GOOD REASONS WELL STATED.
By C. P. Bollman
THE so-called orthodox ministers and churches, though generally in favor of the Blair bill and kindred measures, are not wholly united in support of such legislation. Some there are who, while themselves Sunday-keepers, see the injustice of forcing its observance upon others, and recognize in the Blair bill a long step toward a union of Church and State in this country. Rev. M. D. Shutter, pastor of the Church of the Redeemer, Minneapolis, takes this view of the Blair bill. In a sermon preached in that city March 24, and published in the Tribune of the 25th, he said:— “I am opposed to this measure because any attempt to promote by legislation the observance of any day as a day of religious worship is no part of the function of the State. . . . For the State to proceed upon the basis that such a thing is demanded by the law of God, is to establish the principle that the State has a right to determine what are the laws of God. The Sabbath is in debate even among Christians. The action contemplated in the Blair bill makes the State a partner in a religious controversy, and forces it to a decision against one set of claimants and in favor of the other. Its decision must then be enforced, and this is persecution. The principle itself is the one that lies at the bottom of a union of Church and State. Let Christian people translate the truths and doctrines of Christianity into their lives and not into the statutes. Conversions are not produced by law. We had a trial of the very thing to which this bill would lead, in the early days of this country, when each colony was dominated by a religious sect. We have gotten away from that condition. Let us take no backward steps!” This is sound, and no man can show it to be otherwise. Some suppose that we oppose Sunday legislation simply because Sunday is not the Bible Sabbath. That is not the ground of our opposition. We would oppose just as strongly a bill to enforce the keeping of the Bible Sabbath, for the principle is the same whether the thing to be enforced be in accordance with the Scriptures or not. To legislate upon religious questions is to empower the courts to decide such questions as they do other questions of law and fact, and to enforce their decision by penalties, and that is persecution, whether the decision be scripturally correct or not. C. P. B.