jority may rightfully coerce the minority, however small, in religious matters, the fact that such coercion appears as the outcome is conclusive proof that the system from which it proceeds is unchristian and un-American, a curse and not a blessing to both state and church.

CHAPTER XIX

OW the principles set forth in the foregoing pages operate in actual application has been shown in events that have taken place in Arkansas, Tennessee, and other States, which reveal the practical workings of a Sunday law whenever and wherever it may be secured.

The attention of the people in some places in Arkansas was being called to the importance of observing the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath according to the fourth commandment of the Decalogue, by the advocates of that faith. As converts to that view and practise began to appear, strong opposition was excited on the part of some, as it has been in other places, and as truth has always excited opposition ever since error has endeavored to usurp control over the minds of men. How far the action which followed was owing to this opposition, we do not say. We only state the facts, and leave the reader to draw his own conclusions.

In the winter of 1884-85, a bill was introduced into the Legislature of the State to abolish the clause in the existing Sunday law which exempted from its operation those who conscientiously observed the seventh day. Up to this time the laws of that State had been comparatively liberal in this respect. But now a petition was presented that the exemption clause be stricken out, bringing all alike, without regard

to their religious faith or practise, under subjection to the enactment to keep the first day of the week as the Sabbath. The petition claimed to have been called out by the fact that certain Jews in Little Rock, regarding the seventh day as the Sabbath, kept open stores and transacted their usual business on the first day of the week. Considering the fact that their places of business were open also on the seventh day, this brought them into unfair competition with the other merchants of the place. There was certainly no necessity for a change of the law to meet this difficulty; for the law exempted those only who conscientiously observed the seventh day; and these Jews, by keeping open places of business on the seventh day, showed that there was no such conscientious observance on their part, and consequently that they could not justly claim the exemption of the law. But ostensibly on this ground the petition was urged, and the repeal of the exempting clause secured.

What was the result? We have not learned that the aforesaid Jews in Little Rock, or any other part of the State, were molested; that railroads, hotel-keepers, livery men, or those engaged in any like vocations, were in anywise restrained. But those persons above referred to, who, from a Christian point of view, had commenced to observe the seventh day in preference to the first; who were not engaged in such business as brought them into competition with others; who, having conscientiously observed the seventh day, proposed to go quietly, soberly, and industriously about their lawful business on the first day of the week,these soon found that they were not overlooked. Warrants were promptly issued for the arrest of some five or six of these, one of them, J. W. Scoles, a minister, whose offense was that he was engaged one Sunday in the boisterous work of painting a meeting-house erected by his people!

SEVENTH-DAY OBSERVERS SINGLED OUT

373

The trial of these persons came off at Fayetteville, Ark., the first week in November, 1885. In making up the indictment, an observer of the seventh day was called in to testify against his brethren. The following examination

substantially took place:

"Do you know any one about here who is violating the Sunday law?"

"Yes."

"Who?"

"The Frisco railroad is running several trains each way on that day."

"Do you know of any others?"

"Yes."

"Who?"

"The hotels of this place are open and doing a full run of business on Sunday as on other days."

"Any others?"

"Yes; the druggists and barbers.”
"Any others?"

"Yes; the livery-stable men do more business on that day than on any other."

As these were not the parties the court was after, the question was finally asked directly, "Do you know of any Seventh-day Adventists who have worked on Sunday?" Ascertaining that some of this class had been guilty of labor on that day, indictments were issued for five persons accordingly.

At the trial, the defendants employed the best counsel obtainable Judge Walker, ex-member of the United States The points he made before the court were that the law was unconstitutional,—

Senate.

First, because it was an infringement of religious freedom, or the right of conscience, inasmuch as it compelled

In Jail for the "Crime" of Obeying the Fourth
Commandment of the Decalogue by Work-
ing Six Days of the Week and Resting
on the Seventh

This is no fanciful picture, but shows a scene which has many times been enacted in recent Sunday-law prosecutions in this country. During 1895 and 1896, no less than seventy-three seventh-day observers were prosecuted in the United States under the Sunday laws, twentyseven of whom suffered imprisonments of from 5 to 129 days, and nine of whom were made to serve 54 days each in the chain-gang.

men to keep as the Sabbath a day which their conscience and the Bible taught them was not the Sabbath; Secondly, because it was an infringement of the right of property, taking from seventh-day keepers onesixth part of their time; and the time of a laboring man being his property, the law was in its nature a robber; and

Thirdly, because it took away a right that God had given -the right to labor six days and to rest one.

All this was overruled by the judge,

who charged that the

law rested equally upon all, requiring that all men should rest one day, and that the first day of the week; which requirement rested alike on the Methodists, the Baptists, the Congregationalists, the Sabbatarians, the Jews, worldlings, and infidels; and if our religion required us to keep another day, that was a price we paid to our religion, and with that the State had nothing to do. He ruled, moreover, that no one had a right to set up his conscience against the law of the land.