Suggests an Exception: Dr. Loeb Asks that Sunday Closing Law Shall Not be Universal

“Suggests an Exception: Dr. Loeb Asks that Sunday Closing Law Shall Not be Universal,” Evening Star (Washington, DC), May 28, 1902. https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1902-05-28/ed-1/seq-7/

SUGGESTS AN EXCEPTION

Dr. Loeb Asks That Sunday Closing Law Shall Not Be Universal

    Rev. Dr. Julius T. Loeb, rabbi of the Adath Israel Congregation, on behalf of the Hebrew orthodox community of the District, has presented a communication to the board of District Commissioners with reference to the proposed Sunday closing law. In the letter Dr. Loeb states that he favors a Sunday closing law, but suggests that an exception be made in the case of those who observe Saturday as a day of rest and worship. The text of the communication is in part as follows: 

    “No argument is needed to sustain the righteous plea for a strict observance of a Sabbath one day each week, which in itself is a civilizing principle no less than a practice of religion. The enactment of a law to this effect surely is in consonance with human reason, with good sense and good government. I, for one, cannot but be in perfect sympathy with the Sunday closing movement. Let the first day of the week be observed as a Sabbath by all those who pursue their daily vocations throughout the rest of the week. But I would humbly request you, gentlemen, to provide for those who conscientiously observe the seventh day as a day of rest, as ordained in the Bible, and since Sunday to them is a secular day I submit that they be not compelled to keep another day’s rest. 

    “I make this petition as a citizen of the United States and by reason of the liberal spirit which permeates this glorious commonwealth and its benign institutions. I venture to state that this country is not the sponsor of any religious creed, but that it is the flower garden of Almighty Providence, where the rose, the lily, the carnation and the magnolia all go to make up a complex whole; where the various sections and spheres of mankind meet in universal harmony on the broad plains of freedom and equity, under the reign of justice and peace, and under the proud and mighty banner of liberty. 

    “The United States government, we may assume, stands not for a religion with particular dogmas, but for an all-embracing morality, for a faith in God, who is the Creator and Ruler of all. ‘Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.’ The beautiful words of the founder of our republic should find an echo in the heart of every true American. And it is meet that the District of Columbia, which is the government seat of this grand republic, should exhibit an example worthy of the tolerance for which the republic is famed.

    “True it is the majority rules; but the citizens of the United States never have been, and, we hope, never will be, called upon to vote as to what religion they would choose or what day in the week they might select as a day of rest for all. As an Israelite I believe that the biblical injunction which imposes a rest on the seventh day ‘as a sign between God and the children of Israel throughout all generations that in six days He made heaven and earth and rested on the seventh,’ that this repeated and explicit statement can have no other conception, and holds goof now as in times of yore. 

    “I further believe that the Anglo-Saxon race, which may well be the offspring of our ‘lost ten tribes,’ as some learned men aver, like Israel of old, is now destined by an especial Providence to carry the torch of civilization and the broad principles of liberty and justice to all the corners of the globe, and by its humane rule proclaim to the world universal peace, as predicted by the prophets. 

    “Now, gentlemen, I do hope and believe that in framing a law which imposes a rest of one day each week you will consider the peculiar condition into which many of our citizens would be plunged if that day be no other than Sunday. The country’s liberty might thereby be impaired to an enormous degree. The passage of the Sunday act without the provision as mentioned above would mean to the consistent Israelite, to the Seventh-day Baptists and such others either to be reduced to poverty by closing up two days each week or be converted to the others’ conception of a Sabbath and of religion. I would be very much disappointed to see such an injustice sanctioned by our lawmakers. I therefore indorse such a law as compels the observance of a Sabbath, but leaves it to the conscience and faith of the citizen to select the one to be observed.”