The Squater Method

In Atlas Shrugged the strikers gathered in the gulch for a month out of every year and then recharged with the knowledge that their ideal was possible and attainable they went back to their "lives"... actually scratch that... for that month they lived and for the other 11 they went back to existing.

So is that method possible? Could an area be found, that would offer a small number of gulchers a respite from the statists world?

I think that it is possible, not only that, I think that it is the most practical method of achieving some sort of liberty, albeit stolen liberty, in this age.

Let us say for the sake of argument that a location sufficiently remote and sufficiently large can be found. The question is could a group of strikers construct their own GG complete with infrastructure and industry (albeit on a small scale) right under the nose of big brother?

I think that this too is possible, at least in Canada.

My government does not spend a whole lot of time looking in at itself from a security point of view. Our resources are thin at best and mostly concentrated on in and near large population centers or upon our northern borders which other nations have shown a clear disdain for. The government isn't spending time examining central Ontario (or any other province) for squatters, it's got more important fish to fry. Truthfully I think the greatest risk of discovery would be by accident, a hunter or backpacker stumbling into town.

Having driven the trans Canada Highway (#2) north of Lake Superior I can vouch for it being as secluded a spot as you might hope to find, though still close enough to have somewhere to get the things that can't be produced in GG.

Would it be possible to operate such a place for a couple of weeks a year, a month perhaps?

Would it be possible for some of the strikers to be permanent residents, living in the gulch year round

Imagine, a community completely isolated and secret. Where Big Brother could be ignored and the community could be socially and philosophically correct. Where a man could live like he owned his life, not like he owed his life.

It would be an evasion of sorts I suppose, after all it would not be a real escape from the statist machine, and if discovered the strikers would or could be labelled squatters, perhaps charged with tax evasion or some other non-crime.

But wait...

If such a community could exist and operate free of any government aid, funds, infrastructure or interference for a number of years would it then be possible (upon discovery) to claim sovereignty based on those facts? Would it have a legitimate claim to sovereignty as a state?

The definition of a state is "a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory", would the community's successful claim on that definition in exclusion from other governmental control for a significant period be grounds for claiming de facto sovereignty?