nature, and of great public concern; and that object has been attempted in repeated instances to be carried out by force-by assemblages of armed men. Such insurrections are clearly treasonable under the statutes of the State; "they have a direct tendency to dissolve all the bonds of society, and to destroy all property, and all government too, by numbers and an armed force."

How this case-so extraordinary, so degrading to the character of the State, and so alarming-has been met and treated by men and parties out of the circle of Anti-Rent operations; what the public press has had to say about it; and how it has been met and treated by the public authorities; of these things we may have occasion to speak further on. At present, we must take some notice of the more prominent matters that have been put forth in various quarters as justifying, if not a resort to extreme measures, at least a strong feeling of dissatisfaction and resentment, on the part of those owning or holding lands subject to rent, towards their creditors, the owners of these rents. It is said that there is something wrong in the relation between these parties-something which ought not to be suffered in a free country-something degrading to the landholders, inconsistent with the spirit of our institutions, and calling for the interference of the public authorities. Oppression is sometimes alleged in reference to the original contracts of sale and purchase. They are spoken of as hard bargains, oppressively insisted on and enforced. Doubts are expressed about the title to the lands; and complaints are made that the legal facilities for enforcing collections of rents are too great. Let us see what foundation there is for these allegations-how much of this spirit of complaint is founded in just considerations, how much in imaginary ills-how much of it is real, and how much is assumed for the occasion.

It is important, in the first place, that we should understand the true relation subsisting between the parties to deeds which convey lands in perpetuity, reserving annual rents; for this, we believe, is the kind of conveyance most complained of at any rate, it is that under which the lands in the quondam "Manor of Rensselaerwyck" are principally held. Be it remembered, that we are now looking after the substance of things, and names must not be suffered to mislead us. It has been common to call these con

veyances, Leases; to call the grantor, a landlord; and the grantees, Tenants. Strictly, every one who holds land is a tenant; but the word, as popularly understood, is usually employed to designate those who hold lands belonging to others, under some agreement for the temporary occupation. So the term landlord may mean any one of whom, or from whom, lands are holden, or the title derived; but it is usually applied, with us, to the owner of lands occupied, under agreement, by others. The word lease, in its appropriate meaning, is a contract of letting, by the owner of lands, to another.

Now, we have already said that the occupants of these lands are freeholders; and a freeholder is one who holds independently of the will and caprice of a feudal lord or landlord, or anybody else. But this term does not fully describe the tenure of these occupants; for an estate for life is a freehold, and it is, at the same time, a leasehold and a limited estate. The farmers of Albany and Rensselaer have better estates than this. Theirs are estates of inheritance-estates in fee— estates to last forever. Their conveyances are deeds of assurance, and they run in this wise, namely: that Stephen Van Rensselaer, "by these presents, doth grant, bargain, sell, remise, release and confirm unto the said party of the second part, and to his heirs and assigns, all that certain farm, piece or parcel of land," &c.- "to have and to hold the said farm, piece or parcel of land, unto the said party of the second part, his heirs and assigns, to the only proper use and behoof of the said party of the second part, his heirs and assigns, FOREVER." This is language, as every lawyer knows, which has a strong legal significance. By it every particle of interest which the grantor had in the soil passed to the grantee. The grantee became the sole owner. There was not only no present interest in the soil reserved to the grantor, but there was no future or reversionary interest. There was a clean conveyance of the whole estate of the whole property.

It is true, that while the fee was granted-by which we mean, according to the modern use of the term, the whole property of the soil-a certain annual profit or return from the land was reserved by the deed to the grantor, and stipulated to be paid by the purchaser. This was an annuity, and was the consideration, or a part of it, for the purchase. It was a mode of paying for the fee, by paying for

the perpetual use. It is known in the law as rent, though in some respects differing essentially from rent reserved upon a lease, by the common law. It was called, and is called, fee-farm rent. It did not carry with it, and as inseparably incident to it, as other rent did, a right of distress. Without a stipulation to that effect in the deed, it was rent seck-dry or barren rent and could only be collected by an action, as for an annuity or other debt. But by a stipulation, or covenant, by which the right of distress was expressly granted by the purchaser, it became a rent-charge, and then it might be recovered or enforced, either by action or by distress. Such a stipulation is found in the conveyances we are now considering. Under these conveyances, the rent is a rent-charge. The purchaser has agreed, in case of his failure to pay for his land, as the stipulated payments fall due, that his grantor and creditor may distrain his property on his premises-may take such property away, and sell it at public vendue, for the satisfaction of his debt. But in all this there is no property in the soil reserved to the grantor. The grantee has it all, as much as if no rent had been reserved. He has contracted to pay a debt, by deed, and he has given to his creditor a right to take his personal effects in pledge and as security for the payment, with the right to make the debt out of them if he can. So far it is, in substance, a personal mortgage of a peculiar legal character. The pledge, or right of distress, is given, and left to be pursued under the existing regulations of the law in regard to it-regulations which now carefully guard the debtor against oppression or injury in the exercise of the right. In the cases we are considering, the right of distress rests, as we have said, in contract, under legal regulons; and it is no more than the universal right which exists in the New England States, in reference to all debts, without any special contract, under their law of attachment on mesne process. There, they not only do not abolish distress for rents, but they give, in effect, a right of distress for all debts. They probably do not regard it as a wrong, that unwilling debtors should be compelled to pay. The law holds the property of debtors liable to be taken in pledge, or distrained, for their debts. And this is no impeachment of the title or ownership of their property; though it is just as much so as, in the cases before us, the

rent reserved, with the right of distress, is an impeachment of the full right of property which these purchasers have in the soil which has been conveyed to them.

But there is another feature in these conveyances which must be considered. There is a provision to this effect: That in case of failure to pay the rent, and the want of sufficient distress to make the rent out of, and in case, generally, of a failure on the part of the grantee to keep and perform his covenants contained in the deed, a right of reëntry into the lands accrues to the grantor. One of the covenants is for a right of preemption to the grantor, at the grantee's own price, if he is minded to sell. Here, undoubtedly, is a stringent provision. The purchaser, in effect, pledges his land to the faithful performance of his covenants. His title and ownership are in no degree impaired. The whole estate vests in him, and forever; but he imposes a heavy penalty on himself, in case he fails to keep his agreements with his grantor. Every mortgager of lands does much the same thing. He is liable to lose his land. By this provision there is a possibility-depending, however, wholly on himself that his estate may be defeated. This is, in law, a "condition subsequent." If, however, the forfeiture is incurred by the non-payment of rent, the law interposes in his behalf, and gives him a reasonable time to redeem his land, by the payment of arrears. The law comes to his aid where mere negligence or misfortune may have led to the forfeiture. And in no other case can he incur a forfeiture but by the direct, voluntary commission of some act in the face of his own contract. Undoubtedly, these conditions, annexed to estates in fee, (and they are annexed also, commonly, to estates held under leases for life, or for long terms,) are sufficiently severe, if rigorously enforced. The law does not regard them with favor; and custom and conscience are, and long have been, opposed to a rigorous or harsh exaction of them; and where such exactions have been attempted, in times past, Chancery has gone as far as it could to relieve against them. In practice and effect they are, in truth, at this day, (except in rare instances,) extreme remedies reserved for extreme cases. At any rate, they have been so, as far as we can learn, among the freeholders of Albany and Rensselaer, and generally where the Anti-Rent excitement has most prevailed. If there has been a single case of just

complaint on this ground, it has not met our eye, or come to our knowledge.

What we have now said is enough to show the true relation subsisting between the parties to these conveyances; and the sum of the matter is this: These farmers are owners of a freehold estate of inheritance-an estate in fee simple. Nobody owns their farms, or has any part of the ownership, except themselves. Having contracted to pay for their farms by an annual sum, they have, in effect, pledged their land as security for the faithful performance of this and other covenants. But they are in no wise dependent on the will or favor of their grantor or his heirs, for the perpetual enjoyment of their estates. Their estates are inheritances to which their heirs may succeed. They may contract debts on the strength of them. They may dispose of them, at their free will and pleasure, by devise. They may sell and convey them as they please, only giving their grantor a chance to become the purchaser -a condition which, we learn, has never, in a single instance, been insisted on. They hold independently, by deeds of conveyance, and not by leases. They are not tenants in the sense they would be if their estates were limited and leasehold; nor is their grantor a landlord in the sense he would be in that case. As a person entitled to an annual payment issuing out of land, and technically called rent, he is embraced in certain statutory provisions under the name of landlord; and in like manner these freeholders, though owning the fee, may be called tenants in legal parlance, inasmuch as they are persons owing rent, and hold land which is subject to rent. In no other sense does the relation of landlord and tenant exist between the parties to these conveyances, and whenever they are spoken of as such, this distinction should not be forgotten.

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An idea has prevailed extensively that the "Manor" lands must be held by what are called feudal tenures: with some a very honest idea; with others not so honest. It is a capital in trade much relied on by some, to talk of "manorial" rights and privileges, of the troon," or the "lord proprietor," and his "vassals," the tenants. We have seen already that the farmers in Albany and Rensselaer counties, in reference to whom the complaints have been loudest, cannot well be called vassals or serfs to any body, unless independent freeholders are

such; and they have been freeholders, and feeholders, from the hour they set foot on their lands under their present titles. The "patroon," after the Revolution, whatever he might have been before, was simply the owner of a large tract of land. Others have owned larger tracts in this State, since the Revolution, out of all comparison. Phelps and Gorham were proprietors, at one time, of nearly the whole of that part of the State lying west of the region of the Cayuga Lake. A company of foreigners in Holland owned more acres in this State, twice or three times told, we think, than Stephen Van Rensselaer. There are several individuals, or families, and corporations, holding, at this day, a reversionary interest in lands in the city of New Yorklands paying ground-rents too-of more value, probably, by a great deal, than the Manor" lands of the Van Rensselaers were ever worth. If the Van Rensselaers are "lords proprietors," we can only say there are a great many such among us. The truth is, that these gentlemen are comparatively small proprietors of lands. The late Stephen Van Rensselaer, as we have seen, sold and conveyed the fee of a great part of his lands in Rensselaerwyck, about fifty years ago. From that day to this, neither he nor his heirs have owned a rood of the lands thus sold, or had any share in the ownership, unless it may have been in solitary instances by re-purchase. There never has been a moment since such sale when they could legally set a foot on those lands without the consent of the rightful owner, or under agreement with him. What they have owned, and do own, is a debt due from the purchasers of these lands, for the purchase-money or consideration of sale, and which exists in the shape of an annuity, or of annual profits, and is technically called rent; and which is secured by a pledge, first, of the personal effects of the debtor on his premises, and next of his land. If there is anything "feudal" about this, then every pledge of personal property, and every mortgage of real estate, as security for debt, is feudal. The debt in this case is a very moderate annual interest upon the value of the lands, as a capital or principal sum, at the time of the sale, or at the time when payment was first demanded. As it is in the light of purchase-money, it is secured on the land; and as the principal sum is never demandable, the interest is perpetual-or at least, until,

and resistance put an end, at once, to any farther attempts at this mode of settling with land offices in that region. But the hostile spirit was not subdued. Last winter the sheriff was resisted in Cattaraugus by an armed force, when attempting to execute a writ of possession. The writ was against a man who had taken a contract for his farm of 150 acres in 1821, nearly a quarter of a century before, when he had paid one dollar. He paid neither interest nor principal till 1837, when he was induced to take a new contract, and pay fifty dollars; and after that he utterly refused to pay any more. He had a most valuable farm, for which he was required to pay, principal and interest, at a rate rather below than above the value of new land. And this was regarded in that quarter, quite extensively, as a case calling for sympathy, if not for violence. The truth is, and it is only too apparent, that it is not that particular form of indebtedness for land which is called rent-it is indebtedness for land in any and every form-which makes the trouble. The agrarian spirit of the times is alive with a special hostility to this indebtedness. The claim is for land to every man without paying for it. Property in land, beyond what a man can personally occupy and cultivate, is especially denounced; and so is property, or debts, due for land. It is denounced as monopoly, it is branded as "feudal," and inconsistent, therefore, with the spirit of our institutions!"

We think it not unimportant to put to silence, so far as truth can do it, the customary clamor in which many persons indulge about feudal tenures in the "Manor" of Rensselaerwyck. Many, we doubt not, are deceived; but some, who use this " argument" most freely, must know better, or they ought to know better.

It is a settled rule in New York that all valid individual title to lands in the State, is derived either from the State, or from the crown, or royal government of the Colony, previous to the Revolution; and such title must be verified by patent. The reliable title of the Van Rensselaers to the lands of Rensselaerwyck, though their ancestors had had the possession and ownership long before, dates from a patent under James II., in 1685, confirmed by a patent under Queen Anne in 1704. James had his title to lands in New York by grant

from Charles II., which expressly declared that they should be held " in free and common socage, and not in capite by knight-service." The same tenure was declared to be that by which the Van Rensselaers should hold, in the patent to them. Previous to the time of the grant from Charles II. to his brother, a statute of the realm had been passed which had, as Chancellor Kent remarks, " essentially put an end to the feudal system in England, although some fictions (and they are scarcely anything more) founded on the ancient feudal relations and dependence are still retained in the socage tenures. In 1787, an act to the like effect, but more extended, in respect to the incidents of socage tenures, was passed by the legislature of New York. It was scarcely necessary to have done this, since it is clear that not a trace of the military tenures of the feudal system, nor any of the more burdensome incidents of the socage tenures, ever existed here at all. It was done for abundant caution. And, at any rate, from that date, although socage tenure was nominally retained, yet not a mark of its feudal incidents remained, except such as were, in effect, pure fictions. The only incidents retained were, fealty, to be enforced by distress, and the holding of a lord or superior; and these were merely theoretical. If they were ever resolved into any practical meaning, it was, that socage lands were held of the people of the State, as the "lord paramount," and that fealty was identical with allegiance, which was due to the State. But this is not all. Since 1830, by the Revised Statutes, not even the name or theory of socage tenure any longer exists in this State. All lands are declared to be allodial; i. e., all estates in them are enjoyed in absolute right and ownership, and nothing like the shape or shadow of a feudal tenure or incident remains.

Under such a state of the law, it is a little difficult to understand what persons mean when they talk, at this day, about feudal tenures in Rensselaerwyck, and manorial or baronial rights and privileges enjoyed there. The title of Stephen Van Rensselaer was a title by patent; that is to say, a title by deed of conveyance, recognized by the People of the State after the Revolution as valid. It was just such a title as every man in the State has who holds land by deed, and there was not a right or a privi