clique or external force, rather than being developed by
the members of the community themselves.

Did democracy exist on this Pennsylvania frontier? Was the Fair Play
system marked by real representation and popular control? These
questions must be answered before any judgment can be made concerning
political democracy in the West Branch Valley.

Was there equality of economic opportunity on this farmers' frontier?
Was land available to all who sought it, and on equal terms? These
problems need to be considered before we can attach the label
"democratic" on the economic life of the Fair Play settlers.

If democracy prizes diversity, as some claim, were the diverse elements
of Fair Play society equally recognized?[3] Was the class structure open
or closed, mobile or fixed? Did the mixed national stocks enjoy
religious freedom? One needs to inquire into each of these areas prior
to a final evaluation of Fair Play society.

A useful tool for evaluating political democracy can be found in Ranney
and Kendall's _Democracy and the American Party System_.[4] It suggests
the use of popular sovereignty, political equality, popular
consultation, and majority rule as criteria for democracy. Accepting
these criteria as basic principles of democracy, we can begin to analyze
the democratic character of the Fair Play system.

A political system based upon popular sovereignty is one in which the
final authority to rule is vested in the people. The question of who the
people are is still before us today. In the fullest sense, popular
sovereignty means rule by all the people, but in colonial America the
"people" was a much more qualified term. It generally signified white,
Protestant, adult males who were property owners. In the Fair Play
territory, the ruling "people" were "the whole body" of adult male
settlers who annually elected their governing tribunal and participated
in the decisions of its "court."[5] Lacking an established church, or
any church for that matter, and possessing property lying beyond legal
limits of settlement, the Fair Play settlers could not have enforced
religious or property qualifications for voting, even if they had so
desired, and there is no evidence to indicate that they did.
Furthermore, the frequency of elections, which were held annually, and
the principle of rotating the offices among the settlers tended to
emphasize the sovereignty of the people in this part of the West Branch
Valley. The right