More information should clarify Vermont campaign

Monday, April 11, 2005

Your editorial (April 2) on the drinking-age campaign in Vermont made it sound as though Alex Koroknay-Palicz foisted his campaign to lower the drinking age onto Vermont. That is not true. Let me give you some background into the campaign:

(1) Lowering the drinking age was part of my gubernatorial campaign in 2004. I think we need to look at new solutions to reduce the amount of teenage alcohol abuse. What we have today are teenagers learning from their peers to binge drink in the woods or at unsupervised parties. It makes sense to allow parents to teach teenagers responsible and moderate alcohol use in a supervised setting, such as at home or at a restaurant.

(2) The governor of Vermont supports a drinking age of 18.

(3) John M. McCardell Jr., president emeritus of Middlebury College in Vermont, has written newspaper columns calling for restoring the drinking age to 18 because the current drinking age is bad social policy on college campuses.

After my campaign for governor was over, a member of the National Youth Rights Association in Vermont asked me to help start a chapter in Vermont. The Vermont chapter welcomed Alex Koroknay-Palicz to Vermont because he generated press interest for our 2-month-old group that we might not have been able to achieve on our own.

Hardy Machia

Grand Isle, Vt.

hardy@freevermont.org