Forces in Active Antagonism to the Fundamental Principles of the American Government
By C. M. S.
IN God’s dealings with men we find this fundamental principle, not merely expressed, but actually operating:— “Surely the Lord Jehovah will do nothing, except he reveal his secret unto his servants the prophets.” Amos 3:7. The revelations of his Word and their fulfilment in affairs of men and nations verify our Lord’s declaration through the prophet Amos. But he has done more than that; for he has also revealed to his servants the great purposes of the adversary, and the manner by which they will be worked out. We know that our nation is a subject of prophecy; we know that, in spite of the fact that the various colonies had governments that were at enmity with the governmental principle laid down by Jesus Christ, yet when the nation was established, it was established upon the principle which our Lord enunciated—the separation of church and state. It is therefore only reasonable to suppose that if this nation should abandon that principle, and adopt and operate upon the opposite principle, the all-wise Father would reveal that to his servants in his Word. And he has done so.10 Throughout the whole world, this nation, the United States of America, is known as the nation whose key-word is freedom of conscience,—the nation which leaves the spiritual interests of the people with the church, and the temporal interests with the state. It is also a republic, a nation wherein the people rule. Therefore, of more than ordinary significance are these words of Inspiration in reference to that symbol which so certainly represents this nation: “Saying to them that dwell on the earth [the people], that they [the people] should make an image to the beast who hath the stroke of the sword and lived.” Rev. 13:14. These words indicate that Inspiration is speaking of a nation whose ruling power is “the people.” They indicate also the apostasy of that government from the principles upon which it was founded; for that governing power of which Inspiration speaks, assumes the right to enter the realm of religion and dictate to men whom they shall worship and how they shall do it, and then overrides the rights of every man’s conscience by declaring that they who do not thus worship shall be killed. Rev. 13:15. From freedom of conscience to martyrdom because of conscience is not the work of a moment, and such a work is not accomplished without the putting forth of tremendous power. Whence comes that power which can metamorphose a nation from within, without force of arms, which can set a mighty nation backward against the current of its own progress and the shibboleth of its own people, without the shock of foreign war? There can be but one answer, and that is: From combination of great forces, inside the nation, operating upon the religious instincts of the people. Do we see any such combinations in this country now whose principles are in antagonism to the principles of soul-freedom upon which this nation was founded? The history of certain great movements now in operation in this country answers that question by their own utterances and the records of their doings. As might have been expected, the establishment of this nation upon the principles of soul-freedom was not accomplished without opposition. It was not done with the unanimous consent of the people. The adherents of the idea of a national religion were not converted in toto, neither has that idea at any time since lacked its supporters and advocates. In the bosoms of such people there has constantly lurked the idea that in some way the state is responsible for religion, must support the church, must protect and perpetuate the day of worship. As early as 1829 that sentiment was taking tangible form in an organized assault upon Congress to the end that the government should recognize the first day of the week as the nation's sabbath and enforce it. The movement gained considerable headway, because of its influential clerical backing; and it was for the purpose of explaining its refusal to yield to that demand that the Congressional Committee on Post-offices and Post-roads drew up and issued its now famous Sunday Mail Reports. Those reports not only explained why the government could not do what was demanded of it, but warned the people against entering upon such a course, and plainly outlined the danger. The reports declare that should Congress yield to the petitioners because of their belief that the carrying of mail on Sunday was a violation of the law of God, "it would establish the principle that the legislature is a proper tribunal to determine what are the laws of God." The report continues:— It would involve a legislative decision on a religious controversy, and on a point in which good citizens may honestly differ in opinion without disturbing the peace of society or endangering its liberties. If this principle is once introduced, it will be impossible to define its bounds. Among all the religious persecutions with which almost every page of human history is stained, no victim ever suffered but for the violation of what government denominated the law of God. To prevent a similar train of evils in this country, the Constitution has wisely withheld from our government the power of defining the divine law. . . . Extensive religious combinations to effect a political object are, in the opinion of the committee, always dangerous. . . . All religious despotism commences by combination and influence; and when that influence begins to operate upon the political institutions of a country, the civil power soon bends under it; and the catastrophe of other nations furnishes an awful warning of the consequences.—United States Senate Report, Jan. 19, 1829. What those feared who drew up that report is now fast coming to be a real, tangible, active menace to those vital principles of our government which guarantee our civil and religious liberties. It is certainly true that whatever menaces our religious liberties menaces our civil liberties as well; for when religious liberty is denied and trampled upon, the very basis of liberty itself is gone. With religious liberty denied, there is no basis on which to rest any kind of liberty. A man must feel himself a free man in soul as well as in body if civil liberty is to have its full meaning and full value to him; and he can not consider himself a free man while his soul is chained, while there is a church-and-state padlock on the door of his mind, while the temple of his soul's worship is closed and barred by the decrees of his government. Nevertheless, the warning given to the nation through those Sunday Mail Reports continues to fall on ears that are dull of hearing and on hearts that will not heed the danger-signal. The demands of that element that sought legislation on behalf of a religious institution were answered by the arguments adduced in those reports, but they were not silenced; and in the year 1863 the movement was crystallized into an organization which put forth, as definite propositions to be labored for, the very things condemned and warned against in those reports. That was the National Reform Association. And it proposes not only that the government shall define what the law of God is, but that the government shall be based upon that law; that it shall establish a national sabbath and protect it from desecration; that the government shall maintain the religious element in education; that the government shall declare its own allegiance to Jesus Christ, and its acceptance of the moral laws of the Christian religion, so indicating that this is a Christian nation, and placing the Christian laws, institutions, and usages of our government on an undeniable legal basis in the nation's Constitution. Those are principles diametrically opposed to the principles upon which this nation was founded. They are principles upon which every church-and-state government could profess to stand. Rome claimed to be representing God when she burned the martyrs and racked and mutilated the victims of the Inquisition. The church-and-state governments of England and Scotland claimed to be doing God's special service when they burned and hunted to their death men and women who would worship God in harmony with the dictates of conscience. The church-and-state governments of colonial days professed to be the personal representatives of Jesus Christ, and to base their laws on the divine law when they harried and hunted and hanged the best Christians in the world because their religious beliefs did not harmonize with the tenets of faith adopted by the government. That institution which in our day would reestablish the colonial, or medieval, or church-and-state government in this country has been carrying on its propaganda during all these years since 1863 with increasing vigor, conducting institutes, publishing literature, and besieging national and State legislatures for legislation in harmony with its ideas. Having been continually met with the argument, which it could not answer, that what it proposed was unconstitutional, it is seeking now a complete transformation of the nation through a transformation of the nation's fundamental law—the Constitution. The attempt and the whole propaganda is revolutionary, because it would change the whole genius of the government, and the nation would then stand for everything that it repudiated when it became a nation. Such an attempt against a government's most fundamental ideas, establishing a complete metamorphosis of its actuating principles, can not be considered as a matter of no consequence. It is a movement against the government as truly as any ever inaugurated anywhere against any government. Then, in place of the liberty of conscience now guaranteed, we would have the dictation of the state in the religious affairs of the people. Instead of all religions being on an equal footing before the law, the government would favor or establish one and disbar others. Where the government now guarantees that no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification for office, the religious test would then be the first and chief test.