The Bill Is Despotic by W. S. Pechin

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jun 26, 1889

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 4, No. 22.

The Bill Is Despotic.

By W. S. Pechin

If the Blair bill and the proposed amendment are righteous measures, we may well ask why did not Jesus and his co-workers petition the Roman Government to establish the kingdom of God by law. The gospel asks for no legislation, and should have no laws to support it. The great commission was to disciple the nations.

The “Blair bill” makes the “Lord’s day” a religious institution and violates the spirit and the letter of Article I. [See amendments to Constitution of the U. S.] It prohibits persons from engaging in any recreation “to the disturbance of others on the first day of the week.” The crime would be in disturbing someone. Some overzealous persons would, for the purpose of prosecution, seek to be disturbed. The bill is despotic, and a long step backward toward the Dark Ages. We have no scriptural command to observe the first day of the week as a day of rest and worship. The authority is custom and common consent. There is a respectable body of Christians in this country which holds to the seventh day, and freedom of conscience would be placed under the ban of law by the bill. Shall the State compel seventh-day worshipers to give up their creed? Is the United States Senate an infallible pope to issue bulls and promulgate decrees?

The first section of the proposed amendment is misleading and false, as it relates to the second section. The first prohibits an establishment of religion, and the second is that “the principles of the Christian religion” shall be taught in the public schools.

Who shall determine what are the principles of the Christian religion? The answer is an easy one. The dominant religious denomination of any State can interpret these principles in accordance with its creed. Thus would churches be tempted to degenerate into political parties.—W. S. Pechin, in Reason.