CONGRESSMAN BOWERS ON RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION.
THE following letter from Hon. W. W. Bowers, member of Congress from California, was called forth by the request of a Ventura County minister that he would use his influence and vote against the repeal of the act of Congress closing the World's Fair on Sunday. It shows that the congressmen have not all lost their regard for, or understanding of, the plain principles of our national Constitution in regard to the religious rights of the people of every persuasion:— REV. GEORGE GLUNG, BARSDALE, CAL.—Dear Sir: I have yours of the 20th inst., regarding Sunday closing of the World's Fair. It is not usual for members to reply to such letters, for they come in such numbers—from both sides of the controversy—that it is impossible. But I have disposed of the mail that has come to me in the House this afternoon, and must sit here to vote on the bill now under discussion, and will occupy the time in answering your letter. It is much like hundreds of others received. You say that you "want your representative on record as opposed to any violation of the explicit command of God." You are asking a good deal of me to fill such a bill. Do you do it? Do you know anyone who does? But who is to say what are "the explicit commands of God"? Who among the contending sects is authorized to pronounce the law for others? The history of the world shows that for centuries the people of one religious sect burned the people of other sects at the stake in public for the sole reason that they differed in opinion as to what were the "explicit commands of God." The reformer who broke away from "religious bigotry"—as soon as he acquired the power—burned those who differed from him in religious belief. They tell us the Puritans came to this country to "escape religious persecution," and to "worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences." But they tortured those whose consciences did not dictate in the same line with theirs. *It seems to be taken for granted that the days of religious persecution, when men were thrown into prison and cruelly treated because of their religion, are long past. Would to God they were. We are especially fond of boasting that under the American flag civil and religious312liberty is guaranteed to all citizens. The boast is a lie. The evangelical churches of Arkansas and Tennessee have made it a lie. The shameless persecutions, engineered by these churches, of Christians in those States whose only offense was in obeying the command of Jesus Christ as they conscientiously believed, in keeping the Sabbath day—the seventh day—causing them to be thrown into prison—their homes and property confiscated, is a disgrace and an outrage on the dearest right of the American citizen, and shames the annals of the Dark Ages of religious persecution. Thanks to the patriots who founded and those who preserve the republic, I am enabled to live in a State where no church can cause persons to be thrown into prison and cruelly treated because of a difference in religious belief or observance,—the State of California, that repealed its Sunday law.* Before entering upon my duties as congressman I took an oath to support the Constitution of the United States. That Constitution declares that Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. In my opinion every member of Congress who voted for the Sunday closing of the World's Fair did so in direct, unquestionable violation of his oath. It was at the command of religious organizations, and for religious purposes only. If any American citizen's religion impels him to work the six days beginning with Monday, and to observe Sunday as a holy day, he has that right under the Constitution. And if another citizen's religion impels him to work six days, beginning with Sunday, the first day of the week, and to observe Saturday, the seventh day—the Sabbath of Christ—as a holy day, he has that right under the Constitution to select his own day, whatever day it may be, and to work the other days. And Congress is prohibited by the supreme law of the land from interfering between these citizens making laws establishing the religion of one and prohibiting the religion of the other. Yet this is unquestionably what Congress attempted to do in its World's Fair Sunday legislation. In all the history of the world the blackest pages—the saddest—are those whereon is recorded the cruelties, the horrible murders, committed by those who spread and enforce their religion with the sword. Those who in these days seek to enforce their religion upon others by employing the sheriff's posse are just as cruel and infinitely meaner than those who used the sword. Cannot the evangelical churches see that their very existence depends upon the absolute liberty of the citizen in all matters of religion, upon the utter absence of all religious legislation, of laws regulating and establishing religion? Can they not see the danger they invite by letting down the constitutional bars and demanding that the nation enter upon a system of religious legislation? Do they not realize that just as surely as they let down those bars, and open the gates, the "Mother Church" will make the laws, and they will not be in accord with evangelical doctrine? Are they blind to the signs of the times, deaf to the public, bold avowals of the managers of "Mother Church"? The preservation of civil and religious liberty in this country depends wholly upon the absence of religious legislation. I believe the best citizen of the United States—the best man in the world—is the real Christian whose religion has taken all the cruelty out of his heart and filled it with love of his fellow man—that has taken all the devilishness out of his disposition; who, rejoicing in his freedom to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, freely accords to others the freedom he enjoys, who, if he cannot persuade others by reason and argument to believe as he does, never thinks of employing the sword, the sheriff's club, or the prison, to compel them. And the worst man—the most dangerous man—is, and always has been, the religious light who would force his religion upon others by the sheriff's club and the prison's discipline; and the more conscientious he is the more dangerous he is. As for me, I shall keep my oath, as I interpret it by the ordinary meaning of the English words used in the Constitution, and shall strive to keep up the bars, and the gates closed against the religious legislation demanded by mistaken churchmen—and forbidden by the Constitution of the United States. Very truly yours,
W. W. BOWERS.