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Politics & Government

DeSorgher: It's the Only Game in Town and it Decides Your Future – Town Meeting

On Monday, April 30 at 7:30 p.m. in the Medfield High School gymnasium, residents will participate in the town's 361st Annual Town Meeting. Here's a look at the history of Medfield Town Meetings.

The critics are out there.

It is inefficient some will say. Others say it is boring and the seats are too hard.

Critics of the institution claim that, in practice it is not the purest form of democracy. They point to low turnout of registered voters, and the alleged domination of the meetings by special interest groups.

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James Madison, a critic of town meetings, wrote in The Federalist Number 55, "In all very numerous assemblies, of whatever characters composed, passion never fails to wrest the scepter from reason. Had every Athenian citizen been a Socrates, every Athenian assembly would still have been a mob."

They are all talking about Town Meeting. Accept or reject the criticism, the fact remains that it is the system we have in Medfield, like many other small New England towns. It is the only ballgame in town.

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Do you want a bike and multi-use trail to run along the former train line going towards Dover and Needham?; should the town replace the water mains along North and Green Streets?; what is the quality of our drinking water going to be?; what is your opinion on the future of the former and should we hire a consultant to advise us, as it will have a historic impact on the town?; what is the quality of your child’s education going to be for the next year; what will you pay for taxes? These and many other issues are decided upon by those who show up at Town Meeting.

The Medfield Town Meeting; typically 400 to 600 voters will be there. They will be given all the power and all the authority to decide what the quality of life will be like in Medfield for the upcoming year. They will get to make all the decisions. The other 9,000 who stay at home forfeit their voice, ability to vote and decision making.

They will have no say.

Medfield’s first Town Meeting took place 361 years ago, in 1651, when we became the 43rd town in the then Massachusetts Bay Colony. Over the years, Town Meeting voted or voted down issues that have had enormous impact on the town. In 1713, Town Meeting voted down an article to build a new meeting-house on the west side of the Charles River.

That vote caused the settlers in “western” Medfield to breakaway and form the new town of Medway. During Revolutionary times, Medfield Town Meeting voted to establish a Medfield Minuteman Company, support the actions of Samuel Adams against British injustices in Boston, and stated that those in Medfield, “have all the rights and privileges of Englishmen as the birthright of every American.”  

In 1881, Medfield Town Meeting took up the issue of “extending to women, who are citizens, the right to vote in town affairs, and to hold town offices, on the same terms as male citizens.” This was some 38 years ahead of the federal government’s giving the women the right to vote with the passage of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

In 1895, it was a Town Meeting vote that permitted Medfield Catholics to have the right to be buried in Vine Lake Cemetery for the first time. During the 1950’s, Town Meeting voted to build the instead of adding a second story on the current Pfaff Center.

It was a handful of votes that prevented a bowling alley from being built in Medfield Center on North Street and a handful of votes that prevented the town from obtaining the property where the current Mobil Gas Station is located, for use as a Town Common or green area. Defeat of the Historic District at Town Meeting in the 1970’s led to the demolition of one of Medfield’s most impressive and historic mansions, The Curtis Mansion, on the corner of North and Frairy Streets. Those who attended got to decide Medfield’s future.

On Monday, April 30 in the gymnasium of , this 361 year-old tradition will continue when Town Moderator Scott McDermott bangs his gavel and brings to order the 2012 Annual Town Meeting. You can be in on the decision making by attending or you can stay home and be given the decisions of those who do attend. 

It is said that democracy is not a spectator sport and there is no better example of that than the New England Town Meeting. Action here in Medfield begins at 7:30 p.m. on Monday night.

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