Petitions Presented During the Sixtieth Congress by W. A. C.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 11, 1909

Petitions Presented During the Sixtieth Congress

By W. A. C.

As reported in the last number of the REVIEW, in the concluding report of the recent hearing on the Johnston District Sunday bill before the House District committee, some might get a wrong idea of the number of petitions against Sunday legislation that have been sent in during the Sixtieth Congress. The petitions presented at the hearing were those simply which we had collected, or which had been sent to our Office, and did not include those which had previously been sent in by us, or which had been sent directly to Congress from the country at large.

In presenting the petitions before the committee at the hearing, we said: “The same section in the Constitution which prohibits Congress passing a law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, grants the right of petition. In addition to the numerous petitions, containing many thousands and tens of thousands of signatures, which have been sent to Congress directly from the people all over the United States, we herewith present petitions as follows,” and then gave the different items in the list, totaling 345 petitions and 22,797 signatures.

Two days after the hearing we had the privilege of counting the petitions which had previously been sent to the House during the Sixtieth Congress, and referred to the committee on the District of Columbia. These we found to contain about thirty thousand signatures. Adding all together, we find the total to be 1,331 petitions and 52,097 signatures.

W. A. C.