Town Meeting

It's the New England Town Meeting time of year.  Registered voters in most towns in New England meet for Town Meeting (never "the" Town Meeting) at least once a year, and act as the legislative body of that town.  Not their representatives - the people themselves.  Their job is slightly different from state to state, but they all gather to decide on policy, planning, taxes and budget.  And anything else that comes up.

It's the purest form of democracy you've ever seen.  They've been doing it for four hundred years.  Everyone gets a say, everyone gets to speak, including Jim Edgerton (left), subject of  "Freedom of Speech" by Norman Rockwell.  He was a real voter in a real town - Arlington, MA - at a real Town Meeting in 1942.  He was against building a new school, and got up to say so.  He was the only one there who opposed the project, but everyone else listened to what he had to say until he was done.  Then everyone voted - one person, one vote - and they went on to the next item on the agenda.

Voting is a serious thing.  All registered voters attending Town Meeting are given a voting card, maybe the size of an IPhone, and when it's time to vote you raise your hand with the card in it.  First the "ayes" and then the "nays."  The moderator decides who which has prevailed, unless it's close, at which time the tellers get up and count their sections and report the results.  Majority rules.

As you probably know, we've had a house in Truro, MA for almost ten years; we pay taxes there but vote in Oneonta, NY.  We're "non-resident taxpayers," and we get to attend Town Meeting and have our say, just like everyone else.  We just don't get to vote.  I've been to Town Meeting, but haven't spoken.  This year, it was televised on local-access TV, and I watched the whole thing - all five hours of it.  I was moved by the ordinary people just like me who gathered under a big tent on the school ballfield, on a perfectly good Saturday in May, to do democracy.  They came together with their neighbors to make decisions that ranged from the annual budget to a massive affordable housing project to giving seniors a $50 break on a dump permit.  It was community, it was responsibility, it was, in many cases, passion, and it was democracy in action.

Arlington still has Town Meeting.  This year, in the deep, dark days for democracy, Arlington Town Moderator Greg Christiana said this to his fellow moderators, at a gathering before the season started:

“Right now, people are afraid. They see a government systematically chilling free speech. The tyranny of fear is setting in. It might seem like a good time to keep your head down and stay quiet, but silence at a time like this would be a grave mistake. Here in New England, we always stood against tyranny, including by votes at town meetings like this, and I hope we always will.”

Turns out the town was named Arlington to honor those who had fallen while defending democracy, and who are buried at Arlington National Cemetery.  New Englanders are like that.  There's a bridge here.  It's in Concord.  Come for our democracy, and we'll be waiting on the other side.