Howard C. Wilkinson - "Law and Order" (October 25, 1970)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
(choir singing) | 0:05 | |
(choir singing continues) | 2:07 | |
(organ music) | 4:16 | |
("A Mighty Fortress is Our God") | 4:19 | |
(congregation singing) | 5:04 | |
(congregation singing continues) | 6:16 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 8:27 | |
- | If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves | 8:43 |
and the truth is not in us. | 8:49 | |
Therefore let us offer unto God a unison prayer | 8:53 | |
of confession and for pardon. | 8:57 | |
Let us pray. | 9:01 | |
Oh righteous Father, before whose holiness | 9:04 | |
our hearts tremble, we humbly confess the many sins | 9:08 | |
with which we have dishonored thy name, | 9:12 | |
our shortcomings in faith, obedience, and love. | 9:16 | |
We confess that we have failed to love our enemies | 9:21 | |
and to do good to those who hate us. | 9:24 | |
We have pointed to the spec in our brother's eye, | 9:28 | |
but have not noticed the log in our own eye. | 9:32 | |
We often have been behaved as badly | 9:36 | |
as those who are not of the household of faith. | 9:38 | |
We pray thee to forgive us our sins | 9:42 | |
and to enable us to make a gracious witness | 9:46 | |
for Christ in the world. | 9:48 | |
We pray in His name, amen. | 9:51 | |
Hear these words of assurance of forgiveness | 9:56 | |
as they are recorded by the Psalmist. | 10:00 | |
"The Lord is gracious and merciful, | 10:04 | |
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. | 10:08 | |
The Lord redeems the life of his servants. | 10:15 | |
None of those who take refuge in Him will be condemned. | 10:21 | |
Therefore let us be of good courage." | 10:28 | |
(organ music) | 10:35 | |
(choir singing) | 11:22 | |
(choir singing continues) | 12:46 | |
- | Our scripture lesson this morning is taken | 15:31 |
from the sixth chapter of the Gospel according to St. Luke, | 15:34 | |
beginning with the 37th verse: | 15:37 | |
"'Judge not and you will not be judged. | 15:41 | |
Condemn not and you will not be condemned. | 15:44 | |
Forgive and you will be forgiven. | 15:48 | |
Give and it will be given to you, | 15:51 | |
good measure, pressed down, shaken together, | 15:54 | |
running over will be put into your lap. | 15:57 | |
For the measure you give will be the measure you get back.' | 16:01 | |
He also told him a parable. | 16:05 | |
'Can a blind man lead a blind man? | 16:08 | |
Will they not both fall into a pit? | 16:11 | |
Why do you see the spec that is in your brother's eye, | 16:14 | |
but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? | 16:18 | |
Or how can you say to your brother, | 16:22 | |
'Brother, let me take out the spec that is in your eye,' | 16:25 | |
when you yourself do not see the log in your own eye? | 16:28 | |
You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye | 16:33 | |
and then you will see clearly to take out the spec | 16:38 | |
that is in your brother's eye.'" | 16:41 | |
Here ends the scripture lesson. | 16:43 | |
(organ music) | 16:47 | |
("Gloria Patri") | 16:50 | |
♪ Glory be to the Father ♪ | 16:56 | |
♪ And to the Son and to the Holy Ghost ♪ | 17:01 | |
♪ As it was in the beginning ♪ | 17:09 | |
♪ Is now and ever shall be ♪ | 17:14 | |
♪ World without end, amen, amen ♪ | 17:19 | |
- | The Lord be with you. | 17:30 |
Let us pray. | 17:33 | |
Oh God our Father, merciful and gracious, | 17:40 | |
hear are the thanksgivings with which we come | 17:45 | |
before thy throne. | 17:47 | |
For the wonder of their beauty manifest in the world, | 17:50 | |
for thy wisdom inspiring the works of men, | 17:55 | |
and for thy Fatherly love shown forth to us in Christ Jesus, | 17:59 | |
praise be to thee oh God. | 18:05 | |
For any happiness in our earthly life, | 18:09 | |
for home and school and friends, | 18:13 | |
and for the joy of loving and being loved, | 18:17 | |
praise be to thee oh God. | 18:21 | |
For the grace to worship thee, | 18:26 | |
for the right to pray to thee, | 18:29 | |
and for thine answers to our prayers, | 18:33 | |
praise be to thee oh God. | 18:37 | |
But above all for Jesus Christ thy Son, | 18:41 | |
the Word incarnate who came to end | 18:45 | |
the reign of sin and death | 18:49 | |
and to bring in the reign of righteousness and life, | 18:52 | |
praise be to the oh God. | 18:56 | |
And on this Reformation Sunday, | 19:02 | |
let us pray for the whole state of Christ's Church. | 19:05 | |
Most gracious Father, we humbly beseech thee | 19:11 | |
for the holy Catholic Church, | 19:15 | |
fill it with all truth, in all truth, with all peace. | 19:19 | |
Where it is corrupt, purge it. | 19:25 | |
Where it is in error, direct it. | 19:29 | |
Where it is right, strengthen and confirm it. | 19:34 | |
Where it is divided and rent asunder, | 19:39 | |
do thou make up the breaches in it for the sake of life Son, | 19:43 | |
whose church it is. | 19:50 | |
Let us offer a prayer of intercession | 19:53 | |
for the United Nations. | 19:55 | |
Oh heavenly Father, we thank thee | 19:58 | |
for those who out of the bitter memories of strife and loss | 20:00 | |
conceived a more excellent way for the nations of the earth | 20:05 | |
whereby justice and order may be maintained | 20:11 | |
and differences of people may be resolved in equity. | 20:16 | |
We pray thee to help men of goodwill, | 20:21 | |
to establish their purpose on sure foundations. | 20:25 | |
Trust for their labors | 20:31 | |
that thy will may be done on earth in love and in peace. | 20:34 | |
You've been asked to offer a pair of intercession | 20:42 | |
for the sick. | 20:45 | |
Oh Lord who dost feel the pain of the world, | 20:48 | |
look down upon all sick and suffering persons, | 20:51 | |
old and young, and fold them with thy love | 20:56 | |
that in the midst of pain, they may find thy presence. | 21:01 | |
To doctors and nurses, | 21:06 | |
grant considerate hearts and healing hands. | 21:08 | |
And if it be thy will, give health again in body and soul | 21:13 | |
for thy tender mercy's sake. | 21:19 | |
And let us offer a prayer of intercession | 21:24 | |
for the families in our community, | 21:27 | |
into whose home's death and anxiety have come. | 21:31 | |
Oh God who healest the broken in heart | 21:37 | |
and bindest up their wounds, | 21:40 | |
look down in tender pity and compassion upon thy servants, | 21:43 | |
whose joy has been turned to into mourning. | 21:48 | |
Leave them not comfortless, | 21:52 | |
but grant that they may be drawn closer one to another | 21:56 | |
by their common sorrow. | 21:59 | |
As thou has given them this new tie | 22:03 | |
to bind them to the world unseen, | 22:05 | |
so grant unto them that where their treasure is, | 22:08 | |
there may their hearts be also. | 22:12 | |
So dwell with them and be their God | 22:17 | |
until the day break and the shadows flee away. | 22:23 | |
And let us offer a prayer of supplication for ourselves. | 22:30 | |
Oh God, amid the darkness of this world in the ignorance | 22:35 | |
of our own minds and in the feebleness of our efforts | 22:39 | |
after truth, we so often lose the way. | 22:43 | |
Thou who art the way, the truth, and the life, | 22:51 | |
show us the way that leads to thy truth, | 22:55 | |
that knowing the truth, we may inherit life, | 23:01 | |
life that is everlasting through Jesus Christ our Lord | 23:05 | |
who taught his disciples to pray saying, | 23:13 | |
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed by thy name, | 23:18 | |
thy kingdom come, thy will be done | 23:23 | |
on earth as it is in heaven. | 23:27 | |
Give us this day our daily bread | 23:30 | |
and forgive us our trespasses | 23:33 | |
as we forgive those who trespass against us. | 23:35 | |
And lead us not into temptation, | 23:39 | |
but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom | 23:42 | |
and the power and the glory forever, amen. | 23:46 | |
- | Before coming in here, I was having a little trouble | 24:11 |
getting my watch to go. | 24:17 | |
David Vaughn quickly offered me his. | 24:20 | |
Though he normally is a generous man, | 24:24 | |
in this particular instance, | 24:28 | |
I thought his generosity was prompted | 24:30 | |
by considerations of self-interest, | 24:32 | |
so I shall be watched by two watches | 24:35 | |
as I proceed through this homiletical effort, | 24:39 | |
not counting yours, of course. | 24:44 | |
The subject which this fall in the United States | 24:50 | |
is being discussed more widely than any other topic | 24:54 | |
is that of law and order. | 24:59 | |
A number of our leading governmental figures, | 25:03 | |
political spokesman and editorial writers, | 25:07 | |
have asserted that the issues involved with obedience to law | 25:09 | |
and the preservation of order | 25:14 | |
are indeed the most pressing issues of our time. | 25:16 | |
What do we mean by that phrase, "law and order"? | 25:23 | |
As I understand the meaning, | 25:28 | |
it is that we are a people whose life together | 25:30 | |
is structured by a number of things, one of which is law. | 25:33 | |
Not all the fabric of our communal life is made up of law, | 25:39 | |
but some of it is. | 25:42 | |
And as a group, we expect every individual | 25:44 | |
to be obedient to those patterns | 25:48 | |
which have been crystallized into law. | 25:51 | |
For example, in a small town it may be a custom | 25:55 | |
for almost everyone to go to church on Sunday, | 25:59 | |
but every citizen is free to follow that custom | 26:04 | |
or not to follow it without being penalized. | 26:07 | |
There's no law about it, | 26:11 | |
but in that same community, it may also be customary | 26:15 | |
that individuals do not disrupt the worship of those | 26:19 | |
who choose to attend church. | 26:22 | |
And this custom may have had a penalty | 26:25 | |
attached to non-compliance. | 26:29 | |
That is, through their government, | 26:33 | |
the citizens may have decided to set up a legal prohibition | 26:34 | |
against breaking that particular custom | 26:38 | |
and have established machinery | 26:42 | |
to punish those who are disobedient. | 26:44 | |
So in any organization of people, whether a fraternity, | 26:49 | |
a city, a state, or a nation, | 26:54 | |
the people divide their behavior patterns | 26:58 | |
into two groupings, one voluntary, the other compulsory. | 27:01 | |
I have known some Duke fraternities to make it a law | 27:08 | |
that every member must attend | 27:11 | |
every official meeting of the frat. | 27:13 | |
A penalty in the form of a $5 fine was levied | 27:16 | |
against any brother who missed a meeting. | 27:20 | |
There were other behavior patterns involved | 27:24 | |
in the life of the frat. | 27:26 | |
Some of them were regarded as being very important, | 27:28 | |
but only those which the group considered essential | 27:31 | |
were made into law. | 27:36 | |
Hence, in a political democracy, | 27:39 | |
law is the decisions which the majority have made | 27:42 | |
concerning certain types of behavior | 27:46 | |
which are to be required of all citizens, | 27:49 | |
whether in the majority or in the minority. | 27:52 | |
When a person violates a law, whatever else he is doing, | 27:56 | |
he at least is saying that he will not in this instance | 28:01 | |
behave the way the majority have said | 28:05 | |
everyone must be behave. | 28:07 | |
When we move from the relative simplicity | 28:12 | |
of a local fraternity to the relative complexity | 28:14 | |
of a national government, | 28:17 | |
the processes by which the majority makes its laws | 28:19 | |
becomes correspondingly complex. | 28:23 | |
And our political science department | 28:27 | |
can help us understand these process. | 28:28 | |
But the essential fact to remember is that in a democracy, | 28:32 | |
the concept of law is basically that it is what the majority | 28:36 | |
has declared to be essential. | 28:42 | |
You can see right away that there's a fundamental difference | 28:50 | |
between the moral value of law in a democracy | 28:53 | |
and law in a dictatorship. | 28:57 | |
In Hitler's Germany, law was whatever Hitler wanted. | 29:00 | |
If a citizen violated a law, | 29:05 | |
he had no way to know whether he was going against the will | 29:07 | |
of the majority or not. | 29:10 | |
Indeed, at times, so I've been told, | 29:14 | |
one had the feeling in Germany | 29:18 | |
that to break one of Hitler's laws | 29:19 | |
might have been what the majority desired. | 29:22 | |
So today a citizen of China has no way to be sure | 29:26 | |
whether Mao's laws correspond with the wishes | 29:30 | |
of the Chinese population. | 29:32 | |
Or in Cuba, whether Castro's laws would be freely ratified | 29:35 | |
by the majority of the Cubans who managed to survive | 29:39 | |
Che Guevara's firing squads. | 29:42 | |
Men of goodwill around the world actually honor | 29:46 | |
a long list of names of men who became heroes | 29:52 | |
precisely because they defied the laws of Hitler. | 29:56 | |
We think of Martin Niemöller, | 30:01 | |
who has preached in this pulpit, | 30:02 | |
and of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, | 30:05 | |
the Bishop of Bova, Bishop Beargrow, Professor Henry Kramer, | 30:06 | |
Patriarch Guillo, Cardinal Van Roy, and Kaj Munk, | 30:11 | |
among many others. | 30:16 | |
These men became heroes in the eyes of decent people | 30:19 | |
because they defied laws which were against the freedom | 30:22 | |
and welfare of the majority, | 30:27 | |
laws which represented only the will | 30:30 | |
of a dictatorial minority. | 30:33 | |
On the other hand, in a political democracy, | 30:37 | |
law represents what most of the people believe is essential | 30:41 | |
and it is therefore morally binding upon citizens | 30:46 | |
to obey the law. | 30:49 | |
This is especially true, | 30:53 | |
seems to me in the United States, | 30:54 | |
where well-oiled machinery exists for changing laws | 30:56 | |
which are found to be bad | 31:00 | |
and where freedom of speech and press | 31:02 | |
make it relatively easy for any citizen | 31:05 | |
to express his views concerning laws | 31:08 | |
he believes ought to be changed. | 31:10 | |
Now the alternative, the alternative to obeying the law | 31:13 | |
in a political democracy is to assert the will | 31:19 | |
of the individual or the minority | 31:24 | |
over against the will of the group as a whole. | 31:27 | |
If I disobey a law which has been made by all of us here | 31:31 | |
in the chapel, I am in effect saying that I don't care | 31:34 | |
about your decision, I will do just as I please. | 31:38 | |
There are two circumstances in which, | 31:47 | |
even in a political democracy, | 31:50 | |
a citizen may break a law in good conscience. | 31:52 | |
If he firmly believes a particular law in a city or state, | 31:57 | |
for example, is contrary to the basic law of the nation, | 32:01 | |
he may conscientiously break that law in an effort | 32:07 | |
to have this law tested in the courts | 32:10 | |
and its constitutionality established or rejected. | 32:14 | |
However, such a person must be entirely willing | 32:19 | |
to suffer the legal consequences | 32:23 | |
if the particular law he has broken | 32:26 | |
is found to be constitutional. | 32:29 | |
If I were to refuse to pay my income taxes | 32:32 | |
in order to have the constitutionality | 32:35 | |
of the tax law tested, | 32:36 | |
I should be willing to endure the penalties | 32:39 | |
of not paying proper taxes | 32:42 | |
if that law is found to be constitutional. | 32:44 | |
The second circumstance in which a citizen | 32:51 | |
may abrogate the law in good conscience | 32:53 | |
is when he sincerely and inescapably is convinced | 32:56 | |
that a part part law would require him to do something | 32:59 | |
basically contrary to the will of God. | 33:04 | |
When the Apostle Peter told the high priest, | 33:09 | |
"We must obey God rather than man," | 33:12 | |
he spoke for all the great religions of the world. | 33:15 | |
Henry David Thoreau wrote that "if a man does not keep pace | 33:20 | |
with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears | 33:23 | |
a different drummer. | 33:26 | |
Let him step to the music which he hears, | 33:28 | |
however measured or far away." | 33:31 | |
Sometimes a person may find no fault | 33:35 | |
with the political process by which a law came into being, | 33:38 | |
and indeed he may affirm that it represents | 33:42 | |
the expressed will of the majority in his nation, | 33:45 | |
yet he finds that specific law unacceptable | 33:49 | |
in terms of his loyalty to God | 33:52 | |
as he understands that loyalty. | 33:54 | |
In such an instance, | 33:58 | |
this individual may conscientiously disobey that law | 34:00 | |
provided he makes clear the reason for his disobedience | 34:06 | |
provided he acknowledges the political propriety of the law | 34:11 | |
provided further that he affirms the correctness | 34:16 | |
of the penalty which he then must suffer under the law | 34:20 | |
because of his conscientious disobedience. | 34:26 | |
All of this is important in itself | 34:30 | |
because of what that point of view expresses, | 34:33 | |
but it is preliminary to our consideration | 34:38 | |
of the very first thing mentioned in this sermon, | 34:41 | |
that is the phenomenon that a number of our political | 34:45 | |
and governmental leaders are currently discussing the issues | 34:48 | |
of law and order and what they are saying about it | 34:52 | |
merits our consideration | 34:56 | |
in the light of the preliminary remarks I have just made. | 34:58 | |
The chief point which these spokesman have been making | 35:04 | |
with the greatest frequency and with the loudest emphasis | 35:07 | |
is that our American college campuses | 35:12 | |
are now two often scenes of lawlessness. | 35:15 | |
Many college students are breaking the law | 35:19 | |
and disturbing the order which lawful processes provide. | 35:22 | |
Here are two samples of what they're referring to. | 35:27 | |
On the eighth of this month, | 35:31 | |
a bomb was planted in a university building at Berkeley. | 35:34 | |
Had it not been discovered and removed in time, | 35:38 | |
it would've destroyed a building | 35:41 | |
erected by the University of California | 35:42 | |
for the purpose of aiding in the education | 35:45 | |
of many thousands of students. | 35:47 | |
The overwhelming majority of people have voted | 35:50 | |
to make such destruction as that illegal. | 35:53 | |
On April 24, a fire bomb severely damaged | 35:59 | |
the Research Center for Advanced Study | 36:02 | |
of Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University | 36:04 | |
and in so doing destroyed the lifetime research | 36:08 | |
of a visiting professor of sociology | 36:11 | |
from the University of Delhi, | 36:14 | |
along with much research material of nine other scholars, | 36:17 | |
whose work would greatly have benefited mankind, | 36:20 | |
had it not been burned up. | 36:23 | |
Well, there's a law against that kind of activity | 36:27 | |
and violation of it carries a very stiff penalty. | 36:30 | |
The people as a whole are not willing to leave matters | 36:34 | |
of this sort to mere custom or to personal volunteerism | 36:38 | |
or to deans of students who hopefully can coax | 36:43 | |
recalcitrants into being nice. | 36:46 | |
The majority has long held this variety of behavior | 36:50 | |
shall be under the rule of law. | 36:53 | |
The college students who are urged onto violence | 36:57 | |
by Peking's Little Lord Fauntleroys | 37:00 | |
and by other apostles of hate, | 37:02 | |
may know in advance that a high price must be paid | 37:05 | |
for calculated destruction. | 37:08 | |
The willingness of a small minority of students | 37:14 | |
to violate the law on campuses across the nation | 37:17 | |
does not present a pretty picture. | 37:20 | |
However, it probably is the least ugly picture | 37:24 | |
in the entire album of pictures | 37:29 | |
which portray the violation of law in these United States. | 37:31 | |
A worse picture was shown to the world last March | 37:37 | |
when tens of thousands of adult American citizens | 37:40 | |
brazenly ignored not only the law | 37:45 | |
which had been passed by Congress, | 37:48 | |
but also defied the federal courts | 37:51 | |
and the national Executive administration as well. | 37:53 | |
It was a massive total defiance | 37:57 | |
of the entire federal government. | 38:01 | |
Who were these lawless people? | 38:04 | |
College students? | 38:07 | |
Absolutely not. | 38:10 | |
They were adult employees of the US Post Office, | 38:13 | |
your friendly postman, if you please. | 38:18 | |
Notwithstanding the fact that federal law | 38:23 | |
specifically forbids civil service employees | 38:25 | |
to strike against any federal agency, | 38:29 | |
tens of thousands of them in cities | 38:32 | |
across the North and Midwest did go on strike | 38:35 | |
in full knowledge that they were in open defiance | 38:39 | |
of the federal law. | 38:42 | |
The strike concerned wages. | 38:45 | |
Their average pay was about $3 an hour | 38:48 | |
and they said when they went out on strike | 38:50 | |
that they wouldn't deliver the mail again | 38:52 | |
until they got a 40% increase salary. | 38:53 | |
It is worth noting here today that more post offices | 38:58 | |
were crippled by this adult law-breaking | 39:02 | |
than there have been campuses crippled | 39:07 | |
by student law-breaking. | 39:09 | |
And certainly far more individual adults violated the law | 39:12 | |
in that episode than the total of students involved | 39:15 | |
in campus shenanigans to date. | 39:20 | |
The adult postal employees knew they would be disobeying | 39:24 | |
the law when they voted the strike and they persisted | 39:27 | |
in the strike even after a federal court injunction | 39:30 | |
had been issued and after the Nixon administration | 39:32 | |
had ordered them back to work in Executive language. | 39:35 | |
The New York Times, on March 19, | 39:39 | |
editorially asked this question: | 39:41 | |
"What hope can there be for fostering respect for law | 39:44 | |
and democratic processes on campus and elsewhere | 39:48 | |
if federal employees disregard their oath | 39:52 | |
to stay on the job?" | 39:55 | |
I wish I could now go on to add that this postal strike | 40:00 | |
was the most extreme example | 40:03 | |
of adult lawlessness in America. | 40:04 | |
Unhappily, it is not. | 40:07 | |
In 1954, the highest judicial authority in our government | 40:12 | |
made it entirely clear that racial segregation | 40:16 | |
in the public schools is illegal, | 40:19 | |
that it is an act to defiance of the Constitution | 40:22 | |
of the United States to maintain a public school | 40:25 | |
on a racially segregated basis. | 40:28 | |
Because this ruling would require that some adjustments | 40:32 | |
be made in buildings, in teachers, in buses, et cetera, | 40:35 | |
the court did not require the schools | 40:39 | |
be totally desegregated overnight, | 40:41 | |
but it did soon specify that desegregation should go forward | 40:45 | |
with all deliberate speed. | 40:49 | |
Well, at what speed has it gone forward? | 40:53 | |
How have the white parents and white adult members | 41:01 | |
of school boards proceeded in their devotion | 41:04 | |
to obeying the law? | 41:06 | |
Many have obeyed. | 41:10 | |
In numerous communities, | 41:13 | |
plans were soon made and carried out in exemplary fashion | 41:14 | |
to comply with the law. | 41:18 | |
But alas, in thousands of others, | 41:21 | |
there was monotonous delay and imaginative procrastination. | 41:23 | |
15 years after the 1954 ruling, | 41:30 | |
Time Magazine reported on September 5th, 1969, | 41:35 | |
that there still were 1,534 school districts | 41:40 | |
in Southern states which had not desegregated. | 41:46 | |
This was not a report on racial balance, | 41:51 | |
but on simple desegregation. | 41:54 | |
1,534 school boards had not discovered a way to desegregate | 41:57 | |
their schools in 15 years, | 42:03 | |
even though they knew they were in defiance of the law. | 42:05 | |
What would you expect students to learn about obedience | 42:11 | |
to the law if they receive their education in those schools? | 42:15 | |
At a time when some college students | 42:25 | |
are being nationally chastised for having broken the law, | 42:27 | |
it is embarrassingly awkward for adults | 42:32 | |
to have to acknowledge that a much greater number | 42:35 | |
of adult postal workers and white adult parents | 42:39 | |
and school board members | 42:42 | |
have intentionally violated the law. | 42:43 | |
But perhaps the most painful acknowledgement of all | 42:48 | |
is the fact that the adult man who has chosen to condemn | 42:53 | |
the students the most vehemently and in the most places | 42:57 | |
and on the most occasions and has denounced them | 43:01 | |
as being the prime example of American lawlessness, | 43:05 | |
is himself in serious need of repair at this very point | 43:09 | |
and is one of our top national leaders. | 43:14 | |
I refer, of course, to Mr. Spiro Agnew, | 43:18 | |
Vice President of the United States. | 43:21 | |
"Law and order," he says, | 43:25 | |
"is the chief issue before the nation today." | 43:27 | |
What is his own performance in that vital area? | 43:31 | |
Here are a few matters to consider. | 43:36 | |
On October 14, many of you read, as I did, | 43:39 | |
a column written about the honorable Mr. Agnew | 43:43 | |
by the usually reliable Jack Anderson. | 43:45 | |
That column was published in a local newspaper. | 43:48 | |
His column is also published in newspapers | 43:53 | |
from coast to coast and in every state. | 43:55 | |
In this particular column, | 43:59 | |
Anderson charged that when Mr. Agnew | 44:01 | |
took his political campaign to Las Vegas recently, | 44:03 | |
an impressive assortment of federal and state laws | 44:07 | |
were violated by those who prepared | 44:12 | |
for the Agnew political visit | 44:15 | |
and that these violations were at points calculated | 44:17 | |
to aggrandize Mr. Agnew and the political candidates | 44:21 | |
on who specific behalf he had made the trip. | 44:24 | |
Anderson publicly offered to furnish the Justice Department | 44:28 | |
with the evidence of the violations | 44:33 | |
and he challenged Mr. Agnew to instruct that department | 44:36 | |
to prosecute the alleged offenders. | 44:39 | |
Since then, 11 days have gone by | 44:43 | |
and I have seen no reply to this from Mr. Agnew. | 44:46 | |
Furthermore, there are law and order questions | 44:51 | |
for Mr. Agnew arising from the school | 44:53 | |
desegregation situation in the South. | 44:56 | |
There are law and order questions for Mr. Agnew | 44:59 | |
growing out of the postal workers strike. | 45:02 | |
Let's take a brief look at the latter. | 45:04 | |
Federal law prohibits federal employees | 45:08 | |
from striking a governmental agency, | 45:11 | |
as has already been noted. | 45:14 | |
But federal law also provides that those who do so strike | 45:16 | |
shall be fined up to $1,000 and/or imprisoned up to a year, | 45:22 | |
and the law also specifies that their employer, | 45:28 | |
the government, shall discharge them | 45:31 | |
from their federal jobs. | 45:35 | |
The law prohibits a man who has struck | 45:39 | |
against a government agency from holding a government job. | 45:42 | |
Now since Mr. Agnew is the number two man | 45:47 | |
in this government, it seems appropriate to ask | 45:49 | |
whether he has carried out the requirements of the law | 45:52 | |
with respect to the tens of thousands | 45:55 | |
of illegally striking postal workers. | 45:58 | |
And if not, why not? | 46:00 | |
Law and order absolutely require it. | 46:05 | |
But can Vice President Agnew name one illegal striker | 46:10 | |
that his government put in jail, or fined, or even fired? | 46:15 | |
Were they not all instead rewarded with a pay increase? | 46:22 | |
But if a few college students broke a law | 46:29 | |
and were treated in fashion even remotely similar to this, | 46:31 | |
Mr. Agnew would employ his most venomous rhetoric | 46:35 | |
in denouncing the college administration | 46:38 | |
for coddling law breakers. | 46:40 | |
And he probably would demand that the alumni | 46:42 | |
see to the firing of the university president | 46:45 | |
as he has done in the past. | 46:48 | |
These painful thoughts called to mind | 46:52 | |
a word which St. Paul wrote to the Romans. | 46:54 | |
He said: "Therefore, you have no excuse, oh man, | 46:57 | |
whoever you are when you judge another | 47:01 | |
for in passing judgment upon him, | 47:05 | |
you condemn yourself because you, the judge, | 47:07 | |
are doing the very same thing. | 47:10 | |
You then who teach others, | 47:14 | |
will you not teach yourself? | 47:15 | |
You who boast in the law, | 47:18 | |
do you dishonor God by breaking the law?" | 47:20 | |
The relevance of this scripture to the Agnew rhetoric | 47:26 | |
is not at all diminished by the fact | 47:28 | |
that the Apostle Paul was here discussing the religious law, | 47:30 | |
whereas we today are discussing governmental law. | 47:34 | |
The principle is exactly the same. | 47:37 | |
It is particularly distressing when adults | 47:41 | |
who are not blameless before the law, | 47:43 | |
denounce some students for their faults | 47:45 | |
because adults are a able to have a direct influence | 47:48 | |
upon the laws under which they live, | 47:51 | |
whereas students are not able to do so in the same way. | 47:54 | |
Adults can vote. | 47:57 | |
Most undergraduates cannot vote. | 48:00 | |
Now I am not by this word implying that students | 48:05 | |
who disregard the law may be excused for their disobedience. | 48:08 | |
On the contrary, they are inexcusable | 48:12 | |
when they violate the law. | 48:14 | |
But what I am not only implying, | 48:17 | |
but plainly stating is that adults who can by their vote | 48:19 | |
help to make the laws under which they live | 48:22 | |
are doubly inexcusable when they violate the law. | 48:24 | |
And that those adults who wink at violations of the law | 48:28 | |
and lambaste students, | 48:31 | |
are being profoundly and extravagantly hypocritical, | 48:34 | |
and they vastly contribute to the nation's problems | 48:40 | |
and are in no sense a part of the cure | 48:43 | |
of the country's ills. | 48:46 | |
However pious it makes them feel to hear themselves | 48:48 | |
censure student violators, however many votes | 48:51 | |
they think their red-hot rhetoric can harvest | 48:54 | |
for their office-seeking friends, | 48:57 | |
what they actually are doing is forging a needless | 48:59 | |
and dangerous polarization of our people | 49:02 | |
and it ought to stop now. | 49:05 | |
Respect for law in a democracy | 49:12 | |
is a very necessary commodity. | 49:16 | |
At present, it is in short supply | 49:20 | |
among both adults and young people. | 49:23 | |
There is something which adults can do to help. | 49:27 | |
There is something which students can do to help. | 49:31 | |
Adults can acknowledge that they have tended | 49:36 | |
to make their most vigorous contribution to law and order | 49:38 | |
by making purple-faced pronouncements | 49:41 | |
about it to young people, | 49:43 | |
meanwhile hypocritically winking at violations | 49:45 | |
of the law in their own lives. | 49:48 | |
But having made that acknowledgement, | 49:52 | |
they should not then lead to the wrong conclusion. | 49:53 | |
They can avoid this by paying careful attention | 49:58 | |
to the advice Jesus gave in the scripture lesson read today | 50:00 | |
by the President of the Bar Association. | 50:04 | |
He said, "Why do you see the spec | 50:07 | |
that is in your brother's eye, | 50:08 | |
but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? | 50:10 | |
Or how can you say to your brother, | 50:14 | |
'Brother, let me take out the spec that is in your eye | 50:16 | |
when you yourself do not see the log | 50:20 | |
that is in your own eye?'" | 50:21 | |
- | I'm sick and tired. | 50:23 |
Get out and let me take over. | 50:23 | |
- | No, I won't, sorry. | 50:25 |
- | Okay, fine. | |
- | "'Brother, let me take out the spec that is in your eye | 50:30 |
when you yourself do not see the log | 50:33 | |
that is in your own eye.' | 50:35 | |
You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, | 50:37 | |
then you will see clearly to take out the spec | 50:41 | |
that is in your brother's eye." | 50:43 | |
Observe that point is not that we should cease caring | 50:46 | |
about the spec in our brother's eye | 50:51 | |
since we have a log in our own eye, | 50:55 | |
rather it is commendable that we should want to remove | 50:58 | |
the spec from his eye, | 51:01 | |
but to enable ourselves to have the necessary | 51:04 | |
clarity of vision, we first must extract the timber | 51:06 | |
from our own eyes. | 51:11 | |
So adults can best help students to learn respect | 51:14 | |
for the law, not by loquacious harangs, | 51:17 | |
but by quiet and convincing example. | 51:21 | |
What students can do to help sounds very much like | 51:26 | |
what adults can do, | 51:29 | |
except that there's a difference in emphasis. | 51:31 | |
Traditionally young people are as a group | 51:34 | |
more idealistic than adults as a group. | 51:37 | |
Students are clamoring for changes in the structure | 51:41 | |
of society and indeed most of the law violations | 51:43 | |
which have occurred on campus | 51:46 | |
have revolved around students' demands | 51:47 | |
for improvements in society, | 51:49 | |
but how students press for these changes | 51:52 | |
is desperately important. | 51:56 | |
The Apostle Paul wrote to his young friend, Timothy, | 51:59 | |
let no one despise your youth, | 52:02 | |
but set an example in speech and in conduct, | 52:05 | |
in love, in faith, in purity. | 52:09 | |
In describing what this means, | 52:14 | |
I don't think I can improve upon the words | 52:15 | |
written by a Duke student, Bob Edman, | 52:17 | |
published in the September 16 Duke Chronicle. | 52:20 | |
Bob wrote: "If there is one goal of the cause | 52:24 | |
of human justice that overrides all others, | 52:28 | |
it is the aim to eliminate violence from human affairs. | 52:31 | |
Properly, those who believe in social justice | 52:36 | |
fight against war, against racism, against greed. | 52:39 | |
But now we're confronted with a group of people | 52:44 | |
who rail against these evils as vociferously as anyone. | 52:46 | |
Then they go out and destroy a building | 52:50 | |
which might contain people or shoot policemen, | 52:52 | |
who are people, all in order to achieve some greater good. | 52:56 | |
There is a contradiction here | 53:01 | |
and it is simply this: means condition ends. | 53:03 | |
Of course we must sympathize with the frustration | 53:09 | |
and alienation that moves some activist toward violence, | 53:12 | |
but their actions pose just as great a danger | 53:16 | |
to the achievement of a humane society in our country | 53:19 | |
as the actions of the people | 53:22 | |
radicals claim as their enemies. | 53:24 | |
If ever the aim of a world without violence | 53:27 | |
is to be reached, the practitioners of violence | 53:30 | |
must be made to see the futility and danger | 53:33 | |
of their actions, whatever their goals | 53:36 | |
and wherever they come from." | 53:38 | |
End of quote. | 53:41 | |
In closing, I would like to remind all of us, | 53:44 | |
students and adults alike, of a short chapter | 53:46 | |
in the history of this university | 53:50 | |
and to commend a study of that chapter | 53:52 | |
whenever law and order are up for consideration. | 53:54 | |
Almost immediately following the death | 53:59 | |
of Martin Luther King Jr., | 54:01 | |
approximately 1,500 duke students kept a vigil | 54:03 | |
on the main quad asking for specific decisions to be made | 54:06 | |
which were in the areas of human justice and dignity. | 54:11 | |
While the vigil was in effect, | 54:16 | |
there was not a single report of the violation of any law, | 54:17 | |
any rule, or any regulation. | 54:22 | |
No property was harmed, no person was injured. | 54:26 | |
Law and order were respected and human rights | 54:30 | |
and human justice were strengthened. | 54:34 | |
Amen and amen. | 54:37 | |
In the name of the Father, and of the Son | 54:41 | |
and of the Holy Spirit, amen. | 54:43 | |
(organ music) | 54:51 | |
(congregation singing) | 55:22 | |
(congregation singing continues) | 56:07 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 56:28 | |
(organ music) | 56:56 | |
(organ music) | 58:18 | |
(choir singing) | 58:23 | |
(choir singing continues) | 1:00:11 | |
(organ music) | 1:01:52 | |
("Doxology") | 1:01:56 | |
♪ Praise God from whom all blessings flow ♪ | 1:02:16 | |
♪ Praise Him, all creatures here below ♪ | 1:02:22 | |
♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ | 1:02:28 | |
♪ Praise Him above the heavenly host ♪ | 1:02:35 | |
♪ Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost ♪ | 1:02:41 | |
♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ | 1:02:46 | |
♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ | 1:02:53 | |
♪ Hallelujah ♪ | 1:02:59 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 1:03:07 | |
- | All things come of thee, oh God. | 1:03:14 |
Our silver and our gold and of thine own do we give thee | 1:03:17 | |
as the symbol of ourselves in the of Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 1:03:23 | |
Now under God's gracious mercy and protection do we commit. | 1:03:34 | |
May the blessing of God come upon you abundantly. | 1:03:42 | |
May it keep you strong and tranquil | 1:03:46 | |
in the proof of His promises through Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 1:03:50 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 1:04:02 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 1:04:09 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 1:04:16 | |
♪ Amen ♪ | 1:04:35 |