UNITED STATES. 



785 



vorably, and their report was adopted by the 

 convention. An assembly held at Pittsburg, 

 Pa., on the 4th of July of that year, at which 

 delegates were present from various denomi- 

 nations, was the next step. The first national 

 convention was held in Alleghany, Pa., on 

 January 27, 1864, and a National Association 

 organized by that body. This Association has 

 held eight conventions, of which five have 

 been held in Philadelphia, one in Pittsburg, 

 one in New York, and one, this the eighth, in 

 Cincinnati. The call for this convention in 

 Cincinnati was as follows: 



THE RELIGIOUS AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION OF 

 THE UNITED STATES CALL FOB A NATIONAL CON- 

 VENTION. 



Government is instituted for man as an intellectual, 

 social, and moral and religious being. It corresponds 

 to his whole nature. It is intended to protect and 

 advance the higher as well as the lower interests of 

 humanity. It acts for its legitimate purposes when 

 it watches over domestic lite, and asserts and en- 

 forces the sanctity of the marriage-bond ; when it 

 watches over intellect and education, and furnishes 

 means for developing all the faculties of the mind ; 

 when it frowns on profaneness, lewdness, the dese- 

 cration of the Sabbath, and other crimes which in- 

 jure society, chiefly by weakening moral and reli- 

 gious sentiment, and degrading the character of a 

 people. 



Acting for such purposes, government should be 

 established on moral principles. Moral principles 

 of conduct are determined by moral relations. The 

 relations of a nation to God and His moral laws are 

 clear and definite : 



1. A nation is the creature of God. 



2. It is clothed with authority derived from God. 



3. It owes allegiance to Jesus Christ, the appointed 

 ruler of nations. 



4. It is subject to the authority of the Bible, the 

 special revelation of moral law. 



In constituting and administering its government, 

 then, a nation is under obligation to acknowledge 

 God as the author of its existence and the source of 

 its authority, Jesus Christ as its ruler, and the Bible 

 as the fountain of its laws, and the supreme ruler of 

 its conduct. 



Up to the time of the adoption of the national Con- 

 stitution, acknowledgments of this kind were made 

 by all the States. They are yet made by many of 

 the States. And, in the actual administration of the 

 national Government, the principle is admitted. But 

 the fundamental law of the nation, the Constitution 

 of the United States, on which our Government 

 rests, and according to which it is administered, fails 

 to make, fully and explicitly, any such acknowledg- 

 ment. This failure has fostered among us mischiev- 

 ous ideas, like the following : The nation, as such, 

 has no relations to God ; its authority has no higher 

 source than the will of the people ; government is 

 instituted only for the lower wants of man ; the 

 State goes beyond its sphere when it educates reli- 

 giously or legislates against profanity or Sabbath 

 desecration. 



The National Association, which has been formed 

 for the purpose of securing such an amendment to 

 the Constitution as will remedy this great defect, and 

 indicate that this is a Christian nation, and place all 

 Christian laws, institutions, and usages, in our Gov- 

 ernment, on an undeniable legal basis in the funda- 

 mental law of the nation, invites all American citi- 

 zens, who favor such an amendment, without dis- 

 tinction of party or creed, to meet in Thoms's Hall, 

 Cincinnati, on Wednesday, January 31, 1872, at two 

 o'clock P. M. 



All such citizens, to whose notice this call may be 

 brought, are requested to hold meetings, and appoint 



VOL. XII. 50 A 



delegates to the convention. A reduction of fare 

 has been secured on most of the railroads leading to 

 Cincinnati. 



WILLIAM STRONG, U. S. Supreme Court, 

 President of National Association. 



Attached to the call were the names of nine 

 vice-presidents and one hundred prominent per- 

 sons. The following resolutions were adopted : 



Resolved, That the State, as a power claiming and 

 exercising supreme jurisdiction over millions of hu- 

 man beings, as the sovereign arbiter of life and 

 death, and as an educating power, has necessarily a 

 moral character and accountability of its own. 



Resolved, That it is the right and duty of the United 

 States, settled by Christians, a nation with Chris- 

 tian laws and usages, and with Christianity as its 

 greatest social force, to acknowledge itself, in its 

 written Constitution, to be a Christian nation. 



Resolved, That, as the disregard of sound theory 

 always leads to mischievous practical results, so, in 

 this case, the failure of our nation to acknowledge, 

 in its organic law, its relation to God and His moral 

 laws, as a Christian nation, has fostered the theory 

 that government has nothing to do with religion but 

 to let it alone, and that, consequently, laws in favor 

 of the Sabbath, Christian marriage, and the use of 

 the Bible in the schools, are unconstitutional. 



Resolved, That we recognize the necessity of com- 

 plete harmony between our written Constitution and 

 the actual facts of our national life ; and we maintain 

 that the true way to effect this undoubted harmony 

 is not to expel the Bible and all ideas of God and re- 

 ligion from our schools, abrogate laws enforcing 

 Christian morality, and abolish all devout observ- 

 ances in connection with the Government, but to 

 insert an explicit acknowledgment of God and the 

 Bible in our fundamental law. 



Resolved, That the proposed religious amendment, 

 so far from tending to a union of Church and State, 

 is directly opposed to such union, inasmuch as it rec- 

 ognizes the nation's own relations to God, and insists 

 that the nation should acknowledge those relations 

 itself, and not through the medium of any Church 

 establishment. 



An act of Congress, approved May 22, 1872, 

 removed all political disabilities, imposed by 

 the third section of the fourteenth article of 

 amendments to the Constitution, from all per- 

 sons whomsoever, except Senators and Kepre- 

 sentatives of the Thirty-sixth and Thirty-sev- 

 enth Congresses, and officers of the judicial, 

 military, and naval service of the United 

 States, heads of departments, and foreign min- 

 isters of the United States. 



The number relieved by this act was esti- 

 mated at not less than one hundred and fifty 

 thousand persons of capacity and experience. 

 The exceptions, however, embrace a consider- 

 able number of men formerly conspicuous in 

 Southern political life, and probably amount 

 to between three and five hundred. The pas- 

 sage of the act disposed of a great number of 

 cases pending before the United States Su- 

 preme Court, where information had been 

 made against persons holding office contrary 

 to the provisions of the Constitution. All such 

 cases were dismissed. 



For the financial condition of the United 

 States, . see the article FINANCES. For the 

 foreign relations of the country, nee the Presi- 

 dent's Message in PUBLIC DOCUMENTS, and the 

 title DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE. For the 

 military and naval affairs of the country, see 



