Land and Entitlement Theory [split from Hovind Jailed!]

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Hogeye, you keep forgetting - American pioneers filed land claims with government land offices. If they didn't, the claim didn't hold up in court when somebody else coming through did. The State validated the claim. The State is big enough to do that. Your non-state groups, no less claiming ownership by force than the State, are not. Very few people dispute a State-backed claim, and when they do so, they do it in court. (Not talking nut groups here, but ordinary people.)

Locke wasn't talking about invalidating land appropriation because others who can't appropriate what was just appropriated would make them worse off. He was talking about use of commons - grasslands where villagers could pasture their goats or oak woods where they could run their pigs (to fatten on acorns). When the commons are appropriated and become private property, then a whole lot of people can be very much worse off.

[Hogeye]

American pioneers filed land claims with government land offices.

Right, but generally only to formalize de-facto ownership already recognized by their neighbors. The typical homesteading was done extra-legally wrt statist law. Many homesteads had three or more conflicting claims. The radical convention of presumption gave the advantage of formalizing ownership to the squatter/pioneers - an advantage not enjoyed by e.g. most people in Latin America who were never similarly legalized. (Cf: "The Mystery of Capital" by Hernando de Soto, available in the Fayetteville library, for details.)

The State validated the claim. The State is big enough to do that. Your non-state groups, no less claiming ownership by force than the State, are not.

This is a mysterious claim. Why are voluntary orgs incapable of validating claims? In fact, history shows many did, and quite well. Besides the book noted above, you can get examples of successful mining and cattlemen's and claims associations from the pdf An American Experiment in Anarcho-Capitalism: The Not So Wild, Wild West.

Very few people dispute a State-backed claim...

Just as very few people disputed a respected claims association backed claim. You have failed to show that only a coercive monopoly State is capable of enforcing property rights.

Locke wasn't talking about invalidating land appropriation because others who can't appropriate what was just appropriated would make them worse off. He was talking about use of commons - grasslands where villagers could pasture their goats or oak woods where they could run their pigs (to fatten on acorns).

You are mistaken. Locke's first use homesteading criteria would give those villagers ownership. Locke was a radical voice against feudal and statist claims and grants of property which would dispossess earlier users like the villagers. Locke's proviso was about just as good unused or undiscovered land.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Defacto claims (squatter's rights) were frequently set aside in favor someone who'd followed the State's rules and filed a legal claim with the government. Kentucky had numerous "rebellions" and more than a few threats of secession in the 1780s/90s over that very issue. They finally came to a compromise position that included Kentucky becoming its own state (rather than an extension of Virginia) and the "squatters" being permitted to buy the property (at a set price lower than "market" price) from the "owners" who had legal claims through the Virginia courts. Nobody was happy, which is usually the sign of a fair compromise (a good compromise is where everybody happy, but those are hard to come by). Mining and cattlemen's associations were backed by law. They didn't always pay attention to law and had bloody "warlord" wars about which we get the Hollywood history of the west. Any non-state "validation" of property claims are only as good as the gunslinger they hired. Any state validation of property was backed by the sheriff, and all the legal-system backup the sheriff can call on, up to and including asking the state or territorial governor for help from the militia/national guard.

Hogeye, you apparently misunderstood what I said about Locke. I was saying Locke was saying the "elites" couldn't (or shouldn't - they did it anyway) claim ownership of land the peons were using. Of course, since they were all using it jointly, no individual peon could claim it as personal property, either.

Basically there is no such thing as "unused or undiscovered" land. There is/was just "unused or undiscovered by my group land". To western Europeans it was "not being farmed/managed in any way we understand it land". That's why I keep saying private ownership of land is a concept that is not valid. It is a LEGAL concept, but has to be enforced with violence (or the obvious ability to use violence) to back it up. This is why State-validated claims work where others don't because, rightly or wrongly, the State has the largest and most obvious ability to use violence to back up its claims.

[Hogeye]

I agree with you that the State took over the property arbitration biz, and officially recognized and "legalized" former non-statist associations providing that service. I agree that both State and private arbitration has had "warlord wars." Whether a few sporadic and local small-scale Lincoln County "wars" is less bad than e.g. genodide of the plains Indians by the government monopoly is pretty obvious to me. We agree that the State monopoly failed miserably in protecting the property rights of Indians.

Perhaps one discrepancy in our positions is that I acknowledge that private firms did adequately protect property rights (until the State took over) whereas you have been reluctant to admit this. You haven't explicitly come out and claimed that property protection services can't be done voluntarily, but you repeatedly imply that such services require monopoly force by the State. E.g. when you write, "This is why State-validated claims work where others don't because, rightly or wrongly, the State has the largest and most obvious ability to use violence to back up its claims." Do you really intend to deny that voluntary associations didn't work at all? Do you really think that only a State monopoly can provide rights-protection services? I would say both claims are counter-historical - it's easy to find examples of private property-protection services that did work adequately.

Locke was saying the "elites" couldn't (or shouldn't - they did it anyway) claim ownership of land the peons were using. Of course, since they were all using it jointly, no individual peon could claim it as personal property, either.

Right; the homestead principle would give them joint ownership, analogous to joint stock ownership of corporations. But of course this is based on individual ownership. E.g. Any individual peon has a right to sell his share, and the joint owners are entitled to sell out to an individual.

To western Europeans it was "not being farmed/managed in any way we understand it land". That's why I keep saying private ownership of land is a concept that is not valid.

I agree with the first sentence. The second doesn't follow at all. Here's something that does follow: By not recognizing the use of land by peons (Indians, etc.), those Europeans failed to properly apply the homesteading principle.

It [sticky property] is a LEGAL concept, but has to be enforced with violence (or the obvious ability to use violence) to back it up.

I agree that sticky property is a legal (and philosophical) concept, and that it must be enforced with violence against those who would steal. Unfortunately, many people choose the plunder strategy over the produce/trade strategy,* so such defensive violence is sometimes necessary.

*See the discussion on Anti-state.com about Private property and the prisoners dilemma.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Hogeye - simple sentence - Voluntary organizations do not work unless validated/backed by the state. They are fine until somebody bigger/better armed comes along, but somebody bigger and/or better armed always does come along.

Peons using common land are not joint owners - that's how the elites grabbed the land from them - they are joint utilizers. If one leaves and another comes in, then you have a shift in the population of utilizers. You don't have sale/purchase of shares of property. As to the Indian's land - that comes under the definition of not being used as "not being farmed/managed in any way we understand it". The Brits did exactly the same thing to the Irish several hundred years earlier than the Brit/Americans did it to the Indians - the Irish were not as susceptible to biological warfare as the Indians, so didn't get quite the same genocidal result (but if you read Swift's satire on the solution to the "Irish question", you'll see it wasn't for lack of trying).

[Hogeye]

Hogeye - simple sentence - Voluntary organizations do not work unless validated/backed by the state.

Yes, a simple sentence and simply false. There are numerous examples of voluntary organizations that did work, and quite well, without being backed by a State. For some from US history, read the link I provided about the "Not So Wild, Wild West." There are also articles I can provide about "thief catchers" in London before govt municipal police, and tons of other examples. You are simply mistaken that none worked.

Peons using common land are not joint owners - that's how the elites grabbed the land from them...

Right; if their ownership is not legally recognized (preferrably by a non-statist legal system), they are subject to being dispossessed by the powerful. Which is why formal ownership is so necessary, especially for the poor. That is a major problem today for "informals" in Latin America. (Cf: "The Other Path" by Hernando de Soto.)

As to the Indian's land - that comes under the definition of not being used as "not being farmed/managed in any way we understand it". The Brits did exactly the same thing to the Irish several hundred years earlier than the Brit/Americans did it to the Indians...

Right. We agree on this. The British and Americans rulers failed to apply Locke's homesteading principle to other nations/races. Clearly, to me anyway, they should have. But what do you expect from govt monopoly legal systems?