What Ought to Be by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Nov 18, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 45.

What Ought to Be.

By Editor

The Constitution of the United States declares that "the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." The Federal Constitution does declare of the Federal Government that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." It is therefore evident that the power to establish religion is reserved to the States and to the people; but as religion is a personal matter between the individual and God, the matter of its establishment or prohibition ought to be prohibited forever to the States, and reserved forever to the people as individuals. We wish it could be, for it is a right which ought to be recognized; but we have no hope that it will be, for divine prophecy indicates otherwise.