as editor-in-chief.

2. Refusing to Enter the Merger.—The United Lutheran Church, according to the Lutheran, "has inaugurated a new era of progress for our beloved Lutheran Church. . . . Three names have gone down, but a new and greater name has arisen from their ashes." This, however, was not the view of the Iowa and Augustana synods, though both indirectly, through their connection with the General Council, had for years been in church-fellowship also with the General Synod, hence, consistently might have entertained scruples to join the Merger no more than the Council. When, at Philadelphia, October 25, 1917, the General Council passed on the Merger, Dr. M. Reu, the representative of the Iowa Synod, was the only delegate (advisory) who voted against it. Pointing especially to the fact that the General Synod, at its last convention in Chicago, had elected as president a man [Dr. Geo. Tressler] who was publicly known to be a Mason of a high degree, Dr. Reu warned against the union, as it would practically mean the abandonment of the Council's position on pulpit- and altar-fellowship, as well as on the lodge-question. The Kirchenblatt of the Iowa Synod: "It is apparent that the influence of the General Synod on the General Council has paralyzed the practical principles of the fathers, and that the contemplated Merger is tantamount to an anulment of these principles, as far as the official practise of this new church-body will come into question. And yet, just this life, the ecclesiastical life and practise of the ministers and congregations, is the mirror in which the real confessional attitude may be seen. We [Iowa] owe much to the General Council, and will always remember this gratefully, but now our roads separate and we must part. American [?] Lutheranism [?], [tr. note: sic] which the General Synod has always stood for, and which has had its adherents also in the General Council, especially among its nativistic representatives, will control also the new church-body. This, according to our understanding, means that a far-reaching influence of a Reformed nature will manifest itself, especially with respect to church-practise and the attitude toward all manner of societies and antichristian lodges." (Lehre und Wehre, 1917, 521. 572.)

3. Withdrawal of the Augustana Synod.—For more than a decade prior to the Merger the current within the Swedish Augustana Synod had been running against the General Council. Accordingly, to the Augustana Synod the contemplated union was an occasion rather than a cause for refusing to join the movement and for severing her connection also with the Council. Indeed, at the convention of the General Council at Philadelphia, October 25, 1917, all of the Augustana representatives had cast their votes for the new organization. At her last convention, June 8, 1918, however, the Synod, in spite of the most strenuous efforts on the part of the delegates of the General Council to draw her into the union, passed the resolution: "Resolved, That the Augustana Synod does not at this time see its way clear to enter the proposed merger of the United Lutheran Church in America, but declares itself in favor of a federation of Lutheran church-bodies in North America." A subsequent resolution severed her connection with the Council. The reasons advanced by the Augustana Synod for her action were not of a doctrinal or confessional nature, but rather pertained to the interest of her peculiar work among the Swedish population of our country. Yet the course chosen by the Augustana Synod was, at least part, the result also of the secret fear that the new body would rapidly sink to the level of the doctrinal and practical laxism of the General Synod. Warning against the Merger, the Lutheran Companion, of the Augustana Synod, wrote: "We must hold ourselves aloof from spiritual fellowship with such churches or denominations, some of whose factors advocate and defend lodgism, dancing as a pastime for the young people under the auspices and sanction of the church, etc." (L. u. W., 1917, 522.) Disappointed on account of the withdrawal of the Augustana Synod, the Lutheran, of the General Council, commented: "The Augustana Synod has subordinated unity of faith to unity of race. This is as un-American as it is un-Lutheran, and the day of its real Lutheran union is thereby indefinitely postponed. . . . We are persuaded that this separation was willed by man and not by God, though we also believe that He will, in the end, overrule it for good. . . . The Augustana Synod has missed its opportunity; it has limited the sphere of its influence; it has placed synodical and social interests as a clog in the wheel of the Lutheran Church's progress as a whole, and set the Church back a generation or more to start afresh on the pathway to its ultimate goal. . . . Lutherans are now to be fenced off into social groups to be known as the Swedish, the Norwegian, the German, and the English divisions of the Lutheran forces in this country." (L. u. W., 1917, 522; 1918, 329 ff.)

4. Attitude of the Ohio Synod.—Though representatives also of the Ohio Synod served on the Joint Quadricentennial Committee in order to arrange for a union celebration of the Reformation together with the representatives of the General Synod, the Council and the United Synod South, the official organs of the Ohio Synod were severe in condemning the Merger. The Lutheran Standard, August 4, 1917: "There are chiefly two practical differences that keep us apart, namely, that concerning altar- and pulpit-fellowship and that concerning the lodge. Concerning the first point the constitution [of the Merger] has nothing to say whatever. Relative to lodge-membership, the general body will have only advisory power." The Kirchenzeitung, of the Ohio Synod, May 12, 1917: "The great and glorious work of Dr. Krauth in the Council has been nullified. The General Synod's practise of fraternizing with the sects will prevail. What is sound and good in the Council will crumble; the proposed union is a great victory for the lax portion of the General Synod and a pitiable defeat for the Council. Indeed, we shall be told about the 'salt' that the Council may be in the new body, but that is an old, old game, which cannot fool people any more. And this to celebrate the Reformation Jubilee! Would that Luther could return and with the thunder of his scorn shatter this celebration of his work! Where unionism has its jubilee, all true Lutherans turn away in sorrow and anger." (Luth. Witness, 1918, 406.) However, considering that pulpit- and altar-fellowship, where-ever justified, clears the way for all other external unions, and that Ohio representatives served on the Quadricentennial Committee for a union celebration of the Reformation, the above criticism, warranted though it be, will hardly be viewed as consistent.

CONSTITUTION.

5. Doctrinal Basis.—The Constitution of the United Lutheran Church provides: "Article II: Doctrinal Basis. Section 1. The United Lutheran Church in America receives and holds the canonical Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the inspired Word of God and as the only infallible rule and standard of faith and practise, according to which all doctrines and teachers are to be judged.—Section 2. The United Lutheran Church in America accepts the three ecumenical creeds; namely, the Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasian, as important testimonies drawn from the Holy Scriptures, and rejects all errors which they condemn.—Section 3. The United Lutheran Church in America receives and holds the Unaltered Augsburg Confession as a correct exhibition of the faith and doctrine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, founded upon the Word of God; and acknowledges all churches that sincerely hold and faithfully confess the doctrines of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession to be entitled to the name of Evangelical Lutheran.—Section 4. The United Lutheran Church in America recognizes