National Reform – Moses Harman, 12/19/1884

Republished from our predecessor publication Lucifer the Light Bearer

The agents of the “God-in-Constitution” movement are again working up a convention in Northeast Kansas. Mr. M.
A. Gault, the “district secretary” for Kansas of this organization, informs us that said convention will be held at North
Cedar on Tuesday and Wednesday, the 30th and 31st inst. In their printed “call,” they say: “This movement has
been steadily growing in power since its organization in 1863. It now has seven lecturers in the field, and an ably
edited weekly journal as its organ. The movement is in no wise sectarian, having among its advocates the leading
men in the different evangelical churches, who are working for the reformation of the Nation from the standpoint
of morals and of high Christian principle, rather than from that of any sect or party. It is not a movement merely to
inscribe the name of God in our National Constitution. Its real purpose is to agitate the Christian theory of government,
instead of the secular. It is to educate in the minds of the people such a conviction of our nation’s responsibility to
Almighty God, and to Christ, the moral Governor of the world, that the people will suitably express it in the fundamental
law.” “The National Reform movement is a mustering of the Christian forces in our land to meet the tide of infidel
godlessness, licentiousness, and intemperance threatening to sweep away our Christian institutions. These are
waging their bitterest opposition against Sabbath and temperance legislation. They are organized on the so-called
platform of ‘Liberalism,’ and with the most astounding liberality demand the abolition of all laws looking to the
enforcement of Christian morality. They would obliterate every recognition of God and his Law from our National
life, removing the very foundation of law and order, taking away every barrier to vice, and letting loose every tide
of immorality.” “What we need, and what we must have, is a law that is the will of an unchanging Lawgiver. This
alone will present a force sufficient to bind the conscience of the citizen.” “It seeks nothing like the union of church
and state.” If these extracts fairly represent the animus of this so-called “National Reform” movement, and we
maintain that they do, then we think two or three conclusions or deductions must be apparent to every reader:

1st. That the leaders of this organization are insincere and jesuitical; for how is it possible that the Christian’s God
shall be recognized as the “supreme Lawgiver” and yet avoid a union of church and state? Who but the church can
tell what the laws of God are? In other words, if the Bible is to be the statute book to which all state laws must be
made to conform, who is to be the expounder of that statute book unless it be the authorized or recognized church
commentators of that Bible? If this does not mean a union of church and state, then we do not understand the
meaning of language. But while most of these God-in-Constitution champions are not candid enough to avow
their real intentions, they are not all open to this charge. Instance: One of the leading contributors to the Christian
Statesman, the organ of this movement, in a long article published in that paper of March 6th, ’84, openly and
candidly defends the principles of a “Union of Church and State.” He says: “Without such union no millennium is
possible.” He mentions a “number and variety of ways in which church and state are thus united” already here
in America. Among others: “The President of the United States annually calls upon the people to return thanks
to God. Now it is true that the President in proclaiming a Thanksgiving day, departs from and utterly disregards
the secular theory of government! He does assume to himself the office of Pontifex Maximus” [or High Priest!
Italics are his.] After mentioning some five or six ways in which church and state, by the authority of custom, are
already united, he continues: “I confess that every instance of union of church and state referred to, has been
inconsistent with the secular theory of government, and inconsistent with our secular Constitution.” Most evidently,
the one object for which this so-called National Reform movement was organized is and was to legalize, strengthen,
and enforce the union already existing between church and state in this country, and it does not speak well for
the candor and manliness of Messrs. Gault, Milligan, & Co., to urge, as they do in their official circular, that this
“movement” “seeks nothing like the union of church and state.”

Evidently also does it appear from these extracts that should this Religious Amendment become the law of the land,
“liberty of conscience” will be at an end. All must then subscribe to the national creed—must submit to the “law that
is the will of the unchanging Lawgiver”—in other words, must become Christians, or, in default thereof, must be
deprived of the rights and privileges of citizenship. And with this deprivation of the rights of citizenship will naturally
follow overt acts of persecution, by the agents of this Christian government, such as fines, imprisonment, banishment,
if not death by fire or halter. 3d. It must also be apparent to every observant reader of this official circular that these
Christian propagandists are quite reckless and unscrupulous in stating the principles and objects of Liberals, or “infidels”
as they are called. This circular charges that we as Liberals are seeking to remove “the very foundation of law and
order, taking away every barrier to vice and letting loose every tide of immorality.” It is commonly thought that the
trade or profession of politics naturally develops or graduates the most unscrupulous falsifiers in regard to the
characters and doctrines of their opponents, but surely no pot-house politician ever exceeded the above utterances
in point of reckless disregard of truth. But as we are anxious not to impute bad motives to any one, we hereby
offer the use of our columns to these zealous Christian champions, and ask them to tell us definitely what they
mean by the sweeping charges made by them against Liberals and Liberalism.