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: