On September 19 our friends at the Loudoun Times Mirror spoke out against a decision by the office of Loudoun County Administrator Tim Hemstreet to "decline requests to allow voter registration drives at county libraries."

The LTM pointedly dismissed the reasons cited for the decision: concerns about non-partisanship, anxiety over the collection of "private" information, and worries about objections from the U.S. Department of Justice

"Declining assistance and the use of public property for voter registration," the editorial concluded, "arguably one of the most important functions of government – the county runs the risk of finding itself made irrelevant and appearing as if it doesn't want to see voters on Election Day."

That very night, at the September meeting of the Loudoun County Public Library Board of Trustees, citizens from all across the political spectrum turned out to protest the county's decision.

The Library Board rejected a motion to adopt an American Library Association resolution that pointedly compared some current voter suppression tactics to those of the Jim Crow era.

Instead, without opposition, the Board voted (with one abstention) to assert it's legal right to control the library facilities under its care, and to continue its decadeslong support of non-partisan third-party voter registration.

The decision was a credit to the Board, and stands as yet another example of how liberals and conservative, Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, can debate a controversial issue with grace and mutual respect, and work together for the greater good.

Kudos to all those who came out to express their concerns and to the members of the Library Board of Trustees for an excellent and well-considered decision.

Kudos are also due to the Friends of the Middleburg Public Library, now nearing completion of their drive to raise funds to double the size of our local facility.

Ours is a small community and it serves the needs of the people of at least three counties. Our library, already only half the size it should have been would never have been able to justify on strictly statistical grounds a disproportionate allocation of Loudoun County funding.

The "friends" however, stood up and are very, very close to reaching their fund raising goal.

We urge everyone to help them as much as you can.

Reading . . . and libraries . . . are fundamental.

The Middleburg Library Expansion