The Colored Man in the Methodist Episcopal Church

by L. M. Hagood

COLORED PASTORATE.

“(1.) Our colored members, ministers, and laymen feel that the times are auspicious to the development of their mental and moral power, and request from us the facilities necessary to this end.

“(2.) A colored pastorate they recognize as among the most important of these facilities, securing to them a ministry adapted to their wants, encouraging their young men to enter the ministerial field, and offering motive and opportunity for general ministerial advancement.

“(3.) They do not, however, propose to secure this by—indeed, they are utterly opposed to—separation from our Church, either with a view to a union with another, or to independent organization. With such a feeling on their part, the General Conference can not consistently with its own responsibility, with their constitutional rights, or with any decent recognition of their loyalty to our Church in all the troubles through which, on their account, she has passed, adopt any measure which shall, even indirectly, look to such a result.

“(4.) Conference organization is asked for from two quarters; other memorials urge that the requests should be granted. The local ministers who have been before us have shown deep solicitude in this direction....

“(7.) From this exhibit of facts two convictions are natural, namely: We must retain the oversight of this people; we must give them efficient colored pastors.

“To retain these pastors as mere local preachers, subject to appointment by white presiding elders, will impair rather than increase their efficiency; will promote congregationalism among them rather than itinerant missionary enterprise.

“To propose their incorporation with the existing annual conferences will be attended with difficulties too formidable every way to be readily disposed of, and the delay incident to such a proposition is incompatible with the urgent requirements of the times.

“In view of these considerations, we recommend to the General Conference for adoption the following preamble and resolutions:

“Whereas, In the present circumstances of our country, the colored people occupy a position of peculiar interest, appealing to our Christian sympathy, and inviting our missionary enterprise; and

“Whereas, This enterprise can not now be made efficient by the policy of our Church hitherto pursued toward them, and especial measures have therefore become necessary; and

“Whereas, The exigencies of the case require to efficiency prompt action; therefore, be it

“1. Resolved, by the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Conference assembled, That it is the duty of our Church to encourage colored pastorates for colored people wherever practicable, and to contribute to their efficiency by every means in our power.

“Resolved, That the efficiency of said pastorates can be best promoted by distinct conference organizations, and that therefore the bishops be, and they are hereby, authorized to organize among our colored ministers, for the benefit of our colored members and population, mission conferences—one or more—where, in their godly judgment, the exigencies of the work may demand it, and, should more than one be organized, to determine their boundaries until the meeting of the next General Conference, said conference or conferences to possess all the powers usual to mission annual conferences: Provided, that nothing in this resolution be so construed as to impair the existing constitutional rights of our colored members on the one hand, or to forbid, on the other, the transfer of white ministers to said conference or conferences where it may be practicable and deemed necessary.

“3. Resolved, That our General Missionary Committee be requested to take into careful consideration the condition of our colored people, and should conferences be organized among them, make to them—consistently with other demands upon its funds—such appropriations as may be essential to success.”

Annual or mission conferences being composed of traveling preachers, it was necessary that some colored local preachers be admitted into the traveling connection before they could be formed into a conference, which gave rise to a question upon which the same committee made a report, which was adopted, as follows (Jour. 1864, p. 253):

“We, the committee to whom this subject was finally referred, beg leave to report that we are not aware of any legal obstacle to the reception of colored preachers into our annual conferences.”

This General Conference at a later day made more specific and direct provision for the Delaware and Washington Conferences in the following resolution (Jour. 1864, p. 263):

“The Washington Conference shall embrace Western Maryland, the District of Columbia, Virginia, and the territory south.

“The Delaware Conference shall embrace the territory north and east of the Washington Conference.

“Resolved, That in order to constitute the first conferences of colored members, the rule of Discipline requiring a probation of two years, be so far suspended as to allow the bishops to organize into one or more annual conferences such colored local elders as have traveled two or more years under a presiding elder, and shall be recommended by a quarterly conference, and by at least ten elders who are members of an annual conference.”

The Delaware Conference was organized July 28, 1864, and the Washington Conference October 27, 1864. It will be noted that “the constitutional rights of our colored members” were recognized, as well as the difficulties of incorporating the work.

Let us now examine the above resolutions more closely.

Blessings seldom come unattended. At a glance any one can see that the requests of the colored members had been granted. Henceforth they were to have (1) colored pastorates, the very thing for which they had prayed. No one doubts, we think, that the granting of that very thing gave birth to all the other race questions that do or may arise touching the relations of the two races within the Church. The wisdom of that General Conference peered away out into the future. It probably saw a time when advanced ideas would lead men within the Church to advanced work. These pastorates created by that General Conference were to be for “colored people.” They were to be allowed (2) separate conferences. There was no way to avoid them where there were “colored pastorates for colored people.” Just so. These separate conferences, however, were (3) “not to impair existing rights of our colored members, nor yet (4) to forbid the transfer of white ministers to said conferences where it may be practicable and deemed necessary.” What “existing rights” had colored members? To remain in any Church they chose within Methodism, or join with and worship in any congregation within the Methodist Episcopal Church. It did not stop there, but action was taken looking to the education of the race. The General Conference Committee on Education reported as follows:

“The committee have had before them the memorial of Rev. J. F. Wright in reference to the Wilberforce University, and, in view of its peculiar character and relation to the Church, we offer for adoption the following resolution:

“Resolved, That we heartily sympathize with the noble purpose contemplated in the establishment of Wilberforce University and we do hereby earnestly commend the institution to the prayers and liberal contributions of the friends of humanity.”

Just what “the peculiar character and relation” were, is not stated. It may have been that the enterprise was sprung upon the Church before it had been duly authorized. It may have been that its “peculiar character and relation” meant that it was to be exclusively colored. It makes no difference as to what was meant, some way or other that institution soon passed into other hands.

BENNETT SEMINARY, GREENSBORO, N.C.

Again, it would have been folly to grant separate conferences for the colored membership and leave standing the old rule, and allow it to apply in this case, requiring a probation of two years before being admitted to an annual conference. This was brought forward at once, and the animus of the General Conference on the subject was at once manifested by the following resolution:

“Resolved, That in order to constitute the first conference of colored members, the rule of the Discipline requiring a probation of two years be so far suspended as to allow the bishops to organize into one or more annual conferences such colored local elders as have traveled two or more years under a presiding elder and shall be recommended by a quarterly conference and by at least ten elders who are members of an annual conference.”

This was a wise and prudential action. Wise in that it at once dissipated any thought that might have arisen in the minds of the less stable members, that the matter was simply put in a complicated shape to keep the colored members at bay, and thereby eventually drive out of the Methodist Episcopal Church all the colored people. To have kept them waiting under the probationary rule would probably have done much harm. Prudential in that even the local elders were to come up well recommended: (1) By their own people, among whom they lived and worked, and who therefore could testify as to their moral, religious, and literary fitness for the traveling connection. (2) To be recommended “by at least ten elders (white) who are members of an annual conference.” Who were better qualified than such elders to know who were and who were not qualified for traveling preachers—our own people had no experience in matters of that kind—in that they would naturally be able and more willing to speak against those “wolves in sheep’s clothing” who sometimes “climb up some other way” into our annual conferences for the purpose of fleecing, instead of feeding, the flock of God? Our own people might have been in some way related to the applicants or ignorant of their devices. Why should not some precautions be observed when clothing with authority those who, even then, must have been witnessing “the pains, the groans, the dying strife” of an institution that had grown gray in crime and debauchery—under which for two hundred and forty-four years the race had suffered in more ways than the Hebrews in Egypt? They had never enjoyed even the privilege of elementary training in any way fitting them for happiness and usefulness in the world. They were poor and ignorant. Poor in that even the good name of the race was gone; and who does not know that a

“Good name, in man and woman,...

Is the immediate jewel of their souls?

Who steals my purse steals trash; ’tis something, nothing;

’Twas mine, ’tis his, and has been slave to thousands;

But he that filches from me my good name

Robs me of that which not enriches him,

And makes me poor indeed.”

We do not know that additional weight attaches to the above by knowing that Shakespeare put these words into the mouth of Iago; but it is a fair statement of the condition of the race when the Emancipation Proclamation was issued. The morality of the race under the old régime is the prodigy of the age! And yet they knew nothing theoretically of morality, and had opportunities for but few examples of it. They knew nothing of home economics, and not five in one hundred of the rank and file could count correctly ten dollars in small change. Hence the Church was wise in throwing around this people safeguards as well as charity. They knew but little, if anything, of the comforts of home life, the proper training of children; while the fantastic mode of dressing immediately after the war tells a tale at which a heathen should blush. They knew comparatively nothing either of Church polity or moral science. Those who have found occasion to laugh at the huge mistakes of some of our ministers, as well as some others who had enjoyed better opportunities, must find a sufficient explanation in the previous condition of the race. Was the Methodist Church not right in doing as it did?

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CHAPTER VIII
THE BEGINNING OF A GREAT WORK.

The beginning of a work among these images of God cut in ebony is found in the following resolutions looking to the protection of the interests of the colored man by the civil government. It is nothing against a system that it was badly managed or fell into bad hands, or else our venerated Constitution is involved. That General Conference (1864) in its report on freedmen, said:

“(1) Resolved, That in the events which have thrown the thousands of freed people upon the benevolence of the humane and loyal people of the North, we recognize a providential call to the Christian public for contributions for their physical relief and mental and moral elevation and especially to the Church of Christ for the means of their evangelization.

“(2) Resolved, That the best interests of the freedmen of the country demand legislation that shall foster and protect this people, and we do hereby respectfully but earnestly urge upon Congress the importance of establishing, as soon as practicable, a Bureau of Freedmen’s Affairs, as contemplated in the bills now pending.”

What did this mean? If it meant anything, the Church meant to practice, at its earliest convenience, the doctrine it had been preaching for the last eighty years and more,—that the poor enslaved colored man should be properly trained to enjoy this life and that which is to come. It meant that just as soon as the alarms of war had sufficiently subsided and God opened the way, or signified that an entrance could be gained, to go at once up and down through the Southland carrying the gospel of free salvation to the downtrodden, poverty-stricken, and demoralized colored man. While but few, if any, believe the only mission of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the South was to the poor colored man, but few will doubt that, had it no other call to go into the South, that were enough. But few rational Christians believe the Church had no call into the South.

That the Church was needed there, no one will question when the condition of the colored man at that time is considered, as well as the relation the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, sustained to the colored man before and during the war, and that other significant fact that the colored man, as such, was, and for that matter is, peculiarly either a Baptist or a Methodist. From the beginning Methodism took hold of him, and he learned that, wherever found, a true Methodist was his friend. This in itself is sufficient explanation of the peculiarity referred to above. What was the condition of the colored man at the close of the war? When the black smoke of battle arose from a hundred battlefields the entire colored population—four and a half millions—came forth ignorant, superstitious, degraded, and poverty-stricken. The only beam of hope rested entirely on the education of the race. The emancipation was followed by the enfranchisement of these ignorant and superstitious people. The cry of opposition was heard vociferously in the South, while in some places in the North leading newspapers and men expressed doubts as to the wisdom of the thing. Who, under the then existing circumstances, doubted the earnestness of those who cried out as they saw the colored men clothed with freedom and franchise, yet slaves to superstition and ignorance:

“A poor, blind Samson is in our land,

Bound hand and foot, and prone upon his back;

But who knows that, in some drunken revel,

He may rise and grasp the pillars

Of our temple’s liberties, shake the foundations

Till all beneath its broken columns lie in ruins?”

Amid the religious training received from that part of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, that trained them at all, did not appear anything different from the system of slavery in vogue, save the promise of an eternal Sabbath. It is true a colored membership was reported by the Methodist Episcopal Church, South; but this did not mean that the colored people within that Church were permitted to worship God in their own congregations, or that there were any colored pastors or class-leaders among that membership. If slavery had continued, the condition of the colored man religiously could never have become better. Just how—unless force of circumstances played a part in the drama—a brotherly feeling could have arisen or existed in the bosom of the poor colored man under that régime, we can not, for the life of us, surmise. But all that was ended with the war, and still there was but little, if any, change. The withdrawals at first opportunity of colored people from the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, meant something. The Methodist Episcopal Church, South, was then, at any rate, unwilling to educate the colored man. In proof of the last assertion, we turn to page 148 of Dr. A. G. Haygood’s book, “Our Brother in Black.” The following, published in 1881 by this leading philosopher and clergyman in the Methodist Episocopal Church, South, is as significant as sound. He says:

“If the work of educating the Negroes of the South is ever to be carried on satisfactorily, if ever the best results are to be accomplished, then Southern white people must take part in the work of teaching Negro schools. There have been some very sad and hurtful mistakes in the relations assumed by most of us of the South to this whole matter, and especially in the fact that, with very rare exceptions, our people have steadfastly refused to teach Negro children, especially since they were made free, for love or money. They have recoiled from Negro schools as if there were personal degradation in teaching them. Perhaps the state of things that existed at the South for a full decade after the war, and for which Southern people were not alone responsible—a state of things that made it impracticable for Southern white men and women to teach Negro schools—was inevitable. But so it was; they could not do it without ‘losing caste.’ As I am trying to state facts honestly, I should add, the prevailing sentiment of the South would not even now look favorably upon such teachers; but I must say we are growing in sense as well as grace on this subject.”

Without further comment, the above corroborates the statement that the condition of the freedmen in the South directly after the war, temporally, spiritually, morally, and intellectually, was a loud enough call, and the mission of enough importance to warrant the action of the General Conference of 1864 in its action that virtually announced the intention of the Methodist Episcopal Church to go into the South. The fact that conferences had been opened in the South for colored people was sufficient proof.