Tour of Central Union Conference
By John S. Wightman
JEFFERSON CITY at last! Beginning a second religious liberty tour at Colorado Springs, Colo., January 17, with a mass-meeting in one of the prominent halls of the city, and intending to visit the various capital cities of the Central Union Conference territory during the time of the legislative sessions, Mrs. Wightman and the writer reached the capital city of Missouri, March 19. All the State capitals have been visited with the exception of Topeka, which, unfortunately, will be reached after the legislature has adjourned. Religious liberty mass-meetings have been conducted in a number of cities, where Mrs. Wightman has delivered a lecture upon the “Inalienable Rights of American Citizenship.” At nearly all the cities the attendance was excellent. Lectures have been given in Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Canon City, Palisade, Denver, Arvada, Fort Collins, and Greeley, Colo.; Sidney, Minatare, North Platte, College View, Lincoln, and Omaha, Neb. Other cities visited, and in which strong personal effort has been put forth, are Cheyenne, Wyo.; Bridgeport, Kearney, and Grand Island, Neb.; and Kansas City and Sedalia, Mo. Ten days were profitably spent in Denver. There is no State Sunday law in Colorado except that controlling saloons and places of amusement. Several bills were introduced in the legislature, making Sunday labor a misdemeanor, or crime, and fixing the penalty. We immediately furnished lengthy communications to the press—the four great dailies of Denver—in opposition to the proposed laws, not one of which was refused publication. Efforts in the House of Representatives to show the danger of religious legislation were successful. Sunday bills perished in the committee on judiciary. The chairman assured me that this would be the fate of such bills. In the senate one bill still claims some attention; but should it pass that body, it can have no hope of recognition in the lower house, unless some great changes take place. Thus, so far, does Colorado refuse to take a signal step in legislating a “sabbath day” upon the people by prohibiting “labor” on that day. Quick and painstaking personal work, personal letters of protest, petitions, and the extensive circulation of our religious liberty literature among lawmakers, with an extensive newspaper correspondence, have undoubtedly prevented this kind of legislation, at the time the Senate was that the National Reform Bureau was urging this legislation in Colorado. Our trip through Nebraska was hastened in order to reach Lincoln, the capital, in time to make our position understood upon the question of religious legislation, at the time the Senate was considering a bill to remove certain restrictions pertaining to outdoor amusements on Sunday, and to materially modify the Sunday law. It proved to be an opportune time for a work of public education. Securing the Auditorium, which will seat two thousand persons, two meetings were held,—one on February 23, the other on February 28. At the first,—an inclement night,—fifteen hundred persons were present. Among these were Ex-Governor Sheldon, Mr. William Jennings Bryan with his wife and daughter, and a large number of the members of the legislature. Mrs. Wightman delivered the address, which was listened to with marked attention, and received frequent applause. At the second meeting, the weather being fine, over two thousand persons attended. The speakers were Elder E. T. Russell and Mrs. Wightman, Elder Russell calling attention to fundamental principles of government, and Mrs. Wightman dwelling on the real dangers that threaten the American system of jurisprudence. In the meantime—eleven days in all—a correspondence, pro and con, upon the subject of religious legislation, took place in the columns of the State Journal, Nebraska’s foremost newspaper. In all, sixteen long letters were published, furnished by more than a half-dozen persons. Certainly Lincoln never was so thoroughly aroused over the question of religious legislation as at this time. These articles will be republished in pamphlet form, and with valuable addenda, will be ready for distribution by the Religious Liberty Department within a short time. Senator Ransom, of Omaha, made a speech in the Senate, in favor of civil and religious liberty, which if not the best, may be said to be one of the best, made in assemblies of lawmakers. Though the bill to modify was defeated by the pressure of combined ministerial alliances brought to bear on the members of the legislature, still the cause of religious liberty has won many new and strong friends both within and without the boundaries of the legislature, and the agitation must result in the enlightenment of many minds. And the Sunday law is no better and no worse than it was. At the time of this agitation, articles from the pen of the writer were published in other papers in Lincoln, Omaha, and Hastings. A mass-meeting in one of the theater buildings at Omaha, March 7, brought out a good attendance, though the weather was quite inclement. Mrs. Wightman gave the principal address, upon “Roger Williams and Civil Government.” Elders E. T. Russell and A. T. Robinson, Pastor L. A. Spring, secretary of the Nebraska department of religious liberty, and his wife, and others, gave valuable aid on this occasion. The Omaha papers printed extended and good reports of the meeting. Shortly afterward, a meeting was held in one of the orthodox churches of Omaha, in which the same ground was taken as to legislation curtailing the natural rights of the people as was taken by us in our Omaha meeting. So much for a change of public opinion! We enjoyed a pleasant visit with the chief justice of the State of Nebraska; and though in a recent opinion he sustained the constitutionality of the Nebraska Sunday law, he seems, in the main, to be sensible of the truths of religious liberty, and willing to admit the rights of all in the premises. In the opinion rendered by the court, he no doubt followed the precedents established by law, rather than expressed the personal convictions and beliefs individually entertained. The chief justice assured us that but for an attack of rheumatism, he, too, would have been present at the religious liberty meeting. Space forbids me to speak of the many public officials whom we have met, and of what they have said. We are encouraged as we see some desire, and even an attempt upon the part of some of these to throw off the galling yoke of ecclesiastical oppression, to free themselves and the civil power from the usurped authority of an organized church force. Many see the danger menacing the free institutions of our land, and will, we feel sure, eventually voice themselves in protest against this new kind of tyranny. In the Wyoming Legislature, at Cheyenne, there were no Sunday observance bills. And we found little beyond personal work to do. Elder R. T. Baer, the secretary of the State conference religious liberty bureau, is keeping close watch of events at this place, while in Brother John T. Burns, secretary of the Dry Farming Congress of the United States, he has a valuable coworker. By the efforts of Brother Burns, religious liberty truths are being brought before many prominent people of the nation, with whom he is personally acquainted. We much enjoyed our visit with Brother Burns and his estimable wife. After the Omaha meeting I went to Des Moines, the State capital of Iowa, upon invitation of Elder M. N. Campbell, president of the Iowa Conference, to assist in a sharp conflict they were having in the legislature there, of which I will write more particularly in a future article. At Jefferson City we find enough to keep us fully employed. No less than eight Sunday bills have been introduced in the legislature,—seven to make more exacting an already strict Sunday law adopted in 1853, and one to modify the existing statute. Besides a strong effort at this place, we are planning on conducting mass-meetings at a number of cities in Missouri, and later in Kansas; and while the legislature of that State is adjourned, we will do what we can at many places where local battles have been waged for stricter municipal Sunday regulation. While we had planned for an eight-weeks’ tour only, we find it will necessarily lengthen out well into the twelfth or thirteenth week, according to the present outlook. It may be interesting to REVIEW readers to know that, so far, in this second tour, over six thousand persons in the aggregate have been reached by public speech; two million four hundred fifty thousand readers of the secular press have been reached with articles ranging from one-half to two columns in length; nearly six hundred personal visits have been made; several thousand letters written; many thousands of pages of literature distributed, besides several hundred copies of Liberty being judiciously distributed. God has blessed the united efforts in the territory of the Central Union Conference to stay the tide of religious legislation and the relentless hand of persecution. Altogether, we have endeavored literally to obey the injunction, “Be staunch to defend your religious liberty.” JOHN S. WIGHTMAN.