The Religious Garb Question

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 16, 1912

The Religious Garb Question

IN speaking of the decision of President Taft in suspending the order of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs forbidding the wearing of a distinctive religious garb in the government Indian schools, the Northwestern Christian Advocate of April 24, 1912, says:—

“There is no need of any hearing of the ‘parties in interest’ to determine what the policy of the United States government ought to be. The dress of a religious order, whether it be that of a deaconess, a Sister of Charity, the Salvation Army, or the Volunteers, is perfectly appropriate in an institution supported by the order or its friends. It is perfectly inappropriate and intolerable in an institution supported by the government in the name of the whole people. No ‘hearings’ can change that, and the religious garb must go.”

We agree with the Advocate that there is no demand for a hearing on a question of this character. Whoever may be the ‘parties in interest,’ whether a humble minority or the thousands of an influential church, a question that involves the basic principles of our Constitution, the very liberties underlying our free government, calls for no delay of decision. It is a question of principle and of fact, and not one of caprice, nor one which should be determined by the judgment of interested parties.