A cityless and countryless world : $b An outline of practical cooperative individualismOlerich, Henry
Science
A cityless and countryless world : $b An outline of practical cooperative individualism
Olerich, Henry
Cooperation; Social problems -- Miscellanea
“The principle of the one is entirely different from the principle of
the other. When an individual or collection of individuals own land by
occupancy and use only, he makes his own physical powers the measure of
the amount he can occupy and use, which can cover only a small area;
for man’s physical powers to occupy and use land are very limited. He
can use but a very limited area to stand on, to lie on, to build his
residence on, and to use for agricultural and sportive purposes. He
can occupy and use only so little of the earth’s surface that there
will be more left than all the rest of the human race can similarly
utilize. Under these conditions there could be no land monopoly, and
with the disappearance of land monopoly nearly all other monopoly would
disappear; for all wealth comes from the land by the application of
labor, and if vacant land were free all could apply their labor to land
and produce their necessary wealth. No one would be out of employment.
No one would work for less than he actually earned. With vacant land
free no one would be the industrial slave of another.
“By _deed_, under certain conditions, an individual, or a small
collection of individuals, may own the _whole_ land area of the earth
or of any other planet or world. There is no further limit to the
amount of land an individual may own by deed. This causes land monopoly
and industrial slavery, because if a few own large tracts of land by
deed, there is not enough left to supply all the remainder of mankind.
This causes land monopoly, and land monopoly causes either directly or
indirectly nearly all other forms of monopoly. Let us illustrate this a
little more fully:
“A person who claims to own a forty-acre farm by virtue of a deed he
holds of it, claims to have a legal right to remove forcibly any and
all human beings from the same if he chooses, and, if he cannot remove
them as an individual, the government from which he bought the deed
must assist him in making the removal or eviction.
“But if one has a legal right to own 40 acres by deed, he has an equal
legal right to own 40,000 acres, or the whole United States, or the
whole earth. Under this condition, the individual or individuals who
own the earth would be masters, and all the rest of the human race
would be slaves.
“The owner or owners of this land, composing the United States or the
earth, would have a perfect legal right to demand all his or their
fellowmen to vacate the land. But he (if one owns it) owns all the dry
land, and nothing but water surface is left for the non-landowners.
And, if the non-landowners are loyal and true to their government and
to the landlord, they must immediately vacate all dry land, which
implies that they must all drown in the water area not covered by the
landlord’s deed, whenever the landlord demands it; if they refuse to do
so they are rebels and a deed becomes a legal farce.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account