Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1914-07-30
W|LS0y WINS FIRST ROUND
Kidder EnjOined from Interior
ing in Water Dept. Affairs.
Pending Final Settlement OF Dispute
by Supreme Court, Judge Fish
Rules in Favor OF New
commissioners.

Thursday afternoon at the county court
house when the two opposing factions N
the struggle for control of the city water
works met In their efforts to have each
other enjoned from interfering with the
conduct of the office. The battle was long
and wordy, and ended with the fort. tenn
porarily al least. in the possession of the
Wilson forces.
The hearing before Judge Frank l..
Fish was called at two o'clock. Max i.
Powell appeared for Mr.. Wilson, the city
attorney taking no part except as one OF
the crowd of spectators who thronged the
door of the small room in which the hear
Ing was held Counsel for Mr.. Kldder
were V. A. Billiard and Sherman r. Moul-
ton. In the room beside the judge and
counsel were practically all the figures
OF the long and complicated disagree
ment, aldermen, mayor, superintendent
and would-be superintendent, waite
commissioners and pretended water com
missoners
Mr.. Powell opened the case with a long
argument, punctuated by the citation OF
precedents, the gist of his remarks being
that Mr. Wilson was in fact the acting
superintendent of the water works. elect .
cd by Messrs Leonard, Grady and An
gus. in fact the acting commissioners
and that pending the decision by the su
preme court of the legality of the pro
ceedings which purported to put out
Messrs. Jones, Simays and Rutter. the
equity court ought to grant an Injunction
restraining Mr.. Kidder from interfering
with the running of the office.
AS the case progressed the question Of
which one was the de factO s1Iperintend-
eht ioor1eo large MI. To"e'i III t'e
opening argument clted many authorl-
Ties TO indicate that the court shoulo
protect by injunction against "'a'liian'S
the de facto holders or an crice. AT the
end OF MT io"eil argument MI nu'-
iard was on MS rect proclaln'ins 'ne woes
."s 'epo' menu, 20 t''as
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e r"''.' ~ A"o" VIM "as ''i'' :" Pc,
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."' -''' We ia, " super ~
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P''e anu 'uiH ou Jul III dues''''"o'
'" s'''7 "S'''" t'o' INC i''1' ''"9'
was oiiiS 'e''iporarN' '"a' 'he supfe.'7
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,,, "a'u '"e uue''Io"' VIM" al. 1on,'
ue'o'Seu ~ 'l'e SUPP e''e Voul' sue Vs.
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or secton 10 TOR SUCH reasons as TO II
shall seem SUFFICIENT was quoted with
force Mr. Powell said the question vast
Did the city council have the power TO
remove these commissioners? Did they
by vote remove them? Did they have
power to I'LL vacancies created by remoV-
ais? Did they elect the new commission
ers ana did the new commissioners quail
n.y. DID they elect wilson and did Will
son qualify? IF this was true he claimed
that Wilson was the de facto superintend-
ent.
The Judge took the direction of the case
into his hands about this time. He lev
eled a number of questions at Mr.. Pow
ell. attempting in particular to ascer-
tain whether Mr.. Kidder was removed
ana whether Wilson was ;hen properly
elected. There seemed no great dispute
on this point. Mr., Moulton denied that
the charges We're served on Mr. Kidder
but the court did not seem to deem this
an insurmountablc obstacle. There was
also an amendment to the bill which Mr.
Powell asked and was granted to make
At length Judge Fish summarized the
case something as follows: There are