It presents yet another routine use of an air-car, this time by a character whose house is raised above the sea on caissons.
Old Svoboda, a Government Commissioner, goes to a lot of trouble on behalf of his son:
his own reasoning and the books of a theoretician called Anker have convinced Svoboda that there is no hope for a better life on Earth in the foreseeable future;
so he wants to give Svoboda Junior a fresh start in a new world;
but this can happen only if there is a colony on an extrasolar planet;
and the colonists are most likely to succeed if they are able people who have left Earth voluntarily;
but such people will leave only if there is a problem on Earth that they cannot overcome;
so Svoboda Senior covertly hires the actor Laird to play the role of an orator who founds the Constitutionalist movement based on Anker's philosophy;
then he retires Laird with a new identity and a lavish pension;
when Laird is no longer around, having disappeared then drunk himself to death, the possibility that Svoboda has had him assassinated remains open;
Svoboda Junior, who has a rebellious temperament, becomes a Constitutionalist;
Svoboda Senior gets the Government to re-institute free public education and, as part of this, to close the independent Constitutionalist schools;
the Constitutionalists, including Svoboda Junior, can preserve their culture and way of life only by emigrating;
the Government sponsors their expedition because, while they remain on Earth, the many professionals and technical experts who are Constitutionalists threaten strikes, sabotage and insurrection;
these well-off people own property which they cannot take with them and which can therefore be sold to fund their expedition.
Results:
Government gets rid of Constitutionalists without having to imprison or massacre them;
Constitutionalists build the society that they want;
Svoboda Junior makes a fresh start in a new world.
But could any one person plausibly contrive all that?
