For Religious Liberty by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Nov 22, 1910

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 37, No. 46.

For Religious Liberty

By Editor

THE Los Angeles "Daily Times" of October 31 gives over a column's report of a mass-meeting held at Simpson Auditorium of that city the afternoon of October 30. More than 1,500 persons were present. The report says: "Among the speakers were Dr. Sigmund Hecht, Rev. W. M. Healey, Rev. Lewis A. Platts, Rabbi Isidore Meyers, Reynold E. Blight, and Rev. E. E. Andross. Ex-Judge Waldo M. York acted as chairman of the mass-meeting, and the South Pacific Sanger Bund occupied the stage with the speakers. Resolutions protesting against Sunday legislation were passed, and another mass-meeting to voice the objection to such a measure was called for next Sunday evening in the same place."

The purpose of the meeting was to arouse a public sentiment for that religious freedom vouchsafed of God to every man and guaranteed in the constitution of federal and state government, and against the effort which has persistently been put forth during a score of years in the past in favor of religious legislation. The following resolutions were passed:

"Whereas, God in His wisdom created man a free moral agent, not subject to the dictation of his fellow men in matters of conscience; and

"Whereas, The history of the world abounds in examples of coercion, whereby the moral scruples of godly men have been ignored, their inalienable rights of conscience trampled in the dust, and their lives and property sacrificed, in a futile attempt to control their religious convictions and practises; and

"Whereas, The multiplied failures to dominate the minds and hearts of men, and to regulate their action by force, do not deter some modern religionists from renewed appeals to the civil power, for administrative orders and legislative enactments, that would compel the surrender of their God-given judgment in the realm of conscience; and

"Whereas, A concerted movement is under way to secure the amendment of the state and national constitutions so as to eliminate just provisions for the free exercise of religious worship, and to substitute therefor terms whereby religious legislation might be constitutionally effected; and

"Whereas, The primary object of these verbal alterations in the fundamental law of the land is to make possible the exaltation of the first day of the week as the Sabbath, notwithstanding the conviction of many that the law of God is not subject to human amendment, and notwithstanding the undeniable right of the individual, so far as the state is concerned, to choose for himself which day he will observe as a day of rest, or whether he will rest at all; now, therefore, be it

"Resolved, That we, the people of Los Angeles, in mass-meeting assembled, do hereby express our unalterable conviction that civil and religious liberty, the treasured heritage of our fathers, ought to be maintained throughout the republic. We deplore the effort to curtail the free exercise of religious conviction by civil process, and to force upon others the conclusions of any man or set of men as to which day is the Sabbath, or to regulate by civil law any religious custom or ceremonial.

"Resolved, That the state, in the proper exercise of the functions of government, has no right to discriminate in favor of or against any citizen or citizens, on account of his religious opinions or practises. We, therefore, demand the freedom vouchsafed by the Creator and safeguarded by the existing Constitution, to worship God according to the dictates of our own consciences, without interference by self-constituted censors, or arbitrary dictation by the civil power. We distinctly demand that the Senate and the Assembly of the state of California refrain from the submission to the voters of the state and from the consideration in the halls of legislation of any constitutional amendment or bill that may be offered, whose adoption would make religious legislation possible, or which might serve as a pretext for the future passage of a Sunday law.

"Resolved, That these resolutions be engrossed, and that copies of the same be presented to the Senate and the Assembly of the state, at the ensuing session of the State Legislature, as an expression of our inalienable right and in demonstration of our settled purpose to submit to no civil enactment that infringes upon the domain of conscience."

We do not know how any reasonable man, religious or unreligious, could object to such resolutions as the above. We do not know why any Christian should ask enforcement of what he calls a Christian institution. Jesus said, "All power [authority] is given unto Me in heaven and in earth." Matt. 28:18. Are they afraid that He will not, can not care for His own? "The Lord's hand is not shortened." Are they doubtful about His owning the "civil sabbath"? Hear Him: "Every plant, which My heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up."