THE RIM COUNTY WAR

Daniel Justin Herman, Hell on the Range: A Story of Honor, Conscience, and the American West (The Lamar Series in Western History) (New Haven & London: Yale U. Press, 2010) ("The Rim County War . . . emerged from economic conflict and weak legal institutions. The feud in Pleasant Valley, however, was no struggle between preindustrial values and entrepreneurial capitalism. It was a uniquely Western 'tragedy of the commons' catalyzed by opportunistic men who flocked to Arizona's Rim County only to find themselves competing for grazing lands. Settlers might lay claim to land or water through preemption and homesteading laws.To succeed as cattlemen, however, they needed access to free range. The problem with free range was its promise. Even settlers with preemption and homestead claims found themselves crowded by newcomers with large herds as well as newcomers with no more than a few cows and a branding iron. All hoped to became independent--or even prosperous--in the cattle trade, Free range thus became an economic and social wrestling mat.What is important about the Rim County War, then, is that it could have happened--and did happen--in other parts of the West where free range existed." Id. at 283."Americana today associate honor with self-sacrifice. Honor means remaining loyal to one's word, one's friends, one's principles, even if one must suffer to do that. The vocations we associate with honor are those involving peril: soldiering enforcing the law, fighting fires." Id. at xiv. For the most part, not much honor in being a lawyer, let alone a law professor.).