The National Intelligencer
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Description: The Hebrew Sabbath
Date: November 12 1825Newspaper published in: Washington, DC
Page/Column: 3/2
The Hebrew Sabbath
A question, of a nature new to us, arose lately at Cincinnati, between the Office of Discount and Deposit of the Bank of the United States in that city, and Mr. MORRIS MOSES. A bill, drawn upon the firm of MOSES & JONAS, of which he is one, at five days after sight, was presented for acceptance on Saturday, the Sabbath of the Hebrews, to which persuasion Mr. MOSES belongs. He proposed to defer the acceptance till the evening of that day, it being contrary to his principles to write on the Sabbath day. This was considered as a refusal to accept, and the note was immediately sent to the Notary to note for non-acceptance. It was, however, presented in the evening, and was then accepted, and has been since paid. The Cincinnati editor suggests that some provision ought to be made by law to pay respect to the religion and feelings of the Jews, in this particular. None can respect more that we do, the conscientious scruples of all professors of religion, Christian or Hebrew; but we should apprehend that the introduction of two Sabbaths into the mercantile law would be inconvenient, to say the least of it. Might it not open a door for evasion, also? We apprehend that there are times at which even a well-intentioned man may be so hard pressed that he would incline to Judaism on a Saturday, resuming his Christian profession on Sunday, if by so doing he could defer the payment of a bill from Saturday to Monday. Our object, however, in noticing this occurrence, is to ask for information, what is the law (by which we mean the mercantile usage,) of Europe, on this subject.