There are divorce laws upon our Statutes which millions of people violently and bitterly oppose. Is a good Roman Catholic a bad American citizen because his conscience refuses to let him condone the rulings of our Courts in divorce trials? On April 24, 1922, in St. Mary’s Protestant Episcopal Church, Emmerton, Maryland, a sermon was preached by the Reverend W. A. Crawford-Frost on the subject of “Obeying a Disreputable Law.” The minister took as his text the verses from Esther 1:7 and 8: “And they gave them drink in vessels of gold, (the vessels being diverse one from another,) and royal wine in abundance, according to the state of the king. And the drinking was according to the law; none did compel: for so the king had appointed to all the officers of his house, that they should do according to every man’s pleasure.” He said in part: “Recently President Harding and Secretary Hughes have made pathetic appeals to the people of America to respect the law. That such a request should have been considered necessary is itself a sad commentary on the state of affairs existing in our republic. There is a difference between obedience and respect. All good citizens are called upon to obey the laws, whether they respect a particular law or not; but they are not called upon to respect a law that is not respectable. “There are disreputable laws just as there are disreputable men. “When is a man properly looked upon as disreputable? That depends on the time and place and the people who do the looking, but in most ages and countries there are some things that the universal conscience of man holds to be not respectable. Thus lying, robbing, cruelty and blasphemy are disreputable, and a man who lies, robs, is cruel and blasphemes is a disreputable man. “Accordingly, if a law can be shown to lie, to rob, to be cruel, and to blaspheme God, it is a disreputable law and does not deserve respect, though all good citizens should obey it until it is repealed. “To call upon the people of America to respect a law that is not respectable is fundamentally dishonest, for it breaks down the distinction between what is respectable and what is disreputable and calls upon us to admire and look up to that which we should despise and abhor. “Now I will give you reasons why I consider that the Volstead Act lies, robs, is cruel and blasphemes God. It may be that my arguments are not sound, but they appear to me to be so, and all that a man can do is to go according to his conscience and his common sense.