This lecture will look at the impact of the Land Commission on Co Monaghan, and, where appropriate, on the Ballybay and surrounding areas. It will provide historical background to the Commission’s establishment, before examining the role it played in land transfer up to independence, and in land redistribution and migration schemes after 1922. The lecture will conclude with a discussion on the possible reasons why its archives have not yet been opened to the research public (except on an extremely limited basis.) While no one has officially admitted that they might reveal a great deal of political corruption and skulduggery, it is a possibility that is hard to dismiss