The special report in this case on the petition from the Sharpe Street Church of Baltimore, asking for a separate conference, reported as follows:
“That having carefully considered the memorials, and feeling an earnest desire to do all that can be done to promote the spiritual interests of our colored people, they recommend to the General Conference for adoption the following resolutions:
“Resolved, That the organization of such (separate) conferences at present is inexpedient.
“Resolved, That the Discipline be so amended that the fifth answer in section 10, part 2, shall read as follows: ‘The bishops may employ colored preachers to travel and preach where their services are judged necessary: Provided, that no one shall be so employed without having been recommended by a quarterly conference.’”
Thus the work of the colored members of the Methodist Episcopal Church began as the great Church itself began, evolving out of necessity, and guided by Providence.
The already existing Churches—the African and African Zion—were not allowed to operate to any great extent in the Southern States by the customs and laws of these States; hence, without giving any reason, it was wise to conclude that at that time, and in that territory, the organization of a separate colored conference among our people, within the Church, was “inexpedient.” And yet the Church was willing to do what it thought best under existing circumstances. The colored ministers within the Church were henceforth to travel and preach at the discretion of the bishops. This was the beginning of colored traveling preachers in the Methodist Episcopal Church.
CHAPTER IV
THE COLORED PASTORATE.
The employment of colored ministers in the traveling connection in the Church, like Methodism itself, was a child of necessity. It has grown to be a man, however, and is the father of several children. Notwithstanding the secession of nearly all our white conferences and Churches—500,000 members in the slaveholding States before mentioned—the record is not written where the Methodist Episcopal Church extended overtures to them to return that in any way involved the relinquishment of its hold on the throat of slavery, or that equaled that offered by our revered president, Abraham Lincoln, to the Southern Confederacy, if they would return to the Union. The whole question of opposing slavery by the Church seems to have been, all along, a work of conscience, not to be repented of; that the work had to be done, because the seal of God’s approval rested upon it. The action and firm stand taken by the Church in 1844 put a quietus upon all who professed to believe the rules relating to slavery would not be enforced during the ensuing quadrennium.
The General Conference of 1852, that met in the city of Boston, was called upon to consider the expediency of separate conferences for colored members. The custom of the Church had usually been to leave all colored congregations, in the appointments, “to be supplied.” But as the work progressed and the colored membership found the braggadocio of those “who went out from us” was invading the rank and file of their work; that each year it increased with telling and disheartening effect, and the more ambitious members among us were becoming restless and wavering in their opinions, threatening with dissolution the work of the colored members within the Church, the members within the bounds of the Philadelphia and New Jersey Conferences—at any rate from members of our Church in Pennsylvania and New Jersey—sent up, not only memorials to this General Conference, but representative men of the more intelligent class, to represent them and see, at the same time, the way the great Methodist Episcopal Church would treat colored memorialists. When the memorials were presented, asking again for separate conferences, they were promptly referred to the Committee on Missions. After careful examination of the memorials, they called before them the representatives. “An open and free discussion of the interests at stake and the benefits anticipated therefrom, was had.” The committee then submitted to the General Conference the following: