The plow and the power: Land, sovereignty, and the logic of dispossession

“ Unlike the roaming tribes of the more northern portion of the continent, where the food supply fluctuates greatly with the seasons, the natives of Mexico early became sedentary, and, owing no doubt in part to the density of the population, became horticulturists, and have continued to cultivate the soil to the present day. They are now essentially agriculturists, wedded to their place of birth, and not only do not desire change, but repel by passive resistance the invasion of civilization and the use of new and improved tools and machinery. ”

“ Their control and utilization are basic in determining the survival or elimination of rivals in the competitive struggle.
Above and beyond the need to occupy the "corner lots" of the planetary land mass was the urge of civilized peoples to advance from littleness to bigness as a goal in itself. Confined by limitations on communication and transportation, pre-civilized man was circumscribed and localized. With the advent of cultivation, land workers were tied to a particular piece of real estate on which they lived and worked. ”

“ Third, it is soil, an essential part of a farmer's equipment in using nature's processes of growth.
As most of these properties of land can be put to use only by repeated and continued exertion in the same place, a large portion of the earth is necessarily apportioned to individual control, i. e., to the ownership of those who can direct its uses, and so it becomes wealth. The sea in most of its uses to men requires no such local control, and so is not owned by a nation even ”

“ THE ECONOMICS OF CIVILIZATION Politics involves the exercise of authority--the policy making, planning, control, direction and administration of a community. Economic forces provide the wealth, income and livelihood--the wherewithal upon which a community depends for its physical existence, its survival, its geographical extension, the continuance of its life cycle. ”

“ Let us recollect the situation of France seven hundred years ago, when the territory was divided among a small number of families, who were the owners of the soil and the rulers of the inhabitants; the right of governing descended with the family inheritance from generation to generation; force was the only means by which man could act on man; and landed property was the sole source of power. ”

“ In the centuries which preceded that in which we live, the aristocracy was in possession of the soil, and was competent to defend it: landed property was therefore surrounded by ample securities, and its possessors enjoyed great independence. This gave rise to laws and customs which have been perpetuated, notwithstanding the subdivision of lands and the ruin of the nobility; and, at the present time, land-owners and agriculturists are still those among the community who most easily escape from the control of the supreme power. ”

“ The possessors of land and capital are able at present, by economic pressure, to use force against those who have no possessions. This force is sanctioned by law, while force exercised by the poor against the rich is illegal. Such a state of things is unjust, and does not diminish the use of private force as much as it might be diminished.
The whole realm of the possessive impulses, and of the use of force to which they give rise, stands in need of control by a public neutral authority, in the interests of liberty no less than of justice. ”

“ The authority of government has not only spread, as we have just seen, throughout the sphere of all existing powers, till that sphere can no longer contain it, but it goes further, and invades the domain heretofore reserved to private independence. A multitude of actions, which were formerly entirely beyond the control of the public administration, have been subjected to that control in our time, and the number of them is constantly increasing. ”

“ But if the natives refuse to conform themselves to their laws they drive them out of those bounds which they mark out for themselves, and use force if they resist, for they account it a very just cause of war for a nation to hinder others from possessing a part of that soil of which they make no use, but which is suffered to lie idle and uncultivated, since every man has, by the law of nature, a right to such a waste portion of the earth as is necessary for his subsistence. ”

“ The Israeli Government confiscated land belonging to several religious institutions to build its separation barrier. Most Palestinians and religious institutions refuse compensation due to the widespread perception that accepting compensation legalizes the confiscation of land and building of the barrier. According to the Israeli Government, it sought to build the barrier on public lands where possible, and when private land was used, provided opportunities for compensation. ”

“ Land, except when used for absolutely universal welfare, must be under individual control, and even then other individuals may have the right of way because of its necessity in the common use. Peculiarities of property in land arising from limitations in quantity or quality will be spoken of under Scarcity Prices and Rent. They differ from similar questions as to any other form of property only because this form of property seems more permanent. Any force of nature brought under control by individual effort contributes to wealth of individuals till all gain equal control. ”

“ World food security is of concern to all members of the international community because of its increasing interdependence with respect to issues such as political stability and peace, poverty eradication, prevention of and reaction to crises and disasters, environmental degradation, trade, global threats to the sustainability of food security, growing world population, trans-border population movements, and technology, research, investment, and financial cooperation. ”

“ The strain with respect to the world's food supply has made obvious to all from the farmer in the field to the cook in the kitchen the social meaning of all occupations connected with the physical basis of life. Consequently the question of the control of land for use instead of for speculation has assumed an acute aspect, while a flood of light has been thrown upon the interruption of the flow of food and fuel to the consumer with a view to exacting private toll. ”

“ The fur-bearing animals of Alaska have been greatly reduced in numbers during the last twenty-five years: the caribou and the moose have, to a marked degree, been killed or driven to remote regions; the larger whales, on account of overcapture by American whalers, have become scarce; the sea-lion and the walrus are nearly extinct; the fur-seal, of more importance to the Aleutians than the Innuits, is rapidly approaching extinction. Thus in many ways the food supply is greatly decreased. Recourse to agriculture is impossible. ”

“ The causes of the annual migrations of birds have received much study and been the subject of much speculation. The general consensus of opinion in this connection seems to be that the birds are controlled largely by what we in our ignorance term instinct. The true beginning of the migration seems to be in the fall, when the birds are driven from their homes by cold or, perhaps more accurately in most cases, by scarcity of food. This, however, is not the whole story, since many species start southward before cold weather approaches and while food is yet abundant. ”

“ Crop surplus control relates to the total amount of any major crop grown in the whole nation on all cultivated land- good or bad—control by the cooperation of the crop growers and with the help of the government. Land use, on the other hand, is a policy of providing each farmer with the best quality and type of land we have, or can make available, for his part in that total production. Adding good new land for diversified crops is offset by abandoning poor land now uneconomically farmed. ”

“ When a man owns a piece of land, for example, he may use force against trespassers, though they must not use force against him. It is clear that some restriction of the liberty of trespass is necessary for the cultivation of the land. But if such powers are to be given to an individual, the state ought to satisfy itself that he occupies no more land than he is warranted in occupying in the public interest, and that the share of the produce of the land that comes to him is no more than a just reward for his labors. ”

“ The right of taking private property for public use is an incident to the sovereignty of every government; eminent domain, or inherent sovereign power, gives this control to the legislature—the interest of the public is deemed paramount to the individual, but the obliation is concomitant that in the exercise of the right full compensation shall be made. ”

“ The power issue, where vigorously handled in the public interest, means abundant and cheaper power for American industry, reduced rates and increased use in millions of urban and rural homes—to say little of the preservation of our water-power resources in co-ordination with flood control, reclamation and irrigation. The American people have a vital stake in the proper handling of this issue. ”

“ But now that the communities have become old, now that the flush of enthusiastic expansion has died away, now that the would-be pioneers have come to realize that all the richest lands in the country have been taken up, we have perceived the necessity for a change of policy in the disposition of our national resources so as to prevent the continuance of the waste which has characterized our phenomenal growth in the past. To-day we desire to restrict and retain under public control the acquisition and use by the capitalists of our natural resources. ”

“ Eventually, if not to-day, the nation must take stock not merely of its land but of the 150,000,000,000,000 or 200,000,000,000,000 cubic feet of water annually falling from the heavens on the 2,000,000,000 acres of that land and giving it value—must conserve and control the boon in such manner as to minimize destruction and loss and maximize benefits for citizens and country: and any present step should take the right direction. ”

“ A people is therefore never so disposed to increase the functions of central government as at the close of a long and bloody revolution, which, after having wrested property from the hands of its former possessors, has shaken all belief, and filled the nation with fierce hatreds, conflicting interests, and contending factions. The love of public tranquillity becomes at such times an indiscriminating passion, and the members of the community are apt to conceive a most inordinate devotion to order. ”

“ The political state is the binding force that held scattered fragments of the human family together during the stresses and strains of the current revolution in science and technology. It is the political state that must be depended upon to resist the fragmentating forces of a disintegrating western civilization, to preserve the social structure and administer human society through the transition from civilization into the structure and functioning of the new social order which is presently supplanting civilization. ”

“ Laidler's authorities. They affirm that several ownership of land originated in force and fraud—whereby the nation, in whom the ownership was previously vested, was robbed of its rights. And from these data they argue that the nation is justified in "resuming" its "rights to the soil."
Now, this is an assertion as to a matter of historical fact which can be tested. In the course of the last thirty years a vast amount of evidence has been obtained respecting the manner in which land is and has been held by people in an early stage of civilization all over the world. ”

“ That private property in land is a public wrong based on force and fraud, and that to right one wrong it is sometimes necessary to do another. This they took to be a lesson in practical politics; and what it points to, in practice, is perfectly clear. Resume possession of the stolen land, if you please, for as private property it still is, and under its present ownership it must ever remain, a wrong to the community. For the rest, though compensation must be made for whatever is in the land which was not in it when it was stolen, yet to right one wrong it is sometimes necessary to do another. ”

“ It is also bent on subjecting property that has outgrown the restraints of competition to political control. Where political control proves inadequate, however, there is a disposition to resort to collective ownership and operation. It is undeniable, also, that the right of private property in such gifts of nature as forest and mineral wealth, and in the future "unearned increment" of land in large cities, is being more and more called in question. ”

“ This land increased in value because of enterprises initiated often by persons not owners of the land, being an increase of value not due to the owner of the land, not because of anything he has planned or brought about, not as the result of his labor, skill, sagacity, or enterprise, but because of other people's labor, skill, and enterprise, and which becomes a tax that the community, as a whole, pays to the owner of the ground. Assuredly this is unjust. Why should men be allowed to grow enormously rich by lying still and simply retaining possession of their land? ”

“ In the first place, the Indians are beginning to act badly—very badly. They are invading Crow territory, and stealing from peaceful bands. They are molesting whites wherever they can find them, and murdering. So we can judge that there will be hard fighting. For the troops will seek to pay them up.
"Oh, Dallas, how I pray to see trouble stop! I am going to the Indians. I know their leaders—have known them for ten years or more. I shall ask them to consider the good of their squaws and children and property, and ask them to accept reservation life. ”

“ The Indians, while still troublesome beyond the Missouri, are rapidly being brought to see the advisability of remaining on the reservations, and little more annoyance on their part may be apprehended. Fort Brannon, he declares, is in the hands of several hundred brave fighting men and may be looked upon as a place of certain refuge in case of an outbreak. ”

“ All other forms of prosperity flow from the application of labor to land, and, therefore, it is sufficient to give to men free access to natural opportunities. If the government of a country owned all the land272 of that country, it could increase, restrict, or otherwise regulate population, and better or worsen the condition of that population by the way in which it granted or withheld the land under its control. ”

“ Any fresh survey of men's political actions shows that, in those who have enough energy to be politically effective, love of power is a stronger motive than economic self-interest. Love of power actuates the great millionaires, who have far more money than they can spend, but continue to amass wealth merely in order to control more and more of the world's finance. ”

“ They stop the course of agriculture, destroying houses and towns, reserving only the churches, and enclose grounds that they may lodge their sheep in them. As if forests and parks had swallowed up too little of the land, those worthy countrymen turn the best inhabited places into solitudes; for when an insatiable wretch, who is a plague to his country, resolves to enclose many thousand acres of ground, the owners, as well as tenants, are turned out of their possessions by trick or by main force, or, being wearied out by ill usage, they are forced to sell them ”