50 It is worth pointing to an analysis of big landowners’ criticism of land reform based on the idea of compulsory expropriation, conducted by Włodzimierz Mich based on landowners’ publications between 1918–39. See Mich, Włodzimierz, W obliczu wywłaszczenia: Kwestia reformy rolnej w publicystyce ziemiańskiej 1918–1939 [Facing Expropriation: Land Reform Issue in Landowners’ Publications] (Lublin, 2001), pp. 43–98Google Scholar. In the chapter ‘Genuine Land Reform’, Mich presents landowners’ ideas on how to amend the bill. They suggested revamping the agrarian system through making farms sustainable, farm consolidation, amelioration and indivisibility of peasant farms. The corrections also concerned land redistribution; the landowners were against forced expropriation for the sake of evolutionary changes by means of voluntary redistribution. They also proposed launching a process of internal colonisation combined with shifting the population surplus to less intensively populated areas. The landowners’ concept of ‘genuine land reform’ also included acceleration of Poland’s economic development, including intensification of agricultural production and creation of non-agricultural jobs, chiefly in the industrial sector (Mich, W obliczu wywłaszczenia, pp. 99–196).
The analysis of landowners’ publications shows that landowners did not only limit themselves to opposing land reform bills, but they also had certain suggestions in this respect and they wanted actively to participate in the work on the reform. A Decision of the Committee of Polish Landowners’ Associations on agrarian policy dated 22nd March 1919 is an example of such a position. The Decision concerned voluntary redistribution of 1,500,000 morgen over five years. The Parliamentary Agrarian Committee was, however, against this proposal, which resulted in rejection of the latter by the Sejm (Mich, W obliczu wywłaszczenia, p. 104). However, landowners’ arguments did not influence significantly the final contents of the Agricultural Reform Act.
