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Sunday Law Tyrannical

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 4, 1907

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 84, No. 27.

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Sunday Law Tyrannical

Circular Sent out Against Recent Sabbath Legislation. Reasons for the Formation of the Canadian Rational Sunday League — The Claim is Made That a Religious Persecution Has Been Commenced.
The reasons given for the formation of the Canadian Rational Sunday League are specified in a circular signed by Major W. H. Orchard, chairman of the organization committee, and Mr. J. Enoch Thompson, secretary. The following is an extract from the circular:—
“The formation of this league has been forced upon us by the tyrannical Sunday laws recently enacted at Ottawa. This legislation was secured by professional agitators in the name of religion, and under sanction of this iniquitous law a religious persecution has begun. Those who do not agree with the Lord’s Day Alliance are to be converted to their views by fines and imprisonment; like St. Paul before his conversion, who said, . . . “and being exceeding mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange cities.” How accurately this represents the attitude of the well-paid agitators of the Lord’s Day Alliance, who travel from one city to another, instituting legal proceedings, taking up collections and stirring up strife! True religion is honest and never aggressive, and leaves every one free to live his own life as his conscience dictates. The religion which requires police, fines, and imprisonment to support it, that causes strife, hatred, and malice, is not the Christian religion. We are unworthy the name of free men if we submit to these tyrannical laws.”
The objects of the league are also stated. Those behind it desire to secure the right to buy and sell refreshments on Sunday, the right to have popular lectures or similar recreations on Sunday, the right to have public amusements in the parks, to open museums, etc., and also the right to buy and sell postage-stamps, tobacco, etc., on the Sabbath day at such places as hotels and drug-stores, which are now open on Sunday.—Toronto Globe, May 1, 1907.