(July 31, 1763\u2013December 12, 1847), was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New York, 1804. He was the Head of the New York Court of Chancery, 1814\u201323; professor of law at Columbia College, 1793; member of the New York Legislature; admitted to the bar, 1785; graduated from Yale, 1781, and after his death he was elected to the American Hall of Fame, 1900. Considered the premier jurist in the development of the legal practice in the United States, James Kent is known for having compiled the work, Commentaries on American Law,<\/i> 1826\u201330. In the case of The People v. Ruggles,<\/i> 1811, James Kent rendered the opinion of the Court:<\/p>\n
The defendant was indicted \u2026 in December, 1810, for that he did, on the 2nd day of September, 1810 \u2026 wickedly, maliciously, and blasphemously, utter, and with a loud voice publish, in the presence and hearing of divers good and Christian people, of and concerning the Christian religion, and of and concerning Jesus Christ, the false, scandalous, malicious, wicked and blasphemous words following: \u201cJesus Christ was a bastard, and his mother must be a whore,\u201d in contempt of the Christian religion \u2026 the defendant was tried and found guilty, and was sentenced by the court to be imprisoned for three months, and to pay a fine of $500.1547<\/p>\n
Such words uttered with such a disposition were an offense at common law. In Taylor\u2019s<\/i> case the defendant was convicted upon information of speaking similar words, and the Court \u2026 said that Christianity was parcel of the law, and to cast contumelious reproaches upon it, tended to weaken the foundation of moral obligation, and the efficacy of oaths. <\/p>\n
And in the case of Rex v. Woolston,<\/i> on a like conviction, the Court said \u2026 that whatever strikes at the root of Christianity tends manifestly to the dissolution of civil government. \u2026 The authorities show that blasphemy against God and \u2026 profane ridicule of Christ or the Holy Scriptures (which are equally treated as blasphemy), are offenses punishable at common law, whether uttered by words or writings \u2026 because it tends to corrupt the morals of the people, and to destroy good order. <\/p>\n
Such offenses have always been considered independent of any religious establishment or the rights of the Church. They are treated as affecting the essential interests of civil society. \u2026 <\/p>\n
We stand equally in need, now as formerly, of all the moral discipline, and of those principles of virtue, which help to bind society together. <\/p>\n
The people of this State, in common with the people of this country, profess the general doctrines of Christianity, as the rule of their faith and practice; and to scandalize the author of these doctrines is not only \u2026 impious, but \u2026 is a gross violation of decency and good order. <\/p>\n
Nothing could be more injurious to the tender morals of the young, than to declare such profanity lawful. \u2026 <\/p>\n
The free, equal, and undisturbed enjoyment of religious opinion, whatever it may be, and free and decent discussions on any religious subject, is granted and secured; but to revile \u2026 the religion professed by almost the whole community, is an abuse of that right. \u2026 <\/p>\n
We are a Christian people, and the morality of the country is deeply engrafted upon Christianity, and not upon the doctrines or worship of those impostors [other religions]. \u2026 <\/p>\n
[We are] people whose manners are refined and whose morals have been elevated and inspired with a more enlarged benevolence, by means of the Christian religion. Though the constitution has discarded religious establishments, it does not forbid judicial cognizance of those offenses against religion and morality which have no reference to any such establishment. \u2026 <\/p>\n
This [constitutional] declaration (noble and magnanimous as it is, when duly understood) never meant to withdraw religion in general, and with it the best sanctions of moral and social obligation from all consideration and notice of the law. \u2026 <\/p>\n
To construe it as breaking down the common law barriers against licentious, wanton, and impious attacks upon Christianity itself, would be an enormous perversion of its meaning. \u2026 <\/p>\n
Christianity in its enlarged sense, as a religion revealed and taught in the Bible, is part and parcel of the law of the land. \u2026 <\/p>\n
Nor are we bound by any expression of the Constitution, as some have strangely supposed, either not to punish at all, or to punish indiscriminately like attacks upon the religion of Mahomet and the Grand Lama; and for this plain reason, that we are a Christian people, and the morality of the country is deeply engrafted upon Christianity, and not upon the doctrines or worship of these impostors. \u2026 <\/p>\n
The Court is accordingly of the opinion that the judgement \u2026 must be affirmed.1548 <\/p>\n
In an address before the American Bible Society, Chief Justice Kent expressed:<\/p>\n
The Bible is equally adapted to the wants and infirmities of every human being. \u2026 <\/p>\n
It brings life and immortality to light, which until the publication of the Gospel, were hidden from the scrutiny of the ages. The gracious Revelation of a future state is calculated to solve the mysteries of Providence in the dispensations of this life, to reconcile us to the inequalities of our present condition, and to inspire unconquerable fortitude and the most animating consolations when all other consolations fail. \u2026 <\/p>\n
The Bible also unfolds the origin and deep foundations of depravity and guilt, and the means and hopes of salvation through the mediation of our Redeemer. Its doctrines, its discoveries, its code of morals, and its means of grace are not only overwhelming evidence of its Divine origin, but they confound the pretensions of all other systems by showing the narrow range of and the feeble efforts of human reason, even when under the sway of the most exalted understanding, and enlightened by the accumulated treasures of science and learning.1549<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
(July 31, 1763\u2013December 12, 1847), was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New York, 1804. He was the Head of the New York Court of Chancery, 1814\u201323; professor of law at Columbia College, 1793; member of the New York Legislature; admitted to the bar, 1785; graduated from Yale, 1781, and after his death … Continue reading “KENT,
\nJAMES”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15722\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}