Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 4.djvu/294

2/8 HAR VARD LA W RE VIE W, already made, that survey itself was an additional source of error, as it was so inaccurate as to be worse than useless. The success of Title Registration in Prussia has been just as marked as in Australia, and Prussia certainly cannot be called a new country. The system has safely passed the experimental stage. It was introduced into South Australia thirty-three years ago ; into New South Wales twenty-nine years ago ; and it is now in successful operation in eight or nine British Colonies, including British Colum- bia. A whole generation of men have grown up under it, and it has given universal satisfaction. It is impossible in the brief space allotted to this article to go much into the details of this method, but the practised eye of the conveyancer can see how thoroughly feasible and admirably simple this duplicate method of convey- ancing is, and how cleverly it avoids the rocks and shoals and sunken reefs on which our present system has been wrecked. The Australian System does not necessarily change existing laws. It is simply the providing of better machinery for carrying out those laws. It substitutes a better system of conveyancing, and, by granting indefeasibility of title, gives the land-owner absolute security. In fact, as its originator says, " There is no legitimate object which a land-owner can accomplish under the existing law, which may not be accomplished more readily, more safely, and at infinitely less expense under [the Australian] system," and ** by registration of titles security has been established for insecurity, simplicity for complexity, and the cost has been re- duced from pounds to shillings." Moreover, who can tell what influence an expeditious and inex- pensive method of transferring land, of converting real into personal property at will, and vice versa^ may not have had in enabling our kindred to build up in the Southern Hemisphere their rich and prosperous Colonial Empire ? The extraordinary development of wealth and population there may in part be attributed to the land- transfer system they were wise enough to adopt. The whole tendency of modern times is to make the transfer of land as easy and simple as that of personal property. In a com- mercial age. Feudal ideas as to land are entirely out of place. Cumbersome and antiquated methods of transfer must give way to the needs of the present time. Under the new system, land can be transferred as easily as stock in a corporation. It can be con-