The Spartanburg Trial by C. M. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jan 24, 1907

The Spartanburg Trial

By C. M. S.

It was decided by those interested in the indictment of the three brethren at Spartanburg, S. C., for Sunday work, that the case of Elder R. T. Nash should be used as a test case, and that the others be disposed of in accordance therewith.

The trial has taken place, as will be seen by the extracts quoted in the Religious Liberty Reading on page 20.

There are some thoughts in connection with these matters that are worthy of more consideration than they generally receive. There is not an advocate of Sunday laws who will admit that their enforcement is an act of persecution against those who religiously observe another day as the Sabbath. The writer has heard prominent National Reformers scout the idea of Adventists' having suffered under the law because of having quietly gone about their own work at home. This conviction of Elder Nash, with the sentence of the court upon him and his two brethren, is an emphatic denial of all such assertions of Sunday-law advocates. The enumeration of the offenses by the prosecution is an enumeration of the most common home duties, whose performance could annoy none but those who wished to compel religious people to cease the outward expression of their belief, and act as if they believed in the sacredness of a Sunday-sabbath and the necessity of taking part in its religious observance.

That this is a fact recognized by more than Seventh-day Adventists is shown by an editorial utterance in the Spartanburg Journal. The editor of that journal admits that there are “many hundreds of people right here in Spartanburg” who “do more work every Sunday than Mr. Nash ever does, and do not defend it on religious grounds.” He says further: “They are not prosecuted, and nobody wants them prosecuted.” Then he asks: “Why then jump on Mr. Nash and his people for doing the same thing or less? The reason is,” he says, “that Mr. Nash and the Seventh-day Adventists defend their acts on religious grounds, and the others do not.” That he sees the injustice of it, as all fair-minded persons must, is shown by his remark: “It is a curious situation, one of the strange inconsistencies of life.”

That the editor does not favor Seventh-day Adventists or their belief, or believe in religious liberty for them, is shown by the following extract from this same editorial:—

Let Mr. Nash and his friends understand that they must obey the laws of the land, or at least those laws that their neighbors happen to be interested in. If they wish to refrain from worldly labors and perform religious devotions on Saturday, they enjoy the freedom of being able to do so unmolested. They are not required to hold or attend religious services on Sunday, but there is a statute in this State prohibiting work on Sunday, which is sometimes fished out and given a little use. Let these good people therefore refrain from hunting trouble, and avoid offending their neighbors when the latter have the law, and therefore the courts and the juries, on their side.

Now the real reason why “their neighbors happen to be interested in” that particular law is, according to the editor's own statement quoted above, because “Mr. Nash and the Seventh-day Adventists defend their acts on religious grounds, and the others do not.” They have a religious belief, but are not to be allowed to exercise it because they have Bible authority for holding it. If this is not a restriction of religious rights, then there never has been any in the history of this world.

Those who would restrict the religious liberties of the people have always stigmatized as “trouble-hunters” those who have sought to “worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences;” and this feature is not wanting in this case. Ahab made the same accusation against Elijah. The officials of the Inquisition held the same opinion of the millions whom they sent to their death; and we have it to-day from the lips of those who, failing to appreciate the blessings of religious liberty, are willing to sell their own heritage of religious liberty by compelling their neighbors to yield to them in religious practise. It is true that they do not always see the logic of their own demand; but it stands out as a fact, nevertheless, that when they secure laws abridging the rights of conscience, they are abridging their own rights of conscience, and admitting the right of majority rule in matters of faith.

The Journal's editorial closes with these words:—

The law having been declared and demonstrated to them in this kindly manner [he here alludes to the smallness of the fine imposed], the obligation rests upon them to carefully observe it in future. It is also a matter of gratification to the public that these defendants were treated in a kind and considerate manner by the court and its officials, and given no grounds to feel that they have been persecuted.

That the editor, after admitting all he does in regard to the injustice of the matter, could close his editorial as he does is to us “one of the strange inconsistencies of” human nature. We wonder if the fact of persecution depends upon the size of the penalty. We wonder if those convicted Seventh-day Adventists feel that they have equality in the sight of the law with their neighbors whose religious belief differs from theirs. While those who do not defend their Sunday work by Bible authority may work as much as they please on that day, and those who defend their Sunday work by Bible authority are indicted and fined because they work, and are threatened with further prosecution for its repetition, the statement that the latter are not suffering persecution, is a palpable misstatement of facts which deceives no one.

In this particular trial the judge several times reminded the defendant that he must not make a religious argument because the court had nothing to do with the religious belief of Seventh-day Adventists. But as a matter of fact the whole thing, the passage of the law, the complaint, the indictment, the trial, and the conviction has to do with religion, and is based upon religion. The law was passed to protect and perpetuate a religious institution. The complaint was made against the defendant because some one felt that the defendant had violated a religious institution. That the law of the land was broken never inspired that prosecution, for it is admitted that it is broken every Sunday in Spartanburg by hundreds of people who are never arrested for doing it, and what is true of Spartanburg is true of every city, village, and town in the United States. The indictment was drawn up because a religious man had complained of the “desecration” of a religious institution by those who did not believe in the sacredness of that institution. The trial was granted and the conviction secured, not because of a violation of the law of the land, but because the law as it stands gives men of a certain religious belief an opportunity to compel others to act as they do in a religious matter. As long as a civil law for the protection of a religious institution remains on the statute-books of any State, it can not be true that the court has nothing to do with the religious belief of those who are indicted for a violation of such law. The law itself takes cognizance of their belief by compelling them to sacrifice one sixth of their time for holding that belief; and the judge takes cognizance of that belief when he fines a man who does not choose to make that sacrifice.

The spirit that is urging on the whole Sunday-law crusade is plainly manifest wherever the enforcement of that law is attempted. It is those who seek to honor their Creator by resting upon the day set apart by him through his own act and his own command that first feel the strength of its persecuting power. That fact demonstrates as plainly as anything need to who is the real author, the inspiring spirit, of the Sunday-law crusade.

C. M. S.