Religious Liberty Notes
By W. A. COLCORD
The Minneapolis Journal of June 3 publishes an article headed, “Must Keep Sunday.” This echoes the spirit now rising in the religious world. Article 15 of the Belgian constitution of 1830, provides that “no one can be compelled to contribute in any way whatsoever to the rites and ceremonies of any religious worship, nor to observe its days of rest.” Such a provision is right and just; but if applied, it would sweep away every Sunday law in the world. Echoes from the Field (Colorado) reports the following: “Raton, N. M., has been the center of religious persecution for some time, and Brother E. K. Cassell, of that place, was put in jail because he would not refrain from working on Sunday. As a result of this agitation an interest has been awakened, and Elders Hoover and Richards will hold a tent-meeting at that place.” The Young People’s Society of Pittsburg, Pa., the hotbed of National Reform, recently ordered thirty-six thousand pages of religious liberty leaflets to be distributed in the cities of Pittsburg and Allegheny, where the Allegheny Sabbath Observance Association is seeking to have the Sunday law enforced. A good example for other Young People’s Societies to follow where the question of Sunday enforcement is being agitated. June 5, Magistrate Furlong, in the Gates Avenue court, of New York City, discharged two Jewish peddlers, charged with violating the Sunday law, on the ground that “the law had been complied with in its spirit, even if it seemed to have been broken in the letter.” The men declared that they observed another day in the week as their Sabbath, and the court therefore held that they had not broken the Sabbath observance law. This is a more liberal interpretation of Sunday laws than can generally be expected. A committee of ministers and churchmen, headed by a former mayor of the place, appeared recently before the council of Dover, N. J., and demanded the enforcement of the ordinance prohibiting Sunday selling. Notices were accordingly served on storekeepers by the chief of police to the effect that violators of the ordinance would be prosecuted. All history attests that law and the police force are the best arguments there are in favor of Sunday observance. The Dover ministers and churchmen, it seems, have discovered this fact. Article 23 of the bill separating church and state now pending in the French Parliament, pronounces a fine of sixteen to two hundred francs, and an imprisonment of six days to two months, against “those who by means of threats or violence shall cause any one to attend or refrain from attending religious worship, or cause him to support or refrain from supporting religious worship, or cause him to celebrate certain feasts or to observe certain days, and, as a consequence, to open or close his shops or stores, and to perform or quit certain jobs.” This is similar in character to Article 15 of the Belgian constitution, above referred to, and carries to its farthest logical conclusion the principle of liberty of conscience as applied to the matter of observing religious rest days. Neither Sunday enforcement nor any other relic of church and state union could exist where such a regulation prevailed. The disposition to secure Sunday rest and Sunday closing by force, which is so wide-spread, is despotic, and is so regarded by men who rightly understand the question of rights. Recently certain merchants of Kansas City, Kan., urged the passage of a strict Sunday closing ordinance by the council of that city, to which the mayor, Mr. Rose, replied: “You ask us to utilize the police department to protect you against the greed of a few men who will not close on Sunday. I sympathize with you, but I disagree with your method.” He then intimated to the merchants that the proper course for them to pursue in the accomplishment of their object was “by an honorable agreement” among themselves. This is the only proper course to be pursued in such matters, if men desire uniformity in practise, and it would be well if more officials were as ready as Mayor Rose to say so to those who are constantly besieging them for enforced Sunday closing.