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Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2002
The ramifications of "Jersey justice" have on occasion interpreted in a
narrow fashion the religious liberties apparently granted by the State Constitution, which ranks high for its liberality. In the celebrated case of
Eaton v. Eaton in 1936, despite constitutional guarantees to the contrary,
the Court of Chancery denied a mother the custody of her children on the
ground that her communistic and atheistic views were contrary to public
policy of the State. The decree was upheld by the Court of Errors and
Appeals, although the latter body, in its opinion, did refer to her beliefs
as "irrelevant."
Organized religion, as such, exerts practically no State-wide political
influence, although the Catholic Church successfully opposed legislation
for the sterilization of defectives. Affected by their neighboring metropolitan areas, churches in the northern part of the State show a general
trend toward liberalism, while those in the southern section are more conservative. The clergy as a whole has limited its support chiefly to the more
widely accepted labor reforms, the peace movement, and good government
drives.
Attempts to make concrete this type of liberalism have cost several New
Jersey ministers their churches. The Reverend L. Hamilton Garner, an outspoken liberal, was forced from his Newark pastorate at the Universalist
Church in 1937 after he had sponsored a community forum in which left-wing speakers participated. For similar reasons the Reverend Archey Ball
was obliged to leave his Methodist pulpit in Ridgewood.
Two of the best-known New Jersey clergymen have won secular and
civil prominence, respectively, as exponents of a more conservative type
of religion. The Reverend William Hiram Foulkes, pastor of Old First
Presbyterian Church of Newark, was in 1937 elected Moderator of the
Presbyterian Church in the United States. In the same year the Reverend
Lester H. Clee, pastor of Newark's Second Presbyterian Church, became
titular head of the New Jersey Republican Party after losing a close race
as its gubernatorial nominee. Clee became known first for his enormously
successful Bible classes and then, while a State legislator, as the spokesman for the Clean Government faction from Essex County.
Interchurch cooperation has made considerable progress throughout the
State. The New Jersey Council for Religious Education, successor to the
New Jersey Sunday School Association, founded in 1858, operates as a
unifying force among Protestant denominations. New Jersey is the only
State in which the national and State units of the religious groups have
set up such a cooperative staff plan. In several communities Protestant denominations have accepted either the John D. Rockefeller or Federal
Council of Churches plan for union and have pooled their material, as
well as spiritual, interests.
Thanksgiving and other national holidays are occasions for joint Jewish
and Christian services; seminars and institutes on marriage, crime, and
other sociological questions usually invite a complete clerical representation. In Newark and the larger cities there has been a marked advance in
cooperation between Negro and white religious organizations. The cause
of world peace, however, has accounted for the greatest measure of religious unity; no peace meeting in New Jersey is complete without the
benediction of priest, rabbi, and minister. Pacificism not only has welded
the churches together but also has been the strongest force for uniting
religious and lay groups on a program of common action.
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New Jersey: The American Guide Series
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