The Eternal Vigilance of Jane Jacobs

“I was brought up to believe that there is no virtue in conforming meekly to the dominant opinion of the moment. I was encouraged to believe that simple conformity results in stagnation for a society, and that American progress has been largely owing to the opportunity for experimentation, the leeway given initiative, and to a gusto and a freedom for chewing over odd ideas. I was taught that America’s right to be a free individual, not at the mercy of the state, was hard-won and that its price was eternal vigilance, that I too would have to be vigilant.”

Excerpted from Jane Jacobs’s letter to the State Department’s Loyalty Security Board in 1952; Portrait of Jacobs by Frank Lennon, 1968

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