A PARIS, Tenn., lawyer recently said to a reporter of the Chicago Tribune, that there is nothing in the law of Tennessee to say how a man shall observe Sunday, “except that he shall refrain from work, such as he follows during the week, and shall not make a nuisance of himself.” The use of the term “nuisance” in this connection is misleading. Private Sunday work is a nuisance only by a legal fiction. Under decisions of the Supreme Court of Tennessee it is not necessary to show that any one is actually annoyed by the work done; and the Attorney-General told the writer of this note that a man working on Sunday where he could be seen and heard only by persons who went there to see and hear him, would be as guilty as though the work were done in the most public manner. The “nuisance” consists solely in the fact that the work is done by those who dissent from the dogma that Sunday is a sacred day. So far as we are aware, this law has never been enforced against anybody but observers of the seventh day. It was invoked a number of years ago against a barber; but the Supreme Court held that barbering on Sunday, though finable, was not a nuisance, and so not indictable. But why not, if quiet farm work is a nuisance, and indictable? Simply because by his work the barber was not emphasizing his dissent from the dogma of Sunday sacredness. He was working on Sunday, not because he denied its sacred character, but simply for worldly gain; hence, according to the Supreme Court of Tennessee, the annoyance occasioned by his work did not amount to a nuisance. A wonderful thing is this nuisance law, truly!
Now that the Government of the United States has invaded the domain of religious controversy it will dominate it; inasmuch as it has assumed jurisdiction to settle religious questions by act of Congress and by Supreme Court decisions it will surely never yield that jurisdiction. When Constantine had made Rome “Christian” it was only natural that he should seek an authoritative definition of Christianity; and when the Council of Nicea had given that definition in the shape of the creed which it adopted, nothing was more natural than that the emperor should require his subjects to subscribe to it. The Government of the United States has entered upon the same evil course. The Supreme Court has declared the Nation to be Christian. Congress has already taken sides in a religious controversy, and to be consistent must not the Government use all the power at its command to enforce that decision and to uphold the Sunday-Sabbath cause which it has espoused? A United States senator has well said, “The domain which government invades it dominates; the jurisdiction it takes it keeps.” This is true whatever the domain or the jurisdiction; and it always has been true.
IN three States of the Union there is organized resistance to State and municipal authority. The combined organization which is threatened would amount to an open revolt against present industrial conditions and relations. This resort to violence and armed rebellion is not because of a lack of the necessities of life. Its primary purpose is revolutionary.
It would be well for statesmen, and political and social economists, and bankers, and capitalists, and directors of great moneyed corporations, to ask themselves why these men have risen against the present state and system of civilization as represented by the industrial interests of which they have been a part. It would be well for labor agitators, and master workmen, and workingmen, to ask themselves why they are in insurrection against the State, destroying the property upon the use of which they themselves, and others, are dependent, and threatening the peace of society. Is there any sufficient civil, social, or economic reason for this? There is not. From that point of view no sufficient cause can be affirmed. The cause arises farther back than civil, social or economic relations, it is in mutual, moral responsibilities which have been ignored, until now this reign of terror is developing. It is the natural and necessary result of mutual error and mutual wrong. Both parties are at fault.
THE press of Tennessee is demanding a new constitution for the State. No doubt the present constitution is deficient in some respects; it certainly is if it means what the courts of the State hold that it does. The constitution says that “no human authority can in any case whatever interfere with the rights of conscience;” but the courts demand that men educate their consciences by the laws of Tennessee. And the authorities claim that under the laws of the State, Sabbath keepers imprisoned for Sunday work may be compelled to work on the Sabbath; also that any Sabbath keeper is liable to be warned out to work on the road on the Sabbath and mulcted if he refuses to go. That is the sort of equality that exists under the present constitution of Tennessee as interpreted by the courts. But it is not along these lines that the papers of the State are demanding a revision of the constitution.
Now that the churches and the saloons have united in the support of the Sunday institution, as they have done in securing the Sunday closing of the World's Fair, we may expect to see its sacredness(?), such as it is, increased at a tremendous pace. Of course Sunday has only such sacredness as man has given it, but what it lacks in quality its friends have always endeavored to make up in quantity, and now re-enforced by the Chicago saloon keepers they ought to be able to whitewash the ancient pagan holiday more effectively than ever.