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NEWS « INTERPRETED 3%
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¥ Harbor scene tne Cologne, Germany. One thousand Royal Air Force planes recently roared over
this vmportard industrial city vn the greatest mass air attack of all time.
protest. Jehovah's Witnesses suffer be-
cause they are a small and, to many, an
obnoxious sect. The minorities whose civil
rights are threatened are always small and,
to many, obnoxious. They may or may not
be unworthy. Yet their treatment 1x the
test, and will alwavs be the test, of the
sincerity with which we cling to the Bill of
Rights. If those of us who belong to the
larger groups do not defend the rights of
persons with whom we disagree, and whom
we may actually detest, we are confessing
that we hold our own rights on suftferance,
or by our numbers, or by our political or
other power.
“It seems to us that the majority opimon
in this instance lends itself to the whittling
down of freedom of speech, freedom of
religion, and freedom of the press. To Chief
Justice Stone 1t seemed that “if the present
taxes, laid mm small communities upon
peripatetic religious propagandists, are to
be sustained, a way has been found for the
effective suppression of speech and press
and religion despite constitutional guaran-
tees.”
Summing up for the others, the St. Louis
Post-Dispatch declared: If a small sect
can be denied its constitutional nights, the
way is open to deny them to other sects.”
When we discussed two vears ago the de-
cision of our Supreme Court concerning
saluting the flag and the treatment ac-
corded the members of the Jehovah's
Witnesses groups by some of our American
citizens, not a few of our readers wrote in to
quire whether we justified all that the
Jehovah's Witnesses sect did in propagat-
ig their religion. We answered by personal
1942
AUGUST,
correspondence that our attitude concern-
mg their manner of propagating their faith
was not the question under discussion, and
that while we might question the ethics of
some things which they did, we were pri-
marily terested to know whether the
American public was ready to deal with this
question on its inherent merits or from a
prejudiced viewpoint. We were thinking
of a statement by James Madison years
ago, when he said that it was no longer a
question of toleration of minonties, but
rather of according them inherent ialien-
able rights.
Our constitution does not make provision
for tolerating minorities. It elevates mi-
norities who are law-abiding to a position
equal before the law with the majority, and
grants to such their God-given, inalienable
rights. Tt 1s time for Americans to ask
themselves the question as to whether they
are going to deny to minorities who may
not please them those four freedoms which
our President proclaims as the basis for our
crusade in behalf of the less privileged who
live In countries now suffering under the
iron heel of the dictator. It appeals to us
that Thomas Paine, an agnostic, was in-
fluenced by the golden rule, which declares:
“All things whatsoever ve would that men
should do to you, do ve even so to them:
for this is the law and the prophets,” when
he said, “T do not believe in a thing vou
ay, but I would die in defending your
right to say 1t.”
Surely in these days when Americans are
making such tremendous sacrifices to bring
help to the oppressed peoples of other na-
tions; it 1s time that we take theopportumty
to study the great fundamental principles
of rehgious, as well ax civil, iberty that we
may accord its benefits to nunorities here
at home which at times may irk us. We
believe that these mimorities should be
strictly loval to the government; but hav-
mg established that fact, they <hould be
entirely free to worship God ax then con-
sciences direct,
Is Prohibition Coming?
triING the past three weeks the
E Methodists, Northern and Southern
: Baptists, the Presbyterian Church
of the United States of America, and the
United Presbyterians, five denominations
im all, have condemned the manufacture
and sale of alcoholic beverages. These
churches, with a total membership of six-
teen million, have gone on record for na-
tional prohibition. While they may have
had in mind that prohibition should be
enforced only during the war, vet their
declaration at this time is rather startling,
as it shows a distinct trend away from the
liberal attitude of a decade ago. Doubtless
our entrance into the war and the observ-
able affects of alcohol upon our soldiery
has led to these open pronouncements.
It was freely asserted a decade ago that
if the church membership had been militant
in 1ts support of prohibition the Eighteenth
Amendment would never have been re-
pealed. Propaganda favoring the use of
light wines and beer as a panacea for the
evils of bootlegging and hijacking resulted
im a change of attitude toward the prohibi-
tion amendment on the part of many
church members in America. Taking ad-
vantage of this situation, those desirous of
a return to the open saloon capitalized
upon the apathy of the church members,
and we all know the result.
Did repeal cure the bootlegging menace?
--Not at all. Evervbody knows that boot-
legging 1s more rife today than it was dur-
ing prohibition. And it has been asserted
that the government is spending as much
now to deal with ilheit hiquor as it did in
the davs of prohibition, but with less suatis-
factory results because it 1s hard to dis-
tinguish a counterfeit bond label. Where
the church failed during the days of pro-
hibition was in educating the public to the
real evils of the use of alcoholic beverages.
After all, the greatest benefit im this field
that can come to any nation nheres mn a
campaign of education, acquainting the
public with the effect of alcohol urd show-
ing that instead of its bemg a food it 1s
essentially a poison.
If the vote of our five great Protestant
religious bodies includes the question of
educating America on the question of the
evils of alcohol as a beverage, then good
results will be seen.
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