Governor Smith's quotation from Dr. Pohle is as follows:

"If religious freedom has been accepted and sworn to as a fundamental law in a constitution, the obligation to show this tolerance is binding on conscience."

At p. 141 infra I have referred at length to statements by the Rev. John A. Ryan in his work on The State and The Church. He holds (p. 47 of his book) to the notion of a Church with "the right to determine when a State ordinance is out of harmony with the ordinances of religion and morality, and the right to refuse obedience to civil regulations which were found to be of this character." Dr. Ryan also holds (p. 46 of his book) the principle that". . . the (Roman) Church, as the guardian and authoritative interpreter of the moral law, has as much right to pronounce upon the morality of political actions and relations as upon the morality of the actions and relations of private societies and individuals." The right to pronounce upon the morality of private individuals does not exist in the membership of that Church but is vested in the alien sovereignty of the Pope under his prerogative of supremacy and infallibility, and obedience to him is commanded under the penalty of damnation. It is clear, therefore, that the right of that Church to pronounce by the Pope on the morality of political actions and relations is supreme. Swearing to religious freedom as a fundamental law in a constitution is a political action, and the relations established are political relations. It would seem, therefore, that where religious freedom in the constitution has been accepted and

sworn to, the oath is not binding on the conscience of Roman Catholics if their Church by the Pope teaches that the constitutional obligation sworn to-to support religious liberty-is out of harmony with its ordinances of religion and morality, i. e., morally wrong. Does that Church so teach? I hold that it does, and that it so teaches as a matter of objective truth. It is fundamental in all morals that an oath to do a thing that is morally wrong is not binding on conscience. Any citizen may morally refuse to keep an oath to do that which he is subsequently convinced is morally wrong. The only question in the modern State is whether the moral determination in respect to civic oaths shall rest in the free conscience of the citizen, functioning in the free collective consensus, in accord with the civic order of the State, or in a conscience subordinated to the Pope's foreign jurisdiction, functioning in the collective consensus of a Roman Catholic solidarity so subordinated, and, therefore, in conflict with the civic order of the State.

RETROACTIVE LEGISLATION

OVER

MORALS AND HISTORY

My statement at p. 70, that the Constitution Pastor Eternus in the Vatican Conciliar decrees of 1870, is, in terms, a piece of retroactive legislation over morals and history, has been pronounced absurd, but I have seen no argument against my conclusion.

It is Roman Catholic doctrine that Papal supremacy and infallibility, defined in 1870 in the Constitution Pastor Eternus as requiring obedience to the Pope in

matters belonging to faith and morals under penalty of damnation, were prerogatives of the Pope by Christ's institution from the beginning, but they were not known to the Church, nor defined as de fide, until 1870. It cannot be denied that before 1870 the Christian world was unconscious of the obedience so required. When in the eleventh century Pope Urban II taught that the killing of excommunicated persons was not murder if done from religious zeal only, it would seem clear that those who may have persisted in regarding it as murder violated in fact the Divine law (existing but unknown because not defined until 1870) requiring obedience to Pope Urban's teaching at the time in moral matters. Their ignorance, or unconsciousness, relieved them, it is true, of the penalty of damnation, but they had in fact transgressed a Divine law though they did not know it, nor did anyone else know it for eight hundred years, i. e., not until 1870. The effect of the decrees of 1870 are therefore, I submit, retroactive over morals and over history.

It will be said that Roman Catholics today are not required to obey the moral teaching of Pope Urban under his prerogative of supremacy, but I submit they are required to believe now that his teaching was valid then in the Divine order. And I say it is monstrous that such teaching should, at any time or for any souls, be regarded as valid in the Divine order, or in accordance with the mind and will of Jesus Christ.

"THE GUTTERS OF HISTORY"

I deeply regret that my plain reference (necessary in my opinion to my argument) to certain undisputed

occurrences in history, discreditable to the Church and to the Papacy, should have been met by intemperate abuse from Roman Catholic critics. The occurrences were referred to in support of the very rational claim that the government of the Church, like that of the State, has fallen at times into degradation and iniquity, and that the State has at times had to constrain the Church and the Popes themselves to the path of decency and moral rectitude, and, on the other hand, that, in the degradation and iniquity at times of the State, the Church has had to constrain the State in a corresponding manner. My argument, in the use of the instances in question, has been described by an eminent member of the Paulist Fathers, in a pamphlet pronounced reliable by The Commonweal, as departing from the standards of a gentleman, and as studiously raking up from the gutters of history the muck of past scandals in an effort to throw dust in the eyes of my readers. My desire has been to show respect for the feelings of Roman Catholics, and all others, in regard to religious convictions, but I decline to respect the padlock placed by The Commonweal and the Paulist Fathers on the door of history.

THE STATE OF MEXICO AND THE CHURCH OF ROME

I have referred in extenso to the religious situation in Mexico and have been accused, in spite of my earnest disclaimer, of approving the outrages inflicted in Mexico upon the Church of Rome and its members. It is true that I am not able to condemn or approve unqualifiedly the course of the Mexican State in re

spect to the Roman Church in its midst, but how, I ask, can one so condemn the course of that State when the Church of Rome, embracing in nominal membership nearly the whole of the Mexican population, asserts, in its philosophy and constitution, its supremacy over the Mexican State in all matters belonging to morals as defined by the Pope, and when the assertion by the Pope in 1856 of his sovereign right to annul the laws of Mexico adverse to the Church remains unrepudiated by the Pope in 1928. It is the claims of the Roman Church to supremacy in Divine right over the Mexican State and over the consciences of Mexicans, and nothing else, that has sealed the lips of the civilized world alike against unqualified sympathy for the Church and against unqualified condemnation for the Mexican State.

THE MARLBOROUGH AND MARCONI ANNULMENTS

In my references to the Marlborough and Marconi annulments there is no intent to show that the findings of the Rota were not in harmony with the law of the Roman Church. I concede that the provisions of the civil law of contract relating to estoppel and providing against fraud are unknown to the Roman Catholic law of marriage. My reference to the cases in question is made only to support the claim, which I should suppose all Roman Catholics admit, that the laws governing the contract of marriage in the Roman Church differ radically from the laws of the State, and that the difference furnishes one of the grounds for that antagonism between them which it is the particular