[72] See Charles E. Gibbons, "A Rural Slum Community." The American Child. February, 1922. pg. 343.
[73] "Juvenile Delinquency in Rural New York." Kate Holladay Claghorn. U. S. Dept. of Labor, Children's Bureau. Publication No. 32. Washington. 1918.
[74] "Social Responsibilities of the Rural Community," p. 129. Cornell Extension Bulletin 39. Rural Community Conference Cornell Farmers' Week. 1919.
CHAPTER XVI
THE COMMUNITY'S GOVERNMENT
Local self-government is a well-established tradition in the United States, but as far as the rural community is concerned it is more tradition than fact, for outside of New England the rural community has no legal or political status. In New England the townships were originally created as community units, for they were modelled after the European village community. The meeting house determined the site of the village where the farmers and craftsmen resided, and the boundaries of the township were coincident with the limits of their lands. The origin of the New England township has been well described by John Fiske in a famous chapter on this subject:[75]
"When people from England first came to dwell in the Wilderness of Massachusetts Bay, they settled in groups upon small irregular-shaped patches of land, which soon came to be known as townships. There were several reasons why they settled thus in small groups, instead of scattering about over the country and carving out broad estates for themselves. In the first place, their principal reason for coming to New England was their dissatisfaction with the way in which church affairs were managed in the old country. They wished to bring about a reform in the church, in such wise that members of a congregation should have more voice than formerly in the church-government, and that the minister of each congregation should be more independent than formerly of the bishop and of the civil government.... Such a group of people, arriving on the coast of Massachusetts, would naturally select some convenient locality, where they might build their houses near together and all go to the same church. This migration, therefore, was a movement, not of individuals or of separate families, but of church congregations, and it continued to be so as the settlers made their way inland and westward....
"In the second place, the soil of New England was not favorable to the cultivation of great quantities of staple articles, such as rice or tobacco, so that there was nothing to tempt people to undertake extensive plantations. Most of the people lived on small farms, each family raising but little more than enough food for its own support; and the small size of the farms made it possible to have a good many in a compact neighborhood. It appeared also that towns could be more easily defended against the Indians than scattered plantations;...