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State and Church

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 8, 1912

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 89, No. 32.

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State and Church

By W. W. Prescott

Reports, Notes, and Comments Pertaining to the Current History of Religious Freedom, and the Campaign “to Make America Catholic.” Conducted by the Religious Liberty Association. W. W. Prescott - - - - - Secretary

The Proposed Sunday Law in California

AFTER several fruitless attempts to secure the enactment of a Sunday law by the legislature of California, the effort will be made to accomplish the same result by means of the initiative, which was adopted at the last election. A petition is now being circulated for signatures by means of which it is sought to compel the submission of a Sunday law to a vote of the people at the State election next November. We print this petition entire:—
“Initiative Measure to be Submitted Directly to the Electors, County of —.
“We, the undersigned qualified electors of the State of California, County of —, respectfully petition for the submission directly to the electors, in accordance with the provisions of Section 1, Article IV, of the constitution of the State of California, of the amendment to the Penal Code attached hereto for a weekly rest-day law:—

“An Act

“To amend the Penal Code by adding a new chapter to Title 14 of Part 1 thereof: To preserve one day in the week as a day of rest, and to promote health, morals, and the public welfare.
“The people of the State of California do enact as follows:—
“SECTION 1. A new chapter is hereby added to Title 14 of Part 1 of the Penal Code, to read as follows:—

“Chapter VI

“Of offenses against health, morals, and the public welfare. 299 Short Title. This act may be cited as the Weekly Rest-Day Act.
“(2) Construction. In this act, unless the context otherwise requires, (a) Sunday means the period of time which begins at twelve o’clock on Saturday afternoon and ends at twelve o’clock on the following afternoon; (b) the following words and terms, to wit: ‘person,’ ‘property,’ ‘vessel,’ ‘peace officer,’ ‘magistrate,’ and others used in this act have the same meaning as defined and explained in Section 17 of the Political Code; (c) a contract rendered void by unlawful action on Sunday can not be made valid by subsequent action; (d) a contract to perform a lawful act, though made on a Sunday, is valid; but a contract made on any day to perform an unlawful act on Sunday is void.
(3) Every person, firm, association, or corporation that on Sunday keeps open any shop, store, office, building, or any place of business, whether for the purpose of carrying on or transacting any business or common labor; or that buys or sells or offers for sale, or advertises any goods, wares, merchandise, property, or other thing prohibited by this act; or that for gain hires or employs, or causes any employee, apprentice, servant, or other person to work at, or to engage in, any trade, business, occupation or ordinary calling on Sunday,except works of necessity, mercy, or charity, is guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof, shall be fined not less than ten dollars nor more than two hundred dollars, or be imprisoned in the county jail not to exceed thirty days, and upon each subsequent conviction, both said fine and imprisonment shall be imposed; except, however, in case of corporations the imprisonment, where imposed, shall be imposed upon all officers or agents thereof in this State committing such offense, or causing such offense to be committed; provided always, for greater certainty, as to the intent of this act, but not so as to restrict the ordinary meaning of the expression 'works of necessity, mercy, or charity,' it is hereby declared that this section does not apply (a) to persons, firms, associations, or corporations in receiving, transmitting, or delivering telegraph or telephone messages; (b) to any work without the doing of which on Sunday, electric current, light, heat, air, water, or gas can not be continuously supplied for lawful purposes; (c) to unavoidable work in any manufacturing plant or industry or industrial process or such a continuous nature that it can not be stopped without serious injury to said plant, industry, or its product, or property used in such process; (d) to unavoidable work in any manufacturing plant or industry, or industrial process, in making repairs to furnaces and repairs in cases of emergency when such repairs could not be made on another day of the week without depriving many operatives of employment; (e) to unavoidable work, essential to the protection of mines, property, or perishable products in imminent danger of destruction or serious injury; (f) to hotels, boarding-houses, restaurants, in furnishing lodging or meals; (g) to the caring for milk, cheese, and live animals, or to the delivery of milk or cream, or to the making of cheese or butter, or to the work of domestic servants or watchmen; (h) to the sale, after one o'clock in the afternoon, of ice-cream, confectionery, non-alcoholic drinks, or the products of tobacco, by retail; (i) to the quiet sale and delivery of daily newspapers and work incidental thereto, or to any necessary work in the preparation of the regular Sunday or Monday morning edition of a daily newspaper; (j) to work essential to the relief of sickness and suffering, including the sale of drugs, medicine, and surgical appliances by retail, between the hours of three o'clock in the afternoon and six o'clock in the afternoon, and said sale at any time on Sunday in case of an actual and urgent emergency; (k) to the burial or cremation of the dead, when and only when the death was caused by a contagious disease, or the body is so decomposed that immediate burial or cremation is necessary; (l) to any necessary or customary work in connection with divine worship or the solemnizing of marriages; (m) to any person who is a member of a religious society which observes some other day than Sunday as its day of worship, and who actually keeps his place of business or of his ordinary calling closed and does not work for gain at his ordinary calling or at common labor on said day of worship; (n) to unavoidable work in the public service of the federal government while acting therein under any regulation or direction of any department of said government and work incidental thereto; (o) to unavoidable work in connection with livery-stables, garages, stage lines, boats, vessels, vehicles, cars, or regular trains for the conveyance of passengers or perishable freight, and work incidental thereto, or to the continuation to their destination of trains or vessels in transit when Sunday begins, and work incidental thereto, or to the unloading of and caring for perishable products or live animals arriving at any point on Sunday; provided nothing herein legalizes special Sunday excursions by any mode of conveyance for hire; (p) to loading and unloading merchandise at intermediate points, on or from passenger-boats or passenger-trains; (q) to unavoidable work in cases of emergency essential to the keeping of the lines and tracks of railways open on Sunday; (r) to unavoidable work for any ocean-going vessel which otherwise would be unduly delayed after her scheduled time of sailing; (s) to any work which the railroad commission of this State, having due regard to the object of this act, and with the object of preventing undue delay, deems necessary to permit in connection with the freight traffic of any railway or other line of transportation within its jurisdiction; (t) to parks, bath-houses, libraries, museums, or art galleries; (u) to sports and amusements; (v) to magistrates and peace officers in the performance of their duties as prescribed by law.
"But provided, however, that the above exemptions, letters 'a' to 'v,' or any of them, shall not preclude the enactment of any more restrictive law or ordinance by the legislature, or by any county, city and county, city or town, nor shall they nullify any more restrictive law or ordinance now or hereafter in force; and provided, further, that except in cases of emergency, said employee, apprentice, servant, or other person shall not be hired, employed, or caused to labor on Sunday, unless allowed twenty-four consecutive hours without labor, does not apply to any person whose total hours of labor during said week do not exceed forty-eight.
"301. Every person, firm, association, or corporation that on Sunday keeps open any bar, saloon, or dram-shop, or any place of any kind or description where spirituous, malt, or fermented liquors or wines, or any admixture thereof, are sold, given away, or served, or kept for sale, or that sells, gives away, or serves any spirituous, malt, or fermented liquors or wines, or any mixture thereof, on Sunday, is guilty of a misdemeanor, and, upon conviction thereof, shall be fined not less than thirty dollars nor more than three hundred dollars, and be imprisoned in the county jail not less than five nor more than ninety days, and upon a conviction, in addition to said fine and imprisonment, any license which may have been granted for opening and maintaining said place of business is void, and shall not be renewed within two years thereafter, to said persons, firm, association, or corporation, provided however that this section does not apply (a) to the keeping open of hotels, restaurants, or other places for lawful purposes; (b) to the use of liquors or wines in one's own home for family purposes, or as an act of hospitality when no money or thing of value is received in return therefor, or to their use for sacramental purposes; (c) to the filling by registered pharmacists of written prescriptions for bona fide medicinal purposes only, upon a prescription issued, signed, and dated by a duly licensed physician, having the name of the person applying for the prescription, and the name of the person for whose use the prescription is made, inserted therein by the physician issuing the same, and said prescription shall be filled but once, and shall then be marked 'canceled' and be kept on file at the place of business of said pharmacist, open to public inspection, and no liquors so sold or served shall be drunk upon the premises; provided that no pharmacist, either directly or indirectly, whether personally or through a clerk or agent, shall sell, serve, give away, or allow, permit, or suffer to be drunk in or taken from his store or premises any liquor or wines prohibited by this act, except as herein provided for.
"301. (a) All fines collected from the violation of Sections 300, 301, of this code shall be paid into the common-school fund of the county.
"301. (b) All acts and parts of acts, either general or special, in conflict with this act, are hereby repealed in so far as they conflict with the provisions of this act."
This proposed Sunday law is certainly a unique one, and the large number of exemptions is a proof of the difficulties that attend the effort to have the State control affairs outside its legitimate jurisdiction.
Our brethren in California have anticipated that such a move as this would be made, and have been preparing for it. A Religious Liberty series of the Signs of the Times weekly, consisting of six excellent issues, has been widely circulated, and other educational work has been done. The campaign will be carried forward vigorously from this time until November, and we hope that the State of California will still remain as the one State in the Union that has no Sunday law.