Vermont
This article is about the U.S. state. For other meanings, see Vermont (disambiguation).) is a
U.S. state located in
New England. The state ranks 43rd in land area (9,250
sq mi), is the most
rural, and its population (608,827) ranks as the second smallest of the 50 states. As the only
New England state with no
coastline along the
Atlantic Ocean, Vermont is notable for the
Green Mountains in the west and
Lake Champlain in the northwest. It is bordered by
Massachusetts to the south,
New Hampshire to the east,
New York to the west, and the
Canadian province of
Quebec to the north.
Originally inhabited by
Native American tribes (
Iroquois,
Algonquian and
Abenaki), the territory that is now Vermont was claimed by
France but became a British possession after France's defeat in the
French and Indian War. For many years, rightful control of the area was disputed by the surrounding
colonies. Settlers who held land titles granted by the
Province of New Hampshire, through their
Green Mountain Boys militia, eventually prevailed. Vermont became the 14th state to join the United States, following a 14-year period during and after the
Revolutionary War as the independent
Republic of Vermont.
Famous for its scenery,
dairy products and
maple syrup (it is the leading producer of maple syrup in the United States), Vermont has long been known for its
liberal politics and staunchly independent political thinking. The state capital is
Montpelier, while the largest city is
Burlington.
Two
United States Navy ships have been named
USS Vermont; the first
Vermont was a
receiving ship and the second
Vermont (BB-20) was a
Connecticut-class battleship.
Vermont is located in the New England region in the
eastern United States and comprises 9,614
square miles (24,902
km²), making it the 45th largest state. Of this, land comprises 9,250 square miles (23,955 km²) and water comprises 365 square miles (948 km²), making it the 43rd largest in land area and the 47th in water area.
 |
Map of Vermont, showing cities, roads and rivers |
The west bank of the
Connecticut River marks the eastern border of the state with New Hampshire (the river itself is part of New Hampshire).
Lake Champlain, the major lake in Vermont, is the sixth-largest body of fresh water in the United States and separates Vermont from New York and Quebec (Canada) in the northwest portion of the state. From north to south, Vermont is 159
miles (256
km). Its greatest width, from east to west, is 89 miles (143 km) at the Canadian border; the narrowest width is 37 miles (60 km) at the Massachusetts line. The state's geographic center is
Washington, three miles (5 km) east of
Roxbury.
The origin of the name
Green Mountains (French:
Verts monts) is uncertain. Some authorities say that they are so named because they have much more forestation than the higher White Mountains of New Hampshire and Adirondacks of New York. Other authorities say that they are so named because of the predominance of mica-quartz-chlorite schist, a green hued metamorphosed shale. The range forms a north-south spine running most of the length of the state, slightly west of its center. In the southwest portion of the state are the
Taconic Mountains; the Granitic Mountains are in the northeast. In the northwest near Lake Champlain is the fertile
Champlain Valley. In the south of the valley is
Lake Bomoseen.
Several mountains have timberlines:
Mount Mansfield, the highest mountain in the state and
Killington are two examples. About 77% of the state is covered by forest; the rest is covered in meadow, uplands, lakes, ponds and swampy wetlands.
Areas in Vermont serviced by the
National Park Service include the
Appalachian National Scenic Trail and the
Marsh - Billings - Rockefeller National Historical Park in
Woodstock.
Vermont is known for its
mud season in spring followed by a cool summer and a colorful autumn, and particularly for its cold winters. The northern part of the state, including the rural northeastern section (dubbed the "
Northeast Kingdom") is known for exceptionally cold winters, often averaging 10 F° (6 C°) colder than the southern areas of the state. Annual
snowfall averages between 60 to 100 inches (150–250 cm) depending on elevation, giving Vermont some of New England's best cross-country and downhill
ski areas.
In the autumn, Vermont's hills experience an explosion of red, orange and gold foliage displayed on the
sugar maple as cold weather approaches. This famous display of color that occurs so abundantly in Vermont is not due so much to the presence of a particular variant of the
sugar maple; rather it is caused by a number of soil and climate conditions unique to the area.
The highest recorded temperature was 105 °
F (41 °
C), at
Vernon on
July 4,
1911; the lowest recorded temperature was -50 °F (-46 °C), at
Bloomfield on
December 30,
1933.
Prehistory and Precolumbian
Vermont was covered with shallow seas periodically from the Cambrian to Devonian periods. Most of the sedimentary rocks laid down in these seas were deformed by mountain-building. Fossils, however, are common in the Lake Champlain region. Lower areas of western Vermont were flooded again, as part of the St. Lawrence Valley "
Champlain Sea", at the end of the last ice age, when the land had not yet rebounded from the weight of the glaciers. Shells of salt-water mollusks, along with the bones of beluga whales, have been found in the Lake Champlain region.Little is known of the
pre-Columbian history of Vermont. The western part of the state was originally home to a small population of
Algonquian-speaking tribes, including the
Mohican and
Abenaki peoples. Between
8500 to
7000 BCE, at the time of the Champlain Sea,
Native Americans inhabited and hunted in Vermont. From
7000 to
1000 BCE was the Archaic Period. During the era Native Americans migrated year-round. From
1000 BCE to
1600 CE was the Woodland Period, when villages and trade networks were established, and ceramic and
bow and arrow technology was developed. Sometime between
1500 and
1600, the
Iroquois drove many of the smaller native tribes out of Vermont, later using the area as a
hunting ground and warring with the remaining Abenaki. The population in 1500 is estimated to be around 10,000 people. In 950, the Viking explorer,
Olaf Tomsson is alleged to have reached the Northern part of the state, where he settled for several years before leaving because of war with the local
Abenaki.
The second
European to see Vermont is thought to be
Jacques Cartier, in
1535. On
July 30,
1609,
French explorer Samuel de Champlain claimed the area of what is now
Lake Champlain, giving to the mountains the appellation of
les Verts Monts (the Green Mountains).
Colonial
France claimed Vermont as part of
New France, and erected
Fort Sainte Anne on
Isle La Motte in
1666 as part of the
fortification of Lake Champlain. This was the first European settlement in Vermont and the site of the first
Roman Catholic Mass.
During the latter half of the
17th century, non-French settlers began to explore Vermont and its surrounding area. In
1690, a group of
Dutch-British settlers from
Albany under Captain Jacobus de Warm established the De Warm Stockade at
Chimney Point (eight miles or 13 km west of present-day
Addison). This settlement and trading post was directly across Lake Champlain from
Crown Point,
New York (
Pointe à la Chevelure).
In
1731, the French arrived. Here they constructed a small temporary wooden stockade (Fort de Pieux) on what was Chimney Point until work on
Fort St. Frédéric began in
1734. The fort, when completed, gave the French control of the New France/Vermont border region in the Lake Champlain Valley and was the only permanent fort in the area until the building of Fort Carillon more than 20 years later. The government encouraged French colonization, leading to the development of small French settlements in the valley. The British attempted to take the Fort St. Frédéric four times between
1755 and
1758; in
1759 a combined force of 12,000 British regular and provincial troops under Sir
Jeffrey Amherst captured the fort. The French were driven out of the area and retreated to other forts along the
Richelieu River. One year later a group of
Mohawks burnt the settlement to the ground, leaving only chimneys, which gave the area its name.
The first permanent British settlement was established in
1724, with the construction of
Fort Dummer in Vermont's far southeast under the command of
Lieutenant Timothy Dwight. This fort protected the nearby settlements of
Dummerston and
Brattleboro. These settlements were made by the
Province of Massachusetts Bay to protect its settlers on the western border along the
Connecticut River. The second British settlement was the
1761 founding of
Bennington in the southwest.
During the
French and Indian War, some Vermont settlers, including
Ethan Allen, joined the colonial militia assisting the British in attacks on the French.
Fort Carillon on the
New York-Vermont border, a French fort constructed in
1755, was the site of two British offensives under Lord Amherst's command: the
unsuccessful British attack in 1758 and the
retaking of the following year with no major resistance (most of the garrison had been removed to defend
Quebec,
Montreal, and the western forts). The British renamed the fort
Fort Ticonderoga (which became the site of two later battles during the
American Revolutionary War). Following France's loss in the
French and Indian War, the
1763 Treaty of Paris gave control of the land to the British.
The end of the war brought new settlers to Vermont. A fort at
Crown Point had been built, and the Crown Point Military Road stretched from the east to the west of the Vermont wilderness from
Springfield to Chimney Point, making travel from the neighboring
British colonies easier. Three colonies laid claim to the area. The Province of Massachusetts Bay claimed the land on the basis of the
1629 charter of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony. The
Province of New York claimed Vermont based on land granted to the Duke of York (later
King James II) in
1764. The
Province of New Hampshire also claimed Vermont based upon a decree of
George II in
1740. In
1741, George II ruled that Massachusetts's claims in Vermont and New Hampshire were invalid and fixed Massachusetts's northern boundary at its present location. This still left New Hampshire and New York with conflicting claims to the land.
|
The flag adopted by the Vermont Republic served originally as an infantry banner for the Green Mountain Boys |
The situation resulted in the
New Hampshire Grants, a series of 135
land grants made between
1749 and
1764 by New Hampshire's colonial governor,
Benning Wentworth. The grants sparked a dispute with the New York governor, who began granting charters of his own for New Yorker settlement in Vermont. In
1770, Ethan Allen—along with his brothers
Ira and Levi, as well as Seth Warner—recruited an informal militia, the
Green Mountain Boys, to protect the interests of the original New Hampshire settlers against the new migrants from New York. When a New York judge arrived in
Westminster with New York settlers in March 1775, violence broke out as angry citizens took over the
courthouse and called a sheriff's posse. This resulted in the deaths of Daniel Houghton and William French in the "Westminster Massacre."
Independence, the Vermont Republic and Statehood
|
Winooski River, Montpelier |
On
January 18,
1777, representatives of the New Hampshire Grants convened in Westminster and declared the independence of the
Vermont Republic. For the first six months of the republic's existence, the republic was called
New Connecticut.
On
June 2, a second convention of 72 delegates met at Westminster, known as the "Westminster Convention." At this meeting, the delegates adopted the name "Vermont" on the suggestion of Dr. Thomas Young of
Philadelphia, a supporter of the delegates who wrote a letter advising them on how to achieve admission into the newly independent United States as the 14th state. The delegates set the time for a meeting one month later. On
July 4, the
Constitution of the Vermont Republic was drafted during a violent thunderstorm at the Windsor Tavern owned by Elijah West and was adopted by the delegates on
July 8 after four days of debate. This was among the first written constitutions in
North America and was indisputably the first to abolish the institution of slavery, provide for universal manhood suffrage and require support of public schools. The Windsor tavern has been preserved as the
Old Constitution House, administered as a
state historic site.
The
Battle of Bennington, fought on
August 16,
1777, was a seminal event in the history of the state of Vermont. The nascent republican government, created after years of political turmoil, faced challenges from New York, New Hampshire, Great Britain and the new United States, none of which recognized its sovereignty. The republic's ability to defeat a powerful military invader gave it a legitimacy among its scattered frontier society that would sustain it through fourteen years of fragile independence before it finally achieved statehood as the 14th state in the union in 1791.
During the summer of 1777, the invading British army of General
John Burgoyne slashed southward from Canada to the Hudson River, captured the strategic stronghold of Fort Ticonderoga, and drove the Continental Army into a desperate southward retreat. Raiding parties of British soldiers and native warriors freely attacked, pillaged and burned the frontier communities of the Champlain Valley and threatened all settlements to the south. The Vermont frontier collapsed in the face of the British invasion. The New Hampshire legislature, fearing an invasion from the east, mobilized the state's militia under the command of General
John Stark.
General Burgoyne received intelligence that large stores of horses, food and munitions were kept at Bennington, which was the largest community in the land grant area. He dispatched 2,600 men, nearly a third of his army, to seize the colonial storehouse there, unaware that General Stark's New Hampshire troops were then traversing the Green Mountains to join up at Bennington with the Vermont continental regiments commanded by Colonel Seth Warner, together with the local Vermont and western Massachusetts militia. The combined American forces, under Stark's command, attacked the British column at
Hoosick, New York, just across the border from Bennington. The American troops were defending their homes, families and property. General Stark reportedly challenged his men to fight to the death, telling them that: "There are your enemies. They are ours, or this night Molly Stark sleeps a widow!" In a desperate, all-day battle fought in intense summer heat, the army of
yankee farmers killed or captured virtually the entire British detachment. General Burgoyne never recovered from this loss and eventually surrendered the remainder of his 6,000-man force at
Saratoga, New York, on
October 17.
The Battles of
Bennington and
Saratoga are recognized as the turning point in the Revolutionary War because they were the first major defeat of a British army and convinced the French that the Americans were worthy of military aid. Stark became widely known as the "Hero of Bennington", and the anniversary of the battle is still celebrated in Vermont as a legal holiday known as "Bennington Battle Day." Under the portico of the Vermont Statehouse, next to an heroic granite statue of Ethan Allen, there is a brass cannon that was captured from the British troops at the Battle of Bennington.
Vermont continued to govern itself as a sovereign entity based in the eastern town of Windsor for 14 years. The Vermont Republic issued its own currency, coins and operated a statewide postal service linked to the Universal Postal Union.
Thomas Chittenden, who came to Vermont from
Connecticut in
1774, acted as president of Vermont from
1778 to
1789 and from
1790 to
1791. Thomas Chittenden exchanged ambassadors with France, the Netherlands, and the American government then at Philadelphia. In
1791, Vermont joined the Union as the 14th member–the first state to enter the union after the original 13 colonies, and a counterweight to slaveholding
Kentucky, which was admitted to the Union shortly afterward.
The Civil War and beyond
Vermont had a
unicameral legislature until
1836.
Leading up to the civil war Vermont produced the Radical abolitionist Republican
Thaddeus Stevens, and then in 1860 it voted for Lincoln, giving him a larger margin of victory than any other state.
During the
American Civil War Vermont sent over 32,000 men into the service of the
Union Army, of which one out of six did not return, a higher proportion of men sent and lost than any other state. The most famous Vermont unit was the hard-fighting
First Vermont Brigade. The northernmost land action of the war took place in Vermont on
October 19 1864, in what is known as the
St. Albans Raid.
The first election in which women were allowed to vote was on
December 18,
1880, when women were granted limited
suffrage and were first allowed to vote in town elections, and then in state legislative races.
Large-scale
flooding occurred in early November
1927. During this incident, 85 people died, 84 of them in Vermont. Another flood occurred in
1973, when the flood caused the death of two people and millions of dollars in property damage.
On April 25, 2000, Vermont legislators passed and Governor Howard Dean signed into law HB847, a law providing the state sanctioned benefits of marriage to gay and lesbian couples under the title Civil Union.
Population
| Historical populations |
|---|
Census
year | Population |
|---|
|
| 1790 | 85,425 |
| 1800 | 154,465 |
| 1810 | 217,895 |
| 1820 | 235,981 |
| 1830 | 280,652 |
| 1840 | 291,948 |
| 1850 | 314,120 |
| 1860 | 315,098 |
| 1870 | 330,551 |
| 1880 | 332,286 |
| 1890 | 332,422 |
| 1900 | 343,641 |
| 1910 | 355,956 |
| 1920 | 352,428 |
| 1930 | 359,611 |
| 1940 | 359,231 |
| 1950 | 377,747 |
| 1960 | 389,881 |
| 1970 | 444,330 |
| 1980 | 511,456 |
| 1990 | 562,758 |
| 2000 | 608,827 |
According to the
U.S. Census Bureau, as of 2005, Vermont has an estimated population of 623,050, which is an increase of 1,817, or 0.3%, from the prior year and an increase of 14,223, or 2.3%, since the year 2000. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 7,148 people (that is 33,606 births minus 26,458 deaths) and an increase due to net migration of 7,889 people into the state. Immigration from outside the United States resulted in a net increase of 4,359 people, and migration within the country produced a net increase of 3,530 people.
Ethnicity
The largest ancestry groups are:
* 23.3%
French or French Canadian* 18.4%
English* 16.4%
Irish* 9.1%
GermanResidents of British ancestry (especially English) live throughout most of Vermont. The northern part of the state is inhabited principally by people of French (including French-Canadian and Québecois) ancestry.
Religion
Like many of the neighboring states, Vermont's largest religious affiliation in the colonial period was
Congregationalism. In
1776, 63 % of affiliated church members in Vermont were Congregationalists. At the time, however, most settlers were not church members because much of the land was wilderness. Only 9 % of people belonged to a church at the time. The Congregational
United Church of Christ remains the largest Protestant denomination and Vermont has the largest percentage of this denomination of any state.
Today about three-fourths of Vermont residents identify themselves as
Christians. The largest single religious body in the state is the
Roman Catholic Church. A Catholic Church survey in 1990 reported that 25% of Vermonters were members of the Catholic Church, although more than that self-identify as Catholics.
Overall, Vermont's current religious distribution is:
*
Christian – 74%
**
Roman Catholic – 39%
**
Protestant – 34%
***
Congregational/United Church of Christ – 7%
***
Methodist – 7%
***
Episcopal – 5%
***
Baptist – 3%
*** Other Protestant – 12%
** Other Christian – 1%
*
Jewish – 1%
* Other Religions – 1%
* Non-Religious – 24%
Almost one-quarter of Vermonters identify themselves as non-religious, tying Vermont with Oregon as having the second-highest percentage of non-religious people in the United States. Only Washington State has a higher percentage.
More than one-third of Vermonters are self-identified
Protestants. The largest Protestant denomination in the state is the United Church of Christ, and the second largest is the
United Methodist Church, followed by
Episcopalians, and
Baptists.
Joseph Smith, Jr. and
Brigham Young—the first two leaders of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—were both born in Vermont. Adherents to the Mormon faith, however, do not make up a single percentage point of Vermont's population; a memorial to Joseph Smith, at his birthplace in Sharon, is maintained by the LDS.
Judaism and
Unitarian Universalism claim around 1 % each of the state's population. The 2001
Shengold Jewish Encyclopedia reported that the state has 5,000
Jews—3000 in Burlington and 500 each in Montpelier-Barre and Rutland—and four
Reform and two
Conservative congregations. It is notable that in Burlington, a Jewish and Muslim congregation share the same building, an example of Vermont's culture of tolerance and mutual respect.
Other religions such as
Islam,
Hinduism, and
Buddhism have very few adherents. However, although small in relation to other religions, Vermont has the highest concentration of western-convert Buddhists in the country and several Buddhist retreat centers.[
1]
According to the 2004 U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis report, Vermont's gross state product was $22.1 billion. The per capita personal income was $32,770 in 2004.
Over the past two centuries, Vermont has had both population explosions and population busts. First settled by farmers, loggers and hunters, Vermont lost much of its population as farmers moved west into the
Great Plains in search of abundant, easily tilled land. Logging similarly fell off as over-cutting and the exploitation of other forests made Vermont's forest less attractive. Although these population shifts devastated Vermont's economy, the early loss of population had the beneficial effect of allowing Vermont's land and forest to recover. The accompanying lack of industry has allowed Vermont to avoid many of the ill-effects of 20th century industrial busts, effects that still plague neighboring states. Today, most of Vermont's forests consist of second-growth.
Of the remaining industries,
dairy farming is the primary source of agricultural income.
An important and growing part of Vermont's economy is the manufacture and sale of artisan foods, fancy foods, and novelty items trading in part upon the Vermont "brand" which is managed by the Vermont Secretary of Agriculture and fiercely defended by the Vermont Secretary of State and Attorney General. Examples of these specialty exports include
Cabot Cheese, the
Vermont Teddy Bear Company, Vermont Butter and Cheese Company, several micro breweries, ginseng growers,
Burton Snowboards,
Lake Champlain Chocolates,
King Arthur Flour, and
Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream. Vermont's Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets maintains the highest dairy standards in the U.S. Only France's Minister of Agriculture, Food, Fishing and Rural Affairs (see
Minister of Agriculture (France)) has standards for butterfat content equal to Vermont's.
Captive insurance plays an increasingly large role in Vermont's economy. With this form of alternative insurance, large corporations or industry associations form standalone insurance companies to insure their own risks, thereby substantially reducing their insurance premiums and gaining a significant measure of control over types of risks to be covered. There are also significant tax advantages to be gained from the formation and operation of captive insurance companies. According to the Insurance Information Institute, Vermont in 2004 was the world's third-largest domicile for captive insurance companies, following
Bermuda and the
Cayman Islands.
Tourism is the state's largest industry. In the winter, world famous ski resorts like
Stowe,
Killington Ski Resort,
Mad River Glen,
Sugarbush,
Stratton,
Jay Peak,
Okemo, and
Bromley draw skiers from around the globe, although their largest markets are Boston, Montreal and the New York metropolitan area. In the summer, resort towns like
Stowe,
Manchester, and
Woodstock draw visitors looking for a mountain vacation. Resorts, hotels, restaurants, shops and attractions employ many people year-round.
Numerous summer camps contribute to Vermont's economy.
Trout fishing, lake fishing and even
ice fishing draw outdoor enthusiasts to the state, as does the excellent hiking on the
Long Trail. Several noteworthy
horse shows are annual events.
Golf courses are springing up with
spas to service the weary client. One major fashion outlet mall isn't really a mall but the old town of
Manchester gentrified.
The towns of
Rutland and
Barre are the traditional centers of marble and granite quarrying and carving in the U.S. For many years Vermont was also the headquarters of the smallest union in the U.S., the Stonecutters Association, of about 500 members.
In recent years, Vermont has been deluged with plans to build
condos and houses on what was relatively inexpensive, untouched land. Vermont's government has responded with a series of laws controlling development and with some pioneering initiatives to prevent the loss of Vermont's dairy industry.
In 2001, Vermont produced 275,000 gallons (1,040,000 l) of maple syrup, about one-quarter of U.S. production. The Vermont Department of Agriculture maintains a rating standard for maple syrup that is higher than the U.S. Department of Agriculture's, all other states, and Canada.
Vermont collects personal
income tax in a progressive structure of five different income brackets, ranging from 3.6% to 9.5%. Vermont's general
sales tax rate is 6%. The tax is imposed on sales of tangible personal property, amusement charges, fabrication charges, some public utility charges and some service contracts. There are 46 exemptions from the tax which include medical items, food, manufacturing machinery, equipment and fuel, residential fuel and electricity, clothing, and shoes with a purchase price of $110 or less. A
use tax is imposed on the buyer at the same rate as the sales tax. The buyer pays the use tax when the sellers fails to collect the sales tax or the items are purchased from a source where no tax is collected. The use tax applies to items taxable under the sales tax.
Property taxes are imposed for the support of education and municipal services. Vermont does not assess tax on
intangible personal property. Vermont does not collect
inheritance taxes; however, its
estate tax is decoupled from the federal estate tax laws and therefore the state still imposes its own estate tax.
Vermont's main mode of travel is by automobile. Individual communities and counties have public transit, but their breadth of coverage is frequently limited.
Greyhound Lines services a number of small towns and
Amtrak serves stations in Rutland and Fair Haven (off the Ethan Allen Express) and St. Albans, Essex Jct., Waterbury, Montpelier, Randolph, White River Jct., Windsor, Bellows Falls and Brattleboro on the Vermonter line.
Interstates
I-89,
I-91 and
I-93 pass through Vermont.
Vermont is served by two commercial airports:
*
Burlington International Airport is the largest in the state with regular flights to many major cities including
Boston,
Chicago,
Detroit,
Newark,
New York,
Philadelphia, and
Washington, DC.
*
Rutland State Airport is the only other commercial airport in the state and has regular flights to
Albany and Boston.
Vermont's local community public and private transportation.
* Addison county has the ACTR (Addison County Transit Resources) out of Middlebury, also serving Bristol and Vergennes.
* Bennington county features the GME (American Red Cross Green Mountain Express) out of Bennington and the YT (Yankee Trails) running out of Rensselaer, New York.
* The RCT (Rural Community Transportation) runs out of Saint Johnsbury and services Caledonia, Essex, Lamoille and Orleans counties.
* Burlington (home of
University of Vermont) has CCTA (Chittenden County Transportation Authority) and CATS (University of Vermont Campus Area Transportation System).
* Colchester in Chittenden county is serviced by the SSTA (Special Services Transportation Agency).
* The Network (Northwest Vermont Public Transit Network, NVPT) running out of Saint Albans, services Franklin and Grand Isle counties.
* Stowe, in Lamoille county, is serviced by STS (Stowe Trolly System, Village Mountain Shuttle, Morrisville Shuttle).
* STS (Stagecoach Transportation Services) out of Randolph in Orange county also serves parts of Windsor county.
* Rutland county has the Bus (Marble Valley Regional Transit District, MVRTD) out of Rutland.
* In Washington county the GMTA (Green Mountain Transit Authority) runs out of the capital city, Montpelier.
* Brattleboro in Windham county is served by the BeeLine (Brattleboro Town Bus). Windham is served, out of West Dover, by the MOOver (Deerfield Valley Transit Association, DVTA).
* Ludlow (in Windsor county), home of Okemo Mountain is served by the LMTS (Ludlow Municipal Transit System). Windsor is also served by Advanced Transit (AT) out of Wilder and the CRT (Connecticut River Transit) out of Springfield which also serves parts of Windham county.
* The Burlington and Grand Isle areas are connected to New York State by ferries operated by
LCTC, the
Lake Champlain Transportation Company.
The Constitution of the State of Vermont
Provision is made for the following "frame of government" under the Constitution of the State of Vermont: the executive branch, the legislative branch, and the judicial branch.
Executive branch
Vermonters independently elect a state
governor and
lieutenant governor every two years (as opposed to every four years, which is the most common term length for a governor of a U.S. state). The current governor of Vermont is
Jim Douglas, who assumed office in
2003.
Vermont does not have a
term limit for the governor.
Legislative branch
Vermont's
state legislature is the
Vermont General Assembly, a
bicameral body composed of the
Vermont House of Representatives (the
lower house) and the
Vermont Senate (the
upper house). The Senate is composed of 30 state senators, while the House of Representatives has 150 members. Like the governor, members of the General Assembly serve two-year terms.
Judicial branch
The Vermont Supreme Court is the state
supreme court, made up of five justices who serve six year terms.
Superior courts in the state are made up of eight judges serving a term of six years. Appointments to the state supreme court, superior court, and
district courts are made by the governor, from a list of names submitted by the state's
Judicial Nominating Committee and then are confirmed by the Senate. At the end of each six year term, the Gereral Assembly votes by
joint ballot (each member, senator or representative, getting one vote) on whether to retain the judge or justice (known as a
judicial retention vote). Judges on lower courts are elected on a partisan ballot. The
Vermont Constitution spells out the process of judicial appointment and retention in Chapter 2, Sections 32 thru 35, 50 and 51 [
2].
Civil rights and liberties
The Vermont Constitution outlines and guarantees broad rights for its citizens. Even in the eighteenth century it was seen as being among the most far reaching in the new world and in Europe, and it predated the
Bill of Rights by a dozen years. The Constitution's first chapter, "Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants of The State of Vermont" prohibits slavery, indentured servitude, and allowed for universal manhood suffrage, regardless of property ownership. The Declaration of Rights set in place broad protections of religous freedom and conscience while erecting a strong firewall between church and state, by prohibiting establishment or promotion of any faith by the government, or compulsion to worship. The "Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants of The State of Vermont" is believed to have been a model for France's Déclaration universelle sur des droits de l'homme (Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man).
Federal legislative representation
In the
U.S. Senate, Vermont is represented by Senator
Patrick Leahy, a
Democrat, and Senator
James Jeffords, an independent. Jeffords was a
Republican but left the party in
2001 as a result of political disagreements and now
caucuses with the Democrats. Like its neighbor New Hampshire, Vermont tends to elect more independents than other states; in the
U.S. House of Representatives, Vermont's single at-large
congressional district is represented by
Bernie Sanders, an independent representative and
Social Democrat who served as the mayor of Burlington. Among Vermont's distinguished public servants, U.S. Senator
Winston Prouty (R) gained national prominence as an early critic of Senator
Joseph McCarthy. Upon his departure from the Republican Party, Senator Jeffords cited the late Senator Prouty, who hailed from Vermont's most prominent political family, for the latter's legendary spirit of independence.
George Aiken (R), who served as senator from 1941 until 1975, was equally prominent. He is perhaps best known for his proposal that the United States declare victory in Vietnam and leave.
Vermont is an
Alcoholic beverage control state.
The
age of consent in Vermont is 16.
Politics
Vermonters are known for their political independence. Vermont is one of the few states that was an independent
republic, and has a long history of contrarian voting in national elections. Notably, Vermont is the only state to have voted for a presidential candidate from the
Anti-Masonic Party, and Vermont and Maine were the only states to vote against
Franklin D. Roosevelt in his second election.
Today, Vermont is known nationally for its
liberal political views, although this is perhaps an oversimplification. Perhaps the best description would be that Vermont tends to be very liberal or
libertarian when it comes to social issues, but tends to be moderate to conservative when it comes to fiscal issues. The Vermont government maintains a proactive stance with regards to the environment, social services and prevention of
urbanization. For example, facing severe pressures from out-of-state real estate developers, the state passed the Land Use and Development Law (
Act 250) in 1970. The law, which was the first of its kind in the nation, created nine District Environmental Commissions consisting of private citizens who have the power to approve or disapprove land development and subdivision plans that would have a significant impact on the state's environment and many small communities. Another case involves the recent controversy over the adoption of
civil unions, an institution which grants same-sex couples nearly all the rights and privileges of
marriage. In
Baker v. Vermont (
1999), the Vermont Supreme Court ruled that, under the
Constitution of Vermont, the state must either allow
same-sex marriage or provide a
separate but equal status for them. The state legislature chose the second option by creating the institution of
civil union; the bill was passed by the legislature and signed into law by Governor
Howard Dean. At the same time, Vermont is one of only two states in the Union to allow any adult to
carry a concealed firearm without any sort of permit.
Vermont is the home state of the only two current members of the United States Congress who do not associate themselves with a political party:
Representative Bernie Sanders and
Senator Jim Jeffords.
Attempts by out-of-state candidates (so called "flatlanders") to be elected to office in Vermont have often been thwarted by locals. In
1998, a 79-year-old farmer named
Fred Tuttle received national attention by defeating a
Massachusetts multimillionaire in the
Republican Primary for Senate. With a campaign budget of $201, Tuttle garnered 55% of the primary vote, then promptly announced his support for the
Democratic incumbent,
Patrick Leahy. This campaign was an example of
ostension, as Fred had starred as himself in the Vermont-produced film, "A Man With A Plan", which depicted him winning a shoestring-funded election to Congress.
Republicans dominated Vermont politics from the party's founding in
1854 until the mid 1970s. This likely owes more to the state's abolitionist history and later to their tendency towards fiscal conservatism than to social conservatism. For example in 1980 when faced with a choice between the socially conservative Reagan and a "big government" Democrat, many from Vermont voted for the the 3rd party candiadate,
John Bayard Anderson, who ran on a more libertarian platform. In the early
1960s many
progressive Vermont Republicans and newcomers to the state helped bolster the state's small Democratic Party. Until
1992, Vermont had supported a Democrat for president only once since the parties founding—in
Lyndon Johnson's
1964 landslide victory against
Barry Goldwater. In 1992, it supported Democrat
Bill Clinton for president and has voted for Democrats in every presidential election since. Vermont gave John Kerry his fourth largest margin of victory in
2004. He won the state's popular vote by 20 percentage points over incumbent
George W. Bush, taking almost 59% of the vote.
Essex County in the state's northeastern section was the only county to vote for Bush.
The
Vermont Progressive Party is a small liberal political party created in the early
1980s. The Vermont Progressive party is similar to the
Green Party in its environmental policies but operates more center-left similar to the
Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands â€" SPD) in its business and social policies. It and has represented a handful of seats in the Vermont legislature for two decades and has run candidates for governor and lieutenant governor. The party is similar in spirit to an earlier Vermont party called the Liberty Union Party based upon the ideas of
Social Democrat Eugene V. Debs. The party has a similar philosophy to Vermont's lone congressman,
Bernie Sanders. It has had official recognition as a
political party by the state government since 1999.
Vermont's liberal/libertarian views do not coincide with the general American political stereotype that rural states tend toward
conservatism (the
red state phenomenon). The contradiction is thrown into great relief when it is observed that Vermont's longtime
doppleganger neighbor,
New Hampshire, is consistently
Republican in its politics (although New Hampshire leans more toward
libertarianism than toward standard Republicanism).
Some have attempted to explain away Vermont's contradictory politics by arguing that the state is a haven for affluent vacationers and retirees from strong liberal
metropolitan regions such as Boston and
New York, and that the financial power of such persons dominate the politics. Yet native born Vermonters tend to vote for social libralism while remaining fiscally frugal. Vermont average family income is near to the national average. Others argue that Vermont, which borders
Canada, is a main thoroughfare of land travel to major
Canadian cities such as
Montréal and
Toronto, and the influence of liberal Canadian thought and Canadian city-dwellers on vacation also affects the political climate.
|
The logo of the Vermont Lake Monsters is "Champ," the legendary sea monster of Vermont's Lake Champlain. |
No major professional sports teams are based in Vermont. The largest professional franchise is the
Vermont Lake Monsters, formerly the Vermont Expos, a single-A
minor league baseball team based in Burlington. The
Vermont Frost Heaves are a franchise of the
American Basketball Association, and will be based in
Barre starting in fall 2006. Vermont also has a semi-professional football team in the
Vermont Ice Storm, based in
South Hero, which plays its home games at Colchester High School.
The University of Vermont is the only state university in the nation not to have a football team. Soccer, hockey and basketball are the primary varsity sports at the school.
Vermont is the birthplace of former presidents
Calvin Coolidge and
Chester A. Arthur.
Vermont is one of four states (along with Alaska, Hawaii, and Maine) to have prohibited all billboards from view of highway rights-of-way by law, except for signs on the contiguous property of the business location.
A major political issue for some years has been taxation and education funding. The town of
Killington is currently trying to secede from Vermont and join
New Hampshire due to what the locals say is an unfair tax burden.
Vermont has many
festivals, including the
Vermont Maple Festival, the
Enosburg Falls Dairy Festival, the Apple Festival (held each Columbus Day Weekend), the
Marlboro Music Festival, and the
Mozart Festival. The
Vermont Symphony Orchestra is supported by the state and performs throughout the area. The
Poetry Society of Vermont publishes a literary magazine called
The Green Mountain Troubadore which encourages submissions from members of various ages. Every year they hold various contests - one being for high school age young people. The Brattleboro-based
Vermont Theatre Company presents an annual summer Shakespeare festival. Brattleboro also hosts the summertime Strolling of the Heifers parade which celebrates Vermont's unique dairy culture.In the Northeast Kingdom, The
Bread and Puppet Theatre holds weekly shows in Glover in a natural outdoor amphitheater.
One of Vermont's best known musical exports is group
Phish, whose members met while attending school in Vermont. The state has always held great importance for
Phish—for example, lead singer and guitarist
Trey Anastasio built a studio in Vermont used by the band and others, called The Barn.
Phish ended their tenure together as a band with a farewell concert weekend in the state's Northeast Kingdom, which was dubbed "Coventry" after (in part) the venue city of
Coventry, Vermont, on August 16, 2004.
Vermont was the last state to get a Wal-Mart (there are four, as of June 2006), is currently the only state without a Lowe's (as of June 2006), and it remains the only state without a McDonald's restaurant within the city limits of the capital.
Largest cities in Vermont
Largest cities (2003 est.):
*
Burlington, 39,148
*
Rutland, 17,103
*
South Burlington, 16,285
*
Barre, 9,166
Largest towns in Vermont
Although these towns are large enough to be considered cities, they are not incorporated as such.Largest Towns (2003 est.)
*
Essex, 18,933
*
Colchester, 17,175
*
Bennington, 15,637
*
Brattleboro, 11,996
*
Hartford, 10,610
*
Milton, 9,924
State symbols
The state song and state symbols are designated by act of the state legislature and confirmed by the governor.
Vermont's
state song is "
These Green Mountains," composed by Diane Martin and arranged by Rita Buglass Gluck. This song was officially designated as the state song on
May 22,
2000, when Governor Howard Dean signed No. 99 of the Acts of 2000 into law. This song replaced "
Hail to Vermont!," which was written by Josephine Hovey-Perry and made the state song in 1938.
The
state bird is the
hermit thrush (
Catharus guttatus). This was adopted as No. 1 of the Acts of 1941, effective
June 1,
1941. The bird was only designated after debate in the legislature; though the hermit thrush is found in all of 14 counties and has a distinctive sweet call, it leaves the state during the winter for its yearly southward migration. Many legislators favored the
blue jay (
Cyanocitta cristata) or the
crow.
The
red clover (
Trifolium pratense) was designated as the
state flower by No. 159 of the Acts of 1894, effective
February 1,
1895. The red clover is often seen in the countryside of Vermont hosting the state insect, the honey bee, but was originally naturalized from
Europe.
Vermont has two official
state fish, both adopted by Joint Resolution R-91 of the Acts of 1978 and effective on
May 3,
1978: the cold-water fish, the
brook trout (
Salvelinus fontinalis) and the warm-water fish, the
walleye (
Sanders vitreous vitreous).
The
state tree is the
sugar maple (
Acer saccharum), adopted by the Acts of 1949, effective
March 10,
1949. The sugar maple is the source of
maple syrup, Vermont's most famous export.
The state mammal is the
Morgan horse, designated as such by No. 42 of the acts of 1961, effective
March 23,
1961. The Morgan horse is a
horse breed originally from Vermont.
The state insect is the
honeybee (
Apis mellifera), designated by No. 124 of the Acts of 1978, effective
July 1,
1978.
The state amphibian, adopted by No. 126 of the Acts of 1997, is the
Northern Leopard Frog (
Rana pipiens).
Vermont has also designated an official state
mineral (
talc),
pie (
apple pie),
soil ("Tunbridge Soil Series"),
beverage (
milk),
gem (
grossular garnet), and
fossil (the
beluga skeleton at the University of Vermont's Perkins Geology Museum.)
Crime
Vermont is one of twelve states that have no
death penalty statute. After
1930, there were four executions; the last was in
1954. Capital punishment was effectively abolished in practice in
1964, with the statutes being completely removed in
1987. State law allows children as young as ten years to be tried as adults, the lowest age limit currently specified by any of the 50 states.
Crime per capita is generally very low.
The Vermont prison system is administered by Vermont Department of Corrections. There are nine prisons in Vermont:
*
Caledonia Community Work Camp*
Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility*
Dale Women's Facility*
Marble Valley Regional Correctional Facility*
Northern State Correctional Facility*
Northwest State Correctional Facility*
Southeast State Correctional Facility*
Southern State Correctional Facility*
St. Johnsbury Regional Correctional Facility*
Ethan Allen, commander of the
Green Mountain Boys*
John Deere, inventor
*
John Dewey, philosopher, educator
*
Royall Tyler, playwright and first Chief Justice of the Vermont Supreme Court
*
Thomas Davenport, inventor of the electric motor
*
Calvin Coolidge thirtieth President of the United States
*
Chester A. Arthur*
Alexander Twilight, first African American to receive a college degree, and to be elected to public office
*
Dorothy Canfield Fisher, writer
*
Richard Morris Hunt, architect
*
Horatio G. Loomis, one of the organizers of the Chicago Board of Trade
*
Justin Morrill, sponsor of the Land Grant College Act establishing "public ivies"
*
Warren Robinson Austin, early U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations
*
Philip Maxwell, physician and politician and the person for whom Chicago's famous Maxwell Street was named
*
Wilson Bentley, scientist and photographer
*
Joseph Smith, Jr., prophet, founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
*
Brigham Young, early church president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
*
Jody Williams Nobel Peace Prize Laureate for leading international action to ban landmines
*
Moses Pendleton choreographer
*
John LeClair first native born Vermonter to play in the National Hockey League
*
David Mamet, playwright
*
Trey Anastasio, vocals/guitar for
Phish, a popular jam-band.
*
Louise Gluck, Pulitzer Prize winning poet
*
Howard Dean, current Democratic National Committee Chairman
*
Madeleine M. Kunin, seventy-seventh Governor of the State of Vermont, U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland
*
William H. Macy, actor and director
*
KT Tunstall, musician
*
William Rehnquist, (deceased) former supreme court justiceSherman Adams governor, East DoverChester Alan Arthur U.S. president, FairfieldOrson Bean actor, BurlingtonCalvin Coolidge U.S. president, PlymouthThomas Davenport inventor, WilliamstownJohn Deere inventor, RutlandGeorge Dewey admiral, MontpelierJohn Dewey philosopher, educator, BurlingtonStephen A. Douglas politician, BrandonJames Fisk financial speculator, BenningtonWilbur Fisk clergyman, educator, Ralph E. Flanders senator, BarnetHorace A. Tabor silver king, HollandJustin Morrill politician, StraffordRichard Morris Hunt architect, BrattleboroWilliam Morris Hunt painter, BratleboroElisha Graves Otis inventor, HalifaxMoses Pendleton choreographerPatty Sheehan golfer, MiddleburyJoseph Smith religious leader, SharonErnest Thompson actor, writerRudy Vallee singer, band leader, Island PondHenry Wells pioneer entrepreneur, ThetfordBrigham Young religious leader, Whitingham(http://www.50states.com/bio/vermont.htm)Nettie Maria Stevens (1861-1912)Maria von TrappRudy Vallee (1901-1986)David DellingerBrigham Young (1801-1877)Joseph Smith (1805-1844)Cyndi Lauper (1953- )Elisha Graves Otis (1811-1861)Frank MillerHarry) Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951)Dorothy Thompson (1894-1961)Ernest Thompson (1950- )Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn (1918- )Veronica Lake (1922-1973)Ernest KinoyPhineas Gage (1823-1860)Andrew Ellicott Douglass (1867-1962)Jody WilliamsJacques Cousteau (1910-1997)John Ciardi (1916-1986)Bob KeeshanTantoo CardinalWarren AustinJeff Danziger (1943- )Wilson "Snowflake" Bentley (1865-1931)(http://www.vermontguides.com/1998/profil74.htm)
*
Scouting in Vermont*
Vermont media*
Music of Vermont* Albers, Jan.
Hands on the Land: A History of the Vermont Landscape. MIT Press: 2000. ISBN 0262011751.
* Cohen, David Elliot, and Rick Smolan.
Vermont 24/7. DK Publishing: 2004. ISBN 0756600863.
* Coffin, Howard.
Full Duty: Vermonters in the Civil War. Countryman Press: 1995. ISBN 0881503495.
* Duffy, John J., et al.
Vermont: An Illustrated History. American Historical Press: 2000. ISBN 1892724081.
* Duffy, John J., et al.
The Vermont Encyclopedia. University Press of New England: 2003. ISBN 1584650869.
* Grant, Kim, et al.
Vermont: An Explorer's Guide. Countryman Press: 2002. ISBN 0881505196.
* Klyza, Christopher McGrory, and Stephen C. Trombulak.
The Story of Vermont: A Natural and Cultural History. University Press of New England: 1999. ISBN 0874519365.
* Potash, P. Jeffrey, et al.
Freedom and Unity: A History of Vermont. Vermont Historical Society: 2004. ISBN 0934720495.
* Hunter, Preston.
"Religion in Vermont". Adherents.com.
* Rodgers, Steve.
Country Towns of Vermont. McGraw-Hill: 1998. ISBN 1566261953.
* Sherman, Joe.
Fast Lane on a Dirt Road: A Contemporary History of Vermont. Chelsea Green Publishing Company: 2000. ISBN 1890132748.
* Sletcher, Michael.
New England. Westport, CT, 2004.
*
Vermont Atlas & Gazetteer. DeLorme: 2000. ISBN 0899333222.
*
State of Vermont.
*
Lake Champlain Regional Chamber of Commerce. Business and tourism information.
*
Cities, Towns, Mountains, Rivers, and Lakes, from Hayward's Gazetteer of 1839.
*
Vermont Department of Tourism and Marketing*
Vermont Convention Bureau*
Vermont Historical Society.*
Vermont Judicial System.
*
"Vermont QuickFacts". U.S. Census Bureau.
*
"Vermont State Historic Sites". Vermont Division for Historic Preservation.
*
Vermont State Legislature.
* [
3].
* [
4].
*
"Historic maps of Vermont".
*
The Appalachian Trail*
A history of the presidency from the point of view of Vermont. Discusses history of American presidential elections, with two states as opposite "poles", Vermont, and Alabama.
*
Vermont State Facts *
Directory of filming locations in Vermont
