The Colored Man in the Methodist Episcopal Church

by L. M. Hagood

THE CHURCH IN THE SOUTH.

When the General Conference of 1868 met in the city of Chicago, Ill., for its twentieth session, among other things it took up the subject of the relation of the Church to the colored man. There were present at that General Conference two hundred and forty-three delegates. When the General Conference of 1864 authorized the formation of mission conferences in the South for colored people, as a Church, it “had been practically excluded for twenty years” from Alabama, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas, while a generation had grown up under the immediate care, as if were, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. It is true that the Methodist Episcopal Church had held on in some sort in the city of Baltimore—this being her strongest fort—while through some parts of Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri it had a foothold. Our Church in 1863, in the last-named States, claimed 332 effective preachers, 84,673 members, and 919 church-buildings. By the next year, when the General Conference of 1864 met for its nineteenth session in Philadelphia, it claimed in the above-named five slave States 309 effective preachers, 87,072 members—15,898 being colored—and 982 churches, being an increase in these five States of 2,399 members, not including probationers, and a decrease of 23 effective preachers, and an increase of 63 church-buildings. Thus it may be seen that a wise Providence proclaimed the mission of our Church; and there was then, as we see now, no mistake made on the part of our Church when it heard and obeyed the commission in this case, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” The crowning act touching the subject we discuss was given by the General Conference of 1864 in these words: “We are not aware of any legal obstacle to the reception of colored preachers into our annual conferences.” Touching the work done by the last General Conference, and showing somewhat of the results attained, the Bishops’ Address to the Twentieth General Conference contained the following:

“They [the Delaware and Washington colored conferences] now contain one hundred and one ministers and twenty-six thousand four hundred and eighty-seven members and probationers. The creation of these conferences was hailed by our colored ministers and membership with great joy, and has, we believe, been productive of much good. The ministers are becoming familiar with the mode of conducting business, and many of them are rapidly improving. At their recent sessions they elected representatives to this body according to the form of the Discipline for electing delegates. Whether these representatives should be admitted, you alone have authority to decide. In our judgment, the success of this work demands all the encouragement which the General Conference can properly give.”

The regular and natural succession of action touching the relation of the Church toward the colored man seems to declare, to our mind at any rate, that it has the divine sanction. The submission of the above resolution brought at once before the General Conference of 1868 the question of the advisability of admitting—not colored testimony, or testimony from people of color—but colored delegates to equality in the General Conference of one of the largest denominations in the world. The Christ-like spirit of the bishops in presenting the matter, supported by their modest indorsement of it, was manly. They said: “In our judgment, the success of this work demands all the encouragement which the General Conference can properly give.” It may have been that it was not thoroughly settled in the minds of all the delegates of that General Conference. The result, however, was satisfactory, in that James Davis and Benjamin Brown were seated as delegates, and thereby the equal rights of our colored members were not only recognized, but everything looking to their elevation, done by the Church, was stamped with approval. The adjournment of that General Conference did not take place until provision for other conferences for our people, at their own request, was made. The year preceding that General Conference a colored presiding elder had been appointed over a district in Kentucky; nine mission conferences had been organized in our Southern field; colored preachers had been received into the Kentucky and Missouri Annual Conferences. Notwithstanding this, wherever a mission conference was organized a new inspiration seemed to overshadow the entire work. The provision above referred to was as follows:

“‘Resolved, 1. That the bishops who may preside in the Kentucky Conference during the next four years, are hereby authorized to organize the colored ministers within the bounds of said conference into a separate annual conference, if said ministers request it; and if, in the judgment of the bishops, the interest of the work requires it, to be called the —— Conference: Provided, that nothing in this resolution shall be construed to impair the existing constitutional rights of our colored members on the one hand, or, on the other, to forbid the transfer of white ministers to said conference, whenever it may be deemed desirable or expedient.’

“So soon as this resolution was taken up, a motion was made to lay it upon the table, which was lost.

“A motion to amend by inserting, ‘Provided, that colored members may remain in the Kentucky Conference,’ was laid on the table.

“A motion to strike out the words ‘the interest of the work,’ and insert ‘the unity and success of the Church,’ was laid on the table; and the resolution was adopted as matured by the Committee on Boundaries.”

The motions subsequently made show at once the animus of the white brethren of that conference at that time. While many were anxious to have restrictions, others objected to it in toto. But, as in the General Conference, so it has been in nearly every annual conference, that a wide difference of opinion on the color-line question existed. It is well that it was so.

Following hard upon the above action in the interest of the colored man, this General Conference paid special attention to its work so grandly begun in the sunny South. While the discussion of the status of the colored delegates elicited much animation, the restrictions were removed from the conferences of the Church in the South, irrespective of color, by a vote of 197 to 15. All our benevolent societies were instructed to redouble their diligence to meet the exigencies of the case; our Book Concerns were to publish one or more papers adapted to the new order of things within the South; transfers, if needed, were to be sent into this fruitful field; training-schools and theological schools were ordered for the special training of the colored people of the South within our Church and without, if accepted. The bishops were requested to give the colored work special episcopal supervision. As a finale of the action of that General Conference, an “enabling act” for the establishment of the third annual conference among our colored members was passed, with the provision that in every case the rights of every preacher were to be fully and carefully, as well as impartially, considered. The white preachers and teachers who were sent by the Church into the South to carry out this plan of work were, in too many cases, not only subjected to insult, but cruel scourgings and false imprisonment, as if ostracism was not cruel and wicked punishment enough. But many of those thus treated were men and women of God, and therefore consistent but firm and true heroes and heroines.

Dr. Walden (now bishop), in an address, Aug. 13, 1883, at the anniversary of the Freedmen’s Aid Society, spoke of this work. The following needs no comment, as he speaks of the period in our work in the South at which we now are, and we insert it here as a retrospect:

“Two courses were open—one to delay employing colored preachers until they could be educated, the other to put these untutored men to work at once. No people ever needed the gospel more than did the freed people. Standing in the midst of new relations, the possessors of a new-found freedom for which they had never been trained, they needed both the restraints and the inspiration of the gospel. The Wesleyan prescience of our Church recognized this need, and at the same time the fact that these unlearned preachers, if divinely called, could so tell the story of the Cross as to benefit their people. The lives of many of these men had been an unbroken period of slave-toil; but the sequel proves that they knew enough of the saving power of Christ and the fullness of his love to instruct their hearers in the way of life, and we now see that their relation to this work was not unlike to that of the first of Wesley’s lay preachers to their work among their own classes in England.

“With this illustration before us of the general principle that a people may and must be instrumental in their own evangelization, let us study some of the results of our itinerant system among the freedmen—of our itinerancy and its auxiliary agencies. All understand our itinerancy to be the general superintendency and the pastorate; by auxiliary agencies I mean our sub-pastorate, in which the class-leaders stand, our Church literature, and our Sunday-schools. The mere suggestion of the fact leads you at once to see that the real function of each and all of these is to re-enforce both the general and the particular work committed to the itinerancy or three fold pastorate—the bishops, presiding elders, and pastors of our Church. The very fact of taking this comprehensive system to a people who had no system, of beginning at once to build them up into it, could not be without producing some marked and favorable results. I mention the more obvious of these:

“(a) The freedmen who were recognized as having a call to preach could do little more than exhort, but they were put into the pastoral relation; a great Church committed to them a new and solemn trust, and laid upon them grave responsibilities; they were under the leadership of the superintendents of the missions—good, prudent, self-sacrificing men—men who in their devotion to duty represented the highest life of their Church. Such things could not be without affecting these untutored preachers. Crude as all they did may have been at first, their pastorate benefited the people they served, and was to themselves a means of training, of real and rapid progress; and there are still in the effective ranks of the conferences which came from such beginnings many pious, able, and successful preachers, who were thus transferred from the cotton and rice fields and sugar plantations to, and trained in, our itinerant ministry.

“(b) As the work progressed, these colored men acquired by observation and experience, and such study as was possible with them, a wider knowledge of their work; and in due course the bishops began to appoint some of them as presiding elders, investing them with all the honors and responsibilities of this important office. It should also be stated that the Church that acted thus through her bishops was constantly displaying to them an encouraging interest in them by furnishing means to aid in the support of their Church work.

“(c) In the annual conferences they were and are brought under the presidency of our bishops—the most efficient presiding officers in this or any other country, a fact that became most obvious at the Ecumenical Methodist Conference. The very methods of business in our annual conferences, and the promptness with which it is dispatched under this presidency, have had such influence on the older conferences that the advantages of like administration to the colored conferences are obvious. The influence of the conference session ought also to be named, as these annual meetings of the preachers have all along affected most favorably the character of Methodism. These colored preachers have been coming together, as do their brethren in older conferences, to report and review the year’s work, to pass upon the character of each one, to consider the various connectional and benevolent causes, to attend to all the business that is usually presented, and to enjoy the social privileges and religious services to which all our preachers look forward with deep interest. Every such session tends to make them wiser and more effective in their work.

“(d) Under our system of study for probationers and deacons, the colored preachers are steadily improving, and their conferences are becoming more careful as to the qualifications of those who are received into the ministry. I well remember the class taken on trial in the South Carolina Conference in 1867; near a dozen of them were then uncouth and ill-clad men, who seemed to have come direct from the plantations; little or nothing was said as to even elementary education; they were taken as they were, and sent out to do work for the Master, who ordaineth strength even out of the mouths of babes. But it is radically different in that conference now; at its session, last January, I heard the report of examinations, and learned thereby that the standard of qualification is applied more rigidly each succeeding year. I rejoiced in this as a fact common to all these colored conferences; and yet I also rejoiced to remember that when the exigencies required it, our Church dared to send out the earlier members of that and other conferences, illiterate as they were, to the work of winning souls.

“(e) These early colored preachers, coming as they did from a condition in which there was no home, in the better sense of that word, soon came to know something of the importance that our Church attaches to Sunday-schools. They were organized, often in the crudest form; but they have been improved, and now nearly two thousand are reported in the twelve conferences. This work is important there, not only because it is in behalf of the youth and children, but also because there has been, and is, a relatively great demand for such work in the South. It is a fact that the ratio between the number of Sunday-school scholars and Church members of any and all Protestant denominations in the South is far below what it is in the North. The schools organized in our “new Southern field” have been aided with papers published by our Church, and especially adapted to the condition of the scholars. All the teachers employed by the Freedmen’s Aid Society have done good and faithful service in these Sunday-schools. Through them the Church has been, and is, furnishing moral and mental instruction to about one hundred thousand of the youth and children, that will be of incalculable value to them, and through them to the Church and the nation.

“(f) The Methodist newspapers published in the South—within this new field—by our Church, in order to furnish a literature specially adapted to the condition and needs of the people, have been potent for good. We may not be able to estimate the force of the fact that papers have been provided for them which they in a special sense regarded as their own. It was no mean fact with them that a part of the capital of the Book Concern was being employed to publish papers which, by their very location, must chiefly be for them. And the presence of a depository of books at Atlanta tended to impress the lesson, taught in so many ways, that our Church was ready and anxious to help them in their every effort to reach the plane of a higher and better life.

“Other facts might be named to show how every thing that is forceful in our itinerancy and its auxiliary agencies has been constantly, wisely, and effectively employed to reach, evangelize and elevate these colored people. It has been more than a formal recognition of Christian equality; it has been the continuous presence and power of educational relations as well as educational agencies among them. The Church, during these years, has recognized the divine call into her ministry of more than a thousand of these men, thereby reposing a confidence and conferring an honor that has been a special inspiration to them, and, in good degree, to their people. Ministerial position and pastoral duties, prerogatives and responsibilities, shared in common with the largest corps of preachers in our country, have been made realities to them. When that whole people shall come to the plane and glory of a true manhood and womanhood, it will be known that the impartial planting of our system of itinerancy among them was one of the early and potent means of their elevation.

“3. The aim of the Methodist Episcopal Church is to enlist every local society in the support of her benevolent enterprises. She would give to every person converted at her altars the opportunity to do work for the Master. For this reason, all her pastors are charged with the duty of presenting to their congregations the claims of the Missionary, Church Extension, Freedmen’s Aid, Sunday-school, Tract, and Educational causes, and of affording to all the opportunity to contribute thereto according to their ability. Into each sphere of work represented by these causes, the Church has been led by a marked providence, and her efforts in them have been attended with her Lord’s signal favor. The presentation of these causes in the relation they hold to the world’s evangelization, the end for which Christ established his Church, teaches with special emphasis the magnitude of her mission, and indicates the certainty of ultimate success. How the faith of God’s people has enlarged under the inspiration of this widening work! These causes have been presented more or less fully to our new societies in the South.

“The colored preachers and people have taken a ready interest in the Missionary Society because it carried the gospel to them. The preachers were not learned, and the people were poor; but what if the earlier missionary sermons were crude presentations of a world-wide cause? what if but a few pennies were collected in a charge? the people were thus coming into contact with the genius of the gospel, and beginning to have some part in the movement that is conquering the world. Among the many wise things done during the administration of the revered Dr. Durbin as missionary secretary, the one of all others that has affected and will continue to affect our Church the most, was providing for the organization of the Sunday-schools into missionary societies; wise and potential, because thus, in a practical and methodical way, the idea of the world’s evangelization is fixed in the thought of the youth and children, by far the greatest idea touching the human race that can be given to the human mind.

“The colored preachers have been learning this fundamental idea of the missionary cause and the purpose of each of the other benevolences of our Church, and in their own way it may be presenting them to their people; but the result has been a measure of enlightenment in these directions, an increasing knowledge of the far-reaching plans of the Church to which they belong, a clearer consciousness that by being brought within her pale they have part in one of the great aggressive Christian movements of the age. Standing as they do in the dawn of a new day, this conscious identification with all the benevolent plans of the Church that brought them the gospel can not do less than enlarge their views of Christian duty, and inspire them with zeal for and devotion to causes grand in themselves and glorious in their results.

“4. The preaching that is distinctively Methodistic has had its influence in this as in other fields. While we hold the fundamental truths of Christianity in common with other evangelical Churches—points of agreement, each of which is infinitely more important than all the questions in regard to which there is a difference—all do not place the same emphasis we do on some of these truths. Our preachers in the ‘new Southern field,’ as elsewhere, have given special prominence to the willingness and power of Jesus to save every one who comes to him; the universal call and the gracious ability of every one to come; the radical character of the change wrought in conversion—a new life through divine power; the adoption into the divine family, and that adoption clearly, satisfactorily attested through the witness of the Holy Spirit; the complete cleansing power of the blood of Christ, and the keeping power of the promised grace. Need I say in this presence that the emphasis given to these Scriptural doctrines by our ministry has molded the experience of Methodists in every society, and made the meeting for testimony, whether love-feast or class-meeting, a part of our Church life? The preaching of these doctrines in the earnest Methodist way among the colored people, the building up of a Church among them under the molding and inspiring effect of such truths, the leading of the members up to a clear, well-defined religious experience, is giving them a Church life, the advantage of which is best known from what Methodism has done for other peoples. Already the advance of Christian morality, the growing habits of industry and economy, the increasing spirit of benevolence and liberality, the new home-life where home was so recently unknown—the fruits of an evangelical gospel faithfully preached—show what we have done, and are the promise and pledge of a pure, strong, and active Church in every part of our new Southern field in the near future.”

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CHAPTER IX
THE COLORED BISHOP QUESTION.

The quadrennium from 1868 to 1872 exhibited a marvelous growth among the colored membership of the Methodist Episcopal Church. This was but the pulsation started by Methodism among her hitherto downtrodden children, by her labor of love in carrying to them the gospel of free salvation through the agency of her benevolent societies, the class of bishops, General Conference officers, and the consecrated and self-denying white teachers from the North, who left their homes of comfort and joy to go South and put themselves upon God’s altar for the elevation, morally, financially, intellectually, and spiritually, of their “brother in black.” The work done, and its effects in so short a time, seem now the marvel of the age! The scattered sheep had been gathered from the hills and valleys, the cane-brakes and swamps, from the villages and the larger cities, into societies nearly everywhere. Wherever possible they had been organized into conferences as had been provided by the action of the General Conference of 1864. With the application for recognition came that also for separate conferences. Two separate annual conferences had been organized before 1865—the Delaware Conference, July 28, 1864, and the Washington Conference, October 27, 1864. Besides this, the Rule of the Discipline, requiring a probation of two years, had been suspended so far as to permit our bishops to organize annual conferences with such colored local elders as had traveled two or more years under a presiding elder, who were recommended by a quarterly conference and by at least ten white elders. Thus the constitutional rights of the colored membership of the Church had been recognized, and the marvelous growth among them during this quadrennium was but a manifestation of appreciation on the part of the religious colored people of the South, evidence of their preference for Methodism, pure and simple.

The fact that colored delegates were recognized by the General Conference of 1868, and provision made for the organization of the Lexington Annual Conference, that had hitherto been mixed with the Kentucky Conference, white; that separate annual conferences had been formed; indeed, that every practically conceivable thing was being done by the Church for her colored members,—caused many to flock toward her that had fled for safety in another direction. The tide was soon checked by the ministry and membership of the two colored denominations—the African Zion and the African Methodist Churches—that were toiling in the same field, by crying out “the Methodist Episcopal Church will never permit a colored man to be elected a bishop.” Consternation seized many of our members when they were told that the Methodist Episcopal Church would only tolerate a black membership as “hewers of wood and drawers of water.” It at last became to many, as they said, “self-evident, that to retain the better class of colored people there must be no discrimination anywhere in Methodism on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” Many, many hard battles were fought, not with the enemy of souls, but with our brethren of the above-named two denominations. From 1868 to the adjournment of the General Conference of 1872 a bitter religious warfare was waged. At last, as the quadrennium drew to a close, it was evident that the agitation of the question of a bishop of African descent had not only done much injury, poisoning and unsettling the minds of our colored membership, but that, in one way or the other, the question must be put and answered by the ensuing General Conference. This was one of the most important questions considered by the General Conference of 1872, sitting in Brooklyn, New York. This, the twenty-first session of our General Conference, will be remembered as the largest ever held by our Church up to that time, there being four hundred and twenty-one delegates. Several of our colored conferences sent up memorials in favor of the election of a bishop of African descent. As they were presented they were respectfully referred to the Committee on Episcopacy, composed of one delegate from each annual conference, colored or white. The petition for a bishop of African descent from the preachers’ meeting of New Orleans received the following reply:

“The special committee to which was referred the memorial of the New Orleans preachers’ meeting of May 23d, asking for the election of an additional bishop, who shall be of African descent, respectfully report: That at a meeting of the committee, held May 30th, the statements of the memorialists and their requests were carefully considered. The very reasonable demand, that at least some action may be taken which shall assure our people that the Methodist Episcopal Church invites to her altars peoples of every nation, and extends to them equal rights in her worship and government, was responded to with great unanimity by the following declaration of facts which, we are persuaded, will be entirely satisfactory to the memorialists.”

Then follows the report of the Committee on Episcopacy, viz.:

“The Committee on Episcopacy report to the General Conference concerning the election of a colored bishop: (1) That they are deeply impressed with the Christian spirit manifested by those memorializing the General Conference on this subject. The rapid progress our brethren of color are making in all that elevates mankind is most commendable, and we have no doubt there is a future of great promise before them. Your committee would further report that, in their judgment, there is nothing in race, color, or former condition that is a bar to an election to the episcopacy, the true course being for us to elect only such persons as are, by their pre-eminent piety, endowments, culture, general fitness, and acceptability best qualified to fill the office. (2) The claims of our numerous and noble-hearted membership of African descent to a perfect equality of relations with all others in our communion are fully recognized by the Discipline, and amply demonstrated in the administration of the Methodist Episcopal Church. There is no word ‘white’ to discriminate against race or color known in our legislation; and being of African descent does not prevent membership with white men in annual conferences, nor ordination at the same altars, nor appointment nor eligibility to the highest office in the Church. (3) Election to the office of bishop from among candidates who are mutually equal can not be determined on the ground of color or any other special consideration. It can only be by fair and honorable competition between the friends of the respective candidates. And yet the presentation of a well-qualified man of African descent would, doubtless, secure very general support in view of the great interests of the Church, which would thereby be more abundantly promoted. No such opportunity, however, has been afforded at this General Conference.”

Quite a while before the assembling of that General Conference the colored bishop question had been widely discussed, receiving very general consideration and favorable mention in some localities. It, however, was not of a demonstrative character. The fair, plain, Christian statements of that General Conference put an end to the “color question” within the Church, so far as special ecclesiastical legislation goes. May we not hope that it put a quietus upon those without the Church who prefer to arrogate to themselves a kind of aristocratical attitude, because they have solved the Negro problem by divorce, but who willingly join in any outcry that will have a tendency to condone any action relating to “the vexed question” they have taken, or seem to shadow any spirit of unkindness that would naturally attach to such a wicked divorce? The manliness, Christian spirit, and unwavering fidelity of the Methodist Episcopal Church toward the colored man from his arrival in this country, so far as the heart of the Church is concerned, ought to be “read and known of all men.” That General Conference said all on the colored bishop question that could be said; and, for that matter, all on the race question that needs to be said for all time to come.

While glancing backward and beholding what the Methodist Episcopal Church has done, and is now doing, for the amelioration of the condition and giving the colored man in general, and the colored membership within the communion of the Church in particular, prestige, we feel as if the ignorance of any colored man in this country who dares say the Church, as such, has not loved and respected the race, is inexcusable, reprehensible, and hate-provoking. In many instances the Church did not do what we asked; in others it did not do what others thought it should have done; but time and experience have taught us it did generally what was best. It was feared that much harm would come to Methodism among our people if a bishop of African descent were not chosen at that General Conference. Ought we to say it was the hope of some? In the rural districts, where the general intelligence of the race was not above par, it may have caused friction because of the omnipresence of “colored bishops,” “General Conference officers,” “college presidents,” etc. The years that are to come, unless a strange influence not related to that of the Church of the past comes upon our Methodism, will show that up to this time it was better as it happened. The election of a man of African descent was urged and expected: (1) To tighten our hold upon our people by offsetting outside statements that the Church would never elect a colored man to the bishopric; (2) To remove any lingering doubts, if there remained any, as to the intention of the Church touching the relation of the colored man to it. We doubt not many, without the Church, who persistently pushed this matter, urging it through their Church papers, the secular press, and in nearly every public place, and on nearly every occasion; who did this for the specific purpose of demoralizing and scattering our membership, though done with a seeming gravity and earnestness worthy of a better cause, did not honestly believe it possible that the great Methodist Episcopal Church would even go as far as it did; believing that it was an impossibility, as much so as it would be to elect a white man to the bishopric in one of the distinctively colored organizations, were there the same number of white people within the communion of those three Churches, comparatively, that there are colored in our Church, and that the Church would not only passively refuse, but would plainly say so. This would naturally have weakened their faith, and they would have doubted the sincerity of the professions of the Church made in favor of the colored man by it in the past. On the contrary, the action of that General Conference had no such effect where the truth of the matter was properly told, or where the intelligence of our people made them conversant with the past history of the Church on the color-line question.

The discussion of the question was kept up until the assembling of the session of the General Conference of 1876. Without stopping to speak of the spirit manifested in the discussion of this question, pro and con, outside of the General Conference, nor to speak our views then or now, wishing to give as complete an account of the manner in which that General Conference was brought to see this question, we simply state that the discussion was carried into nearly, if not every congregation in the Church during the quadrennium. The whole matter, phœnix-like, came to the surface at the call for resolutions and memorials. The Mississippi Conference led with the following, presented by Moses Adams:

“Whereas, The Methodist Episcopal Church has under her care one hundred and fifty thousand members of African descent; and whereas, the said Church meets with great opposition from other Methodist bodies, I therefore respectfully ask this General Conference to elect a man of African descent to the office of bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church. This is asked for two reasons: (1) That the Church needs one to help defend her cause. Nothing, in my judgment, would build up the Methodist Episcopal Church more than the election of a bishop from the membership of African descent. (2) The race is not fully represented in the Methodist Episcopal Church without one such being elected to that high office of trust.”

From the West Virginia Conference the following was presented by G. W. Atkinson:

“Resolved, That the Committee on Episcopacy consider the expediency of electing a German bishop and one or more African bishops, to supervise the German and African conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church in America.”

The Delaware Conference sent up a memorial in favor of the election of a bishop of African descent, which was presented by H. Jolley. The petition in favor of the same sent up from the Georgia Conference was presented by Rev. C. O. Fisher, signed by himself and sixteen others. The Mississippi Conference sent up a similar petition by A. C. McDonald. The foregoing gives a faint idea of the scope of the question.

Just how that General Conference would handle the question, striking the happy, golden mean between the two extremes, without reflecting upon the past history of the Methodist Episcopal Church relating to the colored membership on the one hand, or, if necessary to refuse, how it could avoid injuring the work already established among the race, was a perplexing question. Each memorial was given a careful and respectful investigation and promptly and properly referred to the Committee on Episcopacy. At last, after many guesses and prophecies by friends of the measure, and others, the work of the Committee on Episcopacy was finished. When the committee signified its readiness to report, on motion of General Clinton B. Fisk, Report No. 2 of the Committee on Episcopacy was taken up. When the secretary arose to read it, it appeared as if a peculiar spell had come over a great many members of that General Conference who knew nothing of the decision of the Committee. The report was as follows:

“We have had before us certain papers asking the election of a man of African descent to our episcopal office, and other papers asking that the residence of such bishop be in Liberia. It is claimed in these petitions that the circumstances of the people of African descent are such that the efficiency of the work of our Church among them demands the election of a man of African descent to our episcopacy; that such election, more than any other fact, would establish beyond all gainsaying the relation of our Church to its members of African descent; that it would give them a bishop that could mingle freely with them without embarrassment to the work among them in any locality; that these ends would be reached, and the needed administration in Liberia be secured, by fixing the residence of such bishop in that colony. Your committee have considered these facts; but in view of the statement received from the present Board of Bishops as to their ability to discharge the duties of the superintendency, we recommend the adoption of the following:

“Resolved, (1) That this General Conference elect no bishops.

“Resolved, (2) That the facts presented in the several petitions above mentioned are entitled to careful consideration whenever the election of additional bishops shall become necessary.

“Resolved, (3) That we reiterate the declaration of the General Conference of 1872, touching the relation of a man of African descent to our episcopal office, and assert that race, nationality, color, or previous condition is no bar to the election of any man to the episcopal office in our Church, nor any other elective office filled by the General Conference.” (Journal 1876, p. 353.)

The fact that “papers asking that the residence of such bishop be in Liberia” had also been presented, though coming in all probability from opposition to the election of a man of African descent to the bishopric, like Thomas doubting his risen Lord, demonstrates the fact that that General Conference, by its Committee on Episcopacy, would have granted the petitioners in favor of the election to the episcopacy of a man of African descent their request, if they had produced a suitable man of African descent; or that the election of a missionary bishop for Liberia would put a quietus upon the agitation. If not this, then it declares that there were those in that General Conference who had expressed themselves as favoring every move touching the colored membership in the Church that would elevate and inspire them with hope for the future. The entire proceeding is, to my mind, inexplicable, were it not for the omnipresent fact that, so far as the Church is concerned, “God is in the midst of her.” The plea of the petitioners was not granted by that General Conference; but that is not stranger than the fact that other plans failed to be carried out at that General Conference, and for that matter every General Conference in the history of the Church from 1844 until to-day, that were, so far as arrangements, etc., go, already well supported before the meeting of the General Conference. Going back to the day of the adjournment of that General Conference, we say, we can wait.

The General Conference of 1880.—During the following quadrennium up to this General Conference the colored bishop question was more generally discussed than before. The official papers of the Church began to take notice of the question, while our brethren of the African and Methodist Episcopal Church, South, joined in to help on the good work—the former, in all probability, because of the supposed predicament it put the colored members into; and the latter, because they wished to push what they were pleased to call “the thorn in the flesh” farther into the quick of the white membership in the Church. The Baltimore District of the Washington Annual Conference passed a series of resolutions touching this question. Those resolutions were, in all probability, too radical when they declared the election of a man of African descent to our episcopacy “the only way the Church can hope to prove its good faith or respect for the numerous colored membership within the Church.” The fact is, the Church was not required to bring forth fruits to exhibit any such thing.

The Central Christian Advocate, our official organ at St. Louis, thus spoke on this subject:

“A few weeks ago the members of the Baltimore District Conference, Washington Annual Conference, passed a preamble and resolutions, in which they declare that members of African descent in the Methodist Episcopal Church do not enjoy practically the fullest recognition of Church fellowship and communion; that the only way to prove to them and the world that they are recognized as equals in the Church is the election of a man of African descent to the office of bishop; and they recommend their brethren to ‘agitate’ the question and, if necessary, to ‘demand’ the election of a colored bishop at the General Conference to be held in May, 1880. This is the action of a single district conference; to what extent it represents the opinions of the colored ministers of the Church we have no means of knowing; for, so far as we have observed, no other district conference has yet taken action on the subject.

“The action of a single district conference, however influential and worthy of consideration, scarcely brings a question before the Church sufficiently to make it at once a subject for general discussion in the official papers. We proposed, therefore, to wait and see whether the Baltimore District Conference represented the convictions of others than itself. But our editorial brethren of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, caught it up at once as a choice morsel, which afforded them a nice opportunity to worry, as they believe, the white membership of our Church, and to sow dissension among the colored members. The Richmond Advocate declared that intense mortification and confusion would seize upon the whites when this action of their colored brethren became known, and that not an official paper of the Church would dare mention what had taken place. It was a false prophet. And it must have been doubly surprised when the New York Methodist, which is presumed to represent the more conservative element in the Methodist Episcopal Church, promptly pronounced in favor of the election of one or two colored bishops. The Louisville Methodist thinks we have ‘a difficult problem’ on our hands, and, with an air of compassionate concern, informs our colored brethren ‘that all the important offices of the Methodist Episcopal Church will be filled by white men, notwithstanding the resolutions of the Baltimore District.’

“But the Louisville Methodist is too anxious to make out a case. It says that the colored members of our Church were greatly disappointed that a colored bishop was not elected in 1872. Had the editor consulted the published proceedings of that General Conference instead of drawing upon his imagination for his facts, he would have scarcely made such a statement. There was but one memorial before the conference on the subject, and it had only four signatures attached. The Committee on Episcopacy, to which it was referred, reported ‘that, in their judgment, there is nothing in race, color, or former condition that is a bar to an election to the episcopacy, the true course being for us to elect only such persons as are, by their pre-eminent piety, endowments, culture, general fitness, and acceptability, best qualified to fill the office.’ And no more eloquent speech was made during the conference than that of Hon. James Lynch, of Mississippi, a colored lay member, declaring that the colored men asked no favors on account of race, and that when they produced a man as fit for the place as those about them, it would then be time enough for action.”

The spirit manifested by our Southern brethren in the discussion of this question within our Church smacks of officiousness. They are in no way to be affected whether it is or is not done. While they have a perfect right to take part in any and all discussions worthy of public attention, anything like an attempt to sow the seeds of dissension among the members of any other denomination is, in the eyes of an ignorant black man, reprehensible, not to say unchristian. It gives room for complaint from the world that Southern “Methodists are no better than other folks.” The colored man who is simply a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church for the sake of “important offices” had better leave it—the sooner the better. No Christian white man remains in any Church for that sole reason; and, as Bishop Simpson once said: “A white man is as good as a colored man, if he behaves himself.” One thing is certain, that every such office-seeking colored man in the Church will fail to receive the support of every intelligent colored Christian within the Church. It is true that, on general principles, it was but a short time until the desire of the brethren of the Baltimore District became that of many others; that is, that it was thought necessary that a colored man should be elected to the bishopric.

When the General Conference of 1880 met in Cincinnati for its twenty-third session, this question again came up for discussion. Memorials and resolutions on this subject were presented from Washington Conference, by Henry A. Carroll; from Delaware Conference, by W. F. Butler, Zoar Church and Cambridge charge; J. C. Hartzell, from New Orleans preachers’ meeting; by John H. Dunn and J. H. Shumpert, from Mississippi, et al.; and C. O. Fisher presented an extract from the journal of Savannah Conference and from Atlanta District. On Wednesday, May 12th, on motion, the rules were suspended to allow E. W. S. Hammond to present the following paper:

“Whereas, It is clearly evident, from the memorials and petitions on the subject, and which were duly referred to the Committee on Episcopacy, that the colored people of the Methodist Episcopal Church desire a bishop of their own race; and whereas, the election of a colored bishop would be a practical recognition of our full manhood by the Church, and a grand influence in the extension of our work in the United States and in other lands; and whereas, the General Conference of 1872 did declare, and the General Conference of 1876 did reaffirm, with emphatic significance, that race, nationality, color, or previous condition is no bar to the election of any man to the episcopal office in our Church; and whereas, the General Conference of 1876 did recommend that the memorials, petitions, etc., on the above-named subject should be entitled to a careful consideration whenever the election of additional bishops shall become necessary; and whereas, the necessity for the election of additional bishops is apparent, and the way is now open for the practical operation of the above resolution; be it, therefore,

“Resolved, That this General Conference recommend the election of a colored man to the episcopacy.”

He supported the above preamble and resolution by a vigorous and timely speech, through courtesy of the General Conference, lasting over fifteen minutes.

On motion of L. C. Queal, the foregoing paper was laid on the table for the present. The memorials, followed hard by that resolution and speech, seemed to put the General Conference to thinking on the subject as never before.

It is not exactly certain that there was no opposition to the question at that General Conference. Why need any one demand a thing to which there is no objection? It would come as a matter of course. Some spirit of opposition anon manifested itself in a way as unfair as uncalled for. For instance, the following presented by A. W. Milby, of Wilmington Conference:

“Whereas, The question of a colored bishop is with great persistency urged upon the attention of the General Conference; and whereas, it is a question to be determined, not by appeals to sentiment, but by arguments and facts addressed to the reason and the understanding; and whereas, we believe that the records of the benevolent societies and the statistical reports of the several annual conferences, composed of colored preachers, will furnish the best data for a wise and godly judgment; therefore,

“Resolved, That the Committee on Episcopacy be, and are hereby, instructed to inquire into and report to this conference at an early day, the following items in respect to the conferences composed, in whole or in part, of colored preachers, to wit: (1) The amount of money contributed by said conferences to the Episcopal Fund during the last quadrennium. (2) The amount contributed to the missionary cause. (3) The amount contributed to the Church Extension Society. (4) The amount contributed to the Freedmen’s Aid Society. (5) The amount received by said conferences from the Missionary Society during the quadrennium. (6) The amount received from the Church Extension Society. (7) The amount received from the Freedmen’s Aid Society.”

On motion, the above resolutions were referred to the Committee on Episcopacy. The unfairness of such a proposition, as well as the unchristian spirit that produced it, become at once apparent, when it is remembered that in the Church of God the good to be done for our brother is not to depend either upon his willingly accepting it, demonstration of appreciation, the amount of wealth possessed by the recipients, or the amount of money they can or will produce. “How much will he bring at auction?” was the language of slave-traders in the past. The amount given for almost any cause by almost every person is dependent upon the intelligence possessed or communicated relating thereto, and the interest taken therein, coupled, of course, with financial ability. If the resolutions above referred to were germane, why not have each of the above conferences also report: (1) How many souls have been converted during the quadrennium? (2) How much religious fervor, comparative consistency in religious life, has been manifest among them? (3) How much time have they had, and under what circumstances, to be prepared to accumulate wealth, and then give it “as the Lord prospers them?” (4) What have they given, per capita, in comparison with their white brethren’s wealth, time, and influence, for the spread of the kingdom of God among men? (5) What proportion do they sustain to the rest of the membership of the Methodist Episcopal Church, numerically? (6) What per cent of their actual wealth do they give for the cause of Christ? If any special attention was paid to those resolutions, those in charge of our benevolent societies have no knowledge of it. The Church of God will never require such a test. Were the Methodist Church to do it, Satan would certainly be warranted in affirming that a dollar in her scales weighs more than an immortal soul.

The crisis in the question of a colored bishop came May 20th, when Report No. 3 of the Committee on Episcopacy was presented, as follows:

“The Committee on Episcopacy, having considered the memorials and petitions referred to it on the election of a bishop of African descent, adopted each of the following resolutions by a vote of thirty-nine to eight:

“Resolved, 1. That the best interests of our Church in general, and of our colored people in particular, require that one or more of our general superintendents should be of African descent.

“Resolved, 2. That we recommend that this General Conference elect one bishop of African descent.”

J. S. Smart moved to adopt; thereupon Alfred Wheeler presented the following minority report, and moved that it be substituted for the report of the majority:

“A portion of your Committee on Episcopacy, differing widely from the majority, both as to the necessity and expediency of electing a colored bishop at the present time, feel constrained to express our dissent by a minority report. After listening attentively to prolonged discussions upon the subject, and giving due weight to the arguments urged in its favor, and to full representation of the state of our religious work among the colored people of the South, representations made by themselves as well as by their white co-laborers, we are convinced that sound policy forbids the adoption of the recommendation of the majority.

“Resolved, therefore, That we deem it inexpedient to elect any more bishops at this General Conference.”

John Lanahan moved that the whole subject be indefinitely postponed. On motion of Emperor Williams, the yeas and nays were called, and the motion to postpone indefinitely was carried by two hundred and twenty-eight votes to one hundred and thirty-seven.

To show the interest manifested, of the three hundred and ninety-nine delegates, all were present and voted on that resolution save thirty-four. At page 282 of General Conference Journal of 1880 we have the list of names. There appear names of persons who voted indefinitely to postpone that question that surprises us a little; and not very much, either. However, a quietus was thus put upon that question for that session at least.

Let us look back for a moment. Has it not appeared in nearly every instance, when the colored membership have memorialized the General Conference, that not only has respectful attention been given, but concessions made? Has it not appeared as clearly, all the way through, that the Church, as such, is ready whenever the race presents a proper man? The voice of the Church not only declares its willingness, but even hints that while “race, color,” nor other special considerations are to be helps or hindrances, it is possible to elect a colored bishop by “fair and honorable competition between the friends of the respective candidates.”

There is no man within the Methodist Episcopal Church who would feel worse than the writer, were any General Conference of our Church to elect a white man to the episcopacy because he had been an Abolitionist, a Federal soldier, was a Japanese, or who had been a foreign missionary, but, aside from these things, had no other qualification. Just the same way would it be if any General Conference should elect to the office of bishop in our Church a colored man, simply because he had been a slave, or because he could make a passable speech, or deliver an acceptable sermon, or was pastor of a small congregation, but, aside from this, had no literary attainments, but little or no executive ability, and but little practical experience in general Church work. It would be no particular advantage under such circumstances, while it might do incalculable injury, not only to the general Church, but to the interests of the race in particular.

Hon. James Lynch, of Mississippi, declared in the General Conference of 1872, that no favors were asked on account of race. Rev. E. W. S. Hammond, in the eloquent speech delivered before the General Conference of 1880, in Cincinnati, said that the plea being made was not for a colored bishop simply for the colored people, but a bishop for the Methodist Episcopal Church. And now the way is not only open, but wisdom at the threshold of the bishopric in our Church cries to all, “There is nothing in race, color, or previous condition, a bar to entrance here, but the true course given me is to admit only those who, by their pre-eminent piety, godly judgment, and literary qualifications, are best fitted to fill the office.” There is not an intelligent Christian of color within our Church that does not bow assent to this sentiment. When as a race we are to be represented on our bench of bishops, we want a man who is, and will be, a credit to the Church, an honor to the race and to himself, an equal among equals in every respect—a representative man, “blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, modest, given to hospitality, apt to teach; not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; one that ruleth well his own household; not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.” Then, and not till then, ought a colored man be elected as “one of the bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church.”

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CHAPTER X
WHY ASK FOR A BISHOP OF AFRICAN DESCENT?

Do not the attitude sustained by the colored man to the Church, from his admission into the John Street Church in New York, and the actions taken by the Church relating to his interests, based as they have been upon the integrity and fidelity of the race, up to the granting of separate Conferences, warrant it? If not, why were not our German brethren satisfied until they were represented nationally or linguistically therein? The Church has hitherto carried out the most natural, as well as rational order of succession in this matter, that, if it leads anywhere, leads up, necessarily leads up, to this point. The colored ministers were recognized, licensed, given appointments, quarterly conferences, district and annual conferences, the presiding eldership, admitted as delegates to the General Conferences, elected to General Conference offices, and the Church declared that “race, color, or previous condition” was “no bar to election to the episcopacy in our Church.” If we are required and expected to go on to perfection, will any one deny that election to the episcopacy will push the whole race a step higher in the Divine life? Not simply because of this alone, but because the colored man, like white men, believes the bishopric a step higher, in office at least, than the eldership in our Church. He believes, like other men, that progression is the watchword of the hour. Who does not now know that a bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church is considered the most influential minister in the State, county, city, village, and in the general Church? No other office is paramount. The fact that there is to be allowed no discrimination on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude within the Church, it is claimed, guarantees to them not only the right to ask, but to expect help in securing the same, since it will never be possible for it to be done by the race alone within the Church.

Rev. A. E. P. ALBERT, D.D.,
Editor of Southwestern Christian Advocate,
NEW ORLEANS, LA.

It is therefore declared by many of both races within the Church, that justice to the race demands it as it could not for any other class of members within the Church. Nothing less than injustice can withhold that which is justly due. Now the colored members, whose influence has brought them forth into prominence in the Church, have never asked the General Conference to elect a bishop of African descent because our bishops have been one thing to white members and another to colored members, nor because our bishops, when coming among the colored members, have been “overseers” instead of superintendents, nor because they are not acceptable to the colored membership. Far from it. Our bishops to-day hold a place in the hearts of the colored membership of the Church that any man of African descent, elected to the episcopacy in our Church, could only desire, since he could not dislodge his white colleague. But it is asked for the same reason the Church gave years ago for the proper recognition of colored ministers when it said, it is “a principle patent to Christian enterprise that the missionary field itself must produce the most efficient missionaries.” Is not this an argument at once logically true in the case of a bishop of African descent? The reasons given by representatives from the South when asking for a separate conference were: (1) “It will secure greater efficiency in the prosecution of the work, since many things of great interest to an annual conference and to the Church never get farther than the humblest hearthstone.” (2) “It will relieve us from the taunts and sneers of designing men,” and secure the communion and friendship of many who would not otherwise unite with us. (3) “It will relieve the Church of even a suspicion of a spirit of caste, and make us feel as men, and the peers of our white brethren. (4) It will be no innovation upon any principle of Christianity or of our beloved Church,” but will mightily help in “rending the veil” and breaking down the middle wall of partition Satan has built between brethren out of the remains of slavery that existed in this country. Another reason is offered on the score of the numerical standing of the colored membership.

According to the statistics of 1884, there are now not far from 1,800,000 members within the Church. Of this number, there are about 300,000 colored members. “The constitutional rights of the colored members” being recognized, indeed all their rights and privileges, it would follow that, on general principles, one member in the Church has as many and varied rights as another. The colored members in the Church make up one-sixth of its membership. They would on this scale, therefore, be entitled to one representative on our bench of bishops for every six, and so on.

Will the time ever come when a colored bishop will be elected by the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church? This the future will tell. However ignorant we may now be as to whether it will ever be done or not, we can easily imagine the result of such an election. It would no doubt be as the bursting forth of some pent-up fountain which sends forth streams in opposite directions. Doubtless if there remain any within the Church who fear man more than God, they would likely flow outward toward more congenial climes, where the nursing of wrath brings imaginary peace. It is impossible to turn a mighty stream all at once out of its channel without some commotion. But then the onsweeping tide would soon wear another channel, and no more would be seen of the commotion than anon a ripple in the mighty stream. The other stream, flowing in the opposite direction, would be, to the Christian men and women of this land, “a stream that makes glad the city of God.” It would send a thrill of renewed vigor and confidence in God and Methodism all over this world. Every community where infidelity, skepticism, or Romanism now predominates would be hopelessly stunned, while a gainsaying world would not only stand aghast, but fall back before the enthusiastic shout of seven million hitherto rejected and ostracized images of God cut in ebony. It would be an incentive to Christians everywhere in general, and the three hundred thousand colored members, old and young, within the Church in particular, to live better lives and do better work. The older men who now hold positions of prominence in the Church would have more time in which to do their work, and would probably do it better, at any rate more hopefully. Instead of having to fight caste prejudice, and repel the insults heaped upon them hitherto by that hateful spirit, they would quietly prosecute their work. The younger men, who are already within the colored conferences would feel a desire, even if they were unable to make amends for lost time, better to prepare themselves for future usefulness. The colored annual conferences would at once begin to fasten the breaches in their fences, through which candidates for clerical orders have been creeping at times. The young men who would come flocking to the doors of the conferences for admission would find written over the archway, “No young man admitted to this conference until he shall be found possessed with the necessary qualifications,—‘gifts, grace, and usefulness.’”

Our college alumni, who have gone elsewhere seeking employment, would return. How much more proficient does that man try to be who knows there is a future before him, than the one who suspects there is none! Thousands of our talented young people have left us because they said they saw but little hope in the future for the colored ministry in our Church. Indeed, there was a time in the history of our colored work when the professional man, the mechanic, and the man of means among us, were all about to leave us in some localities, because it had been told them that within the Church we were but “hewers of wood and drawers of water.”

There was also a time when graduates of our institutions, in many instances, were given work by other denominations because we had none for them before they took their diploma from the campus of their alma mater. Why, it is impossible properly to educate a man, and then keep him from thinking, looking, and speaking for himself. It is only recently that the younger people of the race have become interested in our work. This is directly attributable to our separate conferences; while many who left us for “sufficient reasons” would return, and we could more securely hold those we now have.