Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1902-12-26
The License Law and the Referendum.

The seventy-fve thousand copies of
the license law, provided by a joint
resolution of the legislature have been
printed with commendable prompt
ness. and distribution of them wa
begun through the town clerks at tn
end of last week. Every voter in the
state is entitled to copy of this pam
phlet, and every voter ought to make
it his business to get a copy, and take
it home, and read the law carefully
section by section, and form his owr
opinion about it, While individua
Judgment will differ about many OF
the provisions, it will be agreed that
as a whole, the law, as a license law
is a good one, and that it was the in.
tention of those who framed it to give
the state rigid control over the liquo'
traffic under the license system. 1t is
by no means a free rum" measure
Under its provisions, strictly enforc.
ed. it ought to be impossible for ire
sponsible and dangerous men to gain
control of the saloon business. and the
severity Of the peremptory provisions
for the punishment of illegal selling
would seem to be as effective a deter
rent against that business as could be
devised But there are three leading
points which temperance men must
take into view when considering the
possible adoption of the law:
|. 1t lets down the bars and gives
the open saloon legalzed entrance in
to Vermont. Under any circumstan-
ces the open saloon is admittedly one
of the greatest evils of our time, and
in scores of little Vermont villages
it would be a veritable moral pest
hole, should vote for license be car
ried.
.. The saloon always becomes
controlling factor in politics. and it
must especially become so under the
provision of this law which makes the
selectmen of towns and the aldermen
and mayor of cities appoint the IL,
censing boards. Under this method it
will inevitably be the main effort of
the liquor interest, not to secure the
best men for town and city officers,
but TO secure officers who are friendly
to that interest. This point is COW
cred clearly and fairly in an extract
from a Montpelier letter to the Bos
ton Transcript which is printed else
where in this paper.
3. A license law, no matter how good
or effective, will not enforce itself
The men who hold the licenses will
not take the lead in enforcing it. It
must be enforced, if done effectively
by the officers charged with this duty
backed up by public sentiment Ex-
perience in all license states shows
that this is literally true. 1t is claim
ed and figures are given to show. that
there is as much evasion under license
as under prohibition. This is be-
cause every saloon keeper becomes
himself more or less an evader of the
law, and he does not care to invite
attack on himself by attacking others
Moreover no reputable" saloon keep
er wants the trade of the low, drunk
en-. hummer" element. He prefers
that it go to the pocket peddlers, the
kitchen barrooms or the dives.
These three points are not criti-
cisms against the Vermont law in par
ticular. They lie against all license
laws, and they, have got to be taken
into account by every voter who re-
CARDS himself friend of temperance,
but whose conviction or whose preju-
dice leads him to favor license for the
control of the liquor traffic.
The campaign of the next five
weeks, for and against the license law,
ought to be conducted on educational
lines. The effort on both sides ought
to be to arouse the thoughtful and in
telligent interest of every voter, and
call out an expression of individual
conviction at the polls, and not to ap-
peal to passion or prejudice. What
is wanted at the referendum is to find
out what the people of Vermont think
and want as between license and pro-
hibition. This is what the referen-
DUN is for. A forced verdict for
either side would be of little value.
1t would not be decisive. 1t would
not he accepted as final. From the
outset there ought not to be any at
tempt to put any man in the wrong,
or under a ban, or to accuse him as
an enemy of temperance. on which
ever side he votes. On the contrary,
let the effort be to bring out every
mans intelligent, conscientious con-
viction, and to get him to express it
when he drops his vote into the box
on the 3rd day of February. That is
the kind of a referendum vote that the
state of Vermont wants, The major
ity verdict Of such vote throughout
the state will stand. The cause OF
temperance will not be the loser
in the end through such methods, and
as the result of such a vote.