James returns to a favorite theme—his preference for simple, unobtrusive forms of government. According to him, low-profile government allows people to live as they please and thus to thrive. Poverty, a factor in much crime, scarcely exists on Nantucket, not just because people work hard, but because they’re prepared to look out for one another and help those who are struggling. Like other environments, Nantucket shapes the kind of industrious, self-sustaining people who tend to thrive here; though James doesn’t say so directly, people who can’t succeed on Nantucket presumably get weeded out in one way or another.