The legendary self-reliance of the frontiersman is not without some basis in fact. The nature of the frontier experience itself was conducive to its development. Its appearance among the Fair Play settlers is implied in various contexts. Politically, it is suggested in the creation of the Fair Play men, the annual governing tribunal, an extra-legal political agency in this extra-Provincial territory. Economically, it is intimated in the image of the frontier farmer tackling the wilderness with rifle and plow and the unbounded determination to make a better life for himself and his family. Socially, the self-reliance of these doughty pioneers is indicated in the continuation of their religious practices and worship, despite the absence of any organized church. Their self reliance is indicated, as well, in the flexibility of a social structure whose main criterion was achievement, a society in which "what" you were was more important than "who" you were. These examples are, of course, only brief glimpses of the elusive trait of self-reliance which Turner considered typical of the frontier. Independence, or the ability to act independently, was a characteristic frontier trait, according to Turner. The Fair Play settlers presented some contradictions. It is true that they organized their own system of government and the code under which it operated. However, their key leaders lived on the periphery; and the settlers petitioned the Commonwealth government for assistance in the vital questions of defense and pre-emption rights.[8] The Fair Play settlers were generally independent, a condition promoted by the necessities of frontier life; but, obviously, they were not isolated. It is difficult to assess the nationalizing influence of this particular frontier. In the first place, aside from the Second Continental Congress, there was no national government during most of the Fair Play period. The Articles of Confederation were not ratified until 1781, and Fair Play territory was opened to settlement after the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1784. Furthermore, the patriotism of the Fair Play settlers seems to reflect an ethnocentric pride in their own territory and an exaggerated interpretation of its significance to the developing nation.[9] Their patriotism was apparently for an ideal, liberty, to which they were devoted, having already enjoyed it in a nation only recently declared, but yet to be recognized. And, for its support, there had been a rush to the colors by these settlers "beyond the purchase line."[10] The "real American Revolution," as John Adams described it, was "in the minds and hearts of the people," and it was "effected before the war Commenced."[11] That revolution had already occurred in the Fair Play territory prior to the firing of "the shot heard round the world" on Lexington green.