I heard this story years ago, so I thought I’d post it.
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 changes. 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.”
Happy Thanksgiving all. Thanks for all of your comments and encouragement.
Source: http://mises.org/story/336
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Matt, great minds think alike. I had read this awhile back, and it’s great. That’s what socialism does.
Enjoy your holiday and God bless!
Thanks Karen, the libs at Digg will have a frenzy of burying on this one!
Happy Thanksgiving and a God bless you as well!
I have read a version of that same story. It is amazing how we weren’t taught that in grade school!
Happy Turkey Day all!!!
I don’t think the powers that be want us to know that. Can’t have the sheeple questioning the redistribution!
Happy Thanksgiving my friend, and thanks for all of your contributions here!
Thank you Matt for inviting me to be a part of this.
Thanks for sharing this story, Matt. I have not heard that before, but it sheds a very interesting light on “how things work”. Anyone who says capitalism does not work is just plain fooling themselves.
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone here at Conservative Hideout 2.0!!
Thanks LD, and Happy Thanksgiving to you as well!
By this parable then, I presume we’ll be abolishing socialism in 2012 and our future feasts will be dependent upon our efforts, not the governments. That’s as fine as any message I expected to find anywhere today, cuz. Thanks for that.
You just got yourself a Tweet (for what it’s worth).
Thanks Snarky! Happy Thanksgiving to you and the entire Basterd family.
Re-tweeting is fine too.
Matt:
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours and thank you for posting the wonderful truth about Thanksgiving.
Thank you TCL! Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
Matt! What a wonderful Post. Thanks for all you do for Freeedom.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours and God Bless, today and always.
Thank you Bunni! Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
Yep, That flys in the face of Hillary’s “It Takes a Village”, but what else would one expect from the progressive view. Where in the world has socialism worked for any length of time. Many say one learns from ones mistakes—guess our government will have to learn for themselves—few learn from history. Happy Thanksgiving Matt.
In all honesty Ron, I think that this is why actual history is not taught in the schools. Too many “inconvenient truths” for the left. Hence, we are doomed to repeat it, even though we know it.
Happy Thanksgiving to you as well.
Nothing beats celebrating the birth of capitalism in America. Have a good thanksgiving Matt
I hadn’t thought of it that way before Trestin, you’re right! I hope you had a great Thanksgiving.
Outstanding post and a wonderful site. I will definitely put you on my blogroll and thanks for helping to further conservative thinking and the liberty that this nation was founded on.
Thank you Ron, stop by anytime. I’ll add your site as well.