Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1911-09-29
THE VERMONT CENSUS REPORT.

HE VERMONl OENSOS
That there is a silver lining to the
cloud that the census bureaus report
has caused to hover above Vermont
seems easy of proof. Up to the present
time the population of Vermont has con-
sisted largely of genuine old American
stock. Vermont with her upright, rugged
God-fearing men and women has always
stood for what was best in life: for
quality, not quantity. Foreigners who
are willing to work for a low wage, and
to herd together like animals, have not
found a warm welcome here, and there
fore, have not remained to let the num-
Der of their swarming progeny swell the
records of the census bureau.
We have often been told-indeed the
saying has become automatic and is ac-
cepted without due thought-that the
wealth of a nation is in proportion to the
number of its children. And cities or
nations that show a decreasing birth
rate are said to be in a bad way.
If the statement were made that the
poverty of a nation is in proportion to
the number of it's diseased, deformed,
mentally deficient, unsupported children,
it would be capable of easy proof and
although not liked by certain people,
would be accepted as true by most So
cial reformers, philanthropists, and char
liable persons, who have had actual eX-
perience in trying to right the wrongs
OF q world tlaI GOu ueCldTeu TO ne SOOu,
when He finished His work and rested
on the seventh day.
The mentally deficient, the blind, and
the malformed, crippled children, often
natures revenge for broken laws, are
quietly sent to asylums, and a kind pa
rental government cares for them; but
the children that the parents can not or
will not support, are often compelled to
assume the responsibility hat should be-
long to the parents, and are a menace to
the whole population.
In many localities, because of them, it
is unsafe to leave anything, that is not
chained down, out of doors over night.
A piece of yellow linen left to whiten
on the grass, safely hidden at the rear
of the house from view of passers by, is
found at daylight to have disappeared;
wood left to dry is removed by a crowd
of small workers as cleverly organized
as a colony of ants, who disappear as
quickly when frightened away, only TO
return at dark each night and at day
light each morning until what Is left of
the wood is locked in the shed. One
might think that the clothes left to dry
on the line had grown wings in the
night and flown away had not the print
of small bare feet in the mud pointed to
human agency in their disappearance.
No family is too poor to own a little
cart on wheels, and the forage picked up
by the children and carried home in II is
often the main support of parents who
. have no right to propagate their kind.
These hordes of thieving children make
life doubly hard for the sturdy, honest
: little worker who gives up play-time in
the endeavor to help his parents,
In the cities it is often necessary tc
employ special watchmen whenever a
. new building is being erected. Toward
night, safely hidden from sight, a small
I army awaits the departure of the work.
q men. The moment the last man leaves
f the building, the army is on the wins
! over the fence, and the house is soor
f looted of every movable object. No sup.
= plies are safe from their depredations
{ Trained in such a school, is it any
{ wonder that these boys, grown to man
hood, each out and take what the!
: want? They have studied in the schoo
4 of life with dishonest greed for teacher
until they rave little to learn in tn
methods Of acquisition. And the ma
chine of government is just as cleverl,
, organized as in the days when coVete,
+ supplies were handed through the fenc
to a dozen waiting hands, and divided.
One member of the gang-in the Sen
ate perhaps, or maybe a magistrate o.
the bench. or perhaps only a policeman
gets away with a little more tina
his share, But the others do not, be
5 cause of jealousy, make a complaint o
rush into print, They know that to TO
Gus public attention on a clever giraffe
y lessons their own chances of success
e when their opportunity occurs.
They learned years ago, that tn
proper time to make a raid in the bac
e yard was when the attention of tn
- household was attracted in another d
%rection; so, in the larger world of gov
$ eminent, they raise the cry of fraud
against some one not of their gang
{ generally the man of opposing part
farthest from them-and while the pub
u lie, its attention diverted, is reused t
u invective against the one they haV
made scapegoat, they hastily fill the
II wagons. Only now their wagons an
Il larger, and, if not found out and ser
to prison, they ride home to be honore
:. by the community they have ~plundere,
That the population of Vermont is NJ
increased ny the addition of such undo
sirable and unpatriotie people should /
a cause of qualification to all loyal Vel
monters. Were the country to be owe,
run with the dregs of society and IL
,f towns to grow into noisy, dirty ten,
ment-house cities, filled as was II
tower of Babel with warning tongue
then each year the census reports wou
show great increase in population; b
t. Vermont would be a place from whiC
lie to flee, as in the days of the flight fro
h Sodom and Gomorrah.
t. KATHERINE L. WRIGHT.