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Page 547, 548
“By the mid-eighteenth century, the Ulster Scots dominated the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and the upcountry Piedmont farm region of North Carolina and South Carolina. The valley settlers, remote at first from the seat of government authority at Williamsburg, developed their own customary law of settlement, which granted original property rights to land on the basis of certain marks of settlement. These marks conferring ownership included “corn right” and “taking up land,” earned by planting crops and building a home; “tomahawk right,” earned by clearing a few trees; and “cabin right,” gained by building a log cabin. These were rough criteria usually overly generous to the individual settlers, but the system was an instructive example of rough justice emerging from customary law, developed solely by the voluntary actions of the people and without the imposition of statute or decree of the state.”
Page 552, 553
“By Liberty, I understand the power which every man has over his own actions, and his right to enjoy the fruit of his labour, art, and industry, as far as by it he hurts not the society, or any member of it, by taking from any member, or by hindering him from enjoying what he himself enjoys. The fruits of a man’s honest industry are the just rewards of it, ascertained to him by natural and eternal equity, as is his title to use them in the manner which he things fit. And thus, with the above limitations, every man is sole lord and arbiter of his own private actions and property….
“Indeed, Liberty is the divine source of all human happiness. To possess, in security, the effects of our industry, is the most powerful and reasonable incitement to be industrious; And to be able to provide for our children, and to leave them all that we have, is the best motive to beget them. But were property is precarious, labour will languish. The privileges of thinking, saying, and doing what we please, and of growing as rich as we can, without any other restriction, than that by all this we hurt not the public, nor one another, are the glorious privileges of Liberty; and its effects, to life in freedom, plenty, and safety….
“Alas! Power encroaches daily upon Liberty, with a success too evident, and the balance between them is almost lost. Tyranny has engrossed almost the whole earth, and striking at mankind root and branch, makes the world a slaughterhouse….”
Page 509
Cato’s Letters
“While Williams’ heart was in the right place in insisting on purchasing all land voluntarily from the Indians, there were important aspects of the land problem that he had not thought through. While the Indians were certainly entitled to the land they cultivated, and also (1) laid claim to vast reaches of land which they hunted by which they did not transform by cultivation, and (2) owned the land not as individual Indians, but as collective tribal entities. In many cases the Indian tribes could not alienate or sell the lands, but only lease the use of their ancestral domains. As a result, the Indians also lived under a collectivistic regime that, for land allocation, was scarcely more just than the English governmental land-grab against which Williams was properly rebelling. Under both regimes, the actual settler – the first transformer of the land, whether white or Indian – had to fight his way past a nest of arbitrary land claims by others, and pay their exactions until he could formally own the land.”
Page 177
The Further Settlement of Rhode Island:
The Odyssey of Samuel Gorton
Page 187
Politically, this individualist argued that any transgressions of government beyond the rights guaranteed by the English common law were impermissible.
At this trial Gorton denounced the grave violation of English common law in uniting the offices of prosecutor and magistrate in the same man.
Page 188
"In March 1677 the proprietors issued the Concessions and Agreements, a document written largely by Edward Bylling, who was assisted by William Penn. It was signed by all the proprietors and freeholders of the colony. The Concessions and Agreements established a frame of government for West New Jersey. This was a highly liberal document – especially for a proprietary decree – that guaranteed no taxation save by consent of the people (“we put the power in the people”), a representative assembly, trial by jury, full religious liberty (“no person to be called into question or molested for conscience under any pretext whatever”), and no imprisonment for debt."
The Development of West New Jersey
Page 387
Conceived in Liberty, Murray Rothbard, 1979
“The West New Jersey Assembly was to be elected by all freeholders, by the unusual institution of secret ballot, and was to be empowered to create courts and levy taxes. All legislation required a two-thirds vote of the Assembly, thus assuring a greater consensus for legislation than under mere majority rule. Furthermore, the colony was to be fully self-governing, with all executive power in the hands of commissioners appointed by the Assembly. Judges and constables were to be elected by popular vote rather than appointed. There were other unusually libertarian features of this constitution. Except for treason, felony, and murder, the plaintiff had full power to forgive, pardon, or remit punishment, this placing the decision to prosecute and punish for a crime in the hands of the original victim rather than the remotely concerned government. Punishment for theft did not consist in paying a supposed debt to a mythical “society” by languishing unproductively in prison at taxpayers’ expense; instead, it consisted in making restitution to the victim for the crime, and in working off this “debt” to the specific injured party. Furthermore, the beginnings of excellent long-standing white-Indian relations in the colony were assured by the provision that any Indian claim of injury would go to a jury of six whites and six Indians.”
The Development of West New Jersey
Page 388
"In contrast to conditions in other colonies under Dominion rule, everything was quiet during the Glorious Revolution in the colonies of East jersey and West Jersey. While the New England colonies aimed to resume self-government and while New York tried to move from royal colony to self-government, the Jerseys had been proprietary colonies before the Dominion. With Nicholson and his royal officials gone, the proprietors, who had been facing quo warranto action against their territories, trod warily indeed, and did nothing during the years of turmoil after 1689. Central government in the Jerseys disappeared with the end of the Dominion and the colonies were left with existing local governments only. In this state of purely minimal government, the people of the Jerseys were happy. The royal officials were gone. Their ancient proprietary enemies were cautious and inactive. Indeed, there was virtually nothing against which to revolt."
The Glorious Revolution in the Northern Colonies, 1689-1690
Page 427
Conceived in Liberty, Murray Rothbard, 1979
"The confrontation between the two forces continued to mount. The rebels presented a petition to the legislature, citing their Indian titles and calling for a stay of all judicial processes against them, while the proprietor Samuel Nevill denounce the petition as infringing the Crown’s prerogative and its sovereignty over the soil of New Jersey. In a sense, Nevill was correct. The opposing libertarian theory of land ownership, espoused by the squatters, was eloquently set forth by a sympathizer in a New York newspaper. Going beyond Roger Williams’ simply theory of Indian ownership to what was essentially the John Locke labor theory of original landed property, the writer declared that, although the earth “was made for equal use of all, it may nevertheless be appropriated by every individual. This is done by the improvement of any part of it lying vacant, which is thereupon distinguished from the great common of nature, and made the property of that man, who bestowed his labor in it; from who it cannot afterward be taken, without breaking through the rules of natural justice; for thereby he would actually be deprived of the fruits of his industry.”
Land Conflicts in New Jersey
Page 547
Conceived in Liberty, Murray Rothbard, 1979
"Even when modified, Quaker principles were radical enough to be unique in the colonies. Nowhere was this uniqueness more outstanding than in military affairs and in their treatment of the Indians. William Penn had from the beginning set the pattern of peace and justice to the Indians, and scrupulously purchased Indian land claims even when the claims themselves were dubious. Pursuing a policy of peace, incomprehensible to most of the other colonists, who were generally conscienceless in slaughtering the Indians, the Quakers of Pennsylvania built no forts, established no militia, and hired no scouts and Indian fighters. And by pursuing a policy of peace and no armaments, they found mirabile dictu, that they had nothing to fear. They had earned and gained the lasting respect of the Indians, and fair play met with fair play in its turn. As in New Jersey, where Quakers were influential in shaping Indian policy, there was no Indian war in the history of the colony so long as the Quakers ruled."
Pennsylvania: Quakers and Indians
Page 558
Conceived in Liberty, Murray Rothbard, 1979