force, or of which they had obtained the concession from the possessors. Here a difficult problem presents itself for resolution. How could men have passed from the savage life to the agricultural life? How could they have transformed fractions of their national territory into individual properties? If the Europeans, with all the means that industry furnishes them, and with immense capital, have had so much trouble converting uncultivated lands into individual properties, how did men devoid of everything arrive at the same result? If capital is necessary to put lands into cultivation, and if all capital comes originally from the land, by what means did the first cultivators succeed in rendering the land fertile?

In all things, the greatest difficulties that present themselves are in the beginnings. A watch, a steam engine, are marvelous inventions; but, to execute them, it required less time, patience, and perhaps genius, than was once needed to fabricate the first hammer and the first anvil. The first difficulties vanquished, the first instruments of the arts being produced, it was easier to devote oneself to labors of every kind.

We can say, for the cultivation of the land, what we say for the other arts: the products of the first cultivated acre give the means to cultivate the next, and the more cultivation advances, the less difficult it becomes. This explains to us the rapid progress made by the United States, despite the countless obstacles that had to be vanquished when the first colonists began to put the land into a state of cultivation.

But here several questions present themselves. Is it good that all parts of a vast territory be put into a state of cultivation? Can all of them be converted into private properties, or is it suitable that some continue to belong in common to the mass of the population? The rivers and streams, for example, which are of such great utility to a civilized nation, can they fall into the private domain? If, by their nature, they belong to the public domain, how is it suitable to regulate their use, in the interest of the riparian proprietors and of the mass of the population?

There are, in all countries, lands that are never cultivated, either because they are not susceptible of cultivation, or for other causes that I will expound further on; in all, the same principles have not been adopted relative to the property of rivers; one will see, however, that the force of things has ended by introducing almost everywhere the same practices.

The land is not useful to men only by the plants it nourishes; it furnishes them moreover with a great variety of materials that it conceals in its bosom. In becoming proprietor of the surface, that is to say, of the vegetable part, and of the matter that supports it, does a man acquire the property of all the riches it contains in its bosom, and to the formation of which he has not contributed? Does the property of the top carry with it the property of the bottom, to infinity, as far as it is possible to descend? Does it carry with it moreover the property of the space that is situated above, as high as it is possible to rise? What, finally, are the natural limits of a territorial property, whether in depth or in elevation?

The French laws, conforming in this respect to those of other peoples, declare, in general, that the property of the soil carries with it the property of the top and the bottom; that the proprietor can make above all the plantations and constructions he judges suitable, save for the exceptions established relative to easements or real servitudes, and that he can make below all the constructions and excavations he judges suitable, and draw from these excavations all the productions they can furnish, save for the modifications resulting from the laws and regulations relative to mines, and from the laws and regulations of police [^54].

The laws and regulations of police that limit property generally have for their object only to prevent one from abusing it to harm others; but the laws and regulations relative to mines recognize a kind of property distinct from the property of the soil; and it is of these that it will be suitable to examine the nature and extent.

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Notes

[^44]: Raynal, Philosophical and Political History of the European Establishments in the Indies. [^45]: See books ix and x of Robertson's History of America. [^46]: In the United States, families who inhabit newly cultivated lands experience all the illnesses produced by the unhealthiness of the air. La Rochefoucault, Voyage aux États-Unis, vol. 1, p. 243, 279 and 280; vol. 2, p. 305. M. Wright, lett. 12 and 13, p. 203, 204, 231 and 232. [^47]: One can judge the difficulties that cultivation first presented by the report made by the officers who commanded the first expedition. [^48]: Raynal, Philosophical and Political History, bk. 2. According to this historian, each colonist received a square league of land free of charge. [^49]: Raynal, Hist. philosoph., bk. 13. [^50]: De Humboldt, Political Essay on New Spain, suppl., p. 142 and 143. [^51]: Raynal, Philosophical History, vol. 7, bk. 13, p. 27. [^52]: Larochefoucault, Voyage aux États-Unis, vol. 5, p. 192. [^53]: Some men imagine that, when a country is overpopulated, the government can put an end to the misery that weighs on certain classes by forming colonies. Mr. Malthus has perfectly demonstrated the ineffectiveness of this pretended remedy. An Essay on the principles of population, bk. 36, ch. 4. [^54]: Civil Code, art. 552. Article 187 of the Custom of Paris had admitted, before the Civil Code, that the property of the soil entails the property of what is above and below.