eals of New York, the leading exponent of no
liability without fault, had theretofore imposed a liability without
regard to negligence in the case of blasting.

An ingenious explanation of the doctrine of _Rylands_ v. _Fletcher_ by
means of the economic interpretation of legal history demands more
notice. We are told that the English courts were manned by landowners
or by judges drawn from the land-owning class; that the doctrine of
_Rylands_ v. _Fletcher_ is a doctrine for landowners and so was not
accepted by artisans in the United States. But consider which states
applied the rule and which rejected it. It was applied in
Massachusetts in 1872, in Minnesota in 1872, in Ohio in 1896, in West
Virginia in 1911, in Missouri in 1913, in Texas in 1916. It was
rejected by New Hampshire in 1873, by New York in 1873, by New Jersey
in 1876, by Pennsylvania in 1886, by California in 1895, by Kentucky
in 1903, by Indiana in 1911. Is New York a community of artisans but
Massachusetts a community of landowners? Did the United States begin
to change from a country of artisans to one of landowners about the
year 1910 so that a drift toward the doctrine began at that time after
a steady rejection of it between 1873 and 1896? _Rylands_ v.
_Fletcher_ was decided in 1867 and is connected with the movement
Dicey calls collectivism, which, he says, began in 1865. It is a
reaction from the notion of liability merely as a corollary of
culpability. It restrains the use of land in the interest of the
general security. If this view is well taken, if it was an attempt to
take account of the social interest in the general security in a
crowded country, this may explain the reluctance with which it was
received in the United States at first, where pioneer ideas,
appropriate to a less crowded agricultural country, lingered at least
to the end of the nineteenth century. In the actual American
decisions, some follow _Rylands_ v. _Fletcher_ as an authoritative
statement of the common law. Other cases go rather on the principle
that liability flows from culpability. Agricultural states and
industrial states alike divide along these doctrinal lines.
Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, both industrial states, are on
opposite sides. So are Texas and Kentucky, which are agricultural
states. Massachusetts and New Jersey, each with an appointive bench,
are on opposite sides, and so are Ohio and New York, each with an
elective bench. In truth the Massachusetts c