Jewish Views of Religious Liberty
In its zeal for legislation in favor of Sunday, “The United Presbyterian” (Pittsburg) has the following to say with reference to Jewish opposition to this sort of legislation: “One bill proposes permission to conduct secular business as usual on the Sabbath by such as observe Saturday as a day of rest, and another extends permission to all who keep any other day of the week as holy time. In many ways the determination on the part of the Jews to abrogate practically all distinctively Christian institutions and laws, has been very positively shown. Our school-books and holiday entertainments must be dechristianized, and the name of Jesus be blotted out from the instruction of children. To the average American Jew this country is their land of promise. Nowhere in the world have the Jews enjoyed such privileges as here; in no other land have they been allowed to stand on their feet in the fulness of manhood and citizenship. And yet they seek to break down the institutions and the laws which have been fundamental in our government and national life. This is a Christian land, altho not yet wholly sanctified in the lives of its citizens, and they who seek safety and a home here should accept the situation. If the Jew thinks it hard to be compelled to forego the profits of business on one day of the week he should remember that it would be an immeasurably greater hardship for the great body of the people to be deprived of the holy day.” Mr. Charles H. Joseph, the editor of “The Jewish Criterion,” also of Pittsburg, makes an answer to this charge. What he has to say is worthy of thought. It is this: “We would ask the reverend author of the foregoing. By whose authority does he lay claim to the country, and why is it more his country than ours? Such uncharitable and intolerant language comes with poor grace from such a source. This land is just what it is because it gives every man the right to worship God according to the dictates of his conscience and is absolutely free from sectarian domination. That the American people indorse this view is shown by the fact that Mr. Taft was elected President despite the unchristian outbursts of hidebound orthodox theologians of the narrow school. We dread to think of what would have happened, and the kind of Constitution we should now be living under, if the drafters of that document and the founders of the government had been narrow-minded churchmen, instead of big, broad, liberal men. “Tho our worthy friend is so eager to accuse the Jews of doing this or that in an effort to desecrate the Sabbath, what has he to say of those communities where liberal laws are in force and where the Continental Sunday is observed? All through the larger cities of the West the communities seem to be just as moral as the people of Pennsylvania, and yet they refuse to recognize the Blue Law as essential to righteousness. “As for our school-books, by what right has any sectarian body to insist that they should be ‘Christianized’? This is a country where men and women of all nationalities and religious beliefs have sought their home. This applies to the ancestors of the editor of The United Presbyterian as well as any one else; and why should the Jewish child be compelled to read or study Christian church teachings in the public schools which he helps to support? Where is the fairness, where the justice of such a position? He says, ‘Nowhere in the world have the Jews enjoyed such privileges as here.’ Well, where else in the world has any other American enjoyed such privileges as in his own country? “We want to call the attention of the editor to this one fact, and that in as emphatic a manner as possible: the Jew is no less an American than he is, even if his religious belief is different. It is well that this should be understood once and for all. We are heartily sick of the utter intolerance and self-sufficiency that characterize such ignorant outbursts.”