The Land Question was a major issue in the history of Prince Edward Island, now part of Canada. It was about who should own the land on the island. The land was divided into lots by the British government in 1767 and given to private landowners called proprietors. These proprietors wanted to rent the land to settlers, known as tenants, but the tenants wanted to own the land themselves through freehold ownership. The plan worked poorly. There were not enough tenants, so the proprietors did not make much money from rent. Because of this, many of them could not pay the government their required land tax, called a quitrent. In 1781, the island's government tried to take back the land from proprietors who were not paying, but the Colonial Office in Britain stepped in and stopped it in 1783. The governor who led this plan, Walter Patterson, was removed from office in 1786. In 1797, a political movement called the Escheat Movement began. Its goal was to convince the British Crown to take back land from the proprietors and sell it to the tenants. In 1803, supporters of this idea were elected to the General Assembly of Prince Edward Island, but the British government blocked their plans. Over the next few decades, the Assembly kept trying to buy land from the proprietors for the tenants, but these efforts kept failing. From 1864 to 1865, tenants attempted a civil disobedience campaign, but it did not succeed. Eventually, many proprietors gave up and sold their land piece by piece to the local government, which then sold it to the people living on it. Finally, in 1873, Prince Edward Island joined the Canadian Confederation—but only if the landlord system was ended. This agreement solved the Land Question once and for all.
Background In 1763, the Treaty of Paris resulted in the transfer of Prince Edward Island from France to the United Kingdom. In 1767, a system of land ownership was established in which the island was divided into 67 lots of about 20,000 acres (81 km2) each, with settlers living on parcels of the land rented out by the proprietors, the owners of the lots of land. Ownership of the lots of land was determined by a lottery held in London, the winners of which were mostly political, business, and military figures with connections to those in the British government. In 1769, under pressure from the proprietors, who worried that a Nova Scotia legislature would force them to give up their property rights, the British government granted autonomy to Prince Edward Island.
Initial conflict Almost immediately after the establishment of the new system, conflict arose. The American Revolutionary War drove potential settlers away from Prince Edward Island. That caused two problems. It made it difficult for proprietors to fulfill an obligation attached to their grants, to settle one person per 200 acres (81 ha) within ten years of the system's commencement. It also meant that the proprietors were not being paid much rent, as there were not many tenants to pay it. That meant that the proprietors were unable or at least not willing to pay the required quitrent to the Crown. Conflict also arose between the tenants and the proprietors. As the lottery for Prince Edward Island land was held in London, and most of the proprietors were important figures from the United Kingdom, most of the proprietors did not actually live in British North America. That meant that many neglected their obligations to the settlers. In 1774, the government of Prince Edward Island passed the Quit Rent Act 1774 to force the proprietors to pay their dues to maintain civil infrastructure on the island. However, many proprietors continued to simply not pay their quitrent. In 1781, the government, led by Governor Walter Patterson, compulsorily acquired approximately half of the island using a process known as escheat. The same year, the government held a public auction to sell off the land that had been compulsorily acquired. However, following a concerted effort by the proprietors to get the Colonial Office to reverse the action, the Crown overturned the sales conducted at the auction in 1783. The proprietors requested for Governor Patterson to be removed from his office, and the Colonial Office did so in 1786.
Escheat Movement In 1797, the Escheat Movement was born. Under the scheme proposed by the movement, land would be forfeited to the Crown should proprietors default on their quitrents, and tenants would be given the option of either purchasing part of the forfeited land or leasing it from the Crown. Members of the movement won a large majority in the General Assembly of Prince Edward Island in 1802, and in 1803, a law to implement escheat was passed by the legislature. However, the government of the United Kingdom would not abandon its principle of supporting property rights and refused to grant the bill royal assent. In 1832, a tax was placed on land owned by the proprietors. In exchange for collecting the tax, the government promised to abandon its attempts to enforce the payment of quitrents. In 1836, a bill was passed to place a penal tax on unoccupied land. Although the Colonial Office initially refused to recommend royal assent, comments by Lord Durham led the Privy Council to give royal assent to the bill in 1838. Despite the change in property arrangements in Prince Edward Island with the introduction of those taxes, tenants were still unable to take possession of their land. In 1830, Roman Catholics were given the vote, and in 1838, the Escheat Party won a large majority in the General Assembly. Another bill to implement escheat passed the lower house but was rejected by the Legislative Council. The leader of the Escheat Party, William Cooper, travelled to London to meet the Colonial Secretary, but he was turned away without a meeting. Instead, the Secretary advised the Lieutenant Governor of Prince Edward Island that the government would not recommend assent to any bill advocating escheat. The Escheat Movement disintegrated.
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