Breaking down America by demographics can reveal a lot of gaps. But none is so all-encompassing as the statistical social and functional contrasts involving population density.

The urban-rural divide is consistently and substantially distinct in several significant categories, ranging from politics to economics to violent crime and more.

It's obvious that country and small-town living is vastly different from big-city life. What's often overlooked, however, is how different the worldview of residents in metropolises is from America's early history--and conversely, how closely rural communities continue to maintain kinships with the colonial era.

This occurred to me the other day while pulling my trash can out to the shoulder of the old state highway that runs past my house. Gazing out o

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