Observer Online | Reston Seeking Rights That Are Long Overdue

Edition of November 4, 2005

Reston Seeking Rights That Are Long Overdue

To the editor:

Leila Gordon ("Reston is Fine As It Is," The Observer, Oct. 28) believes that a democratically-elected town government in Reston would be too expensive. I believe that it would be priceless.

For over 200 years, Americans have struggled to gain and keep the right to govern their own communities through democratic elections. Our forefathers' motto was "No taxation without representation," not "No taxation." If George Washington, George Mason, and the other Virginians who fought for American independence simply wanted the cheapest government, they could just have easily joined the Loyalists. Instead they wanted their communities to have the right to govern themselves, no matter the cost.

And gaining and maintaining that right has, indeed, been costly, in lives and treasure lost. Treating local government as if it were akin to finding the best buys in the grocery store demeans American values and robs American history of its true worth.

Reston, with a population of 56,000, is bigger than 108 of Virginia's 137 counties and cities, all of whom have their own governments. As a planned community, Reston has a cohesion and unity that most American towns and cities lack.

Nevertheless, even if Reston were the proverbial one-horse town, a flyspeck somewhere between Nowhere and East Nowhere, its citizens, as Americans, would still have the right and responsibility to govern their own affairs.

In seeking a town government, the Reston community is simply asserting its claim to the same rights towns of all shapes and sizes across the country have enjoyed for centuries.

James P. Hubbard

Reston