Steel v Houghton
Steel v Houghton (1788) 1 H Bl 51; 126 ER 32 is a landmark judgment in English law by the House of Lords that is considered to mark the modern legal understanding of private property rights. Ostensibly the matter found that no person has a right at common law to glean the harvest of a private field, but the judgment has been taken to be a more general precedent for private land matters. Background In early modern England gleaning was an important source of income for labouring families, at a time when many parishes were affected by enclosure and the wholesale transformation of property rights. Over the harvests of 1785-1787, conflict had been escalating between land owners and gleaners in the village of Timworth, Suffolk. In 1787, Mary Houghton gleaned on the farm of a wealthy land owner, James Steel, who sued for trespass. Verdict The court sided with landlords and found against the gleaners' claims, rejecting arguments from Mosaic Law (A precedent for gleaning is to be found in the Bible at Leviticus 19:9-10) and from the traditional Anglo-Saxon constitution as a basis for the common law. Although precedent was raised by the gleaners that appeared to support gleaning,