Tenant Right League facts for kids

The Tenant Right League was a group of local organizations in Ireland formed around 1850. It started after the terrible Great Famine. The main goal of the League was to limit the power of landlords. They also wanted to improve the rights of tenant farmers. These farmers rented land from landlords.

The League brought together people from both northern and southern Ireland. These groups usually had different political ideas. But they agreed on the need for land reform. In 1852, the League helped elect 48 members to the Westminster Parliament. These members promised to support tenant rights. However, the unity between North and South did not last. People tried to restart the League in 1874. But the fight for land rights continued with more regional differences.

Why the League Started

The League formed because of a new law called the Encumbered Estates Act of 1849. This law did not protect a special tradition called the Ulster tenant right. This custom was common in northern Ireland. It stopped landowners from charging very high rents. It also prevented them from kicking out tenants who paid their rent.

The Ulster tenant right also meant that farmers could sell their "interest" in the land. This meant they could sell the right to farm the land to a new tenant. They often received a large payment for this. This money could help them, for example, move to America.

People believed that the Ulster tenant right helped Ulster be more successful. It gave farmers some security. It also meant they benefited from improvements they made to the land. Landlords sometimes tried to ignore this custom. This led to protests and even rebellions, like the Hearts of Steel Rebellion in the 1700s.

In 1843, a group called the Devon Commission studied the Irish land system. They said the Ulster Custom was dangerous for property owners. Landlords who ignored the custom were often supported by the courts. With the Famine causing more hardship, farmers felt threatened. Many were being evicted from their homes. In 1849 alone, over 100,000 evictions happened.

Because of this, new groups formed in the south of Ireland. These "tenant protection societies" were often led by local Catholic priests. They demanded that the Ulster Custom be extended to all of Ireland.

Charles Gavan Duffy was a well-known writer and politician. He was convinced that a national movement was possible. He worked with James MacKnight, a newspaper editor, and William Sharman Crawford, a landlord who supported reform. They believed that land ownership should be fair and regulated by law.

The "League of North and South"

Charles Gavan Duffy and James MacKnight joined with Frederick Lucas and John Gray. Lucas was a former Quaker and a Catholic newspaper founder. Gray owned a leading nationalist newspaper. Together, they called for a national meeting about tenant rights.

This meeting happened on September 8, 1850, in Dublin. Many people attended, including members of Parliament, priests, farmers, and business people. Duffy described how different groups came together. There were serious Presbyterian traditionalists from the North. They sat next to Catholic priests who had seen the horrors of the Famine. Farmers who had survived the Famine were also there.

At this meeting, they formed the all-Ireland Tenant Right League. They elected a council with 120 representatives from all over Ireland. The League wanted to reform how land was rented. Their main goals were known as the "Three F's":

• Fair Rent: Rent should be based on the land's value. It should not increase just because a tenant improved the land.
• Fixity of Tenure: Tenants should be able to stay on their land as long as they paid a fair rent.
• Free Sale: Farmers should have the right to sell their "interest" in their land to a new tenant.

The League's plan did not directly talk about who owned the land. It also did not help the poorest people who had no land. The League was mostly made up of well-off farmers.

Meetings were held across the country. Presbyterian ministers and Catholic priests worked together. They spoke out against landlords. One minister, the Rev. David Bell, even invited Catholic delegates to a meeting in Ballybay. There, leaders of the Orange Order (a Protestant organization) and Catholic priests proposed resolutions together.

The Tenant Right League grew stronger with the help of John Martin, a Young Irelander. It also had support from politicians in the British House of Commons. In 1852, the League seemed to win a big victory. About 48 candidates who supported tenant rights were elected to Parliament. They promised to oppose any government that did not make tenant rights a priority.

Challenges and Divisions

Even though many Ulster Protestants supported the League at first, their involvement soon decreased. Of the 48 elected members, only one was from Ulster. In some areas, Protestant voters did not support the League's candidates. Landlords in the North also threatened to remove the Ulster Custom if their preferred candidates were not elected. They even used groups to break up League meetings.

In 1852, the government tried to pass a land bill. It would have paid Irish tenants for improvements they made to the land if they were evicted. This bill passed in the House of Commons but failed in the House of Lords. The League was not impressed by this bill. Landlords could still raise rents freely, so they could just pass on the cost of compensation to tenants.

The Independent Irish MPs had a lot of power in Parliament. They voted to bring down the government. But two of their main members, John Sadlier and William Keogh, broke their promises. They accepted jobs in a new government that did not support tenant rights. This caused problems within the League.

The Catholic Primate, Archbishop Paul Cullen, did not like the idea of independent opposition. He tried to reduce support from priests for the remaining MPs. This led to some Catholic groups leaving the League.

The League's End

The Tenant Right League and its group in Parliament did not last through the 1850s. Frederick Lucas died in 1855. A month later, Charles Gavan Duffy said goodbye to his voters. He felt he could no longer achieve the League's goals. He then moved to Australia.

By 1856, the number of independent MPs had shrunk to about twelve. When the Conservative party came back to power in 1858, many Irish politicians felt they had to make deals for Irish benefits.

David Bell moved to England. He later joined the Irish Republican ("Fenian") Brotherhood.

Trying to Restart the Movement

After 1853, farm prices started to go up. This made the tenant-right movement less active for a while. However, James MacKnight continued to work for tenant rights. The Derryveagh evictions in 1861 were a harsh reminder of how much power landlords still had.

Before MacKnight died, and as farming conditions worsened again, people tried to restart an all-Ireland league. In January 1874, a group called the Route Tenants Defence Association organized a big conference in Belfast. They wanted the "Three F's" and also loans to help tenants buy land. They also wanted to end landlords' control over local government. They planned to elect Members of Parliament who supported tenant rights.

A general election was called sooner than expected, in February 1874. In the south, candidates from the new Home Rule League supported the tenant program. In the north, Liberals championed it. Landlords' power was weaker due to the secret ballot. Conservatives even said they would make the Ulster Custom a legal right. However, they tried to link tenant-righters with Catholic nationalists and their desire for Irish independence.

The Conservatives did not win as many seats in Ulster as they had in 1852. Two tenant-right Liberals were elected in County Londonderry. In County Down, James Sharman Crawford won, where his father William had failed earlier. But in the south and west, the tenant-right movement clearly joined with the Home Rulers.

In 1879, the Irish National Land League was formed. This group continued the fight for land rights under the leadership of Michael Davitt and Charles Stewart Parnell.

In 1881, a new law called the Land Act was introduced. This law gave tenants free sale and better security of tenure. It also created a system to decide fair rents. Landlords were very unhappy, calling these changes "confiscation." For tenants in Ulster, including Protestants, this Act met their main demands. They quickly used the Act to adjust their rents. After a few years, land protests started again in the south and west. But the chance for Protestants and Catholics in the North and South to work together on land issues became even smaller.