Windham County reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1901-1906, 1902-09-05
Results Full of Good,


in which by party leaders on bot
sides has been infinitely productive {
evil, that her people were incapable c
stepping out of party lines We kno'
now that it is not true, and it neve
has been: the reason for the error
that for more than generation pas
the issues that call for independen
voting had never been squarely an
properly made and presented. Their
is no people anywhere on earth tina
can be more deeply stirred by mora
forces. and it was only because prohi
bition seemed to the surface view t.
involve a moral idea and duty that i
took so strong and long a hold. There
is no people more 'steadfast to its con
victons and therefore when once it ha:
embraced an error more inSistent upor
full demonstration thereof before II
changes opinion, but when it changes
the change marks real and permanent
progress Thus it is that radicalism
ed in the descendants of the Green
Mountain boys. Thus it was that they
built up so wonderfully good govern
ment in the days of their independ-
ence thus it was they were the first
in New England to embrace, and the
steadiest to sustain, the Jetfersonian
Democracy in its high ideas and be-
nign philosophy: thus it was that
they went strongest in the political
breakup of the thirties into the anti
Masonic movement with the belief
that it contained a moral issue; thus
it was that they made their early and
splendid record for anti slayery, and
thus it was that they were so quick to
follow Maine into prohibitory legisla-
tion when the idea was new and 50 at
tractiye in the illusion that it meant
the betterment of mankind.
1t was but characteristic of Yer
monters that the idea should have
been given a complete and thorough
trial, even going to extremes, in seek
ing to make it effective, that outraged
all principles that belong TO Vermont
or to free government itself The
demonstration has been completely
made that the law is impracticable.
and VermonterS, with their usual
clearness of reason. now see that the
reason it is impracticable, that it has
become so permeated through and
through with corruption and abuse. is
that it rests upon wrong principles,
violative of the Democratic doctrine
of Home Rule and Home Responsible
ity, through which best results are al
ways wrought out in government, I'M
Vermont theory is a delusion. And
now they have expressed their mature
conviction that in return to Home
Rule methods. through local option, /
and back of that individual response /
bility as the basic idea, is the best /
treatment of this most difficult and /
perplexing of modern questions, and
most promotive of temperance itself.
So in the largest vote ever recorded |
in the state the people have decreed .
this change, the 35,397 for Clement |
and McGettrick to 81, 313 for McCul-
Tough and Sherburne. Some 1000 I
Democrats and 10000 Republicans
have stepped out of their party lines
to do it. The result is unmistakable,
Every vote for Clement or McGettrick
means local option and so do large
numbers of the Mccullough votes held
to the regular ticket only by the prom
Use of local option through referen-
dun. The only surprising thing is
the smallness of the Sherburne vote,
for in that column was the only consis-
tent place for the men who really ac-
cept the prohibition view. that it ought
to be a law because it is right, regard
less of what maiorities want, and that
the true way to reach right is to lead
to it by law. The most surprising I
feature of the campaign has been total {
Jack of defense of prohibition for it
self, except from this little band of
,traightout prohibitionists There are |
If course prohibitionists, more or less a
decided in opinion, in the Mccullough t
,olumn-perhaps two-thirds of the
whole. So estimating it means that
$, 600 votes against LOCO are in favor 1
If local option. This is about what d
he Republican caucus results indicat- >
ID last spring, only more so-that
bout half the Republicans and practi- /
ally all the Democrats were that way. :.
1t shows how grossly misrepresenta :,
i've a representative government may
,e. Every test in the Legislature for
0 years has shown two-thirds to three p
ourths in support of the law to ii
,hich more than two-tbirds of the "
eople are now proved to be opposed.
he result has been solely due to the
otes of men who neither believed in X
t nor lived up to its principles, but so II
oted because they thought it popular
he Reformer has always maintained
nat this was only a superstition, as &C
as also the notion that the small ST
owns favored the law. Tuesdays fig
res both prove that we were right in
!, ppipipp en- generally raUar1a1 u