Chris Graff Commentary

Speaking in 1931 to the Vermont Commission on Country Life, Vermont Supreme Court Justice Wendell Stafford said, "Of Vermont have many books been written, many pictures painted, many songs sung. Yet who shall say that he has ever really seen Vermont? She cannot be seen or described. She can only be suggested." Later in the same speech, Stafford said, "It is always a perilous thing to let a Vermonter get started on the subject of Vermont." As a member of the Council on the Future of Vermont, I appreciate those remarks more today than I did a year ago, when the council began an ambitious project to discover how contemporary Vermonters feel about their state and its future. The council's listening tour has visited 10 of the 14 counties, and Vermonters of all walks of life have spoken passionately about their hopes, their dreams and their fears for the future of Vermont.