The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1916-03-06
Clarke C.. Fits Addresses
Large Audience on Liq-
uor Question
SAYS HALF STATE
is UNDER LICENSE
Great Bulk of Business of Vermont
Done in Larger Places Where License
Prevails = Meeting Presided Over
by Attorney r. G. Bacon.

Dy AIIOIuey d. ". 6dSOu.
The Auditorium was well filed last
evening, the audience including
large proportion OF men, when former
Attorney General Clarke G. Fits of
Brattleboro discussed the relative mer-
its of prohibition and local option for
Vermont. The address was delivered
with Mr. Fitts's characteristic force
fulness and incisiveness, and was high
ly interesting, being a different pre-
sentation of facts than had been given
previously.
From 7.30 to S o'cloek there was a
concert by Leitsinger s orchestra and
then Robert C. Bacon, chairman Of the
public service commission, acting as
chairman of the meeting, in a brief ad-
dress introduced Mr.. Fits. Mr.. Bacon
said that the Perry bill presented a
moral Issue and that it presented the
issue squarely 20 the voters as 70
whether the sale of liquor in Vermont
shall be countenanced.
He said that any contributions TO the
cause might be left with s. a. Daniels,
Z. j. Eddy, Carl s. Hopkins, A. L.
Clapp OF Rodney Wheeler.
Mr.. Fits prefaced his address by
saying that he purposed TO present
frankly his own views TO the situation.
He did not intend TO tell anyone how
they should vote, but merely to tell
how he viewed il. He invited questions
and interruptions and promised to an
swer them or frankly say he could not.
No questions were asked.
He took it for granted that all local
optionists as well as prohibitionists
agreed that they do not want a saloon
in Brattleboro. He did not believe that
the chance should be taken annually
that the liquor interests would put one
in town.
The best that is said of local option
IS that ii is best TO stleave well enough
alone.'i That is standpatism It is
the argument to .'stay in the trench
where we have dug ourselves in Well
enough ism ( good enough. The only
thing that is good enough is the best.
So-called local option is not local op-
ltion, he said. If we were to have q
real local option law il would be one
that would require vote on whether
we should grant license to buy and
drink liquor in Brattleboro by Brat
tleboro citizens only. That would mean
that Brattleboro alone should bear the
resulting burden of the increased taxes
for the increased cost of maintaining
penal institutions.
To illustrate the point he said that
Guilford had voted license once in a
while, but that not one dollar of every
hundred spent in that town for liquor
was by Guilford residents. 1t was
Brattleboro money. Therefore, il was
e not local option for Guilford.
: "When we vote yes here in Brat
!, tleboro it spells hell and damnation
|, from Dummerston to Londonderry, he
r said, and the remark, brought out
Z hearty applause.
b Conditions that have made the cam
,paign apathetie in Brattleboror and vi.
Ieinity have made it energetic in Rut-
land and Chittenden counties, where
there are licensed saloons. He asked
how many local optionists would vote
for real local option as he had out
lined il.
He declared that Vermont could dC
N worse than Maine, a state widely de
rided by reason of its prohibitory law
There is less crime per capita in Maine
than in any other state iE the union
There is less insanity there per capita
u That state stands for temperance
- sobriety and the smallness OF crime
! ! Vermont is sliding back in the list o.
states, under local option. The com
" more than doubled under local option
Speaking of the fact that the Ii
= censed places In the state are general,
! ! the centers of population he declare
!. that ''half of the population of Ner
=; mont does business in licensed town
! and that is the. reason why the poprls
a. - tion of the penal institutions has NOR
- than doubled since 1902. -
He asked if il would be fair, speai
80 ing of the fairness of arguments mad
- in the heat of campaigns, 20 say ths
- with Brattleboro and Bellows Falls 70
ing for license "only two of % town
in the county were wet
He vigorously attacked the stat
ments often made that the prohibitor
Sc law, if passed, could not be enforcel
Speaking of the fact that IL Is ns
. fair to charge the increase in the co
? of municipal courts to the local q
IN tion law alone, he explained that
&c those sections where license prevailt
&c il became necessary to have moi
ng courts and they were establishe
TO Then the other sections Of the stat
Ter where they were not needed. rushed
IKE and got them.
al The wall that no liquor could be o
nd tanned under the Perry bin for medic
er. nal purposes be dismissed with q
TO statement that the proposed law in th
the respect is exactly the same as has be,
in force in Brattleboro several year
He knew of no family in which the
ur- had been a death because of the failu