The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1909-02-03

--'o INNH uNAulc q AeBlHidluft LOT years
Il might be said thar it requires about
as long to thrash out those questions
whether they are solved or not. The
time was not spent largely with the
question this year as is usually the
case, not as much time was spent to
reach an unfavOrable conclusion on
The plurality election question as usu-
al, the liquor business came in for
about the usual amount of attention.
The automobile did not come In for
an unreasonable amount of attention
II must also be conceded that as VeI-
mont grows, as her industries Increase
As civilization advances requiring
more and better roads and schools. as
the banks and corporations grow In
number and volume Of business. that
the legislatures of the present must
necessarily be longer than those of
the past As the Journal said a long
time ago, the day of the before.
thanksgiving adjournment has gone
and gone forever
Is the legislature wholly justified
by one who watched its doings for
the long session, il is justified for It's
failure to accomplish some of the
things 1t was hoped that would follow
No. No and no again
The House, which is generally given
credit for the failures of the present
legislature, had some good qualities.
It was Independent in action. il would
not be led by any one, il contained a
greater number of men able TO put up
a good argument than either of the
last two legislatures. The members
of the legislature. that is. a majority
of them were SELFISH and. as II
seems by the continued reconsidera.
ton of questions. the turning com
pletely around from the time the bin
was passed TO a third reading TO the
time it was placed on its passage. IN
CONSISTENT or WITHOUT A MIND
When its mind was finally made up
however and generally selfish mot
ives played strong part in making It
up ii could not be changed All the
argument in creation would nor turn
it, They wouldn't be made to swal-
low anything The administration did
not seem to realize this and that
made the legislature long for one
thing. The House advanced to
third reading the bill abolishing off
sets and then, after their minds had
been firmly made up. refused a pas
sage of the bill by as large vote as
il advanced it TO a third reading. That
broke up the scheme for taxation re.
form as laid down by the taxation com
mission. 1t simply would not change
It's mind The time spent after that
to accomplish the adjustment of of
sets. the same question that was al
ready dead, was wasted The time
spent to slide through the 100000 nor
NAL school proposition after the money
had ali been spent and the House had
refused to pass it, was all wasted.
AS TO the selfshness, anybody could
see it. When a question came up the
first question was (this. of course,
does not apply TO all, but to a lot OF
them) Does that affect my inter
cstsT The next Does il affect my
town" The next. is II good
thing for my state as general princi-
pie to follow There It IL in nut.
she'll If the questions had been ask
ed commencing at the other end first
results would have been different. The
combination of selfshness and stabil-
ity when the mind was once made is
well illustrated in the passage Of the
bill increasing the pay of the mem
bers. 1t was true that the legislators
should receive more than &c. as that
amount Is not enough The bill could
not be passed without the application
10 the present members So when
the members were sufficiently NOV
ed by this selfishness for more they
had the strength of convictiin to pass
the bill in the face Of all sorts of crit
icism They confirmed their streak
of human nature by their votes Other
legislatures would have liked to do
the same thing but they didn't have
the courage There you have the
character of the legislature Of 1908
and 1909 More win be said later
about some things that were accom-
plished when questions were taken up
in which the self and town interest
were not potent factors.