Trego's Mountain Ear

The settlers on the Mayflower were committed to live communally (https://drcarolehhaynes.com/index.php/articles/culture/history/488-communism-rejected-on-thanksgiving ). “One of the more familiar stories in American history is the disastrous experiment in a communal social and economic structure in the Plymouth Colony from 1621-1623.  The communal lifestyle in the colony resembled a socialist society. 

The colony’s storehouse, houses, gardens, and other improved land were all shared. No one could own private land or work at a private business because of their business deal with their investors. The colonists collectively cleared and worked the land. Many worked hard to provide for their families and lay up stores for the winter while others sloughed off, knowing they would receive equal shares from the single pot regardless of how little they worked. 

Anger and resentment grew among those who did the lion’s share of the work so they became less willing to work. As a result, the colony could not produce enough food to feed everyone.

After two years of living under communism, only a few of the original Plymouth colonists were still alive. By 1626, to avoid an extinction of the colony and provide a solution for repayment to their investors, a new system with private property rights and the right to keep one’s production — free enterprise – was implemented by Governor William Bradford, one of the signers of the Mayflower Compact and the second elected governor of the colony. Each family was assigned personal plots of farm land according to family size and the common storehouse was abolished. Immediately men and women returned to the harvest fields and produced a large harvest. 

Land ownership became a priority of the early settlers. For more than 50 years colonial villages tried to survive under the common ownership system without success.”

The basis for communal ownership among the Hutterites is often cited as Acts 2:44 “And all who believed were together and had all things in common.” And Acts was written a long time before Karl Marx.

Frankly, “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs” sounds nice. The problem is that we elect leaders whose abilities are small, but whose needs are huge. New England was settled under communism, and succeeded only when the communal ownership was abandoned.