A Drastic Sunday Law Bill

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 2, 1908

A Drastic Sunday Law Bill

ON Friday last there was introduced in the House of Representatives another bill to make compulsory a strict observance of Sunday in the District of Columbia. This is the most comprehensive and the most drastic bill that has yet been introduced, and a reading of its provisions will leave no question in the minds of any as to the religious character of this proposed legislation. All business, save the running of trains and street-cars, the operation of livery stables and restaurants, and the sale of drugs, newspapers, etc., is absolutely prohibited, under penalty of fine and imprisonment. An exception is made in the case of those who “uniformly keep another day of the week as holy time,” and do “not labor on that day,” and provided they do not labor on Sunday in such a way as “to interrupt or disturb other persons in observing the first day of the week as a holy time or day of rest.” The bill therefore aims to require of every person within the District the observance of one day of the seven “as a holy time,” for he who would escape punishment for Sunday work must be able to show that he uniformly observes another day “as holy time.” In these provisions is unmasked the true character of the whole Sunday-law movement.