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Note and Comment

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 4, 1913

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 90, No. 36.

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Note and Comment

By Editor

Recognizing the Danger

THE Continent of August 21 recognizes in the efforts of Roman Catholics to exclude certain publications from the mails a real menace to the freedom of the press and the freedom of the people. We quote: —
The Knights of Columbus in their central national organization have taken official measures to induce the Postmaster-General, if they can, to exclude from the mails the anti-Catholic weekly published in Aurora, Mo.—the Menace. The Continent has no confidence in the Menace at all—does not regard it as in any sense a credit or a strength to Protestantism. We both detest its spirit and doubt its sincerity. Nevertheless we see clearly that if Catholic influence should appear at all likely to accomplish its object in this direction, every American loyal to the original ideas of the republic must stand up in defense of the Menace, obnoxious though it is. If a precedent were established for suppressing the Menace by a blanket executive order simply because it criticizes Catholicism, no paper would thereafter be safe which pointed out the tyrannies of Rome in even the mildest terms. The principle of free speech and free press in this country is no academic thesis; it is a vital necessity for a free democracy. The sincere democrat therefore must stand up for the liberty of saying and printing many things that he himself likes neither to see nor to hear. But of course the Roman Church, being in fundamental nature the most anti-democratic organization on earth, can have no appreciation of any such liberty and fits itself to this American condition only under stress of necessity. In consequence, it must be watched with special keenness where the liberty of the press is involved. There are laws sufficient to keep the Menace from printing slander and obscenity, and if the Romanists can curb it any under those laws, well and good. But they must not be allowed to go a step farther than that.The American Federation of Catholic Societies, with a claimed membership of three million, is also demanding a censorship of the mails in the interests of the Catholic Church.