Do Justly—Unless It Costs Me Money
By ,
The real prophet Micah delivered one of the most beautiful statements ever written:
He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?1
Ellen White loved this verse.
She quoted it over a dozen times in books, testimonies, and letters. She invoked it to condemn the injustice of those who would deprive a laborer of his fair wage. She thundered that God himself guards the rights of workers, that oppression of the laboring man is an abomination, that "the Lord does not sanction arbitrary authority, nor will He serve with the least selfishness or overreaching."2
But did she practice what she so often preached?
The Principle She Proclaimed
In the 1890s, the Review & Herald Publishing House was facing financial difficulty. Sales of Ellen White's books were slowing down. After the widespread publication of D.M. Canright's book refuting Seventh-day Adventism and exposing White as a false prophet, appetite for her books dried up among non-SDAs. The Review needed to take serious measures to stay afloat.
When the Review moved to abolish royalties for authors in the late 1890s to stop the financial hemorrhaging, White was outraged. She responded with a sustained, multi-year campaign of testimonies framing author royalties as a divine right, a sacred stewardship principle, and a matter of eternal consequence. She wrote:
The ability to write a book is, like every other talent, a gift from Him, for the improvement of which the possessor is accountable to God; and he is to invest the returns under His direction.3
No greater dishonor can be shown to God than for one man to bring another man's talents under his absolute control.4
Let not authors be urged either to give away or to sell their right to the books they have written. Let them receive a just share of the profits of their work.5
I do not mean that the means that should justly come to me shall be under control of any board of directors.6
She even threatened to take her publishing business elsewhere if the denomination did not comply:
Then, if my brethren did not awake to the situation, I was to make no delay in taking the books into my own hands, and the Lord would prepare the way before me.7
The principle, as she stated it repeatedly, was clear: a worker produces labor. That labor has value. The worker has an inalienable, God-given right to fair compensation for it. To deny that compensation is not merely unfair—it is oppression. It is fraud. It will be recorded in the books of heaven. God will judge it.
She was right. Pity she didn't live it.
The Income She Was Already Receiving
Before examining what Ellen White demanded from others, it is worth understanding what she was already receiving.
White was a salaried employee of the General Conference. She was paid a regular wage as the denomination's prophetic voice and spiritual leader. Her son Willie was also on the General Conference payroll—paid full time to assist his mother's literary work. How many additional staff were funded by denominational money to support her writing ministry is, as critic E. S. Ballenger observed, impossible to determine precisely.8
She was writing her books on denominational time, with denominational support staff, funded by denominational wages.
And then she was collecting 10% royalties on every copy sold.
According to Ballenger, those royalties amounted to between $8,000 and $12,000 per year—a staggering sum at a time when ordinary ministers lived on a few hundred dollars annually.8
The denomination paid her to write. The denomination published her books. The denomination's canvassers sold them. And then White collected a personal royalty on every sale. That is a sweet arrangement that favored her in every way.
The Books of Heaven—And the Book Sales
Ellen White's concern for fair dealing had a remarkably consistent pattern: it intensified whenever her own income was threatened.
When the publishing house placed Bible Readings on the market ahead of her book The Great Controversy—which had already been printed and was sitting in the warehouse—she did not merely object. She called it a cosmic injustice:
No one can have been hurt financially more than I was hurt when The Great Controversy lay for nearly two years dead in the office. Just work was not done in this matter. The book Bible Readings was crowded in before The Great Controversy, which was already printed, and which should have been placed in the canvasser's hands first… This was a dishonest transaction toward me, and it was unfaithful stewardship toward God.9
Bible Readings was a book of scripture studies drawn directly from the Word of God. It sold by the tens of thousands. It brought people to Scripture. Lives were being changed. Canvassers had a much easier time selling it. Arguably, it was far superior to anything White ever wrote. The sales alone proved that.
People Didn't Want Ellen White's Plagiarized Books
Ellen White called it a "dishonest transaction" that Bible Readings for the Home Circle was promoted ahead of her book. The market's verdict refutes that.
Bible Readings was compiled anonymously by a committee of Bible workers and published without individual royalties flowing to any single author. Its authors gave their work to the cause. Why? Because that's what Christians do
It outsold every book White had written. By far.
By the time the revised edition went to press in 1914, the publishers announced this fact on the title page: over 1,250,000 copies of the former edition sold.10
1.25 million copies over roughly thirty years. For a book that paid no individual royalties and bore no prophet's name.
Compare that to The Great Controversy—the book whose delayed promotion White called unfaithful stewardship toward God and a personal financial injury. This was supposedly her epic work — special light revealed in vision to guide God's people through the end times. The Ellen G. White Estate's own account describes its sales between 1888 and 1907 as "many thousands of copies."11 The Spirit of Prophecy, vol. 4, its predecessor, produced ten editions totaling 50,000 copies between 1884 and 1888.12 The sales were not trivial, but they pale in comparison to 1.25 million.
The public had made their preference clear. They preferred Scripture to the so-called Spirit of Prophecy.
Ellen White's response to this was not to thank the anonymous committee for their sacrificial contribution. She was burned up that these Bible workers — writing without compensation — had produced something the market found more compelling than her plagiarized prophetic output. Her response was to call the book's success a financial injury to herself and to threaten to take her publishing business elsewhere if the denomination did not prioritize her royalty income.
The angels of God, she had written, would prepare the way for The Great Controversy in the hearts of the people.7 Apparently not.
It was never about reaching people or changing lives. This episode reveals it was all about the royalties. White did not collect royalties on Bible Readings. She collected royalties on The Great Controversy. It was a simple decision in Ellen's mind: Great Controversy should win. Royalties always trumps effectiveness.
In Ellen's mind, promoting the Bible study book ahead of her book was not merely a business decision—it was a "dishonest transaction" and "unfaithful stewardship toward God."
The same logic applied when another book cut into her son Edson's royalty income. The denomination published His Glorious Appearing, which competed with Edson's Gospel Primer. Ellen White's response was apocalyptic:
The dealing in regard to Gospel Primer was unjust. Another book His Glorious Appearing was crowded in to kill the sale of the Primer. The way in which the Gospel Primer was handled has left a record on the books of heaven which those concerned in the matter will not be pleased to meet in the judgment.13
The denominational publishing house promoted a gospel book about the return of Christ—and this was destined to condemn its authors at the final judgment, because it cut into the White family royalty stream.
It wasn't about content. It was all about the royalties. If her books or her son's books were not placed at the very top of the sales effort, then judgment would fall.
Meanwhile, other authors really did give up their royalties for the good of the cause. They made the sacrifices that Ellen White praised in theory but refused to make herself. Yet these men received no commendation from the prophet. They simply lost money.
Uriah Smith, for example, was maneuvered by publishing house representatives into accepting a very low royalty on Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelation. White was later shown in vision that this had been done through fraud—and she condemned it.14 The principle of fair dealing for authors was sacred.
The Realtor
Here is where the mask comes off entirely. In 1890, Ellen White owned property in California—land she had purchased as an investment, paying interest on borrowed money while doing so. She was eager to sell it. She engaged George Hutchings, a brother in the faith and a real estate agent, to handle the sale.
When Willie White informed her that Hutchings intended to charge his standard commission of 5% on the sale, Ellen White went ballistic. How dare this businessman expect to be paid for his labor. After all, she was the prophet of God!
She wrote to him directly:
I was more surprised at this than I can express, that under the circumstances you should require that sum of me. I do not think it is right that you should do this… I now ask you as a friend, if you can aid me in selling my land and house in the valley to do so… I will pay you for your time and the real expense you are put to in doing this business for me, and this is all you ought to have from me. If you are not discerning enough to understand your duty I will lay it before you in the light God has caused me to regard such things. I do not want you to make any money out of me, considering all the circumstances in the case. And since my son told me your terms for selling the place, you have certainly fallen in my estimation.15
She wrote, "I do not want you to make any money out of me."
This is the same woman who had just spent years producing testimonies declaring that workers have a God-given, inalienable right to fair compensation for their labor. That denying a man the profits of his work dishonors God. That oppression of the laboring man is an abomination. That the books of heaven record every act of exploitation. The White Estate prepared an entire 31-page document — Testimonies on Fair Dealings and Book Royalties — that discusses these concepts at length.
5% in 1890 was not a gouging rate — it was a fair commission for skilled work. The realtor had done nothing wrong. White's indignation that Hutchings expected to make money from selling her property — not just recover expenses — was not a principled stand. It was the demand of someone who believed the rules of fair compensation applied universally, except when she was the one paying.
Ellen White's response was to threaten to instruct him in his Christian duty, tell him he had fallen in her estimation, and demand that he work for expenses only. She expected him to do the exact thing that she utterly refused to do.
She was not done. In a second letter on the same matter, she escalated the moral pressure:
I never have dealt with my brethren after this fashion, for I would not want the books of heaven to reveal such transactions with my brethren. I know those who deal in real estate business, buying and selling, become selfish and grasping. And really, I fear the books of heaven show dishonesty…16
Charging the standard professional rate for real estate services rendered to Ellen White is—according to Ellen White—the kind of dishonesty that will be exposed in the books of heaven.
But collecting $8,000 to $12,000 a year in personal royalties on books written while on the denominational payroll, with denominational staff support? Stealing the writings of other authors and profiting from them? That is a sacred stewardship principle protected by divine testimony.
The Fight Over the Book Prescott Built
W. W. Prescott, a prominent SDA educator, spent years collecting White's scattered writings on education—articles from periodicals, personal correspondence, materials produced across more than a decade. He organized them, edited them for clarity, making only "such changes as seemed to be necessary for clearness," and compiled them into a 251-page book titled Christian Education, published in 1893.17 Prescott did the entire editorial labor without White's supervision and without compensation.
The General Conference Association published the book with an explicit understanding: no royalty. They priced it at fifty cents—deliberately low—and promoted it as a missionary enterprise for the benefit of Christian education. Four thousand copies were printed and sold on that basis.18
Four years later, Ellen White demanded to be paid for it:
I want a royalty on Christian Education. If Brother Prescott wanted to help the cause of God, I think he could have done so better by donating his work to this foreign mission field than by giving it to the publishing association… I do not want any more of my writing handled in the manner Christian Education has been handled. I now ask my brethren to take the book, with the additions I shall send them, and allow me a royalty on the books they have sold. I want them to take the additions of valuable matter, and get out a new, enlarged edition, and give me my due.19
General Conference president I. H. Evans was sufficiently alarmed that he convened the entire Board and wrote to White immediately. His letter of November 11, 1897 is a model of patience in the face of an extraordinary demand:
Now "Christian Education," the General Conference Association understood, was compiled by Professor Prescott, and published with the understanding that there was to be no royalty. It was put down at a low price, fifty cents; and the circulation was encouraged as much as possible as a missionary enterprise in behalf of higher education. There were four thousand copies of this book published—two editions, two thousand at a time. I think the larger number of these books have been sold. … We would be pleased for you to tell us what you would desire in regard to the matter of royalty. Of course you can plainly see that, had we understood the matter as we ought to have understood it before we took on the enterprise, we should have charged more for the book when we sold it; but we were misled by a misunderstanding of the matter.18
The General Conference had not cheated her. They had published the book in good faith, at a deliberately low price, as a charitable enterprise, on the explicit understanding that no royalty was owed. Now, retroactively, she wanted to be paid for books already sold.
Watch what happened next.
Caught between her demand for royalties and Evans's patient documentation of the original no-royalty agreement, White now began revising her account of what she had actually agreed to. In a letter to Evans just weeks after his, she produced a new version of events:
I was somewhat surprised when Brother Prescott told me that he had made selections and compiled the book Christian Education. I understand, as he wrote or said to me, that I would do what I pleased with the book. He gave his time and asked nothing for it, excepting that a few copies were to be published for the benefit of our schools.20
This is a significant shift. Prescott told her she could do "what she pleased" with the book. Therefore—the implication runs—she had never agreed to surrender royalties at all.
But notice what this admission actually contains: she acknowledges that Prescott "gave his time and asked nothing for it." The man who did all the work asked for nothing. The woman whose previously-published words he assembled is now demanding payment four years after the fact.
Then, she went further still:
Had I thought that that matter was to be gathered up from my writings and published, and the proceeds given to the interests at Battle Creek, I should not have consented to its being done. I would have paid for the preparation of the book, for its publication, and then would have used the royalties to help in this destitute field. If any has the advantage, should it not be this destitute missionary field?21
This is now a third position. First: give me my due on the books already sold. When that didn't work: Prescott said I could do what I pleased, so I never surrendered the royalties. Finally: I never would have consented to any of this if I had known the money went to Battle Creek instead of to me.
In none of these three positions does White acknowledge the straightforward fact that the General Conference Association published the book in good faith, at a discount price, as a missionary venture, on the understanding that no royalty was owed—and that the man who actually produced the book gave his labor freely and asked for nothing.
Is this how the Spirit of God operates? When a book assembled entirely from her existing writings was published cheaply to help SDA education, when the compiler donated years of labor without asking for a penny, and when the church sold the volume in good faith on the explicit understanding that no royalties would be paid, White suddenly decided that she had been robbed.
Notice the pattern carefully. Not once does she say, "The brethren acted honorably according to the agreement they understood." Not once does she commend Prescott's selfless labor. Not once does she acknowledge that the entire enterprise existed to advance the very educational work she constantly claimed to champion. Instead, the story keeps changing until it finally arrives at its real destination: I should have gotten the money.
The irony is savage. Prescott gave his labor freely. The General Conference sacrificed profit to keep the book cheap for believers. Everyone involved treated the project as a missionary effort—everyone, that is, except the prophet demanding retroactive payment after the books were already sold.
And then came the final twist of the knife: she objected that the proceeds benefited Battle Creek instead of her chosen mission field. In other words, the problem was never that the money was going into the work. The problem was that she was not controlling where it went.
Conclusion
Micah said to do justly.
Ellen White quoted those words repeatedly. She wielded them like a divine hammer against anyone who, in her judgment, failed to deal fairly with workers and wages.22 She warned that heaven records every dishonest transaction, every act of selfishness, every attempt to deprive a laborer of his due.
And yet when the spotlight turns from her words to her conduct, the pattern is impossible to miss.
When her own royalties were threatened, it became a matter of eternal principle. When books that benefited her financially were not prioritized, it became "dishonest stewardship toward God." When her son's sales suffered, judgment-day thunder rolled from her pen. When a realtor expected standard compensation for professional labor, she treated him like a greedy extortionist unfit for Christian confidence. When Prescott and the General Conference sacrificed profit to publish Christian Education cheaply for SDA schools, she demanded retroactive payment after the books were sold and then rewrote the story repeatedly when confronted with the original agreement.
She demanded for herself the very rights she attempted to deny to others. She preached self-sacrifice while fiercely protecting her own income stream. She condemned "overreaching" while leveraging prophetic authority to pressure fellow believers into financial arrangements she herself would never have tolerated. She transformed ordinary business disagreements into matters of divine judgment whenever her royalties were involved. And she did it all while speaking in the name of God.
Standing behind the curtain is not a humble messenger trembling under divine commission, but a deeply invested religious entrepreneur. Her primary motivation wasn't do justly. It was show me the money.