O'Brien saying that the Labourers Acts – "were scarcely less wonderworking than the abolition of landlordism itself". In 1904 Davitt going so far as to declare that the Labourers Acts constituted – "a rational principle of state Socialism".
O'Brien and Davitt both praised the Labourers Acts, seeing them as significant achievements in social reform, with O'Brien comparing their impact to the abolition of landlordism and Davitt characterizing them as a rational foundation for state socialism.