Administration of property is critical due to its role in the creation of modern subjects/citizens whom the state primarily characterizes by the virtue of their ownership of property as well as in the sustenance of modern empires financially. While there is a substantial secondary literature on the text and the implementation of the 1858 Ottoman Land Code, which was a groundbreaking legislation defining the property regime in the Ottoman Empire, the Hamidian acquisition and administration of large landed estates under the purview of the Privy Purse (Hazine-i Hassa) in the late nineteenth century has received less scholarly attention. Therefore, this paper seeks to revisit the definition and administration of property during the reign of Sultan Abdülhamid II (r. 1876 - 1909) by focusing on the writings and the career of one important bureaucrat: Sak?zl? Ohannes Pasha (d. 1912). Sak?zl? Ohannes Pasha taught at the Imperial School of Administration as the Professor of Economics and the Professor of Public Administration between 1877 and 1897, and served as the Minister of the Privy Purse from 1897 to 1908. The secondary literature hails him as the pioneer in his systematic support of laissez-faire policies and as the author of the first comprehensive work on political economy published in the Ottoman Empire, The Principles of Wealth of the Nations (Mebadi-i ‘?lm-i Servet-i Milel) (Sayar 1986; K?l?nço?lu 2015). The Principles of Wealth of the Nations, published in 1881, was also the primary textbook through which Ohannes Pasha taught political economy to the future generation of Ottoman bureaucrats. First, this paper will discuss Ohannes Pasha’s vision of political economy for the Ottoman Empire, with a particular attention to his definition of ownership of property in relation to landed property in this important work. Second, this paper will highlight the tensions between Sak?zl? Ohannes Pasha’s writings and his bureaucratic role as the Minister of the Privy Purse by relying on Ottoman archival sources. This juxtaposition, I argue, shows that his liberal vision for generating wealth did not parallel his policies as a top bureaucrat in the Hamidian administration.