DEPENDENT ON HUMAN FORCE.
By G.
It is admitted by the man who is doing more than any other person to secure Sunday legislation in the United States, that there is no positive proof for Sunday sacredness; that the claim is based entirely upon circumstantial evidence. Yet he has for years been spending all his energies in the endeavor to compel all the people to recognize the sacredness of the day. And this man's efforts, backed by a number of influential organizations, are able to convince many members of Congress that it is to their political interest to enact laws to that effect. The forces at work to secure religious legislation base their efforts and their hopes of success on the fact that so many legislators—national, state, and municipal—think more of securing their own re-election than they do of the welfare of the people. Even the liberties and rights of the people, which the government was established to defend, are too often sacrificed in the eagerness to secure continuance in office. Much of the success that has been gained in the way of Sunday legislation has been through playing upon this weakness of politicians. The head of the so-called Bureau of Reform at Washington has boasted that twenty men writing letters from a certain state made the Congressional delegation from that state believe that the whole state was favorable to certain measures. So while it is admitted that the claim of Sunday sacredness is based solely on circumstantial evidence, its observance is to be secured by coercing legislators to enact laws compelling the people to acknowledge a religious institution that has only a human foundation. Therefore, the hope of Sunday's general recognition as a sacred day is based on compulsory human legislation. This is admitted by its most ardent advocates. Such an institution has nothing in common with Christianity.