Evening star., 1960-09-18

against American Catholics, the
hierarchy, the Church, are all
false, totally incapable Of proof.
If it can be proved that the
Catholics believe that the bishops
have the right and the duty ito
tell them how to vote" CTIME
magazines phrase, then 1 agree
that Senator Kennedy should be
defeated. go further. If this is
true, no Catholic should hold pub
lie Office, and there should be no
Catholic voters.
DR.. Peale'S statement that
"Spokesmen for the Vatican have
repeatedly urged establishment Of
diplomatic relations with the Ro-.
man Catholic Church" This is
another overworked falsehood,
never presented with any sup
porting Recommendation. 1t cannot
possibly be Catholic or religious
question. Non-Catholics in the
State Department and in the
diplomatic service have urged it,
Russia and the United States are
the only large countries not rep
resented in Vatican City. 1t was
to Vatican City, an independent
country, not to the Catholic
Church that President Truman
nominated Gen. Mark Clark. If
this was a violation of the First
Amendment, because the Pope is
the head of both the country and
the church, then it seems to
follow, since Queen Elizabeth is
the head of both the Anglican.
Church in England and the Pres
byterian Church in Scotland.
sending an Ambassador to the
Court of st. James is double
fracture" of our Constitution. E.
1t is apparently (but irrele-
vanity "inconceivable" to Dr..
Peale that a Roman Catholic
President would not be under
extreme pressure by the hierarchy
of his church to accede to it's
policies with respect to foreign
relations - This is POAU's
shining example of the use Of
the Hitler technique of repeating
the big lie" until the gullible and
the bigoted come to believe it. It.
is shameful for man in DR..
Peale'S position to use 1t with.
necessarily nothing to back it up.
He could not cite a doctrinal text
or a specific example to save his.
pulpit.
Rights Of Other Foiths
His statement that the Catholic
denies equal right to all other
faiths" in countries with predomi-
nantly Catholic populations shows
that he is ignorant COR dishonest
in regard to both history and the
current world situation. 1t is not,
true of Belgium, Ireland, Luxem-
bourg, Quebec. Rhode Island, and
a number of Latin American
countries. He is unfair in not
mentioning the denial Of rights,
to Catholic minorities in Norway,
Sweden, Denmark, parts of SwitZ-
erland, and historically in every
predominantly Protestant county
except the United States. I wish
to emphasize that I know of no
American Protestant who wants
the conditions of Sweden intro
duced into the United States. I
know of no American Catholic
who wants the situation in Spain
brought into our country. Neither
does DR.. Peale.
He knows of no instance in
which Catholics, lay or clerical,
have asked for any special priv.
ilege to Catholics or the Catholic
Church that would not be equal
ly available to all churches and
religious bodies. This perennial
falsehood should be ignored or
denounced by decent citizens.
Health and safety service to
school children on the public
highways, going to the schools the
State requires them to attend, is
not aid to schools, but directly to
the children of the people who pay
for and own the busses, and al
ways to all schools. not only to
Catholic schools, State compulsory
attendance laws apply to religious
schools on exactly the same terms
as to public schools.
Ambiguous Phrase
The phrase 1.-THE separation Of
church and state" is thoroughly
ambiguous; no one, literally no
one, can ever know what it means
unless its meaning is revealed by
its context 1t appears in no Amer
ican constitution, and so has no
possible constitutional meaning.
Both Madison and jefferson al
ways used establishment" in the
sense of a monopolistic position of
government favor, and in his ia
nous use of the wall Of separa-
ton" in his letter to the BaptistS
of Danbury, Jefferson made clear
that he was writing about ma
tional establishment.
The phrase. "the complete sep
aration between church and
state" is undiluted nonsense; no
country on earth has ever adopted
this political unreality in its con-
stitutionS or laws, or practiced it
in its governmental relations with
religion. Before anyone answers
the question whether he believes
in the separation of church and
state, he should find out whether
the question refers to the consti-
tutional provisions of mo estab-
lishment" and of religious free
dom" or whether he means the
"Rutledge doctrine" of Justice
Rutledge and some other justices
of the Supreme Court, and Of.
POAU: "A complete and perma-
nent separation between h e
spheres of religious activity and
civil authority by comprehensively
forbidding every form of public