Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1903-01-12
OUR WORK FOR FEBRUARY 3.

to plain way. Inc questlon now
squarely before Us is, do Vermonters
want license and local option9
What is now needed among our
people is calm courage and steady
work. In answering the central
question at issue 1 am confident in
the assumption that no true son or
daughter of Vermont wants license.
While several classes are trying to
believe that they want it, or are being
deluded by the notion that some
present ills might be escaped if we
had it, the sane, second thought of
every one is that we don't want 1t.
A large part of our people have all
along been of that mind, and since
we are near the time when each one
is called upon to express himself we
are coming more nearly to a unani-
NOUS sentiment on that point. I am
confident in these assertions from a
somewhat extended observation of
the sc ntiments of our people as ex-
pressed in the general conversations
and debates which are taking place
every day.
The man who declares that the
people are swinging toward license
has failed to take the pulse of the
people. His diagnosis has been of
the politicians, or perhaps, of the
papers.
The schools and the business and
| churches of the state are against Ii
cense. The fatherhood and mother
hood of the state abhor it. The
patriotism, the ambition and sense of
our people repudiate it; and even if
these should hold their peace the
stones of our hills would cry out
against it.
The majority of those who are
cursed by the drink appetite really
wish, during more than half of their
waking hours, that the iend who has
robbed and ruined them was banished
| forever from our midst. Even those
who make a gain of the traffic and
| live upon the price of blood more
than half of the time know the tor
lures of that hell where everyone
| hates himself while he blasts and
burns his fellow; and he is looking
for some relief in his misery, and
secretly wishing that he was in better
business.
Nobody really wants the saloon in
Vermont!
The assertion above is not made
without some hesitation on the
ground that it may foster over-confi-
dence, and lead some to slacken their
efforts. Such ought not to be the re-
suit. We can battle all the better
when hopeful and confident spirit
prevails. All the temperance forces
should be tirelessly active in the
month that remains. And, if mat
ter of personal opinion may be
allowed, the writer would Suggest
that we shall be wise to work oul
local forces. We have not now tc
make sentiment so much as to crys.
tallize and focus it. This can be done
by neighbor comforting with neighbor
pastor with people, teacher with pu'
pill, wife with husband, mother will
son. We need a multitude of towr
and neighborhood rallies, and fol
speakers on such occasions none art
better than the citizens themselves
speaking to their neighbors in TIT
homely but forceful language of thu
farm and the home. Some who hav'
never reckoned themselves publ,
speakers could address such gather
! ings with resistless eloquence. Th
, wife or mother whose heart has ble'
on account of the rum curse, tn
parent who breads it's deadly blast
? the child who has shivered an
starved that the saloon might b
warm and it's keeper fare stump
3 tuously, all these will be gladly heard
and their words will weigh, thong
3 the grammar or rhetoric may b
Q faulty. We want also confession
0 and such praying as has never bee
9 known before. sour help comet
from God which made heaven an
earth"
}. Then, after this working and pray
II ing, on the night before the ballotin
o let every voter look in the face {
J. wife and child and next mornin
= bring out the bible, and kissing b
y loved ones, swear over that sacre
=, !, book to be q man that day. The
y when the day ends, our old Gree
'. Mountain state will have won fin.
laurels than at Ticonderoga or Getty