‘Sie vergessen, daß wir in künftigen Zuständen leben, denn das Heute ist die Zukunft von Gestern’.
Theodor Herzl
I. Introduction
The Frontier, the borderline between an inhabited, economically developed and politically structured area and a vast, thinly populated but resource rich area is at the core of the nearly mythical self-image of American society. It triggers memories of high-risk adventurism, courage, bottom-up build communities and sweeping progress. The way the area beyond the frontier became submitted to an established system of property rights is the subject of a substantial body of law-and-economics-literature. Several authors such as Harold Demsetz, Terry Anderson, Peter Hill, Gary Libecap, Dean Lueck 2, analysed the institutional processes through which the American settlers transformed the area of the American West from a vast open range to a gigantic patchwork of private and public property.
