Windham County reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1901-1906, 1903-02-13
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10
Some Final Considerations.

A majority of the voters of the state
having accepted the new local option
high license law, the people of all the
towns, whether previously favoring il
or not, should now render loyal sup
port to the measure and do all in theil
power to give it a fair trial and have it
properly enforced.
The prohibitory law has not been
thus enforced. 1t was unjust in prin-
ciple, obtained over towns a majority
of whose people did not want it, and
thus failed to secure the endorsement
of public sentiment The result has
been an illegal and surreptitious traffic 4;
a lowering of self respect in individ-
ual and community; and general
moral and industrial deterioration rec
ognized and deplored by all.
No such obstacles to success need lie
in the way of the new law. 1t holds
two opportunities from which town
may choose: either have liquor traf-
fic, conducted decently and shorn as
far as possible of evil or else have
none at all. 1t provides strong and eff
fective means for satisfaction under
either choice. There can be no rea-
sonable excuse for evasion of the law
in a town, when that town chooses the
law itself 1t is Home Rule, so dear
to the heart of every thinking, reason
ing being.
The restrictions and provisions of
the new license law, as to their appli-
cation to his particular town, should
be carefully studied by each individ
ual voter, before he votes; especially
by citizens of towns where any con-
siderable demand for liquor exists.
The larger this demand, the more diff
cult and injurious to the welfare of the
town is the enforcement of prohibi.
ton: and the more probable for the
peace and progress of the town, the ac-
ceptance of the license system offered |
by the new law. People who do not T
drink, or want to drink, liquor should
remember that it need not be their
primal aim to deprive a neighbor of |
that privilege, but only to hinder him
from abusing it. In such towns only
as have large and prevailing senti-
ment, and not bare majority, for pro-
hibition should license be refused The
good of the town and not ones personal
preferences should be considered; and
since long trial has shown us that
prohibition does not work for the good
of communities, the license law should
be given the preference, in towns where
the liquor demand warrants license,
for the sake of fairly testing it's value
as corrector of abuses.
Nobody hangs to prohibition now
adays from belief in its practical value;
but many hesitate to abandon it
through lack of confidence in the new
law. The only supporters it has are '
the politicians who profit by it and the {
idealists who will not look beyond their
belief that it is wrong to license an
evil. The former need not be considered {
in connection with the good of any |
thing and the latter might be easily {
converted if they could be induced to &
take the larger view, beyond them I
selves, of the needs and environments a
of others. L
In these days of final decisions, there i
is need of wide thought and unselfish
considerations. Not my theories, my
appetites, my convenience, should be /
the line of reasoning taken: but my. f
town, the public good, the safety of t
society, the prosperity of all. Let us i
throw aside fractional feel ng and pref
udice and show ourselves broad mind
ed and progressive enough to join ;,
heartily in the supreme effort now =
being made for the uplifting and re- :.
generation of Vermont. =
Divided, half hearted effort accom-
plishes little; but working together,
with the honest purpose to get out of
,he new law all of good it may possibly Ct
hold for our state, we may obtain abun- g
1antly the results for which we hope P
and for which the trainers of the meas o,
Ire struggled. 81