"The early courts" Massachusetts 1838

First from Julie's Keyboard:

Today I'm blessed to get to celebrate another special milestone in life.  It's always wonderful when we get to celebrate in such manner with our family and friends.  The special moments that we share with those we love all around us often encourage our awareness of the goodness of our free life in this land.  I'm indeed thankful to be a part of this Country in spite of the troubles at hand. Yet, I'm more thankful to be a part of a Kingdom like no other.  I'm more blessed to have "the friend that sticketh closer than a brother," as my friend.

It's so good today to know that regardless of how good or how unfortunate, things may go in and around us, we have a blessed hope that supercedes the " ins and outs" of this life.  The very best of our earthly friends will have to let us down, at least somewhat, at some point in our relationship with them.  However, there is a Friend that will never sell us short, or be lacking in our time of need with any given situation.  Isn't that an awesome provision?

I ask this question today: "Who is your closest friend?"  Do you know Him today?  If not, it's hard to understand why you would want to be without such a friend.  My prayer today is that you know Him.   "What a Friend we have in Jesus!"

Proverbs 18:24 "A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother."

Have a blessed week,

Julie

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http://spiritualheritage.blogspot.com

"The early courts" Massachusetts

Blasphemy and libel, while such attacks on individuals still remain illegal today, in previous times in the United States, such attacks against God and Christ also fell under the laws that were in place to protect reputations.

In Commonwealth v. Abner Kneeland the indictment recorded Kneeland's puboished statements which stated, "The Universalist believed in a god which I do not; but believe that their god, with all his morals attributes . . . is nothing more than a chimera of their own imagination"; "Universalists believe in Christ, which I do not; but believe that the whole story concerning him is . . . a fable and fiction."

The defendant admitted the writing and publishing of the libel.

Kneeland was convicted by the jury, he appealed, explaining that his conviction should be overturned because: (1) he claimed he did not deny a belief in god; he was a pantheist and only denied the belief in a God; he felt everything was god; (2) he argued that the law under which he was convicted had been superseded and overturned by the constitution's  guarantee of religious freedom; and (3) he believed that the laws against blasphemy were a violation of the "freedom of the press," claiming that the constitution "guarantees to me the strict right of propagating my sentiments, by way of argument or discussion, on religious or any other subject."

The court examined whether the law under which he was convicted had been overturned by the constitution and concluded that it had not since the law forbidding blasphemy, "was passed very soon after the adoption of the constitution and no doubt many members of the convention which framed the constitution were members of the legislature which passed this law."

As you can clearly see, our courts and society in general has made an about face concerning the interpretation of our laws and constitutions of government.  The laws and meanings of our constitutional phases obviously carried a different understanding than our current modern interpretations. 

That is because the original meanings seem out of touch and confining to our current society, therefore we must give them a different meaning than the original in order to legitimize our current actions and ideas of government.

This may be convenient for our society, but it does dishonor to those founding principles before us.  If we as a people decide to go our own way with our own new ideas, there are previsions by which to amend and change our constitutions of government, but it is a dangerous thing to take an original meaning of law and just interpretate it to consign to our new purpose or desires.

May God bless each of you,

David