Posted on 11/26/2015 8:59:16 AM PST by NKP_Vet
Many people are not aware that when the Pilgrims first landed at Plymouth Rock they instituted a system of communism. Faced with shortages of food and supplies, it was decided that a communal system to share resources was the only fair way.
The problem of scarcity soon became much worse. People were not motivated to work and grow their own food, as they knew someone else would do so for them. The system of shared resources without true private property in the name of fairness and equality was a disaster. It was only once the Pilgrims adopted a system based on self reliance and keeping the fruits of ones own labor that they began to produce the resources need to survive.
And that’s what Thanksgiving celebrates; they now enjoyed abundance and would indeed survive.
Personal Liberty recounts the tale:
The first decision made under the covenant was to abandon efforts to reach Virginia and instead to settle in New England. The first explorers landed at Plymouth on Dec. 21, 1620. Weather delays kept the majority from seeing their new home for nearly two weeks. On Jan. 2, 1621, work began on the first building they would erect — a storehouse.
Because provisions were so scanty, it was decided that the land would be worked in common, produce would be owned in common and goods would be rationed equally. Not unlike the society Karl Marx envisioned of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.â€
Unfortunately, thanks to illness, injury and attitude, the system did not work. Pilferage from the storehouse became common. Suspicions of malingering were muttered. Over the course of that first, harsh winter, nearly half of the colonists perished.
(Excerpt) Read more at thelibertarianrepublic.com ...
Tagging: MUST READ
History is strew with the wreckage of Communal and Social experiments from New Harmony to Walden Pond. All failed. How long do you think it takes for the guy who spends 10 hours behind the East end of a West-bound horse to look at Thoreau sitting under a shade tree penning poetry only to share the meal equally at the end of the day? How long do the Libs think 49% of the population will support the remaining 51%? Bernie and his ilk are all idiots.
Being I am a direct descendant of these what is written is largely true.
A very short few years into the experiment, they resorted to infighting and religious persecution. Read up on Mary Dyer wo was hanged jun 1st 1660 for simply preaching te quaker faith. She and others where forbidden to even be in and around Boston by these self rightous bastards. The worst of them was Winthrope, who in his piety, went out and dug up Mary Dyers dead baby who was born still born and deformed. This he did publicly. Any lady who was not married, was suspect of withcraft and we all know the Salem thing.
Ann Hutchenson wrote largely about the Church of Boston and its abusive dealings.
We proved Socialism an Communism don’t work. Karl Marx even before before he was born was an idiot.
How ?
Many people are not aware that when the Pilgrims first landed at Plymouth Rock they instituted a system of communism. Faced with shortages of food and supplies, it was decided that a communal system to share resources was the only fair way.
The problem of scarcity soon became much worse. People were not motivated to work and grow their own food, as they knew someone else would do so for them. The system of shared resources without true private property in the name of fairness and equality was a disaster. It was only once the Pilgrims adopted a system based on self reliance and keeping the fruits of ones own labor that they began to produce the resources need to survive.
And that’s what Thanksgiving celebrates; they now enjoyed abundance and would indeed survive.
Personal Liberty recounts the tale:
The first decision made under the covenant was to abandon efforts to reach Virginia and instead to settle in New England. The first explorers landed at Plymouth on Dec. 21, 1620. Weather delays kept the majority from seeing their new home for nearly two weeks. On Jan. 2, 1621, work began on the first building they would erect — a storehouse.
Because provisions were so scanty, it was decided that the land would be worked in common, produce would be owned in common and goods would be rationed equally. Not unlike the society Karl Marx envisioned of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.â€
Unfortunately, thanks to illness, injury and attitude, the system did not work. Pilferage from the storehouse became common. Suspicions of malingering were muttered. Over the course of that first, harsh winter, nearly half of the colonists perished. Four families were wiped out completely; only five of 18 wives survived. Of the 29 single men, hired hands and servants, only 10 were alive when spring finally came.
The colonists struggled desperately for two more years. When spring arrived in April 1623, virtually all of their provisions were gone. Unless that year’s harvest improved, they feared few would survive the next winter. The Pilgrim leaders decided on a bold course. The colony would abandon its communal approach and permit each person to work for his own benefit, not for the common good.
But once the Pilgrims embraced self reliance, private property, and free trade, the colony began to thrive.
Can you imagine? Some of the youngest and healthiest men in the colony complained that they were working like dogs “for other men’s wives and children.†Sounds like the situation in America today, where the taxes taken from those who work support many millions of others who don’t.
After three years of noble failure, the colonists had had enough. Once they replaced communal efforts with individual responsibility, the differences were dramatic — and life-saving.
Men went into the fields earlier and stayed later. In many cases, their wives and even their children (some barely past the toddler stage) worked right alongside them. More acres were planted, more trees were felled, more houses were built and more game was slaughtered because of one simple change: People were allowed to keep the fruits of their own labors.
In that simple sentence you will find the solution to all of the world’s poverty. Stop taking what others have earned. Let people keep the fruits of their own labors. Then get out of the way and watch the incredible abundance they will produce.
On this Thanksgiving weekend, some 390 years after the Pilgrims celebrated the first of this uniquely American holiday, let us remember the sacrifices they made, the devotion they showed and the lessons they learned.
Read more: http://thelibertarianrepublic.com/thanksgiving-and-the-failure-of-communism-at-plymouth-rock/#ixzz3scSSJBRw
Follow us: @TheLibRepublic on Twitter
Its also wildly oversimplified.
After all, they were starving when they arrived. The loss of the Speedwell led to overcrowding of the Mayflower not to mention the loss of supplies from the Speedwell. They were 6 weeks late. They were deeply in debt and obligated to investors before they could begin to think about themselves. Plus there’s the fact that they landed far from where they expected to land.
Sponsoring FReepers are contributing
$10 Each time a New Monthly Donor signs up!
Get more bang for your FR buck!
Click Here To Sign Up Now!
Really?!! Has FR standards gotten so bad that such a photoshop job is used for the fundraiser?
The early Christians tried it also. It never works.
This story is repeated endlessly at Thanksgiving and is not accurate. The pilgrims did not institute socialism in their new colony, but the common ownership terms were forced upon them by the stocking holding company which financed their colony. Their agent agreed to the terms without telling them and they found out as they were boarding the ships to the new world. It took a number of years to prove to the company that the system was not workable. Once they did, it took another decade to pay off their debt to the company.
Read: PURITAN ECONOMIC EXPERIMENTS BY Gary North (his PhD dissertation)
http://www.garynorth.com/freebooks/docs/pdf/puritan_economics_experiments.pdf
or this article from the Freeman by the same author:
http://fee.org/freeman/the-puritan-experiment-in-common-ownership/
This is a bit overdrawn. First of all, the situation of the Pilgrims was a bit like that of “The 33†down in the nine in Chile. They were low on supplies and had they note founds store sod corn left behind by the Indians, they would probably have been forced to leave. The much better supplied Maine settlement planted at the same time as Jamestown did have to pack it in. Why make an ideological issue out of what the Plymouth Settle meant finally did which was to adapt to the situation?
Bump
The important thing to note is that the collectivism was voluntarily engaged in by a group of People, not imposed from the top down by an overbearing state.
And that, my friends, is all the difference in the world.
Voluntary collectivism can be a wonderful thing, and was practiced by the early Church, for instance. There's nothing wrong with it, although it is essentially unsustainable if its participants are not virtuous.
Authoritarian collectivism is a Tyrannical abomination, and invariably leads to murderous oppression, malaise, and excessive human suffering.
The Puritans failed with a communism which had Christian moral foundation.
Small wonder that atheist communism has also failed.
Jim Jones communist experiment also went bad.
Well at least there was free Kool-Aid.
Too soon?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.