News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1891-01-22
JUDGE POWERS ADDRESS.

CO1I Sc vi Ills ltlllCtl t1C SCJld
"You do one of your humber and
less favored brothers, who has
stayed at home to keep alive the en-
bers of family affection upon the an
cestral hearthstone, great honor in
bidding him welcome to this centep-
NAL festival commemorative -
mission OF Vermont into the sister
ship of American commemorative.
| bring you the cordial greeting OF
the old folks at home, who, above all
things in their evolution as a state,
and their history as a people, are
more than proud of the career OF
their sons, who have gone out from
their borders to the uttermOst parts
of our national domain, to engraft
Vermont ideas and Vermont energy
on the autonomy of every state in
the land.
1--WE do not forget that next to
Lincoln the greatest statesman OF
Illinois, who in his day and genera
ton made a deeper impress upon our
national policy than any other man,
and whose wise forecast and indOm-
liable zeal made possible the build
ing of that great central line of rail
way which poured a current of life
blood into the early life of your city,
was graduated from a workbench at
Middlebury, and that your pulpit,
your bench, your bar, your press and
all the trades and callings of life,
have been largely filled by enterpris-
ing sons of the Green Mountain
state, and that lately when the work
of purifying Haymarket square be-
came necessary, in order to vindicate
the supremacy of American pOlity
over foreign socialism, the duty was
confided to the culture, the courage,
and the persistent zeal of Il gradu-
ate of Middlebury College, and that
when the iealousies and contentious
of your great rival corporate inter
ests required the umpirage of sound
sense, wise Judgment and just dis
elimination, you sent on to us for
another graduate OF the same col
lege.
"One hundred and fourteen years
ago this very day, convention OF
delegates from 20 towns on the New
Hampshire grants voted unanimous
ly to declare Vermont a free and in
dependent state. From that time
till March 4, 1871, she was as indie
pendent of the other American states
as she was of Great Britain.
CATER her independence, and for
sometime before, she steadily assist
ed the colonists in their struggle
with the mother country. She
sought TO be received into the Union
with her sister states but the efforts
of New York prevented. She could
come in as a part of New York, but
this she courageously refused.
For IA years we had the anoma-
lous spectacle of a tull-fedged, fully
equipped, independent state, sur
rounded on four sides by hostile
heighbors, all intent upon capturing
some or all of her territory, and re-
duce her people to their sovereignty
and control.
"The first convention which repre-
scented the people by direct authori-
cation was assembled at Dorset 115
years ago today, and continued the
deliberations by successive adjourn
ments, till January Is, 17T7, when
it re-assembled at Westminster, and
on the next day, as before said, de
clared a free and Independent state
1T was in the fourteen years OF
her independent statehood that were
fashioned many of the characteris-
tics of our present political policy.
Our system of representation in the
Legislature by towns, rather than
upon the basis of population, grew
out of the influence which towns, as
towns, exerted in shaping the affairs
of the settlers in their early strug-
giles.
sour fathers desired to build a
state, and, though forced day and
night to defend their very hearth
stones against threatened destruc-
ton, they looked ahead to the future
and planted the germs of our present
system of education. A competent
number of common schools in each
town, one or more grammar schools
in each county, and a university for
the state, was the prophetic demand
of our fathers in their first public
enunciation of their proposed gov
ernmental policy.
In the early schools of the state,
instruction in the English branches
and in good behavior was the cirric-
ulum of schoolroom duty, prescribed
by statute. No credentials signed
by a twelve hundred dollar supervi-
sOr were eXacted by the schoOlmas-
ter. The big boys examined him.
If be had not the gift of tongue, if he
was too popular with the big girls, if
he lacked an aptitude to teach, orput
on airs, they carried him vi ct arms,
out of the schOolhouse, and this cere-
mony. according to the common law,
annulled his contract with the dis
trict by mutual consent.
MY friends, ! point you to the IA
years of our independently as the for
native period of Vermont character.
Then it was that were born that her
oism of ambition, that long suffering
in virtue, that devotion to duty I'M
der temptation, and that infexible
adherence to the things that make
for honor, that make for peace, and
that make for righteousness, which
give to our early Vermont history
it's brightest colorings.
"Then it was that our fathers cast
the horoscope of the future state.
and foretold it's schools of learning
the broad catholicism of its
churchhood-the bold, daring, I'M
character of it's man
hood, and the law-abiding liberty
loving conservatism of her citizen
ship.
mo fable of Romulus and Remus
dates the sources of Vermont civil
ization. 1t has been the evolution of
germs planted in the strong,
vigorous soil of fortitude, frugality,
virtue and the love of everlasting
Justice. The whole inspiration of
our early Vermont character was
summed up in that coupIet, which
was adopted as it's motto by the
first newspaper published in Yer
mont in 1881,
Plant as reeds where streams of freedom
glide.
Firm as the hills to stem expressions tide"
The pope has demonstrated with
jhe Russian government FORTS perse-