400, it was said: "Christianity, general Christianity, is and always has been a part of the Common Law of Pennsylvania." This language was approved by the United States Supreme Court in Vidah vs. Girard's Executors, 2 How. 127, 198. As far west as New Mexico, and as late as 1896, it was said that this was a Christian nation: Cortesy vs. Territory, 6 New Mexico 682. In State vs. Ambs, 20 Mo., 214, often cited by other appellate courts, it was said: "Our constitution was framed for a people professing Christianity." It may be observed just here that our American decisions and constitutions expressly disclaim any union of Church and State. The law is as far from supporting Christianity as it is from supporting the family, although it recognizes the family and enforces the obligations existing between husband and wife and parent and child.

But proceeding logically and going to the bottom, it is proper to observe that the bed rock upon which rests the Sabbath, is the cardinal truth, that while the law recognizes Sunday both as a day of rest and of worship, primarily it was a day of rest only and was in the beginning set aside absolutely independently of Christianity-indeed, before sin had entered the world or Christianity existed. By divine example the Almighty set aside the day by resting thereon and hallowing it. This answers all arguments that the Sabbath had its origin alone with Christianity and is enforced at the dictation of the Church. It is the necessary day of rest for the man who labors, and a wise and humane law would enforce it as such if there were no church. This is the truth which should be used above all others by the friends of Sunday. It silences every foe.

It may be permissible to say just here, that communications, some of them of great length, have been received from different parts of the Union challenging the writer to debate, some affirming that Saturday and others that Monday and not Sunday, is the proper day. This question is not open for discussion. The law names "the first day of the week commonly called Sunday," and that ends the controversy. For a typical case giving the reason for the selection, see Bloom vs. Richards, 2 Ohio State 387, 391, in which Judge Thurman says: "It was within the constitutional competency for the general assembly to require this cessation of labor and to name the day of rest. It did so by the act referred to, and in accordance with the feelings of a majority of the people, the Christian Sabbath was very properly selected."

The Sunday decisions in America are legion, all to the same

effect. The following epitome of a few may suffice. In a leading New York case, Chancellor Kent says: "The statute for preventing immorality consecrates the first day of the week as holy time." People vs. Ruggles, 8 Johns 290. In Iowa Sunday "is sacred, set apart for rest by the voice of wisdom, experience and necessity." Davis vs. Fish, 1 Green 406. In Pennsylvania it is held that "the day is clothed with peculiar sanctity." Jeandelle's case, 3 Phil. 509. In Georgia the Court says: "All courts should abstain from the transaction of ordinary business on this holy day." Gohlston vs. Gohlston, 31 Ga., 625. In Massachusetts the reason for separating the day as a "holy" one is the fact that the legislative power has exacted the observance of it as such. Pearce vs. Atwood, 13 Mass., 324. Judge Robinson, one of Kentucky's greatest judges, speaks of the law in his State as "the statute consecrating the Sabbath." Moore vs. Hogan, 2 Duv. 437. In another leading case in New York, Judge Allen says: "It does not detract from the moral or legal sanction of the law of the State that it conforms to the law of God, as that law is recognized by a great majority of the people." Lindenmuller ́s case, 33 Barb. 548. Again it has been said in Iowa that Sunday has been "established by law, both human and divine, for public worship and private devotion-a time-honored and heaven-appointed institution." Davis vs. Fish, 1 Green 406. In Maryland the Court says: "The Sabbath is emphatically a day of rest, and the day of rest is the Lord's Day or Christian Sunday. Ours is a Christian community." Kilgour vs. Mills, 6 G. etc., J. 268. Nor did the courts of the past go farther in upholding the Sabbath than the courts of the present. In City of Topeka vs. Crawford, the Supreme Court of Kansas, in an opinion handed down July 3, 1908, has affirmed the lower court, holding that a theatrical manager who conducted his theater on Sunday violated an ordinance copied from the Missouri statute forbidding labor on Sunday. Pacific Reporter, Vol. 96, No. 7, p. 862. This Kansas case cites and approves Quarles vs. State, 55 Ark. 10, affirming the conviction of Quarles for labor performed as a seller of tickets in a theater on Sunday, under a similar statute. The Missouri Court of Appeals at St. Louis, on Jan. 7, 1908, in affirming the conviction of a barber for laboring on Sunday, uses as strong language as can be found in any of the books, when it speaks of "the rights of conscience sought to be vouchsafed (by our Sunday laws) to those God-fearing and Christian people who have

laid the architrave, builded the superstructure and now maintain the edifice of our higher civilization."

Such startling and unexpected statements have been recently made by a number of theatrical managers in New York City as to the "wickedness" and "filth" of the modern theater, that a word may be added before this article is closed, by one in whose court for fourteen months once a week were arraigned not only the managers, but the employees embracing, during this period, a large per cent of the actors, actresses and chorus girls of America. This was probably the longest period in the history of the American stage, when actors and actresses, laying aside their regalia, emerged from behind the scenes, and appearing as "their natural selves" stood before the public, and most any man could probably draw some useful conclusions from what he heard and saw. The first is that while these persons appear by no means as degenerate as they are sometimes pictured, yet if the plays which employers, in order to make money, compel them to present are as "filthy" and "wicked" as these New York managers depict them, then, beyond cavil, they are not good enough for Sunday. In fact, no play presented for money is good enough for Sunday, in the eyes of the law. This is apparent, not only legally but morally, when we consider the kind of plays actually presented. In the lower class of theaters-greatly in the majority on Sundaythe gist of the performance consists in unteaching girls what virtuous mothers have taught them and in dressing Venus in tights to dance young men to perdition. In the higher class of theaters a Sunday performance is the turning of a day intended as a day of rest or on which the soul finds its sublimest ecstacy in seeking its Creator as the eagle seeks the sun, into a day of hilarity, ribaldry and revelry. This is condemned even from a cold legal standpoint, because it is conducting a business for money. But a most practical and important fact I learned was the cruel inhumanity of these managers and the Theatrical Trust to these actors and actresses. Their tired, often pale, faces showed they were the most overworked people on the globe. And the facts attest that more of them break down under the awful strain than in any other departemnt of labor. But they must work on Sunday, the best day for money getting, or lose their places. During the entire period, I do not believe an unkind look ever came from a performer to the judge. As one of them said, "Our lips are sealed, but our prayer is that the judge may succeed." It is to our shame that we talk so much about laws to prevent cruelty to

animals and are opposed to enforcing Sunday laws intended to protect men and women of our own flesh and blood from the cruelty of human greed. The appetite for pleasure is the cruelest monster the world has known. As in the amphitheater in old Rome, the populace refused ofttimes to stay the bloody hand of the slayer, so now "not a thumb is reversed" while these men and women are being worked to death.

As the above article is about to be printed in this book-May, 1914-I desire to add that the statements still sometimes appearing in print to the effect that the Sunday law was not successfully enforced in Kansas City, are absolutely false. The law was successfully enforced. The one bare insignificant exception was in the case of four Sunday theaters, and those conducting them were tried and convicted and paid their fines. In every solitary instance the law triumphed. History does not furnish an instance where the facts have been more deliberately and maliciously misrepresented and perverted than with reference to the enforcement of the Sunday law in Kansas City.

I wish also to state that while Christians and other good citizens who love our laws and our institutions are thinking upon their rights, criminals and Sunday desecrators here are again treading the law under foot and working diligently for the total destruction of our day of worship and rest. The Sabbath was never in such jeopardy as at the present time. While I am writing these lines initiative petitions are being circulated throughout Missouri for the enactment of a statute turning one-half of the Sabbath day over to the open debauchery of the saloon. If this movement should fail them, it is said the purpose is by the use of money and election thievery to elect a Legislature which will enact such a law. The enemies of our Christian Republic are at work everywhere. Beyond cavil, the Sabbath is already greatly impaired.

THE DUTIES OF THE HOUR

Address before the Literary Societies of the Missouri State University as it appeared in the Columbia Herald.

(Editorial Comment of the Herald.)

On Wednesday evening immediately after the address before the alumni, Hon. W. H. Wallace, of Kansas City, delivered the address before the Athenæan and Union Literary Societies. For over an hour and a half, without notes, he held the audience spell-bound by the magical power of an address of extraordinary eloquence. Mr. Wallace has long been eminent as an attorney and public man, having been prosecuting attorney of Jackson County for several years and a candidate for Congress, and the fame of his ability as an orator has become as wide as the State; but the public was hardly prepared to expect such a remarkable display of power as a lecturer upon a literary subject. His style of oratory possesses much of the vehemence and dramatic qualities of Marshall or Prentiss and the expenditure of nervous energy is prodigious. We publish in this paper a verbatim report of the address.

Young Gentlemen of the Athenaean and Union Literary Societies:

When I accepted your invitation to deliver the annual address before the literary societies at the chief seat of learning of the State of Missouri, I did so with such profound sense of the honor conferred on me, that I resolved to do what I had not done before in twelve years, namely, to write out my speech from beginning to end, and deliver it from the manuscript, thus complying with what, I am told, is becoming the inexorable custom for occasions like this. One duty after another, however, has pressed upon me until I find myself standing before you tonight very much as a lawyer stands before a jury, at the end of a long case in court, and compelled to ask their patience and forbearance, in attempting to follow him in such line of thought and form of expression as he has been enabled to blaze out before him in leisure moments, snatched from the work and wrangle of the trial. Inasmuch, too, as in this instance, you have called your speaker, not from literary walks or halls of learning and culture, as you doubtless usually