The Religious Amendment of the Constitution.
By Editor
THIS movement, and the recent National Convention in Cincinnati, are eliciting many comments from the press of the whole country. While a very few pass it by with a slur as a mere temporary sensation of little or no consequence, it is generally regarded as a work of growing strength and importance, both by its advocates and opposers. Petitions and remonstrances are both being circulated with activity, and shrewd observers, who have watched the movement with a jealous eye, and heretofore hoped it would amount to nothing, now confess that it “means business.” No movement of equal magnitude of purpose has ever sprung up and become strong and secured favor so rapidly as this. Indeed, none of equal magnitude has ever been sprung upon the American mind, as this aims to remodel the whole framework of our government, and give to it a strong religious cast—a thing which the framers of our Constitution were careful to exclude from it. They not only ask that the Bible, and God, and Christ shall be recognized in the Constitution, but that it shall indicate this as “a Christian nation, and place all Christian laws, institutions, and usages in our government on an undeniable legal basis in the fundamental law of the nation.” Of course, appropriate legislation will be required to carry such amendments into effect, and somebody will have to decide what are “Christian laws and institutions.” From what we know of such movements in the past in other countries, and of the temper of the churches of this, and of human nature when it has power suddenly conferred upon it, we look for no good from this movement. From a lengthy article in the Lansing State Republican we take the following extract: “Now there are hundreds and thousands of moral and professedly Christian people in this nation to-day who do not recognize the doctrine of the Trinity, do not recognize Jesus Christ the same as God. And there are hundreds and thousands of men and women who do not recognize the Bible as the revelation of God. The attempt to make any such amendment to the Constitution would be regarded by a large minority, perhaps a majority, of our nation as a palpable violation of liberty of conscience. Thousands of men, if called upon to vote for such an amendment, would hesitate to vote against God, although they may not believe that the amendment was necessary or that it is right; and such men would either vote affirmatively or not at all. In every case such an amendment would be likely to receive an affirmative vote, which would by no means indicate the true sentiment of the people. And the same rule would hold good in relation to the adoption of such an amendment by Congress or by the Legislatures of three-quarters of the States. Men who make politics a trade would hesitate to record their names against the proposed Constitutional amendment, advocated by the leaders of the great religious denominations of the land, and indorsed by such men as Bishop Simpson, Bishop McIlvaine, Bishop Eastburn, President Finney, Prof. Lewis, Prof. Seeley, Bishop Huntington, Bishop Kerfoot, Dr. Patterson, Dr. Cuyler, and many other divines who are the representative men of their respective denominations.” Not only the representative men of the churches are pledged to this movement, but Governors, Judges, and many of the most eminent men of the land are working for it. Who doubts the power of the “representative men of the denominations” to rally the strength of their denominations to sustain this work, at their call? We utter no prophecy of the future; it is not needed. Events transpire in these days faster than our minds are prepared to grasp them. Let us heed the admonition to “watch!” and, with reliance upon God, prepare for “those things which are coming on the earth.”