May 7, 2005...
Democracy is on everyone's lips these days. It means respect for human rights, and government by people who owe their positions to election by the people. It does not mean "self-government‚" - except here in New England, in towns like Ashfield.
Churchill once remarked that democracy was the worst form of government imaginable ... except for all the alternatives. Reading and hearing reports from Iraq and Afghanistan - and from Washington DC, and Texas, and Boston, for that matter - we know what he meant.
But in Ashfield, we govern ourselves democratically because it has always seemed perfectly natural and right to do so.
I have been looking into the development of democracy in Ashfield. Ever since it was settled over 250 years ago as a "plantation" called Huntstown, this town has been governed directly by the people who live here.
Actually, in the middle of the 18th century, for about three years, it was governed by "proprietors" - that is, people who owned land here, though few of them actually lived here. But in 1765, two dramatic things happened in Boston: the town got its permanent name, "Ashfield"; and the legislature, the General Court, declared that local laws would henceforth be made by "inhabitants," people who had settled on land here.
Ever since then, residents have met from time to time, at least once a year, sometimes several times in a given year, to plan developments in town (roads, churches, schools, police and fire protection, and other services we want), and to levy taxes on local property to pay for them.
In the early years, we made foreign policy and provided for the national defense, right here in this forum (not in this building, but nearby - but that is another set of stories). We even took action on the U. S. Constitution; we opposed it. We instructed our delegate, Ephraim Williams, to vote against ratification. It only passed into existence because Squire Williams, and eighteen other delegates from small Massachusetts towns, violated their mandates and voted to ratify it.
There have been disagreements over the years, some of them pretty sharp, some that lasted for quite a while, over the two and a half centuries of our existence as a town.
But what makes democracy work here is our respect for one another as people with an equal stake in this precious town. A town is an ongoing creation. We have inherited it from those who have gone before, and we will pass it along to those who follow. In the meantime, we will try to be faithful stewards. It is a great privilege to be part of it.