p. 7 | A BAD OUTLOOK by G.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 27, 1901

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 13.

A BAD OUTLOOK.

By G.

An address to “the forty State Legislatures now in session or soon to meet,” says that the National Reform Association “is composed of many thousands of Christian men and women in all States of the American Republic who seek to promote and to maintain whatever is Christian in the laws and institutions of our government.” Interpreted by the constitution of the association, this means enforcing the observance of all Christian laws, institutions, and usages upon the people by the secular government. Then, according to the address to which we here allude, there are many thousands of Christian men and women in all the States of the Union seeking to compel the consciences of men by human law. That is, they are seeking to have the government compel all the people to observe certain outward forms of religion; in other words, to make hypocrites of all who do not believe in those forms, and to punish by fine or imprisonment all who will not yield their conscientious convictions. The address further states that “good citizens of all parties, and of all Christian denominations, Catholic and Protestant alike, are engaged in this movement and represented in this association.”

We would not be understood as antagonizing the idea of uniform marriage and divorce laws in all the States, which this particular address especially advocates. It is the main object of the association—the enforcement of religious observances by secular law—to which we would call the attention of the public as being exceedingly dangerous. The address takes advantage of an appeal for a possibly good move to advertise the association as a general benefactor. Thus many thousands of “good citizens” and “Christian men and women” may be unwittingly drawn into the support of the general work of the association.

It should not be forgotten that its leading spirits have not hesitated to boast that when they shall have acquired in the government the power which they seek, the disfranchisement or even the banishment or death of dissenters would be a logical probability. Therefore we say that the addition of “many thousands of Christian men and women in all the States” to the support of such an association is a bad outlook.