Excerpt from The Annals, Vol. 32: Of the American Academy of Political and Social Science The most conspicuous product of this anglo-saxon trait, carried forward into the experiences Of the people of the United States, is our agricultural proprietorship, - the fact that the farm ing lands of the country are held in small independent holdings by the people who do the farming, - a trait that was. Recognized and helped along in the settlement of the great public domain by the pre-emption and homestead laws of the United States. And out of that wide diffusion of proprietorship has come a distinctive type of the world's farmer, -the American farmer, - undoubtedly the strong heart and the enduring hope of the republic. Another product, until the corporation came, pre-empting for itself almost the whole industrial field, was the American mechanic -the carpenter, the saddler, the gunsmith, the whole run of men attached to the trades - who not only operated his shop, but indi vidually owned it, and thus made a place for himself, as an inde pendent proprietor, among the other proprietors in the community. One Of the most far-reaching and dangerous consequences of the introduction of corporate life is that this kind of wide-spread indi vidual proprietorship has almost entirely disappeared. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.