1975-03-03 to 1975-04-16 ATM-min

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(Adj. Tn. Mtg. - March 25, 1975) Article 2. principles; I do not know whether they will serve only as counsels; (Cont.) but this much I think I do know -- that a society so riven that the spirit of moderation is gone, no court can save, that a society where that spirit flourishes, no court need save; that in a society which evades its responsibilities by thrusting upon the courts the nurture of that spirit, that spirit in the end will perish." Some years ago when I was Moderator I used to go on the Town Meeting member tours, partly to find out what was going on, and partly to try to put together the names and faces of the new members. A curious thing happened over and over again. I was constantly asked the same question, "How many nights do you think, Bob, how many nights this year ?" Yes, brevity has virtue, of that I am now painfully aware, and it would be great if we could confine dis- cussion to the really important, and rarely consider an article more than once. But given effort to identify the important and to stay with it, the quality of this meeting surely cannot be measured in terms of a small numbered response to the question, how many nights? Neither, I would suggest with great respect to the hard- working citizens to my right, those legitimate guardians against waste, neither is the size of the tax rate the one true barometer of success of the meeting. Holmes has said that taxes are what we pay for civilized. society. When I divide the tax by the number of days in the year, I am amazed at how much, tangible and intangible, we receive. And I deeply believe that the quality of a community is to be measured more by how much we can do together than by how little we can get by with. I have suggested that this meeting not try to avoid the terrible problems facing Boston, the country, the world. These are our problems, as they were recognized to be 200 years ago. Our relation- ship to these problems should be discussed in this place. These problems are controversial; to use an overworked but very appropriate word, they are divisive. My own feeling is that we have suffered as a people from a malaise of the political spirit since the dreadful events of 1963 and 1968. The agony of Vietnam has touched this community in many ways, and we are all adept at interpreting Lex- ington's history to bring it into harmony with our own pictures of the present. We need a rededication to Judge Hand's spirit of moderation, not to the moderation of the uninvolved, but to a spirit of civility with each other, that civility which necessitates the procedures by which this meeting is governed. In an atmosphere of civility we can come together and work out informed positions on tough problems. If for want of such civility we shrink from those problems we are in trouble. Earl Warren put it this way: "Our nation stands at a crossroads. As we face the future, we must make a choice on which way we shall travel. One leads to that plural society to which we rededicate ourselv:s -when- ever we repeat the Pledge of Allegiance. That road leads to unity of purpose and action which will make life meaningful for all. The other_ road would divide us into segments of discontented people with a divisiveness that leaves no room for the happiness and contentment of the children of any of us in the forseeable future." I believe in symbols. On the walls of the High School Auditorium are two inscriptions: on one wall "What a Glorious Morning for America "; on the other, "Every Man is the Architect of His Own Future" (and man can and must be read to include woman). Those inscriptions belong here as well, for between the heritage on the one hand and the future on the other, this meeting is the workshop; what happens here is the blueprint for tomorrow; however well it is done, it becomes the heritage we leave for the generations unborn. What happens here today takes on far more meaning because of what happened then. The country pays attention to what we do, because of what they did, it is at once our unique opportunity and our very special burden. Mr. Moderator, I believe that the relationship of this Town Meeting to the events of 200 years ago can be expressed in a question drawn . from those words of Jones Clarke brought so vividly to our own con- sciousness through the work of Doris Pullen: "They Nobly Dar'd ". How nobly dare do we ?" 8:13 P. M.