Billy Sunday Quotes
Some homes need a hickory switch a good deal more than they do a piano.
Ellis, William T. “Billy” Sunday, the Man and His Message. John C. Winston Company, 1914, p. 415.
This seems to be the first instance of the famous dictum.
This quotation has caused a great deal of conflict between some parents and local governments. In many states, beating a child with a “rod” of other implement is a crime—often a felony. Religious fundamentalist parents insist on their right to bring up their children in accordance with “God’s law”. In American society generally, we have decided that children’s safety and rights trumps the Bible where there are conflicts. Spanking with an open hand in moderate amounts is generally considered legal although most child development experts counsel against it as it models a resort to violence and tends to culturally perpetuate itself over generations. See {642236} and {642235}.
This Biblical passage is often used by fundamentalists who claim that any child abuse laws limiting their right to discipline their children is an unconstitutional interference with their religious duty. Even in the early American colonies this was an issue. See Cotton Mather: {612010}
William Ashley Sunday was an American outfielder in baseball's National League and widely considered the most influential American evangelist during the first two decades of the 20th century.
