Owen’s followers moved into the houses that had been vacated by Rapp’s colonists, and set about organizing the new community. On April 27 Owen addressed them in the Rappite church, which had been preëmpted for sectarian uses and dedicated to liberal thought and free speech. He spoke with great enthusiasm, declaring that he had come to introduce a new and enlightened state of society, eliminate ignorance and selfishness, and remove all cause for contest between individuals; but the change from the new to the old could not be accomplished in a day, and he called New Harmony a halfway house between the evils he complained of and the ideal. In May, the _modus vivendi_ of a preliminary society was promulgated, as a means of preparation for the perfect community to which Owen looked forward. Negroes were excluded from membership, though they might become “helpers,” or they might form an independent community. Age and experience alone were to confer precedence. For the first year a committee to be appointed by the founder was to have charge of affairs, and later the society might elect three representatives of this council. Members were required to provide their own household effects, to accept houses assigned to them, and to render their best services to the community. They were to receive credit at the community store for their labor, which was to be appraised by the committee of management. Members might be expelled for cause, or they might voluntarily retire by giving a week’s notice, receiving in merchandise any balance that remained to their credit. Persons wishing to live in the community as non-participants in its labors might do so by paying for the privilege, and the capital of any who cared to become investors would be received. American products were to have the preference in the purchase of supplies. The young were to be drilled in military tactics, to the end that they might be of service to their country in emergencies, until society had been reformed and war made unnecessary.