The VoluntaryistV o l . 2 , No. 4 , Whole #10 "If one takes care of the means, the end will take care of itself. October 1984

THE NOISELESS REVOLUTIONfy Carl Watner

Noventer 18, 1883, 1s a <¾y that should go down involuntaryist history. I t marks what 1s possible forpeople to achieve when t h ^ are le f t to themselves tosolve their own problems. I t shows what 1s possible whensocial change depends only on proprietary justice andrespect for Individual rights. I t was on that day thatthe standard time zone plan was put Into effect overnearly al l of North America. What 1s so voluntaryistabout this achievement 1s that the whole program wasacccnplished without the benefit of legislation; nocompulsion was threatened or used. Some Individuals andcamirrities, as well as the federal goverrment and asmall umber of local railroads refused to use the newtime, but no one was threatened with j a i l or penalty.The Idea of reducing the nult ipUdty of local times 1nuse througjhout the continent was largely generated out ofthe railroads1 desire to sinplHy their operating sched-ules. The standard time plan was a voluntary arrangementInpiemented by their General Time Convention. Adoptionof standard time was unique 1n that 1t was carried out byprivate initiative and 1t surely demonstrates the rela-tionship of the general habits and usages of the popula-tion, public opinion and the real world. The purpose ofthis article 1s to describe the history and background ofthis event, because 1t proves that free, unmolested in -dividuals are quite capable of both recognizing socialproblems and Inplementing creative solutions, without theneed for any government whatsoever, A runber of otherrelated Issues will be examined, such as the acceptanceof Greenwich Mean Time 1n England (there also a railroadmotivated usage), and the use of the Greenrich meridianas an international geographical reference point. Eventhese subsidiary points reinforce the voluntaryist con-tention that the existence of government 1s not necessaryto the smooth functioning of a voluntary society.

Prior to the early 1880's, mean sun time, or what wasreferred to as local time, was commonly used by mostpeople througjhout North America. Before the coming ofthe railroads, the distances travelled were not usuallylarge enough or traversed fast enough to make an/ s1gn1f-rleant difference with respect to time between differentparts of the continent. Due to the earth's shape and ro-tation and I ts place 1n the solar system, when the sun 1sdirectly overhead 1n one place (thus being noon according

to a local sun dia l ) , i t is not noon in places sane dis-tance to the east or west. The time varies approximatelyone minute for every thirteen miles, or one second forevery 1,140 feet of longitude. So for exanple, in a cityof the size of New York, noon time based on the sun miÿ trøry several minutes from the eastern-most part to thewestern-most part of the city. What this geographicalfact presents 1s the question of how to determine noon,or ary exact time over a sigrlfleant portion of theearth s surface.

The use of a nult ipUdty of local times presented noreal problems until the growth of the railroad Industryduring the middle of the 19th Century. Smaller camuni-ties had traditionally used the time of their largerneigjhboring cities and 1n the large cit ies, local timewas usually designated by sun time at city hall or someother desigiated point. The larger railroads used thetime standard of their home terminals. For instance, thePennsylvania Railroad 1n the East used Philadelphia,which was five minutes slower than New York time and fiveminutes faster than Baltimore time. The Baltimore andOhio Railroad used Baltimore time for trains out ofBaltimore, Colinbus time for trains 1n Ohio and Vincemestime for trains running west of Cincinnati. Most of therailroads running west and south of Chicago, used Chicagotime and those running west from St. Louis used St. Louistime. In short, the railroads had a problem coordinatingtheir schedules and travellers had a problem in knowingthe actual arrival or departure time of trains, sincethere were l i teral ly hundreds of canamities using dif-ferent local times. Railroad industry records indicatethat there were probably at least 100 different localtimes 1n use by the railroads prior to the adoption ofstandard time.

In larger cit ies, i t was not unccmnon to see three orfour clocks 1n the railroad station, all reading dif-ferent times. For exanple, at Buffalo, New York, therewere clocks set to New York City time (for the New YorkCentral Railroad), Colinbus time (for the Lake Shore andMichigan Southern Railroads), and to local Buffalo time.In Pittsburgh six clocks were seen in the terminal build-ing. Since accurate time was a cortmodiìy that peoplewillingly paid for, in the larger cit ies, l ike New York,the Western Union Telegraph Corrpary provided a subscrip-tion service to commercial customers; sending them a timesignal every dqy at noon. Time balls were not an uncom-mon sight. These were large balls (sometimes 3 or 4 feetin diameter) mounted on spires at the top of prominent

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buildings in the larger ci t ies. At noon every day, thetime ball would f a l l , signalling to the populace theexact arrival of noontime. Competition between timestandards and in the provision of time was le f t to thefree market, as can be seen in the case of Kansas City.There, the leading jewelers (who sold timepieces) al l hadtheir own standards of time, and no two standards*agreed. Sometimes the variation in jewelers time was asmuch as 20 minutes. Every jeweler took his own reading,thereby hoping to prove the accuracy of his own merchan-dise. Each jeweler had his own customers who set theirwatches according to their jeweler's time and swore tyi t . According to one account, "the people of Kansas Citynever did have accurate information on the arrival anddeparture of trains, except such as was gained by goingto the edge of the hi l l and looking down at the railwaystation." The babel of clocks in Kansas City was eventu-ally solved by the adoption of the time ball system.

The railroads were cogiizant of these problems. As onenewspaper of the era put i t , "The confusion of timestandards was the source of unceasing armqyance andtrouble." Not only did various time standards pose aproblem for travellers, vrfio often might miss trains be-cause of using a standard differing from the railroadstandard, but the multiplicity also presented a safetyproblem because of the risk of crews misinterpretingv4iich time standard was to be used and of dispatchersordering trains out on the same track at the wrong time.In Msy 1872, an association of railroad superintendentsmet in St. Louis to discuss sunnier train schedules. Thismeeting led to the formation of a permanent organizationsuccessively known as the Time-Table Convention, theGeneral Time Convention, the American Railway Associ-ation, and finally the Association of American Railroads.However, the Time Convention had been preceded ty a con-vention of railroad personnel in New York in October1869. There t h ^ had listened to the presentation ofCharles Ferdinand Dowd of Saratoga Springs, New York, whoproposed a plan of standard time zones based on a merid-ian passing through Washington, D.C.

Dowd, who was principal of a gir l 's seminary in upstateNew York, had himself experienced and perceived the prob-lem faced by the railroads of the country. In an effortto come up with a solution to the problem of so many con-fusing time standards, he proposed 4 hourly time zones

for the continent (Washington time for the Atlanticstates, one hour slower for the Mississippi Y a l l ^states, 2 hours slower for the Rocty Mountain states, and3 hours slower for the Pacific states). Spariced ty theappointment of a committee of railway superintendents vênowere to review his plan, Dowd authored two studies in1870, published under the t i t les of "System of NationalTime for Railroads" and "National Railroad Time". Al-though his plans were treated favorably, the railroadswere slow to act. The f i rs t formal meeting of the Time-Table Convention took place on October 1 , 1872, inLouisville, KentucKy. The following year, Dowd enbarkedon a program of obtaining written promises from railroadexecutives, which provided for the introduction of hisstandard time plan as soon as a majority of the execu-tives of the country had agreed. The financial panic of1873 disrupted interest in his plan, so that i t was notuntil the early 1880's that the railroads were in a posi-tion to renew their efforts on behalf of time standardi-zation. However, through the remainder of the 1870's,the issue did not entirely drop out of sight. SanfordFleming, a Canadian railroad engineer, became interestedin time reform and published several Internationalarticles on "uniform or terrestial time", as he called1t. In 1878, he presented his plan for a 24 hour terres-t ia l c¾y to the Canadian Institute. Fleming's plan wasbased on a meridian 180 degrees fr¢m Greenwich. Variouspapers advocating such Ideas as decimalization of dailytime and the dual use of standard and local times weredelivered before various cultural and scientific groups.Such groups as the American Metrological Society, theAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science andthe American Society of Civil Engineers al l supported thecall for a new timekeeping system.

In 1881, the General Time Convention met again andappointed William Frederick Allen as a conmittee of oneto investigate Dowd's and Fleming's suggested time zoneplans. Allen cane from a prominent railroad family andhad been for many years the secretary of the General TimeConvention and also managing editor of the OFFICIAL GUIDEOF THE RAILVAYS. Allen's favorable report was finallypresented on April 18, 1883, to the meeting of theSouthern Railway Time Convention meeting in New YorkCitv. Allen's plan differed from Dowd's 1n that Insteadof basing the time zones on thp :neri<ttan passing throuç(hWashington, Allen chose to base his zones on the 75th and90th meridians. By spacing the zones 15 degrees of long-itude apart, he provided even hour differences betweenthem. As Allen realized, i t was an added advantage tohis plan to use zones based on a reference point to theGreenwich meridian, because similar plans had alreadybeen proposed ty scientists and scientific societies fortime systems which were designed to include the vrfioleworld. He referred to this as "a gratifying but not aconvincing argument in i ts favor frcm a railway stand-point." Nevertheless Allen was not intimidated by scien-t i f i c authority or the existence of government boundar-ies, for he wrote that:

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Fran a railway standpoint we have nothing todo with State lines or national boundaries,but must confine ourselves purely to theneeds and be governed by the limitations ofrailway operations. We are not scientistsdealing with abstractions, but practicalbusinessmen seeking to achieve a practicalresult.

In formulating his plan, Allen used certain guidelines:f i rst , "that nothing should be proposed for which therewas not at least a closely approximate present exanple";second, "that, as far as possible, all changes from onestandard to another should be made at points vherechanges were then (being) made"; and third that "thedifference being the substitution of a variation of aneven hour for one of odd minutes.11

Allen's plan differed frcm previous plans in that theyhad assumed adoption of meridians an even hour apart,vtfieneas Allen was able to apply his knowledge of railroadoperations, geography, economics, large cities and thegeneral habits of the people to the idea of sinpHfyingtime zones. Although Dowd might rightfully have beenreferred to as the father of our current time zone plan,Allen was the man responsible for caning up with a prac-t ical , rather than a theoretical plan, and then inple-menting i t . As an interesting aside, neither man re-ceived arry government pay for his work. Dowd was unsuc-cessful 1n obtaining compensation from the railroads forf i rst having suggested the idea of standard time zones.Eventually his only recognition was to receive freeannual passes ever the great railways. Ironically, hedied in 1904, after being run over by a train. Allenreceived no special ccrtpensation from the railroads forMs services (other than in Ms mole as secretary to thetime convention meetings). A six piece sterling#teaservice was presented to him 1n 1886 by the SouthernRailway Time Convention, in recognition of Ms services.In addition, the old Union Station in Washigiton display-ed a bronze tablet honoring his role in the adoption ofstandard time.

Although the tradition or recollection of unsuccessfulefforts to standardize time plagued the railroad Industryduring the 1870's, Allen, within the space of six months,managed to convince all the leading roads of the countryof the merits of his plan. After making Ms presentation1n April 1883, he sent circulars to every railroad 1n thecountry. These Included an explanation of Ms plan, mapsshowing the geographical area encenpassed by each timezone, and a proxy to be signed and returned to himsigiifying the railroad's acceptance or rejection of theplan. The sensible practicality of Ms plan so convincedthe railroads running frcm Boston to Montreal (except theBoston and Lowell Railroad) that they Inaugurated the useof Eastern standard time on October 7, 1883. E¡y earlyOctober, Allen had proxies from many railroads accepting

his proposal. All that was left was to determine whenthe plan would be inaugurated.

This was done at a meeting of the General Time Conventionwhich took place on October 11, 1883, in Chicago. Allenpresented a report in favor of the adoption of standardtime, backed by affirmative votes representing 78,000miles of road. The best available figures indicate thatrailroads representing fewer than 7,000 miles of trackobjected. Objections of railroads in several major met-ropolises had to be overcome. For exanple, in Boston, apromise had to be obtained frcm the Cartridge Observatoryto observe the proposed standard time, before the rail-roads of that city would consent to i t . In New York,similarly, i t was the unanimous wish of the railway linesthat the time ball on the Western Union building shouldbe dropped on the time of the ve* standard on the daywhen i t went into effect upon their roads. Allen had tosolicit the cooperation of the superintendent of theWestern Union office, as well as the cooperation of thecity authorities. On October 19th, he interviewed MayorEdson of New York, vrfio promised to influence the Board ofAldermen. At least one public lecture was delivered atColumbia University and the city authorities agreed tosupport the proposed changeover to standard time. Othercities, such as Baltimore and Philadelphia, followedsuit. In Washington, i t was decided by Attorney-GeneralBrewster that the change would require Congress, not then1n session, to pass an act. Brewster ordered no govern-ment department to adopt railroad time when i t becameeffective on Novenber 18, 1883. In fact, Congress didnot legalize the use of standard time in Washington, D.C.until March 13, 1884, and for the entire nation untilWorld War I . According to what is perhaps an apocryphalstory, Brewster went to the Washington train depot lateon the afternoon that standard time began in order totake a train to Philadelphia. He was greatly surprisedto find that the train had lef t some e i ÿ t minutes beforehe arrived, due to the difference betwen local Washingtontime and the new Eastern standard time.

The railroads encountered other opposition during theircampaign to win ptblic acceptance of the change. Semeconspiracy theorists saw i t as the machinations of thepocket watch and clock manufacturers to ensure steadysales. In Bagnor, Maine, the mayor vetoed a city ordirv·ance that provided for the use of Eastern standard time.He declared 1t unconstitutional, "being an attenpt tochange the Irmutable laws of God Almighty." In Coluntus,Ohio, and Fort Wqyne, Indiana, there was delay in accept-ing the new standard because of their supposed deleteri-ous effect on the working population. The general c r i t i -cism was that "the Railroad Convention has taken chargeof the time business and the people may as well set aboutadjusting their affairs in accordance with its decree."People "mist eat, sleep, and work as well as travel byrailroad time. . . . People will have to marry by ra i l -road time, and die by railroad time." In Detroit, the

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people refused to accept either Central or Eastern stand-ard time, sinçg they were on the borderline of a zone.(They kept local time in effect until 1900, when the CityCouncil decreed that Central time should be used; andeven then there was considerable agitation against thechange.) "The civil population nevertheless adopted'Railroad Time1 almost spontaneously, as had happened inBritain thirty years before: 85 per cent of U.S. townsover ten thousand inhabitants had done so by October,1884."

As a result of this public canpaigning and the priorapproval of over 9O¾ of the railroads, the General TimeConvention voted to adopt Allen's plan, at their meetingof October 11, 1883, and directed a notice that al l r a i l -way clocks governing train operation be set to the newstandard at exactly 12 o'clock noon, Sunday, Novenber 18,1883. This was "the (¾y of two noons", since in theeastern part of each time zone there was a noon basedupon sun time. Then all timekeeping instruments were setback from one to thirty minutes to the new standard time,so that there was another noon vrfien standard time in thecommunity reached 12 o'clock again. This was thenoiseless revolution that took place; namely, thatmillions of people, frcm the Atlantic to the Pacific,from the Arctic to the Gulf of Mexico, were voluntarilymoving the hands of their clocks and watches to railroadstandard time. Near unanimity existed because the u t i l -i ty of the new time plan appealed directly to the goodcommon sense of a l l . Therefore, i t met with generalpublic approval.

However, there is no real unanimity of legal opinion tobe found among the court cases dealing with questions oflegal time. The two earliest of them, a Georgia casefrom 1889, and a Nebraska case from 1890, both favoredthe use of local mean or solar time as opposed to theprestnption in favor of using railroad standard time.Interestingly enough, most of the early time cases dealtwith local or state governmental affairs and not con-tractual matters between private parties. In the Georgiacase i t was decided that a jury verdict given in thecourt of a local judge who ran his court by railroad timecould not be sustained because i t was actually given on aSunday (rather than late Saturday before midhight,according to railroad time).

Partly to alleviate the possibility of confusing railroadand local time, and as part of the war effort to conserveenergy, fi iel, electricity, and to allow working people totake advantage of the evening sun (to work in their war-gardens), an act of Congress legalizing railroad standardtime was sigied by President Wilson on March 19, 1918.This b i l l also enacted daylight saving time, which was togo in effect on March 31 , 1918. The deyligfit saving timemovement had originated in England, where William Willettf i rs t canpaigred for i t as early as 1907. Germany andAustria were the f i rs t to adopt i t as a wartime measure

(April 30, 1916) and England soon followed with i tsStumer Time Act of May 17, 1916. As Willett expressedhimself, "for nearly half the year the sun shines uponthe land for several hours each day while we are asleep."His original plan was to advance the clocks 20 minutes oneach of the four Sundays of Apri l , and then to retardthem the same amount on the four Sundays in September,every year.

In England, legal time had not been defined until wellafter most of the population had accepted Greenwich meantime. I f anything, the experience both in the UnitedStates and Great Britain proves that the voluntaryefforts of the people and ccmrercial enterprises were farin the vanguard of establishing social customs and thattheir respective goverrments were laggards when i t cameto even formalizing those usages. The Definition of TimeBil l was not passed by Parliament until August 2 , 1880.I t established a pnesurption in favor of Greerwich meantime, unless another local time standard was specificallymentioned.

As early as 1840, London time had been suggested as thestandard of time for all of England. During that decadethe great English railways, such as the Great Western,ordered that London time be kept at al l their stations.Mary other railroads followed suit during the next fiewyears. On September 22, 1847, the Railway ClearingHouse, which was an organizaton of railroads begun in1842 with the aim of coordinating various aspects ofrailroad operation, recomnended that each of i ts menbersadopt Greenwich time. By 1855, 98¾ of all the publicclocks in Great Britain were set to Greervrich mean time,but there was s t i l l nothing in the statute book to definewhat was the time for legal purposes. In fact, i t wasthe railways, and not the government or the Post Officein England, which eventually brought about uniform time.In 1858, in the Court of the Exchequer Division, i t washeld that the opening of court was to be governed bylocal mean time and not Greenwich time.

The Greerwich meridian and Greenwich time play aprominent part in English metrological and geographicalhistory. The rtyal observatory at Greenwich park was es-tablished in the late 1670's, and for several centuriesnavigators and explorers of al l nations depended on themeridian and Greenwich mean time for geographical pur̀¯poses. The inportant point to understand is that thelocation of Greenwich is not significant geographically;but only that some point had to be established as a baseline reference for world cartography and navigationalpurposes. Greenwich was one of the earliest observator-ies in existence and had established i ts premier positionthrough i ts pioneering work. There were othercompetitors for the prominent position occupied by theGreerwich meridian. The French government was mostreluctant to accept i t unless the British adopted themetric system. However, given the existence of the

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Bri t ish Nautical Almanac (with a l l i t s calculations basedon Greenwich) and the widespread usage of Greenwich, mostgeographers and seamen had a vested interested inretaining Greenwich as their standard. This via4)ointwas expressed at several international conferences duringthe 1880!s, especially those held in Rome in 1883 andthat at Washington, D.C. in 1884. I ts acceptance as aworld wide reference involved the least amount of workand change to nautical charts, books, and records.

So closes our examination of the noiseless revolution.In one sense, the change from local mean time to standardtime, both in Bri tain and on the North American contin-ent, involved no revolutionary change. I t was simplypart of the spontaneous order; a voluntary af fa i r of agreat man/ people who had a vested interest in doing ðw§ywith the confusion inherent in keeping local time. Anyold curmudgeon who wanted to continue operating on hisold time had the r ight to do so. He might miss his t ra inor be late for the movies, but no one would throw him inj a i l for refusing to l i ve by standard railroad time. Thefact that the large number of people l iv ing around himoperated on standard time would be the strongest induce-ment possible for him to change his habits. Public opin-ion has the power to change behavior and influence ouract iv i t ies i n w3ys that legislation and government cannottouch. Peaceful, evolutionary change based on the volun-tary principle is the voluntaryist w¾r, not the resort toeither bullets or ballots. Thus, this history of stand-ard time proves that voluntary social movements canachieve inportant and long lasting inprovements withoutresorting to governments or coercion.

As a strategy to achieve freedom, anarchists have oftensuggested the creation of voluntary societies. Theywished to remove themselves from the source of injustice— the state — and to test whether their theories oftunan nature and human interaction were valid. Aithouÿithis is not currently a popular strategy, libertarianhistory is rich with attenpts to establish camunities.The following article examines same; of the problems Whichhave and will confront a libertarian camunity.

ANARCHIST COMMUNITIES: AN ANALYSISOF ANARCHO-ZIONISM

By Wendy K£lrcy

In a let ter to Thomas Carlyle, Ralph Waldo Emersonwrote: "We are a l i t t l e wi ld here with rurberlessprojects of social reform. Not a reading man but has adraft of a new caminity in his waistcoat pocket."Nineteenth Century Arerica was the heyday of Utopiancamunities which ran the ganit of economic, sexual andreligious expression. A small minority of them werel ibertarian; by which I mean they enphasized individual-ism as a theory and as a method of organization. Thevast majority of them, l ibertarian or not, fa i led. The

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purpose of this ar t ic le is to speculate as to the causesof fai lure and to show what is necessary for alibertarian caminity to succeed.

Historically, there are three types of cormumties withfundamentally different goals, The f i r s t and most suc-cessful type is sectarian; that i s , a religious caminityprimarily aimed at saving the souls of i t s menters. Mon-asteries and nunneries are early exanples. Mormon,Mennonite and Quaker caminit iës are contemporary ones.These camunities erphasize that man, due to original sinor the lapse of Adam, is corrupt and needs to achievepurity by conforming his nature to certain rules ccmnonlyknown as the word of God.

The second type of caminity, into which l ibertarian onesf a l l , is the reform caminity primarily aimed at expres-sing certain pol i t ical or social principles for the bene-f i t of i t s menbers, but sometimes with the added hope ofinpacting on the world. To these camum'ties, man is notdepraved but a victim of institutions or social pr inci-ples which are corrupt; man needs to reform the ins t i tu-tions and rules which obstruct social harmony. This isan inportant difference because i t changes the object ofreform. Instead of trying to change the nature of man,they attenpt to express i t fu l ly and cleanly. At leastthis was the ideal. I t could be argued, of course, thatthe socialist reform camunities believed that individu-alism ran counter to the nature of man and, so, t r ied toreform their menbers by l iberating them from these tend-encies. This liberation consisted of attacking the twoperceived bastions of individualism, private property andthe nuclear family. Here again, the goal was to returnman to his natural state.

The third type of cominity is peripheral to thisar t ic le ; i t is the economic cooperative in which peoplecome together in hard times and which they abandon whenbetter times arrive. Of course, any particular conmunitymight have elements of a l l three.

One of the most interesting questions about NineteenthCentury caminit ies is why some succeeded while othersfailed? As I mentioned, religious camunities were themost successful, but before examining them, i t should beenphasized that tfiëšè societies were organized to expressan ideal quite different from libertarianism. They ac-t ively subordinated the individual to the collective. I fthere is (as I believe) an intimate connection betweenmeans and ends, between the strategy employed and the

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result achieved, then the success of these caminitiesmay not be adaptable to libertarian goals. I f libertar-ians adopted the methodology of a Mormon cominity withits demand for conformity, they might create a stablesociety, but not a libertarian one. In other words, endsdictate means. With this caveat, i t is instructive toexamine the reasons for success and failure.

"There are two general causes of failure — external andinternal pressures. This article focuses on the internalcauses of failure — the problem a ccmnum'ty faces withinits own structure and goals — as opposed to externalcauses such as intrusion by the United States governmentor other more natural disasters.

Nevertheless, i t is important to make a few quick pointsregarding external pressures. First, this is a far moreserious threat today than i t was in the NineteenthCentury. When the Mormons fled from Ohio to Utah to es-cape the hostility of their neighbors and of the UnitedStates government, they were able to do exactly that —escape. Little by l i t t l e , however, as the government in-creased its reach and its authority, the Mormon l i festyle conformed to government pressure. The most notori-ous concession was the abandonment of polygamy (actuallypolygyny) as the will of God. Those who saw this as sac-rificing religious principles to political expediencyfled to remote parts of Arizona and New Mexico where thçywere hunted down by the federal government. As theWestern states joined the Union, the Mormons had no placevrfiene they could both live in peace and practice theirreligion.

Libertarians today face the same problem to anexaggerated degree. The power and scope of TwentiethCentury government is staggering. Until i t is possibleto construct a society in space, perhaps i t will beimpossible to achieve vrfiat many Utopian plannersconsidered a prerequisite for success — namely,isolation. Isolation is necessary because those who setup a radically different society are always in theminority. I f they were in the majority, they couldsimply stay and change the society around them. We livein a society that worships the state as a creator (ofmoney, of jobs, of education, of civilized man).Anarchists who deny its authority are in a positionsimilar to atheists who deny God. This is dangerous, forsociety may laugh at eccentrics, but i t executesheretics.

Finally, the external pressure on a community tends toincrease or decrease depending on whether the ccmainitywishes to convert the world — is evangelical — or sim-ply exists to benefit its own members. I f i t focusesoutward and seeks to destroy the status quo, i t becomes agreater threat and the likelihood of intervention in-creases. Unfortunately, the more prosperous and success-ful a community becomes, the lure of plunder may also

prompt invasion.

Returning now to the internal causes of failure, why didso many carmunities fail? The main reason is obvious.Many planners were impractical. Religious camunitiesusually consisted largely of farmers and laborers, butreform communities often consisted of theorists andidealists who had difficulty translating their idealsinto reality. For example, while the Hutterítes commonlysent a group of families to farm an area to test its fer-t i l i t y before establishing a community, the Fourierístswho established Sylvania sent out a landscape artist whochose a site with soil so poor i t did not even return theseed that was sown. And then there was Cyrus Spragg whoestablished a nudist colony in Michigan only to watch i tbreak up with the advent of winter. But, assuming we aredealing with reasonable men who have reasonable goals,what problems will they encounter?

Perhaps the most difficult internal problem ismaintaining the purity and ccmnitment of members. Theremust be a strong sense of caminity and camTîtment whichprompts the members to stay within the conmunity throuçjhhard times. This problem has two aspects: preservingthe ccmnitment of the original members and screening new-comers to keep out disruptive members.

With the f i rst aspect, religion seems to have anadvantage over libertaríanism. There are several reasonsfor this. Religion offers the allure of eternal l i fe andentry to heaven which are hard acts to follow. I f a com-munity member believes he will go to hell for leaving, heis likely to stay. Another advantage religion has overlibertaríanism is that religion is a positive philosophywhereas libertaríanism is a negative one; that is , liber-taríanism tells people what they must not do — they mustnot initiate force — but says l itt lëfelse. I t doesn'tproscribe a l i fe style, a sexual preference or even tableetiquette. All peaceful activities are open. Religion,on the other hand, usually provides a specific blueprinton l i fe even down to what food may be eaten (kosher).The sharing of a l i fe style, the sharing of a traditionare strong psychological ties. Perversely enough, arv̄other advantage some religions have is their history ofpersecution. Rallying in the face of a common injusticebinds people together. Although libertarians are victimsof government, thçy are not victims by virtue of beinglibertarians. They are punished as tax resisters, draftevaders or violators of some other victimless crime. Butthe persecution is not aimed at libertarians per se. I tdoes not bind libertarians together in the same mannerthat Mormons or Jews are bound together by shared perse-cution and tradition.

Perhaps, technology will help libertarians overcome thisobstacle of achieving cohesion through easier conrnunicd-tion. Technology may well reduce the need for cohesion.As mentioned before, cohesion is necessary for matters to

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walk away from the outside world and to stand by the com-munity through hard times. To the extent technology in-creases the advantages while reducing the hard times, theneed for cohesion may be minimized. Whether such a com-munity would survive a crisis, such as a governmentalattack, is debatable.

Another method of achieving unity is through strongleadership. This me\̀ x)d has serious drawbacks. I t makesthe society unstable, for i f the leader dies or leaves,the entire system is threatened. Nineteenth Century com-munities often dissolved at the loss of its founder.Also, Lord Acton's axiom "Power corrupts" applies toanarchists as surely as i t applies to everyone else.Strong leadership carries the potential of evolving intoinposed authority.

Despite their advantages, however, even religiouscommunities developed methods to encourage a sense ofbelonging. What were these methods? They included:regular (sometime daily) meetings at which people con-fessed sins; a written code of behavior; common propertyand common dining roans. By enphasizing cannon propertycamunities tried to subordinate the individual to thecollective. Comron dining roans were not for conveni-ence; they were a matter of principle. There is no ques-tion that this helped to achieve unity. Unfortunately,these cohesive camtinities were usually libertarianhorror stories.

For those interested in a libertarian solution tocamunities, Equitable Commerce by the Nineteenth Centurylibertarian Josiah Warren is a pivotal work. Warren wasthe pioneer in libertarian camtinities and EquitableÇannerce outlines several things he considered necessaryto a libertarian camunity. The f i rst was a meetingplace. Another was a private currency — monçy withvalue independent of the outside world. Warren insistedthit each individual be responsible for himself (as op-posed to being a camunity responsibility) and that everyInstitution be privately owned., In carmenting on theOwerrite camunity of New Harmony, Warren wrote: " I tseemed that the difference of opinion, tastes and pur-poses Increased just in proportion to the demand for con-formity.11 Social harmony, he insisted, required radicalindividualism.

(his is a ccnplete departure from the usual approach,:amunity institutions and cannon property are the norm,especially with respect to eating or sleeping facilit ies,[n contrast, Warren wanted eating facilities to be mod-îled after restaurants and sleeping facilit ies, i f notentirely individual, to be modeled after boarding houses,[n describing the libertarian camunity of Utopia, Warren*rote (1848): "Throughout the whole of our opera-tions...everything has been conducted so nearly upon theindividual basis that not one meeting for legislation has:aken place. No Organization, no indefinite delegated

power, no 'Constitutions,1 no 'laws' or 'bye laws,1

'rules' or 'regulations' but such as each individualmakes for himself and for his cwn business. No officers,no priests nor prophets have been resorted to...." Be-cause of Warren's influence, Utopia and Modem Timesclosely resenbled the libertarian ideal.

The second aspect of the purity problem is new members;that is, how to keep out unproductive or disruptivepeople. Reform societies without screening mechanismsgot clogged by parasitical menbers vho did not protestthe outside world — t)f\e/ sinply could not f i t into i t .Horace Greeley watched one such camunity collapse underthe weight of its crackpots and described these menbersas people vìho "finding themselves utterly out ofplace...in the world as i t is , rashly concluded that the/were exactly fitted for the world as i t should be." Inassuming the natural goochesš of man, reform camunitiestoo often threw open their doors. As a result, therewere eccentrics who made a living by going from carmunityto camunity, sowing discord in their wake. Religiouscamunities were not as susceptible to these men. Notbelieving in natural goodiess, they often put potentialmembers to severe tests.

A libertarian camunity could minimize the risk ofdisruptive menters by having the founders own the landand sell i t to new menbers only on the condition thatt h ^ agree to abide by camunity rules. For exarple,they may have to assume liabil ity for acts cormritted byguests. Also, since no members would be supported atcannon expense, libertarian society would not naturallyattract parasites.

But vrfiat of the menber vho canes to fundamentally opposethe purpose of the camunity and tries to subvert it?What safeguards for freedom can be built into thesystem? Of course, such safeguards are speculative. Inthe broadest of terms, the two prerequisites would seemto be private property and technology. Nevertheless, i tis true that all systems break down. Inevitably, youwill have landowners who have not agreed to the laws ofthe camunity, but the basic point is to establish normsand cement them into the pattern of the society.

Another safeguard of freedom would be to establishinstitutions and procedures which maximize freedom. Afree market court system would be necessary to arbitrateand adjudicate disputes. An interesting approach tospeculating about institutions is to ask where the freemarket is vulnerable to government. Historically, wherehas government been able to easily assert itself? Thethree areas seem to be: defense, education, and welfare.Internal defense can be handled by a private policeforce. The solution to education is apparent: the freemarket. The solution to charity is not so obvious.

All communities have disasters and people who cannot care

page 7 cont .»d . p. 8

for themselves. I f this need 1s not addressed by thefree maricet, 1t can become a stepping stone to govern-ment. I t would be wise, therefore, to establish a strongvoluntary charity as an Institutional safeguard of free-dom. For exanple, Nineteenth Century Individualistsanarchists had a systøn of labor Insurance Into whichmentors paid against being ffred or Injured. Perhapssome form of Insurance could be encouraged. The need fbrcharity would remain as 1t always w i l l , but I ts size andthreat would be minimized.

Regarding procedures, the two most ccnmonly citedlibertarian social sanctions are ostracism and boycott.These sanctions proved effective 1n religious commun-it ies, but thçy may be less successful 1n a libertarianone. Libertarians shy awqy from ostracism and boycottbecause these sanctions smack of Intolerance; this 1s anunfortunate attitude. Although libertarians must betolerant 1n the legal sense — anything peaceful — there1s no virtue 1n tolerating anything on a personal level.Toleration does not require the suspension of judgœnt orthe abandorment of standards. I f a man peacefully callsfor taxation, 1t may be appropriate and even necessary topeacefully decline all association with him.

Mary other questions confront a libertarian ccmnunity.Historically, two Inportant ones have been centralismversus deœntralism and the Issue of self-sufficiency.Ther¾ 1s a tradition of deœntralism 1n anarchist theory.Per†wps this 1s because anarchism focuses on the govern-ment and a diffuse state seems clearly preferable to acentralized one. I t Is not similarly clear that deœn-tralism outside of politics offers any advantage. Cen-tralization ray be effective for some purposes and notfor others.

Secondly, should a ccrmunity be self-sufficient? Shouldthe camuiity attenpt to farm, make shoes and f i l l all

the needs of Its menbers in order to be independent ofthe outside world? (This question assures the community1s not set up by survivalists who are convinced the worldwill destrqy Itself; 1t assures a perceived choice.)Most comurrities have aimed at self-sufficiency, but 1twould be Ironic 1f a libertarian society with theoreticalunderpinnings of economic diversity and freedom closedItself off from trade relations. Moreover, 1t could be aserious mistake to divert the comurtfty's most precious

xe — i ts menbers — Into work which miçfrt not suittheir talents.

Utopian cGmnunities are often dismissed as 1npract1cal orIdealistic. In their defense, I would like to state thatthe hunger for such a connurrfty is the hunger for freedomin our time, the hunger to "live" and not merely speakprinciples. As to the practicality of these communities,there may in fact be Insuperable obstacles, but the samehas been said of freedom or putting a man on the moon.I f men have travelled through space, perhaps 1t is pos-sible for them to make one corner of the world trulyfree.

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