Sokol, Mary Isobel; (1994) Jeremy Bentham and the Real Property Commission of 1828. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

Between 1829 and his death in 1832 Jeremy Bentham undertook considerable work for the Real Property Commission which had been appointed in 1828 to recommend reforms for land law. This thesis makes an examination of Bentham's contributions to the Commission using a variety of historical material, including unpublished manuscripts. Bentham's work falls into three categories. In the first fall the brief replies Bentham made to the questions on various topics sent to him by the Commissioners. In the second category can be put the more lengthy and descriptive plans to set up a Register of Title to property. The third category consists of writing that Bentham did not prepare in response to requests from the Commissioners. The existence of this third category allows a conclusion to be drawn that Bentham had his own hidden agenda, which was the systematic, comprehensive, utilitarian reform of property law. Bentham drafted a 'philosopher's tree' of principles applicable to property, which provided the common law with an analytical device to begin the utilitarian codification of property law. He also drafted a table of incorporeal hereditaments setting out rights and obligations in land, which replaced historically derived concepts of property with a rationally based system of rights and obligations.

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