The Frontier and American Institutions a Criticism of the Turner Theory

Abstract

The predicament of the scholar, who has been living in a comfortable frontier philosophy, is beginning to attract some attention. Nor may we comfort ourselves with the assurance that ours is a purely academic debate. For frontier legends of one kind or another have now so permeated American thought as to threaten drastic consequences. Have not our most influential journalists and statesmen for some time been ringing pessimistic changes on the theme of lost frontier, lost safety-valve, lost opportunity? 1 Such convic-