THE TIME TO OPPOSE IS NOW.
The Oakland Telegram has the following liberty-breathing editorial on “Sunday Laws,” which is worth repeating. But the time for the opposition of these things is before the government, National State, and Municipal, in its supineness is bound hand and foot, committed to the wicked principle. Then it will be too late. Now is the time for California and Oakland to arouse:— “The good people who are now pushing along with such zeal and energy the movement for the enactment of more rigid laws concerning the observance of Sunday, are likely to meet with strong opposition some of these days.” “So far, the discussion has been nearly all on their side, but there is a growing feeling among a large and intelligent class of men and women that the time is near at hand when some attention must be paid to the principles of religious liberty upon which this government was founded.” “The Constitution of the United States is supposed to vouchsafe to every citizen the right to worship the Creator according to the dictates of his own conscience, and to perform that homage upon any day that his creed or belief teaches him is right and proper.” “The wise men who founded the government went further than this and absolved the citizen from any sort of religious worship whatever if he so elects.” “The act of separating Church and State was to be full and final. In matters of religious observance the majority rule was forever barred, for that is a matter above and beyond the power of the State. The Jew and the Adventist have precisely the same right under the Constitution to set apart the seventh day of the week for rest and religious services as the Catholic or the Presbyterian, the Baptist or the Methodist, had to choose Sunday as the day for those purposes.”