subject: The First Thanksgiving [print this page] The First Thanksgiving The First Thanksgiving
The difficulty with the first Thanksgiving story is that the crop of 1621 was not copious, nor were the colonists industrious or stalwart. 1621 was a famine year and plenty of the colonists were lazy and could even be considered thieves. Wow! You ever heard that about The FIRST THANKSGIVING?
In his 'History of Plymouth Plantation, ' the governor of the colony, William Bradford, said that the colonists went hungry for a many years because they declined to labor in the fields. They preferred instead to take food from others. He states that the colony was peppered 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 crop feasts of 1621 and 1622, "all had their hungry bellies filled," but only momentarily. The existing condition during those years wasn't the bounty of food that we always hear, it was famine and death. "The first Thanksgiving" was not so much a party as it was moreso the last meal of condemned men.
But in successive years everything radically changed. The harvest of 1623 was changed. 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 the colonists were able to begin exporting corn.
What happened? After the dismal crop of 1622, writes Bradford, "they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop." They changed their organizational structure. Before this "all profits & benefits that are got by trade, working, fishing, or any other means" were gathered from 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." Each person was to put into the common stock all they could raise, and take out just what he required.
This "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" was an early kind of socialism, and it is precisely why the pilgrims were starving. Bradford stated that "young men that are most able and fit for labor and service" complained about having been made 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 powerful declined to labor and the total amount of food produced wasn't sufficient.
To fix this situation, in 1623 Bradford abolished socialism. He gave each household a plot of land and agreed they could keep what they produced, or bargain it away as they saw fit. he gave them free property rights-something else not prevalent in socialism. In other words, he replaced socialism with a free market, and that was the end of famines.
Now The FIRST THANKSGIVING
Early groups of colonists haddesigned socialist states, all with identical terrible results. At Jamestown, established in 1607, out of each shipload of settlers that arrived, less than half would survive their first twelve months in America. The majority of the work was being done by only one-fifth of the people and the other 4/5 chose to be parasites. By winter of 1609-10, called "The Starving Time," the number of colonists dropped from five-hundred to only 60.
Then the Jamestown colony was converted to a free market, and the results were just as dramatic as those at Plymouth. In 1614, Colony Secretary Ralph Hamor wrote that after the switch, there was "lots of food, which every person by his own industry may easily and doth procure." He had said that when the socialist system had flourished, "we reaped not so much corn from the works of 30 men as 3 men have done for themselves now."
Before the free markets were established, the colonists had zip for which to be thankful. They were in the same scenario as Ethiopians are today, and for the same reason. But after free markets were established, the ensuing profusion was so dramatic that the annual Thanksgiving parties became common throughout the colonies, and in 1863, The FIRST THANKSGIVING became a nationwide holiday.
The FIRST THANKSGIVING Truth And Lesson
Therefore the real reason for Thanksgiving is that: Socialism doeswill not work ; the one source of excess is the free market. So this Thanksgiving remember the first Thanksgiving and thank God we live in a nation where we can have the right to earn and keep the fruits of our own labors.
