The Origin of
Sunday Blue Laws in the United States
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Revelation 13:8 contains a
profound prediction: A day is coming
when "All inhabitants of
the earth will worship the beast
– all whose names have not been
written in the book of life belonging
to the Lamb that was slain from the
creation of the world." Two
important features stand out in this
verse. First, the phrase "all inhabitants
of the earth" is inclusive.
Every wicked person living on Earth
at that time will worship the beast!
Second, this text indicates every
nation will be divided into two
groups. One group will worship the
beast and the other will not! When
will this division occur? What will
cause it? Why will 194 nations (as of
date of publication) enact laws
demanding that everyone worship the
beast? Who is this beast that the
wicked will obey? God has answered
these questions in His Word if we are
willing to let the Bible speak for
itself. Surprisingly, the answer may
be quite different than what you
anticipate! So, please take a few
minutes to consider this profound
topic because this prophecy will be
fulfilled very soon.
The story begins about A.D. 1532 in
England. King Henry VIII wanted Pope
Clement VII to annul his marriage to
Catherine of Aragon so that he could
marry Anne Boleyn. When Pope Clement
refused, King Henry retaliated by
declaring himself the Supreme Head of
the Church of England. Using his
authority as King of England and
Supreme Head of the Church of
England, the king
"persuaded" church leaders
in England that it was in their best
interests to annul his marriage to
Catherine so he could marry Anne.
Anne Boleyn became pregnant and
Princess Elizabeth was born in
December 1532. A month later, Anne
married King Henry even though his
divorce from Catherine was not
“declared” until May 23,
1533. Anne was the second of
Henry’s six wives. King Henry
accused her of adultery and had her
beheaded on May 19, 1536, although
many historians agree that the
king’s interest in Jane Seymour
(who became his third wife) was the
primary cause for Anne’s death.
Later on, Pope Paul III
excommunicated King Henry for his
rebellious and adulterous ways, but
the king was not concerned. He
remained a devout Catholic and during
his reign, the Church of England
mirrored the theology and practices
of the Roman Catholic Church –
the most notable difference was that
the Supreme Head of the Church lived
in England instead of Rome.
When King Henry died, his son, Edward
VI, came to power. To win the
approval of Protestants, King Edward
permitted some reforms to take place
within the Church of England. A new
book of Common Prayer was created in
1552. The Protestants were delighted
because it appeared that the Church
of England was finally separating
itself from Catholic heresy and
tradition, but their joy was short
lived because King Edward soon died.
Since he died without an heir, his
half-sister, Queen Mary I (also known
as Bloody Mary), ascended to the
throne. She was a devout
Catholic and she used her authority
as the Supreme Head of the Church of
England to cancel the reforms that
King Edward had permitted. She
abruptly returned the Church of
England to pure Catholicism. Many
people were burned at the stake
during her reign because they would
not embrace Catholicism and renounce
the reformed faith.
Queen Mary also died without an heir
and her half-sister, Queen Elizabeth
I, came to the throne. Queen
Elizabeth I is credited with
establishing the Church of England
(1558) as we know it today. She
negotiated many thorny issues that
existed between Protestants and
Catholics. Theologically speaking,
the Church of England ended up about
80% Catholic and 20% Protestant.
During her reign, a grass-roots
movement formed within the church.
These conservative radicals called
for (a) complete separation from the
Church in Rome, (b) the abandonment
of Catholic rituals, and (c) complete
devotion to perfection and piety. For
the most part, the people calling for
these reforms were considered rabble
(uneducated) and they were given the
derogatory name,
"puritans." To ordinary
laymen, the Puritan Movement appeared
to be obsessed with anti-Catholic
sentiment and a relentless quest for
purity and perfection.
King James I succeeded Queen
Elizabeth in 1603. He favored some of
the theology of the Protestant
Reformation, but he did not like the
Puritans. To his credit, King James
believed that common people should be
able to read the Bible in English and
as the Supreme Head of the Church of
England, he permitted the Bible to be
translated into English. The first
edition of the King James Version of
the Bible was produced in 1611. After
King James died, his son, Charles I,
came to the throne. King Charles
openly detested the Puritans because
he wanted the Church of England to
return to its Catholic roots and
rituals. When King Charles married a
zealous Catholic woman, the Puritans
became outraged. Tensions escalated
and the Puritans repudiated the
doctrine of The Divine Right of Kings
(a political/religious doctrine of
absolutism), and King Charles
responded by condemning the Puritans
as heretics. Deadly persecution
followed and thousands of Puritans
fled England to escape death.
Jean Bodin (1530-1596) initiated a
concept called “The Divine Right
of Kings” based on a doctrine of
sovereignty. Bodin was a devout
Catholic, a French jurist, and a
member of France’s House of
Parliament. Bodin was appalled at the
abuses of the Catholic Church in
general, and the pope in particular.
His investigation into the question
of human authority led to the
conclusion that kings were not
subservient to the Church. Of course,
the Catholic Church condemned his
conclusion. The doctrine of The
Divine Right of Kings teaches that
monarchs are not subject to anyone
but God because they are appointed by
God and they serve at God’s
pleasure. (See Romans 13.) Therefore,
a monarch rules over church and
state. Since a monarch rules
according to divine authority, no one
can question a monarch’s
decisions or judgment without
blaspheming God. As you can see, the
doctrine of The Divine Right of Kings
opposes the doctrine of Petrine
Succession. Petrine Succession exalts
the authority of the head of the
Church over heads of state. Catholics
believe the doctrine of Petrine
Succession is based on Matthew 16:19 where
Jesus gave Peter the keys of the
kingdom of Heaven. Catholics believe
this action by Jesus (who is King of
kings) places the pope’s
authority above any earthly king. At
that time, the Catholic Church held
anyone rejecting the doctrine of
Petrine Succession was a heretic and
subject to excommunication, and where
possible, death. Conflict over this
doctrine explains why Pope Paul III
excommunicated King Henry VIII.
Hopefully, this brief history on the
formation of the Church of England
helps you understand who the Puritans
were and why they left England. Even
though their exodus to the colonies
of New England began
during the reign of Queen Elizabeth,
the Puritans fled England in large
numbers when King Charles began to
vigorously pursue and kill them. One
could say that the Puritans lost
their homeland when they concluded
the king of England and the Church of
England would no longer tolerate
their beliefs. So, the Puritans
arrived on the shores of North
America having a strong resentment
against Catholics and a rigid
devotion to purity and perfection,
and an eagerness for freedom to
worship God according to the dictates
of their conscience.
Life in colonial America for the
Puritans was harsh. Illness was
rampant, food supplies were
inadequate, and the Indians were
often hostile. These challenges
forced the Puritans into a stark way
of thinking and living. The Puritans
viewed life in terms of black and
white, and the laws by which they
lived were simple: Right was right
and wrong was wrong. They regarded
themselves as "godly" and
everyone else, especially Catholics,
as "ungodly." The Puritans
did not associate with the ungodly
for fear they would contaminate their
quest for purity.
The Puritans established Sunday laws
in their colonies because they wanted
to protect the holiness of Sunday
from worldly compromise. To them,
anything less than perfect obedience
to God’s law was sin. Their
Sunday laws varied somewhat from
colony to colony, but the result was
the same. The Puritans obligated
themselves to honor and respect the
holiness of "the Lord’s
Day" through mandatory church
attendance. Puritans could not work
in the fields, make a bed, cook, sew,
or even kiss their own child on
Sunday. All business activities (for
example, discussing business, buying,
or selling) and various forms of
casual pleasure were outlawed.
Consider the severity of the Sunday
law that Lord De La Warr, the first
governor of Virginia, enacted in
1610: "Every man and woman shall
repair in the morning to the divine
service and sermons preached upon the
Sabbath day, and in the afternoon to
the divine service, and catechizing,
upon pain for the first fault to lose
their provision and the allowance for
the whole week following; for the
second, to lose the said allowance
and also be whipped; and for the
third to suffer death." (C. Gary
Hullquist, Sabbath Diagnosis,
Brushton, NY, Teach Services, 2004,
p. 379.) Ironically, the
Puritans came to North America
searching for religious freedom, yet
they were the first to enact and
enforce laws limiting that freedom.
Blue
Laws
Sunday laws are sometimes called
"blue laws." One story
about their
origination is that Reverend Samuel
Peters claimed in 1781 the Puritans
wrote the laws on blue paper or they
were bound in books with blue covers.
(Peters, Samuel, General History of
Connecticut, 1781) No evidence
has been found to support this claim,
but history suggests there may be a
simple explanation behind the phrase
"blue laws." The color blue
is often associated with coldness and
rigidness. For example, when a person
dies, the body loses oxygen, cools,
and then turns blue. When a person
enters cold water, his limbs and lips
will turn blue. Blue was often used
in a number of early American
colloquial expressions to indicate
coldness, such as
"bluenoses" which refers to
people who live in the north or in
cold climates, or "I’m
feeling blue" which can mean one
feels depressed or feels cold, or
"a blue norther is coming"
which means a bitter cold weather
front is coming. The Puritans may
have been delighted with their
stringent regard for the holiness of
Sunday, but their rigid ways and
legalistic regard for Sunday
observance left observers cold. Thus,
the expression "blue laws"
became associated with the
Puritans’ laws regarding Sunday
observance.
After the Civil War (1861-1865),
several southern states (in the
"Bible belt") enacted
Sunday laws. Legislators claimed that
a day of rest would be beneficial for
the well being of society. Keep in
mind that even though the war was
over, attitudes towards slaves and
slavery remained largely unchanged in
the South. Many former slaves were
forced to work seven days a week to
survive. Lawmakers argued that Sunday
laws were good for everyone because
every human being should enjoy the
benefits of a common day of rest.
Most Protestant pastors agreed. They
argued that since Sunday was the
"Lord’s Day," the
Sabbath should be observed by
attending church and resting from
work. Church leaders also favored
Sunday laws because business
interests would not compete with
attendance at worship services;
therefore, most religious and
non-religious people alike considered
the "blue laws" a win-win
situation.
There seems to be a truism that says,
"Every time a new law is
created, unintended consequences
occur." History affirms that
blue laws have caused unintended
consequences. During the late
eighteenth century, non-religious
people were arrested for playing
games on Sunday, working in their own
fields, or for doing menial work
around the farm, such as repairing a
wagon. During the nineteenth century,
blue laws changed focus by becoming
more business oriented. This
transition was necessary because
personal freedom and civil rights
became increasingly important in the
United States. Currently, some cities
still enforce blue laws. They allow
grocery stores and drug stores to
remain open on Sunday, but only
certain items can be sold. (Only
items defined as necessities can be
purchased on Sunday. Nonessential
items cannot.) Liquor stores are
permitted to open on Sunday in some
states, but only during certain
hours. The state of Texas permits a
car dealer to open his business on
Sunday, but only if it is closed on
Saturday. So, while blue laws may
seem harmless to most Christians
today, Jews, Seventh Day Baptists,
Seventh-day Adventists, Muslims and
other religious groups that do not
worship on Sunday often face the
unintended consequences of Sunday
blue laws. For example, a Seventh-day
Adventist may close his businesses on
Saturday due to religious principles.
Because blue laws also restrict
business opportunities on Sunday, his
businesses is limited to operating
five days per week instead of the six
that Sunday observers would typically
enjoy.
With today’s understanding of
the "wall of separation between
church and state," it seems
amazing that in 1961, the Supreme
Court of the United States ruled that
Maryland’s blue laws did not
violate the First Amendment or the
free exercise of religion. The court
approved the state’s restriction
of commercial activities on Sunday
because the judges determined that
Sunday blue laws were designed
"to provide a uniform day of
rest for all citizens on a secular
basis and to promote the secular
values of health, safety, recreation,
and general well-being through a
common day of rest. That this day
coincides with the Christian Sabbath
is not a bar to the state’s
secular goals; it neither reduces its
effectiveness for secular purposes
nor prevents adherents of other
religions from observing their own
holy days." (McGowan v.
Maryland, 366 U.S. 420 (1961),
italics mine.)
Even though the Supreme Court does
not acknowledge the sacredness of
Sunday, it justifies Sunday blue laws
for the same reason that legislators
justified Sunday blue laws in the
South after the Civil War. The
justification was that everyone
benefits from a common day of rest. I
have wondered if the Supreme Court
would have reached the same
conclusion if the state of Maryland
had selected Tuesday as a common day
of rest.
Why
Seventh-day Adventists Anticipate a
National Sunday Law
For the past 145 years, Seventh-day
Adventists (SDAs) in the United
States have anticipated the enactment
of a national Sunday law, and to a
great extent, they believe this event
will initiate a worldwide "time
of trouble." They also believe
"the time of trouble" will
end with the outpouring of the seven
last plagues and the appearing of
Jesus. To understand the origin of
this anticipation and their keen
interest in a national Sunday law, a
short review on the prophetic beliefs
of SDAs is necessary.
Many of the pioneers who would later
form the SDA Church grew up within
the Puritan influence that permeated
New England Protestantism during the
early nineteenth century. Most
Protestants living in the United
States were gratified by news that
the pope had been imprisoned and no
longer had papal authority over
Europe (1798). In 1831, William
Miller, a licensed Baptist evangelist
from New York, concluded that the
Lord would return "around
1843." (Later, he corrected the
date to 1844.) Based on his
preaching, a movement (largely
centered in New England) attracted
between 50,000 and 100,000 of his
followers. After the bitter failure
of the Millerite Movement in 1844,
prophetic interest within
Protestantism generally waned.
However, a tenacious group of
Millerites went back to the Bible to
see why Jesus had not appeared in
1844. After twenty years of regional
conferences and various campmeetings
to determine Bible truth, a
group of people organized a new
church body in Michigan and named it
the Seventh-day Adventist Church. The
year was 1863 and war between the
states was raging.
SDAs believe they are the heirs of
the Protestant Reformation that began
centuries earlier in Europe. Like the
Puritans before them, they believe it
is their divinely appointed duty to
point out the heresies that
originated within Catholicism by
teaching Bible truth. To this end,
SDAs believe that a time is coming
when everyone in the United States
(and ultimately the whole world) will
be forced to recognize Sunday as a
holy day. Once a national Sunday law
is
enacted in the United States, SDAs
believe that all who obey the fourth
commandment will be persecuted for
refusing to recognize the sacredness
of the first day of the week. In some
cases, they believe there will be
torture and even death. (White, Ellen
G., The Great Controversy,
Mountain View: Pacific Press, 1911,
pp. 591-92)
SDAs arrive at this conclusion in
four steps:
Step 1 – The Catholic Church Is
the Beast in Revelation
13:1
SDAs believe the Roman Catholic
Church is the first beast mentioned
in Revelation 13. (White, p.
439) Since the Bible states this
beast will make war on God’s
saints and impose false worship on
the world (Revelation 13:5-8), SDAs
conclude the Roman Catholic Church
(the beast) will someday wage war
against those who observe God’s
seventh day Sabbath. (White, p. 579)
Step 2 – The Mark of the Beast
Is Sunday Observance
SDAs teach that the Roman Catholic
Church altered the Ten Commandments
by eliminating the second
commandment. Moreover, the Catholic
Church has tried to change the
holiness of God’s seventh day
Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday.
(White, pp. 446-447.
Compare Exodus 20:3-17 with
any Catechism published by the
Catholic Church) SDAs interpret
these actions as blasphemy and this
blasphemy is regarded as the mark (as
in a trademark) of the Catholic
Church’s presumed authority.
(White, pp. 447-448) Therefore,
SDAs conclude that the mark of the
beast is Sunday observance and this
mark of papal authority will be
imposed on everyone when a national
Sunday law is enacted. This
anticipated law, they teach, will
require everyone to respect Sunday as
a holy day. (White, pp. 604-605)
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