Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II | Page 9

of the origin is not the
same as that of the present justification of the existing system of private
property. The institution of private property has evolved under diverse
conditions. In early societies individual property rights were not very
clearly marked. Every tribe asserted against other tribes, and tried to
uphold by war, its claims upon its customary hunting grounds; but the
claims of the individual hunters on land within the tribe did not often
come into conflict. Private property at the outset was in personal
possessions, ornaments, weapons, utensils, which were very meager in
that primitive society in which it was the custom "to go calling with a
club instead of a card-case." Only later came individual property in
land. A few years ago it was generally believed that the organization of
the old German tribes was politically an almost perfect democracy, and
economically a communism in which all had equal claims upon the
land. To-day this opinion is very seriously questioned. It seems
probable that there was a goodly measure of communism in the control
and use of lands (tho not in other things), but this was largely confined
to an oligarchy of the favored; whereas the masses lived in subjection,
cut off from all but a meager share in the common lands. However that
may have been, strong forces within historic times have put an end to
the common ownership and tillage of land as it existed among the
peasants of Europe. That system was shown by experience to be
wasteful. Competition tended to bring the economic agents into more
efficient hands, and the movement was furthered by many acts of
injustice and violence on the part of those in power.
Inquiries into the origin and development of any social institution are
interesting and helpful in forming an estimate of its present significance,
but the problems of the past are not those of to-day. Whether or not the
ancient beginning of property in Europe was in violence and evil has
but a remote bearing on the question as to the present working of it.
Social conditions and needs have not changed more than have the

forms and limits of property itself. Each generation has its own
problems to solve, and ignoring for the most part the evils of the distant
past, each generation must test existing institutions by their present
results.
§ 6. #Limitations of private property#. It is well, in discussing private
property, to rid the mind at once of the idea that it is an absolute and
unchanging thing. Few realize the manifold ways in which property
rights are limited. Unmodified private control of property is unknown;
the public makes many reservations in its own interest. There is, first, a
whole set of limitations to prevent nuisances. An owner in many
situations is not free to build a slaughter-house or to start a glue-factory
on his land. Property is governed by general public utility, and anything
that threatens to become a nuisance or a danger may be excluded.
Under the right of "eminent domain," the state or the railroad takes the
old homestead from the owner who would live and die there.
Altho pecuniary damages are paid to him, this is a limitation of his
property rights. Rights of way on property exist either by contract or by
prescription permitting its public use. Most important of all limitations
is the right of taxation, by which society takes more or less of private
incomes for purposes of which the individual owners may not approve.
The law enforces a multitude of private claims by some persons against
others. A variety of rights called easements or servitudes may attach to
private property, modifying its exclusive use. Leases for any period are
a limitation of the owner's control. Both the holder of the lease and the
owner of the property have certain rights before the law. The lender of
money secured by mortgage has a legally recognized and enforceable
interest in the mortgaged wealth. Property is left in trust for the benefit
of persons or of institutions or of the public, and is administered by
trustees who are strictly bound to execute the terms of their instructions.
Contracts of many sorts are entered into by owners, limiting their
control in manifold ways, and the law enforces these contracts. These
all form a complex of equitable claims, which together equal in value
one undivided property right, which in turn equals the value of the
wealth.[4]

§ 7. #Limitations of bequest and inheritance#. The term bequest implies
a will, usually a written will in which the person, in anticipation of
death, expresses his wishes as to the disposition of his property. It is
said sometimes that bequest is a "logical" result of private property, but
the law does not treat it as such.