It is a commonplace that property was worshipped with unusual devotion in Britain between the Glorious Revolution and the railway age. As Hannah More put it, ‘All property is sacred, and as the laws of the land are intended to fence in that property, he who brings up his children to break down any of these fences, brings them up to certain sin and ruin’.1 Such views of the interrelated importance of property and the rule of law have led to major interpretations of the interplay of Britain’s economic, social and political histories, including that secure property rights were a vital foundation for the first industrial revolution. Yet property was often heavily taxed, frequently expropriated and, exceptionally, eradicated through redefinition. Such vulnerabilities did not diminish after the Glorious Revolution, they increased — mainly because parliament now met annually, had greater sovereign power than earlier monarchs and legislated prolifically regarding property. After 1688, Britain’s economic precocity rested less on the enhanced ‘security’ of property in any general sense of the word, much more on respect for parliament’s authority and its willingness to allow property to be alienated, most usually by particular interests claiming to act for the public or wider good. At times this required the reversal of commitments made only a generation earlier, raising doubts about central government’s credibility. Taken together, these uncertainties over property rights were sufficient for some to question whether property had a sound theoretical basis at all.
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Julian Hoppit (2011) studied this question.