The Seventh-Day Adventists and the Protection of Sunday
By Editor
DURING the agitation for a Sunday law for the District of Columbia, the Christian Advocate of New York printed a letter from its Washington correspondent, in which it was stated that the Seventh-day Adventists were opposing the effort to secure a District Sunday law because they believed that the seventh day of the week was the Sabbath. As this did not give the correct reason why Seventh-day Adventists oppose Sunday legislation, the president of the General Conference, Elder A. G. Daniells, addressed a letter to the Editor of the Advocate, in which he correctly defined the attitude of this people on this question. In its issue for June 18, the Advocate referred to this matter in an editorial with the title at the head of this article, and printed the following extract from Elder Daniell’s letter:— Seventh-day Adventists do not oppose the enactment of Sunday law because they believe the only Bible Sabbath to be the seventh day. It is against the evil principle of religious legislation that we protest. The principle of the total separation of church and state would be equally violated in enacting a law compelling the observance of the seventh day. For this reason we would promptly and vigorously oppose any bill favoring the seventh day. The question of the day does not figure in the question whatever. We believe that a civil law would be detrimental to the sanctity and observance of the seventh day. It is the same concerning the first day of the week. At the close of its editorial comment upon this letter, the Advocate said:— We have sometimes sympathized with the Seventh-day Baptists because their day had no protection, while those who believe in Sunday have such protection. But having discovered by the statement of the president of the Seventh-day Adventists that they do not believe in any kind of protection, our heart-strings will no longer vibrate in sympathy with them upon this point. The advocates of Sunday laws seem to find it difficult to comprehend clearly the fundamental principles governing the relation between the state and the church, and the application of these principles in actual experience. Because the Seventh-day Adventists do not ask for any further protection on the seventh day of the week than on any other day, the Advocate declares that “they do not believe in any kind of protection.” Our position is this: we believe that any body of people, religious, political, or otherwise, have a right to assemble peaceably on any day of the week, and that it is the duty of civil government to protect them from disturbance, but we do not deem it within the province of civil government to distinguish between days by granting more protection upon one day than upon another. It is not true that the Seventh-day Adventists “do not believe in any kind of protection,” but it is true that they believe in protecting citizens in the enjoyment of their rights rather than in protecting a particular day of the week. Does the Advocate see the difference between its statement of the belief of Seventh-day Adventists, and our statement of their belief? Will it put the matter before its readers in the proper light? We shall wait to see. In another paragraph, with a closing sentence somewhat ambiguous in its reference, the Advocate pays its respects to the conscientious convictions of the Seventh-day Adventists in these words:— Meanwhile we rejoice to see their devotion to their conscientious views and principles. In matters of this kind, we would rather be wrong and unpopular, conscientiously, than to be right merely for popularity’s sake. We bow to every one who stands up for what he believes to be right, unless he attacks the rights or, unjustly, the characters and reputations of his fellow-citizens. Any person of the latter class deserves contempt, and if he becomes too unbearable, he should feel the full force of the law. We are not certain that we fully understand the application of the last sentence in this connection, unless it be that a too persistent opposition to Sunday laws might be interpreted as an attack upon the rights of citizens. Once it is conceded that the state has the right to legislate with reference to religious matters, and it is an easy step to the ground that the state should punish those who insist on declaring that the civil power has nothing to do with matters of faith, and that every one should be free to follow the convictions of his own conscience in religious questions. Many a page of history is filled with the bloody record of the persecution of those who have advocated the same principles that are now advocated by the Seventh-day Adventists. Will that history be repeated?