Religious Liberty Association DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 1. We believe in God, in the Bible as the word of God, and in the separation of church and state as taught by Jesus Christ. 2. We believe that the ten commandments are the law of God, and that they comprehend man's whoie duty to God and man. 3. We believe that the religion of Jesus Christ is founded in the law of love of God, and needs o human power to support or enforce it. Love cannot be forced. 4. We believe in civil government as divinely ordained to protect men in the enjoyment of their natural rights and to rule in civil things, and that in this realm it is entitled to the respectful obedience of all. 5. We believe it is the right, and should be the privilege, of every individual to worship or not to worship, according to the dictates of his own conscience, provided that in the exercise of this right he respects the equal rights of others. 6. We believe that all religious legislation tends to unite church and state, is subversive of human rights, persecuting in character, and opposed to the best interests of both church and state. 7. We believe, therefore, that it is not within the province of civil government to legislate on religious questions. 8. We believe it to be our duty to use every lawful and honorable means to prevent religious legislation, and oppose all movements tending to unite church and state, that all may enjoy the inestimable blessings of civil and religious liberty. 9. We believe in the inalienable and constitutional right of free speech, free press, peaceable assembly, and petition. 10. We also believe in temperance, and regard the liquor traffic as a curse to society. For further information regarding the principles of this association, address the Religious Liberty Association, Takoma Park, Washington, D. C. (secretary, C. S. Longacre), or any of the affiliated organizations given below: "Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof." Leviticus 25:10. Published quarterly by the REVIEW AND HERALD PUBLISHING ASSN., TAKOMA PARK, WASHINGTON, D. C. VOL. XVII THIRD QUARTER, 1922 NO. 4 CHARLES S. LONGACRE, Editor CALVIN P. BOLLMAN, Managing Editor WILLIAM F. MARTIN, Associate Editor CONTENTS Signing the Magna Charta of American Liberty The Limit of Civil Authority Assaulting the Liberties of the People Wanted (Poem) Shall Christianity Adopt the Rule that " Might Makes Right"? Senatorial Independence "Is Christianity a Part of Our Common Law?" That Drastic Sunday Bill Before Congress Thomas Jefferson Versus Modern Reformers President Harding on Religious Liberty and Religious Intolerance Is Sunday Observance Religious or Not? Bird's-eye View of Lincoln Memorial Frontispiece 83 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 106 107 107 109 110 111 112 Entered as second-class matter May 1, 1906, at the Post Office at Washington, D. C., under the Act of Congress of March 3, 1879. Acceptance for mailing at special rate of postage provided for in Sec. 1103, Act of Oct. 3, 1917, authorized on June 22, 1918. SUBSCRIPTION RATES. One year, 35 cents; three years (or 3 subscriptions, 1 year), $1.00; five or more copies, mailed by publishers to five addresses or to one address, postspaid, each, 9 cents. No subscription for less than one year received. Remit by Post Office Money Order (payable at Washington, D. C., post office), Express Order, or Draft on New York. Cash should be sent in Registered Letter. When a change of address is desired, both old and new addresses must be given. No extra charge to foreign countries. "Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof." Leviticus 25:10. VOL. XVII T THIRD QUARTER, 1922 The Limit of Civil Authority HAT there is a limit to legitimate civil authority, only a tyrant will deny. When our forefathers declared their independence from Great Britain, their first line of moral defense was the great, self-evident fact that "all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights." The fathers of the Republic staked not only their lives and fortunes, but their sacred honor as well, upon that proposi By C. P. Bollman NO. 4 part of the truth. While ours is a government of law, we are protected also by Constitutional guaranties which are based upon principles fundamentally sound and just. As far as was humanly possible, these principles were, by the fathers of the Republic, crystallized into Constitutional provisions, great enabling acts, under which statutes are framed and by which they are tested, while the Constitution itself is tested by those inalienable rights for the defense of which the signers of the immortal Declaration of Independence risked every earthly thing held dear by mankind. Independence Hall tion, and upon it they fought the Revolutionary War, and won for themselves and their posterity the freedom enjoyed today wherever the flag of the Union floats. And it is at exactly this same line of inalienable rights that we find the limit of legitimate authority. It is here also that we learn the character of the government to which we of today are born and under which we live and achieve. A Government of Principles It has been said that ours is not a government of men, but of law. This is true as far as it goes, but it is only a And so today in this American Republic, in the last analysis, not men, nor laws, nor majorities, nor even the Constitution governs, but principles. Show me today a man in the United States who stands for a natural right, and who has not forfeited by crime his right to protection, and I will show you a man who in justice should win, no matter how great a majority may be against him. No government has nor ever can have any moral right to invade the individual conscience, the citadel of the human soul. vade. No man can surrender his conscience to the keeping of another, and maintain his loyalty to God; but as sponsible a re moral being, he must be true to his Creator at whatever cost, even at the sacrifice of life itself. In such cases the word of the Lord is: "Whosoever "We know," says the apostle, “that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God." Rom. 3:19. SOUND AMERICAN PRINCIPLES Every man who conducts himself as a good citizen, is accountable alone to God for his religious faith, and should be protected in worshiping God according to the dictates of his own conscience.- George Washington, in his reply to the Baptists of Virginia. Religion is not in the purview of human government. A connection between them is injurious to both. - James Madison. Almighty God hath created the mind free; all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burdens, or by civil incapacitations, tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercion on either, as was in His almighty power to do.—Thomas Jefferson. his life for My sake shall find it." Matt. The Supreme Law The first and great commandment in the divine law is supreme love to God. The test of love is obedience: "If ye love Me," says the Saviour, "keep My commandments." And again we are told in the divine word that "by this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep His commandments." 1 John 5:2. Hence the commandment to love God is in effect a command that we obey Him. And this the divine law says alike to every man. While God demands man's first and best affections, He throws the safeguards of His law around His creatures, and to each moral being He says, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." But at an early period in the history of the race, man rebelled against the law of his Creator. The divine injunction of equal love for fellow creatures no longer afforded the protection necessary, and so God ordained that men should organize for the protection and securing of their own natural rights. Such organization we call civil government. But this in no way supersedes the divine government; it does not in any measure release the individual from obligation to obey the divine law. It simply provides a way whereby, even amid the cross-currents of personal interest, men may secure that which is their due. God the Great Moral Governor Notwithstanding the ordinance of civil government, God is still the great moral Governor; to Him every soul is responsi ble; to Him every free moral agent must give account. To permit any power whatever to come between the individual and God, would destroy individual responsibility toward God. If it were the |