Rights; and inasmuch as the courts have uniformly held against that plea, there is nothing left for the Adventists but to suffer the penalty usually a small fine. usually a small fine and costs of the suit, amounting in most instances to about fifty dollars in each

case.

There is a strange inconsistency in all these Sunday law cases. Invariably the prosecutors are persons who either have a fancied personal grievance or else are inspired by religious zeal. This latter was well illustrated some years ago in Henry County, Tennessee. There was in that county a community of Seventhday Adventists, numbering about sixty. One day a good brother belonging to one of the several Sundaykeeping churches in that section of the county, said to one of the Adventists, "We have hard work to maintain our meetings in your neighborhood; why don't you people come out on Sunday and help us?"

Said the Adventist : We have our own church to look after, but if you will convince us that we are wrong, we will all attend your meetings."

a legitimate exercise of the police powers of the State." But has it not been ever thus? Christ was put to death on the charge of conspiring against Cæsar. The early Christians suffered as enemies of the state. Wherever church and state are united, it matters not how frail the link may be, offenses against the church or religion are offenses also against the state, and are punished accordingly. In all such cases the police power of the state is invoked to enforce church discipline. But what is the "police power"? Webster's New International Dictionary (1913) says:

The inherent power of a government to regulate its police affairs. The term police

"That's just what we're going to do," said the Sunday keeper; " we're going to prosecute every one of you."

And sure enough, it was only a little while until almost every male Adventist in that neighborhood was indicted, and quite a number of them served terms in jail for the crime of practical dissent from the religion of their Sunday-keeping neighbors. There was absolutely no other fault to be found with these men. Everybody admitted that they were in all other respects model citizens.

It has been argued in Tennessee that "the Sunday law is not a religious but a civil regulation;" that "its enforcement is not religious persecution, but only

power is not definitely fixed in meaning. In the earlier cases in the United States it was used as including the whole power of internal government, or the powers of government inherent in every sovereignty to the extent of its dominions.

But like all other powers of government in this country, the "police power is limited by the constitution, and can never rise superior to it. Outside of the constitution there can be no legitimate power of any sort in any American State; therefore nothing forbidden by the constitution can be justified as a proper exercise of the police power. In all such cases "the police power" is merely a high-sounding phrase. a legal fiction to

week, a purely religious institution? If it be replied that the people need a day of rest, it remains to be shown that a part of the people need two days, and that after some have rested on the day required by their conscience, the State has any just right to require them to rest on another day required by the conscience of their neighbors. There is not a lawyer in the State who does not know that the Sunday law of the State is not in harmony with the Declaration of Rights.

THE Roman Catholic Church lacks but little of having had four hundred years of rule over the nation of Peru, when suddenly comes a heavy stroke, the first of those that are going to overthrow the edifice of superstition and intolerance that has served only to enslave and vitiate the Peruvian people, especially the Indians, during all this long period.

The Roman Church had here the opportunity of the ages. Her representatives accompanied the conquerors. Wherever the sword of Spain took possession of the political dominion, there also were celebrated the victories of the church. The acceptation by the natives of the political authority of the Spaniards signified also, and in all places, the acceptation of the religion of the Spanish state. In nearly every case the change was rapid and complete. At the present time it is only among the tribes of cannibals in the forest fastnesses beyond the Cordilleras that the church does not claim the complete conversion of the natives.

But although sustained by the state, subsidized from the public treasury and protected to the exclusion of every other sect, that church instead of grasping her magnificent opportunity to exemplify the truth of her doctrines, the purity of her teachings, the holiness of her priesthood, has delivered herself entirely over to

traffic in the souls of the victims of her schemes. From their cradle to their grave, she has never ceased to rob her unhappy adherents, and even after their death, she has continued robbing their widows and orphans. Her most holy doctrines are annulled for a price. Her priests do not marry, but they have concubines and children in abundance. the notorious immorality of the representatives of her religion has deeply and sadly damaged that of all the inhabitants of Peru who have received such representatives as their spiritual guides.

And

Now comes her overthrow. After nearly a century of political independence, Peru is unshackling herself from religious slavery. As yet the emancipation is incomplete, but the admission of sects that will compete with the old superstition, teaching pure doctrines, elevating the morality of the family with the example of their married pastors, with the popularization of education free from the influence of the monks, the Republic of the Andes must feel the renaissance of modern progress.

The vote of the Chamber of Deputies, suppressing the last part of the fourth article of the constitution of the republic is the most important step toward full independence from foreign powers that the state has taken since the day that the immortal San Martin read in Lima the

SOME people and even some modern jurists claim that Sunday laws are civil in character, not religious. But any one who goes to the trouble of investigating the origin and history of Sunday legislation knows that for fifteen hundred years the courts, the state, and the church, without an exception, recognized Sunday as an institution of the church and not of the state, based altogether upon religious dogma, not upon civil considerations.

Some people will not believe this, however, without a presentation of facts. from credible sources; consequently we cite the opinion of a supreme court upon this feature of the Sunday laws. In Story vs. Elliott, Am. Dec., page 424, Chief Justice Savage, in giving the origin and history of Sunday laws, says:

Sunday is stated in all books to be dies non juridicus; not made so by the statute, but by a canon of the church, incorporated into the common law. According to the history given by Lord Mansfield, in the case of Swan vs. Broonie (3 Burr., 1597; 2 Bl., 526, S. C.), anciently the courts of justice did sit on Sunday. It appears by Sir Henry Spelman's original of the term, that the "Christians at the first used all days alike for the hearing of causes, not sparing, as it seemeth, the Sunday itself." They had two reasons for it. One was in opposition to the heathen, who were superstitious about the observation of days and times, conceiving some to be ominous and unlucky, and others to be lucky; and, therefore, Christians laid aside all observance of days. The second reason they had was that by keeping their own courts always open, they prevented the Christian suitors from resorting to the heathen courts. But in the year 517 a canon was made: "Quod nullus episcopus vel infra positus die dominico causas judicare praesumat;" and this canon was ratified in the time of Theodosius, who fortified it with an imperial constitution: "Solis die (quem dominicum recte dixere majores) omnium omnio litium et ne

gotiorum quiescat intentio." Other canons were made in which vacations were appointed. These and other canons and constitutions were received and adopted by the Saxon kings of England. They were all confirmed by William the Conqueror and Henry the Second; and so became a part of the common law of England.

Chief Justice Clark of the North Carolina Supreme Court, in reviewing the origin and past history of Sunday legislation, sustains the opinion that Sunday laws were founded upon religious dogma, among the heathen first, and afterwards introduced into the Christian commonwealth wherever there was a union of church and state. His judicial review is as follows:

Sunday legislation is more than fifteen centuries old, and this "historic argument" is of All value in construing the existing law. Sunday legislation is the product of pagan Rome; the Saxon laws were the product of Middle-Age legislation of "the Holy Roman Empire." The English laws are the expansion of the Saxon, and the American are a transcript of the English.

The first Sunday law, the edict of the emperor Constantine, was the product of that pagan conception, developed by the Romans, which made religion a part of the state. The day was to be venerated as a religious duty owed to the god of the sun.

During the Middle Ages, the civil authorities exercised the right to legislate in religious matters after the manner of the Jewish theocracy. The English Reformation introduced, for the first time, the doctrine of the fourth commandment to the first day of the week.— "North Carolina Reports," Vol. CXXXIV, page 508.

The kings of the Holy Roman Empire, under the union of church and state, clearly indicated in their decrees concerning Sunday legislation that it was in the interests of religion and for the support of divine services that such legisla

For all: We decree also both according as the Lord commands in the law, that servile works should not be done on the Lord's Day, and just as my ancestor of blessed memory commanded in his synodical edicts. . . in order that in every way the honor and rest of the Lord's Day may be preserved. But let them come together from all sides to church to the solemnities of the mass, and let them praise God for all things which he does for us on that day.-" Monumenta Germaniæ Historica," Legum Sectio 2, Capitularia Regum Francorum, page 61, par. 81.

1

The edict quoted above is based on a previous edict which was issued by the Vernesian Council in 755 A. D., and adopted by the Frankish kings, and reads as follows:

Since the people are urged concerning the Lord's Day that they ought not to drive horses or oxen or to travel in wagons, nor prepare anything for eating, or to busy oneself about anything pertaining in any respect whatever to the cleaning of the house or of man, . . . rural work, plowing the vineyard, cutting, threshing, grubbing, or fencing, we decree that it must be abstained from, in order that those coming to church may more easily have leisure for the service of prayer. Because if any one shall be found to be engaged in the above-mentioned works which are forbidden, . . . let him appear in court, not in the division of the laity, but to the priests unto punishment.- Id., page 36, par. 14.

Third Council of Orleans upon whose decisions is based the decree, of July 2, 755 A. D. It will be of peculiar interest to note the religious nature of the parent edict cited as the precedent in all these decrees of the Frankish kings. Another interesting feature of the decree passed at the Third Council of Orleans (or Aurelianensi tertio Anno 538), concerning the precedent among Sunday edicts quoted by the Frankish kings, is the fact that the same council also transferred the authority to punish the transgressor fro the civil officers to the priesthood, or clergy. The state authorized the bish

The decree here mentioned refers to a

ops instead of the civil magistrates to punish all who refused to observe Sunday; and the priesthood put all transgres sors under an anathema. The twenty-eighth canon of this council reads:

This shows clearly that Sunday laws are purely religious in their genesis; their object has been to compel people "to attend divine service" on that day. The phrase cited above" so that people may come to church and worship'

can be traced in effect through all

Attended by three hundred and thirty-eight bishops, but not recognized by Roman Cathlics as ecumenical.

onies, back to the English Parliament, thence back to the church-and-state régime of the Roman Empire in the days of Constantine, who personally presided

over the Council of Nicæa. As early as A. D. 343, the Council of Sardica directly specified that if any one "neglected divine service" on three successive Sundays, "he is to be excommunicated."

To compel people "to attend divine service" is still the purpose of Sunday legislation as stated by its advocates. Rev. S. V. Leech, D. D., a prominent leader among the Sunday law advocates, said, in the Homiletic Review for November, 1892:

Give us good Sunday laws, well enforced by men in local authority, and our churches will be full of worshipers, and our young men and women will be attracted to the divine service. A mighty combination of

the churches of the United
States could win from Con-
gress, the State legisla-
tures, and municipal coun-
cils, all legislation necessary
to this splendid result.

Genealogy of Sunday
Laws

The following statements, in form of quotations taken from reliable, sources, present in succinct form the real facts as to the origin and history of Sunday laws:

church of the empire. When Henry VIII, about A. D. 1544, renounced allegiance to the Pope, we retained and are still cherishing these relics of the papal régime."

7. Catholic Church: "Sunday laws and religious legislation were incorporated into our system by the craft, flattery, and policy of Constantine and the ambitious bishops of his time, together with the decrees of popes and councils of later date, by which we transmuted the venerable day of the sun' into the Christian sabbath, in honor of the resurrection."

8. Paganism: With them, Sunday observance originated in sun worship, this day, the first in the week, being dedicated to the greatest, brightest, and most luminous visible object in the heavens, the sun. See Rom. I: 21-25; Eze. 8:15, 16.

9. Sunday: "So called because this day was

1. Protestantism in America: "During nearly all our American history the churches have influenced the States to make and improve Sabbath laws." - Rev. W. F. Crafts, in Christian Statesman, July 3, 1890.

2. Younger States of America: "In Sunday legislation we have followed the example of the older States."

3. Older States: "In Sunday legislation and judicial decisions we have followed the example of the oldest States."

4. Oldest States: "In the matter of Sunday legislation we have followed the example of the original colonies."

5. Original Colonies: "In the matter of

Sunday legislation we followed the precedents

and example of old England, which had an established religion and a church-and-state system."

6. Old England: "In the matter of Sunday laws and religious legislation, they are the relics of the Catholic Church, introduced among us when that was the established