Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1896-08-31
RUTLAND HERALD LIBEL SUIT.


The long pending suit between Gov.
Woodbury. and the Rutland Herald
has been ended by the decision of the
three Supreme Court judges, before
whom it was tried by agreement. The
court awards Gov. Woodbury. 81 900
and his costs The decision shows
that Gov. Woodbury. told the truth
when he declared that he had kept no
liquor in his hotel for sale, had sold
none, and had not permitted the sale
Of liquors by his employees or agents.
The above was proven in the court,
although it turned out that quite
quantity had been furnished to guests
in rooms by bell boys, and that par
ties who had ordered banquet sup
pers had brought in liquors of their
own accord and used them on the ia
bles. One single instance came to
Gov. Woodbury's knowledge of a boy
getting money at the clerks Office
for a guest, when the Governor for
bid the clerk from furnishing money
or permitting the use of any money
belonging to the hotel. Nothing ap
peared anywhere to show that there
was ever any liquor kept about the
hotel for sale purposes; nobody swore
that he ever obtained any of any
clerk of the hotel, that there was any
bar about the hotel, or that the own
er, the manager, the clerk Or any
person who could be considered an
agent sold any liquor.
So far as Gov. Woodbury. was con-
cerned directly no liquor was sold.
When it is known that liquors have
been sold in the city of Burlington, at
hotels, bars drug stores, groceries and
the like to considerable extent, the
law being slackly enforced, there
would have been nothing serious in
the way of liquor selling at the Van
Ness house, if a man had owned it
who had no conscientious scruples
about dealing out the liquid curse to
his customers and tOWnSmen.9 That
Gov. Woodbury. did not sell liquors
and never received dollar Of profit
from the sale of them, shows that he
is the one man of the many with
Christian conscience, who did not sell
liquors when a great profit might
have resulted. We have the state
no doubt that the profit on the sale of
liquors in his hotel from the time he
bought it to the time his libel suit was
started would have been 100000.
made larger sacrifice for law, good
order, and for conscience, than this in
Vermont. The example and the act
is one which ought to rebound to the
credit and the great honor Of Urban
A. Woodbury..
That he could, in the nature Of the
case, not making his home in the ho-
tel, and being actively engaged in
outside pursuits, know what every
employee at the hotel did is not to
have been expected. He could not
prevent liquors being brought to his
house in the trunks or grips of travel
ing guests, nor could he, or his clerks |
so watch bell boys and other people |
about the house. as to prevent them
from handling an occasional bottle of I
LIQUOR on their own account. The tes-
timony showed, and every one famil-
lar with the house, knows that it has
been run as strict temperance house.
The drinking about it was only occa-
sional and the violations of the law
such that it was a difficult thing to /
punish the offender.
It is probably true that the Rutland /
Herald people sent parties to the no
tel for the purpose of trying the
clerks, bell boys and other employees
to find something which could be
brought against the proprietor. The I
onslaught on him was fierce, aggra-
waiting and calculated to stir the blood /
of any man who had any regard for /
his own reputation. It was cruel, I
when the purpose of Gov. Woodbury. /
was known and when the truth, in re-
gard to his honest endeavor to keep
a temperance house and the law, was
The Herald has been al I
most insane in its efforts to bring the I
law into contempt and it has in
more cases than one, published false
and unjust articles on respectable
people. The result of his suit ought
to be such as to teach it a lesson.