Windham County reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1901-1906, 1902-05-23
MIR. C. H, DAvENPORTs REPLY.
In reply to Dir. Marble says:

sufficient to call his opponents rum
miles, he recognized it to be ques
ton upon which men can disagree
while seeking only the best public
good.
The principle of the present law he
defends by likening it to CLOSE" sea
sons of fishing and the exclusion OF
bicycle riders from sidewalks--a kind
of legislation, he said that becomes
more and more necessary as civilization
grows complex. If this be true, its
logical meaning is an exact contradic-
ton of human experience; it means
that the more mankind advances. the
greater the denial of individual rights
the completer tyrannical power. We
don't believe Christianity and civil
cation have been such failure for
the race. What is true is that law
must be bottomed on the Ten Com
mandments and the completely of civ
ilization does not enlarge it's domain,
only sometimes makes it more difficult
to discern it clearly. Catching of fish
at spawning seasons, for instance, is
properly forbidden because it operates
| to deprive Others of their rights in
wantonly destroying food supply of fish !;
bicycle riding on sidewalks is prohib-
| tied because in these narrow limits it
endangers life and limb of pedestrians.
But, unlike our liquor law, these pro
hibitions stop with prohibiting what
ought to be prohibited. If for the
sake of including that, they prohibit
ed bicycle riding at all, or fishing at
all, it would be patterned after the
prohibitory liquor law. Instead there
fore, of demonstrating what he intend
ed. the DOCTORS illustrations demon
strate just the contrary and exemplify
admirably the idea of local-option
license.
So also of his further defense of the
principle of the law, that it does not
interfere with individual rights in
what man may drink or serve at his
own home. We are. willing to trust
the conclusion of so clear headed
man as Dr. Marble if he will only
think it through Unless he manufac-
lures it himself no man can drink in
toxicatng liquor without buying it,
and he can't buy it without inducing
somebody to commit what the law de-
clares to be crime, and he, if a pro-
hibitionist, votes to make a crime.
The fundamental morals of the thing
are not altered by his sending out of
the state to buy; nor even the techni-
cal violation, because the law forbids
the transportation. There is neither
justice nor common sense, nor com
mon decency even. in legislation which
makes one mans half of transaction
all right and the other mans half of
the same transaction such crime as
the Vermont law does any sale of liq-
uor for any purpose outside of a town
agency. 1t is a system that operates
directly to deplete the community of
manhood and fill it with cowardice
and hypocrisy. Before prohibition
can stand up in the court of civilza-
ton. or anywhere except in China,
where it had its origin. let it be
straight and prohibit buyer and seller
alike.
DR.. Marble was rather effective in |
his arraignment of some of Mr.. Glenn !
ent's exaggerations. Then didn't he !
jump into the same thing himself .
when he declared that the question
reduced to its lowest terms was
we should have five or six sa-
looms in Brattlehoro-which quickly
grew into 10 as the argument warmed
up? That is question that would be
asked only after we get local option.
The question now, and the only one,
is whether Brattleboro, and other
owns, knowing best their conditions
and surroundings and possibilities the
nXtent and manageability of the evil
hat confronts them, shall have the
power to decide for themselves how
hey will deal with it. Reduced to
Is lowest terms" it is the question of
elf government itself The doctrine
hat says that Somerset with its 7J
people shall, to the extent il does, say
What Brattleboro with lis 1000 NAV do.
5 logically part Of the same thing
hat empowers the car of Russia to
ay what his 70,000,000 may do; both
people are not to be trusted to decide
or themselves. but must be subject to
ome power above or outside.
No candid man will claim that it is
question between poorly enforced
and perfectly enforced Ii
.ense.' Perfection is not found in
human affairs and certainly not in the
liquor traffic under whatever system.
st measure of good and least of evil,
Iuu lldb iutSllOn III buIu Is tudb
which is the nearest right in princi-
lie. 1t is because the present law has
10 real foundation of Just principle by
which the vast mass of its authors are
Wiling to abide themselves in good
aith and in its full meaning, that it
'ecomes such a bottomless bog of mis-
ERECTED effort, of official rascality, of
ractical inefiiciency and of commun- I
ty insincerity.
The whole defense of the law reduces
tself 10 the claim that license does
OF effect any restraint. that its pro
EDITIONS tof sales to minors, confirmed !
runkards &c. are just as much dis
egarded as general prohibition, and
therefore, that license is so much lost
round The answer is in the official {
cures from Greenfield, whose condi-
ions closely correspond with ours: /
10 years she has had prosecutions for
violating the prohibitory features I
five years she had prosecutions for
selling without license 2 I
five years Brattleboro has had pros
ecutions for violation of prohibit 4
ton. (Reeords at county clerks
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES. ~
So the argument is one fortieth part v
,rrect-a remarkably good proportion j.,
II prohibitory argument. .
Greenfield one year by a tie, voted
no license Her town report for d
lat year
lows arrests for drunkenness.......... 101 p
he next year she returned to license
and her arrests for drunkenness q,
numbered. ........-.-...-.-.-.-.... ~ "
n