Methodist Episcopal Church (North and South.)
John Wesley pronounced slavery to be the “sum of all villanies.” The discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church is quite positive in its condemnation of slavery. Some of the early Methodist preachers gave no quarters to this sin. But as the church increased in numbers and popularity, slaveholders, who at first came in by mere sufferance, assumed a bolder position, and finally ruled the whole church “with a rod of iron.”
The General Conference which convened in Cincinnati in 1836, after a warm discussion, adopted the following resolution:
“Resolved, By the delegates of the Annual Conferences, in General Conference assembled, that we are decidedly opposed to modern abolitionism, and wholly disclaim any right, wish, or intention to interfere in the civil and political relation between the master and slave as it exists in the slaveholding States of this Union.” Yeas 120, nays 14.
This resolution was an offering to appease the bloody Moloch of slavery, which had been aroused somewhat by Orange Scott. At a Gen. Conf. in 1840, held in Baltimore, a resolution was passed depriving colored persons of the right of testifying against white persons. The resolution reads as follows:
“Resolved, That it is inexpedient and unjustifiable for any preacher to permit colored persons to give testimony against white persons, in any State where they are denied that privilege by law.”[17]
The division of this Church (or secession, as some call it, of the Church South) has as yet resulted, so far as we can see, in no advantage to the slave. The southern portion or branch is not more pro-slavery than before; and the northern division occupies precisely the ground maintained when the resolutions of 1836 and 1840 were adopted, and when there were embraced within her communion the owners of 200,000 slaves. Slaveholding is not a bar to membership in the Methodist Episcopal Church North. Ten or eleven conferences are now slaveholding, and between 30 and 40,000 slaves are owned at the present time by members of this church.
The Baltimore Conference, which belongs to the church North, passed in 1836 the following resolution:
“Resolved, That this Conference disclaims any fellowship with abolitionism. On the contrary, while it is determined to maintain its well known, and long established position, by keeping the traveling preachers composing its own body, free from slavery; it is also determined not to hold connexion with any ecclesiastical body, that shall make non-slaveholding a condition of membership in the Church.”
This conference, so far from regarding slaveholding in the membership a sin, seems to consider it a virtue, and a condition of fellowship.
An effort to introduce the slavery question into the last General Conference was defeated, speakers were choked down, and the conference closed in disorder. Since the meeting of that body a number of Conferences have passed resolutions calling for the adoption of a rule which would exclude slaveholders from the church. Some strong men[18] seem determined not to rest the question until there is a semblance at least of consistency between the professions and practice of Methodism on slavery. This church has been “as much as ever deploring the evils of slavery,”[19] for scores of years, and as much as ever strengthening and building up the iniquity! And as a Methodist writer in the Northern C. Advocate in a late article asks—“Is it not high time for honest and God-fearing anti-slavery ministers and members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, to inquire whether in her official position, her anti-slavery professions and character are not all a mere sham!” It is to be feared that the good men of this church, who are laboring to effect its renovation from this foul sin, are doomed to disappointment, as many others, who have preceded them, have been. The fact that three new slaveholding conferences will be represented in the next General Conference of this body, augurs unfavorably.