I came across a very interesting thread this past week that should interest many of our readers. It started with the posting of an article related to Thanksgiving.
The Great Thanksgiving Hoax
by Richard J. Marbury
Each year at this time school children all over America are taught the official Thanksgiving story, and newspapers, radio, TV, and magazines devote vast amounts of time and space to it. It is all very colorful and fascinating.
It is also very deceiving. This official story is nothing like what really happened. It is a fairy tale, a whitewashed and sanitized collection of half-truths which divert attention away from Thanksgiving’s real meaning.
The official story has the Pilgrims boarding the Mayflower, coming to America and establishing the Plymouth colony in the winter of 1620-21. This first winter is hard, and half the colonists die. But the survivors are hard working and tenacious, and they learn new farming techniques from the Indians. The harvest of 1621 is bountiful. The Pilgrims hold a celebration, and give thanks to God. They are grateful for the wonderful new abundant land He has given them.
The official story then has the Pilgrims living more or less happily ever after, each year repeating the first Thanksgiving. Other early colonies also have hard times at first, but they soon prosper and adopt the annual tradition of giving thanks for this prosperous new land called America.
The problem with this official story is that the harvest of 1621 was not bountiful, nor were the colonists hardworking or tenacious. 1621 was a famine year and many of the colonists were lazy thieves.
In his ‘History of Plymouth Plantation,’ the governor of the colony, William Bradford, reported that the colonists went hungry for years, because they refused to work in the fields. They preferred instead to steal food. He says the colony was riddled with “corruption,” and with “confusion and discontent.” The crops were small because “much was stolen both by night and day, before it became scarce eatable.”
In the harvest feasts of 1621 and 1622, “all had their hungry bellies filled,” but only briefly. The prevailing condition during those years was not the abundance the official story claims, it was famine and death. The first Thanksgiving was not so much a celebration as it was the last meal of condemned men.
But in subsequent years something changed. The harvest of 1623 was different. Suddenly, “instead of famine now God gave them plenty,” Bradford wrote, “and the face of things was changed, to the rejoicing of the hearts of many, for which they blessed God.” Thereafter, he wrote, “any general want or famine hath not been amongst them since to this day.” In fact, in 1624, so much food was produced that the colonists were able to begin exporting corn.
What happened?
After the poor harvest of 1622, writes Bradford, “they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop.” They began to question their form of economic organization.
This had required that “all profits & benefits that are got by trade, working, fishing, or any other means” were to be placed in the common stock of the colony, and that, “all such persons as are of this colony, are to have their meat, drink, apparel, and all provisions out of the common stock.” A person was to put into the common stock all he could, and take out only what he needed.
This “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need” was an early form of socialism, and it is why the Pilgrims were starving. Bradford writes that “young men that are most able and fit for labor and service” complained about being forced to “spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children.” Also, “the strong, or man of parts, had no more in division of victuals and clothes, than he that was weak.” So the young and strong refused to work and the total amount of food produced was never adequate.
To rectify this situation, in 1623 Bradford abolished socialism. He gave each household a parcel of land and told them they could keep what they produced, or trade it away as they saw fit. In other words, he replaced socialism with a free market, and that was the end of famines.
Many early groups of colonists set up socialist states, all with the same terrible results. At Jamestown, established in 1607, out of every shipload of settlers that arrived, less than half would survive their first twelve months in America. Most of the work was being done by only one-fifth of the men, the other four-fifths choosing to be parasites. In the winter of 1609-10, called “The Starving Time,” the population fell from five hundred to sixty.
Then the Jamestown colony was converted to a free market, and the results were every bit as dramatic as those at Plymouth. In 1614, Colony Secretary Ralph Hamor wrote that after the switch there was “plenty of food, which every man by his own industry may easily and doth procure.” He said that when the socialist system had prevailed, “we reaped not so much corn from the labors of thirty men as three men have done for themselves now.”
Before these free markets were established, the colonists had nothing for which to be thankful. They were in the same situation as Ethiopians are today, and for the same reasons. But after free markets were established, the resulting abundance was so dramatic that the annual Thanksgiving celebrations became common throughout the colonies, and in 1863, Thanksgiving became a national holiday.
Thus the real reason for Thanksgiving, deleted from the official story, is:
Socialism does not work; the one and only source of abundance is free markets, and we thank God we live in a country where we can have them.
Our conclusion from reading Richard J. Marbury’s article is that socialism doesn’t work and the fair market is the source of bounty and prosperity. However, Alan a member of Alas Babylon Yahoo Group doesn’t agree that Richard has the true story. He writes:
Close, but no cigar, Richard.
“The Pilgrims set up a communist system in which they owned the land in common and would also share the harvests in common. By 1623, it became clear this system was not working out well… The Pilgrims changed their economic system FROM COMMUNISM TO GEOISM [aka Georgism, Geolibertarianism]; the land was still owned in common and could not be sold or inherited, but each family was allotted a portion, and they could keep whatever they grew… Their new geoist economic system was a great success… The Pilgrims recognized that THE LAND ITSELF was and should be their common community property, but that it is proper for THE FRUITS OF THE LABOR of each person and family to belong to those who produced them. This was the great economics lesson the Pilgrims learned, a lesson that so impressed them that they commemorated it every year thereafter… This bitter lesson would be learned all over again by the people of the Soviet Union, where socialism and communalism of production failed again. Fortunately the Pilgrims, a smaller community in simpler times, were able to switch quickly and realize the great prosperity that comes from applying the geoist principle of THE COMMON OWNERSHIP OF LAND AND THE INDIVIDUAL OWNERSHIP OF LABOR.”
Alan refers us to another article for a significantly different point of view.
Thanksgiving Day – the True Story
by Fred E. Foldvary
The Thanksgiving Day that millions of Americans celebrate, with turkey and stuffing, is a myth. The true history was forgotten long ago, and even most of the history books have it wrong.
The myth goes like this: The Pilgrims landed in 1620 and founded the Colony of New Plymouth. They had a difficult first winter, but survived with the help of the Indians. In the fall of 1621, the grateful Pilgrims held their first Thanksgiving Day and invited the Indians to a big Thanksgiving-Day feast with turkey and pumpkins.
There was indeed a big feast in 1621, but it was not a Thanksgiving Day. This three-day feast was described in a letter by the colonist Edward Winslow. It was a shooting party with the Indians, but there was no Thanksgiving Day proclamation, nor any mention of a thanksgiving in 1621 in any historical record.
The history of the colony was chronicled by Governor William Bradford in his book, Of Plimouth Plantation, available at many libraries. Bradford relates how the Pilgrims set up a communist system in which they owned the land in common and would also share the harvests in common. By 1623, it became clear this system was not working out well. The men were not eager to work in the fields, since if they worked hard, they would have to share their produce with everyone else. The colonists faced another year of poor harvests. They held a meeting to decide what to do.
As Governor Bradford describes it,
“At last after much debate of things, the governor gave way that they should set corn everyman for his own particular… That had very good success for it made all hands very industrious, so much [more] corn was planted than otherwise would have been”. The Pilgrims changed their economic system from communism to geoism; the land was still owned in common and could not be sold or inherited, but each family was allotted a portion, and they could keep whatever they grew. The governor “assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number for that end.”
Bradford wrote that their experience taught them that communism, meaning sharing all the production, was vain and a failure:
“The experience that has had in this common course and condition, tried sundrie years, and that amongst Godly and sober men, may well evince the Vanities of the conceit of Plato’s and other ancients, applauded by some of later times; that the taking away of propertie, and bringing into commone wealth, would make them happy and flourishing, as if they were wiser than God.”
Their new geoist economic system was a great success. It looked like they would have an abundant harvest this time. But then, during the summer, the rains stopped, threatening the crops. The Pilgrims held a “Day of Humiliation” and prayer. The rains came and the harvest was saved. It is logical to surmise that the Pilgrims saw this as a was a sign that God blessed their new economic system, because Governor Bradford proclaimed November 29, 1623, as a Day of Thanksgiving.
This was the first proclamation of thanksgiving found in Bradford’s chronicles or any other historical record. The first Thanksgiving Day was therefore in November 1623. Much later, this first Thanksgiving Day became confused and mixed up with the shooting party with the Indians of 1621. And in the mixup, the great economics lesson was forgotten and then discarded by the time the Plymouth Colony merged with the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691.
The Pilgrims recognized that the land itself was and should be their common community property, but that it is proper for the fruits of the labor of each person and family to belong to those who produced them. This was the great economics lesson the Pilgrims learned, a lesson that so impressed them that they commemorated it every year thereafter. This should have been a day to remember their vital economics lesson, but this lesson was later forgotten in the mixup with the shooting party with the Indians!
This bitter lesson would be learned all over again by the people of the Soviet Union, where socialism and communalism of production failed again. Fortunately the Pilgrims, a smaller community in simpler times, were able to switch quickly and realize the great prosperity that comes from applying the geoist principle of the common ownership of land and the individual ownership of labor.
Thanksgiving Day should be remembered not just as a day when we give thanks for our abundance, but more deeply and historically when we recall why we have this abundance. In our Thanksgiving Day celebrations, let us therefore tell one another the true origins of the thanksgiving and the great economic lesson that it rightfully should remember.
Arthur Noll responds:
I’d heard the first story about how the Pilgrims switched to a market and succeeded, but not the second given by Alan here, where land was still kept in common. Interesting. The rebuttal I had at the time, was to ask how the natives had been successful with their different systems. They were using many different methods, I’m sure, the tribes were very diverse, but the market system was unknown, the results of very rich and poor in European communities was found repulsive to natives in everything I’ve read about it. Yet in spite of the diversity of the native tribes, there are common factors of similarity to the Pilgrim solution. Land was held in common by native tribes, and much was shared. Yet there was also individual ownership of things, and it seemed to be decided on the matter of labor put in.
Some have scoffed at the organization of the native tribes, they couldn’t stand up to the European system of markets, indeed, the Pilgrim system was eventually swallowed up by it too. But consider this, consider two men fighting, one has steel tools and weapons, gunpowder, the other has stone tools and weapons, no gunpowder. If you don’t consider this to be a factor, you might try some stone tools and weapons, and compare them with their steel counterparts. Social organization is an important factor, but so is technology.
I think technology has allowed people to be very lax about the effectiveness of their social organization. With stone technology, you needed the most effective social organization to go with it, or you wouldn’t survive. 40,000 years or more of evolution had weeded out and said that this organization of the tribes was the best. Now enter metals, and people feel like the technology made with them is so powerful that the former level of cooperation, once essential, was not needed anymore. They feel they can safely indulge their lust for luxuries and power. Over the short term they were right. Over the long term, it becomes clear that the waste and ignoring of the balance of nature, cannot be ignored.
In the stone age people had little need to worry about the balance of nature. Nature had always taken care of the matter, killing off people as fast as they reproduced, the technology could not take enough to threaten anything. Technology and agriculture in the late stone age started to disrupt this, stone age growth of population with tribes like the Maya, the Mound Builders, started us on a boom and bust stage of history. Metals have greatly magnified the problem. Simply going back to old systems of social organization are not enough, this question of balance with nature has to be taken into account. But systems based on cooperation and trust are going to be, as I’ve said several times before, inherently more efficient, and that was more the model of the stone age tribes.
Efficiency and sustainability of that efficiency, will rule in the end. People who exploit nature and each other, are like the runner at the start of a marathon who starts off sprinting. Of course they go far ahead of the pack to begin. But in the end, they are likely to finish last, if at all.
Alan responds with another point:
Arthur, I also think we must address the issue of population density. Two thousand years ago, the world population was approximately 100 million. Today it is six billion. Population has grown 60 fold, while the land surface of the earth has remained the same.
I think low population density “allowed people to be very lax about the effectiveness of their social organization”. Today, your fair share of world agricultural land is 1.6 acres of thoroughly average land. Two millennia ago, it was 96 acres.
Man is programmed to grow his numbers. Our common genital destiny is to turn plenty into scarcity by making more of ourselves. Technology has occasionally appeared that reduced scarcity, how have we responded? With population growth. Man acts to return himself to a situation of scarcity.