The National Reform Platform
At the Wooster, Ohio, Convention the National Reformers adopted the following as a part of their platform:—
“The rights of man are properly understood and maintained only where responsibility to God is deeply felt. This is sufficient guarantee that our movement cannot infringe upon any just conception of individual liberty.” The self-assurance of these model Reformers is something to be admired. We protest that this is no guarantee at all. All history attests that individual liberty has not been secured, in any instance, by uniting religion with the State. The following proposition, timely three centuries ago, is as conclusive as that copied above:—
“The rights of man are properly understood and maintained only where responsibility to God is deeply felt. This is sufficient guarantee that the supremacy of the Pope as the vicegerent of Christ, and the establishment of the holy inquisition cannot infringe upon any just conception of individual liberty.” To “the Church” this was a very reasonable proposition, and “very full of comfort.” But to dissenters and genuine Reformers, it had a different look. In the light of what we have read from the “National Reformers” we are inclined to believe that the “true inwardness” of the movement and the platform is concealed in the phrase, “just conception of individual liberty.” It was shown in the SENTINEL, from their own avowals, that with them, “just conceptions” of individual rights are that no one shall be a bona fide citizen and eligible to office who is not in full sympathy with “the characteristic faith” of the nation! With this understanding their platform is quite consistent!