Untitled article

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · February 16, 1893

If Congress can do this in one case, can interpret the Bible in one point, it can do it in any case; it can interpret the Bible on every point. When Congress went beyond the Constitution in this, as it did, it put itself and the Government in line with all the Church and State governments that have ever been, and assumed to itself to be the interpreter of the Bible for all the people in the land, and for all who come into the land. More than that, it not only assumed to itself the right and the authority to interpret and enforce divine law as such, but in doing that it put the stamp of its legislative approval upon a given religious and doctrinal belief. It made an adherence to that belief and observance distinctively necessary to citizenship under this Government. It built a surer foundation for that line of judicial precedent in religious law for which there has never heretofore been any adequate basis.