[charlesu]

There is an argument that this sentiment explains a lot of America’s strange choices as it relates to publicly funded everything.

It certainly seems like a lot of our divestment in community resources followed the end of Jim Crow. It would explain the strange bedfellows that are wealthy elites and white supremacists (who lean Republican; obviously not all Republicans are racist). The elite gets the benefit of lower taxes and new business revenue from privatization of former government services; the racist gets knowledge that people they dislike are being hurt more than them. It’s a win-win.

[Nasrudith]

There is also heritage of the territories system like the homesteading act as very bottom up for various reasons. The approach specifically wasn't even to establish a state with an appointed governor or to send out survey corps and use them to establish "seed settlements", or even to start auctions in lands covered by existing forts but to do it from the bottom up with land allocations. Instead it was essentially a petition to join once a sufficient population was achieved and unified.

They had a "national memory" of getting screwed over by the old world and having Pointy Haired Boss mercantalists telling them to travel for months across the atlantic for trade rather than trade with other colonies - and many of the founding fathers were smugglers for their scoffing laws not in their interest.

Now the national memory is clearly memetic like well nations - their ancestors were likely actually still farmers or tradesworkers before emmigrating from their origin or immigrating to the states. Essentially the mentality is they /were/ the resources and didn't (while ignoring those they used as resources). Thus top-down anything is viewed with suspicion and "cutting a slice for yourself" as good. Corruption involving vote buying and extortiong likely also didn't help the trustworthiness to government institutions. Given those alone even if assuming ahistorical tolerance I wouldn't be surprised at publically funded X being looked at with a jaundiced eye as a "Okay how you are setting yourself up like a political boss - how are you trying to shove funds into your pocket this time?"

Combine that with the longstanding elite education having a Greeco-Roman obsession's influnce and seeing the ironic effect of what seems like common sense "supply your own military with equipment so their means don't limit your defense" as effectively establishing a generalismo to gain personal armies.

All of those point to ample reasons to view publically provided X with suspicion. The only reason public education did as well as it did was fear of catholic influence and them being better organized. The red scare had an internecine ancestor. "If they didn't provide education to the masses the Catholic church would and upset the general very peaceful in comparison to Europe balance of power." That notion of retaining that peace and not having "all of the bloody European wars for absolutley no gain" was very agreeable to all, especially emmigrants from said wars so Catholics wouldn't be too put out by "redundant funding" of what the church effecfively going to protestants as the church already gave it to their parishoners.

The more I think about the more I can see both sympathetic and bigotted reasons for them to have been suspicious of "free X" as a trap. Either way the roots existed well before Jim Crow a specifically post civil war system. Even if the centuries of suffering of Jim Crow could be retconned away it would probably "just" leave the South looking more like the North sooner as opposed to public healthcare approaching its 1st centurty anniversary.