The Colored Man in the Methodist Episcopal Church

by L. M. Hagood

This, in itself, showed that the friends to the educational work of the Church among the white people of the South were on the alert; that the next General Conference would have to speak out as to aiding them.

During the quadrennium following the adjournment of that General Conference the question of changing the name of the Freedmen’s Aid Society was discussed. During the discussion it was very evident that “the color-line” was being crossed and recrossed, denied and affirmed, objected to and supported, execrated and declared a blessing. Some declared that the reason for wanting the name of the society changed was: (1) Not simply that the society might help more largely in carrying on educational work begun by our white membership in the South, but (2) to make them eligible to such aid without being considered second to the colored man, or seeming to have to accept the crumbs that fall from the colored man’s table, prepared for him by the Methodist Episcopal Church in the presence of his enemies; (3) that those who are willing to aid in the educational work of the Church among the whites, without any of it being used to help colored students, may have a chance thus to display their liberality; (4) that those within the Church who have all along refused to contribute to the support of the benevolences of the Church because of their objection to the bringing in of this Gentile proselyte on an equal footing, may have a chance to empty their liberal gifts into the coffers of the Church. Indeed, so high ran this discussion during the quadrennium, that some even went so far as to declare it an effort to fan anew the slumbering but not quenched embers of caste prejudice; to keep verdant the rank weeds of race prejudice that continue to grow rank and prolific in the swamps and bayous, on the mountains and hill-sides, the plains and valleys of some of our Church-work in the South. This question, in many minds, swung around to the previous conditions of the two races within the Church in the South. To give some idea of the previous conditions of the two races within the Church in the South hitherto, we quote from the address of the president of the society, Bishop Walden, the following:

“Our Church had access to two classes on entering this field,—the whites in North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas, and Texas, and the colored people in all of the States from which she had been excluded. The condition of these classes was different. The whites were impoverished by the war, but they had some possessions and some kinds of business; they had church-buildings, however dilapidated; but in some places all Church organizations had been disbanded, and in other places the connectional bonds were broken; they were ready, however, for reorganization, and in Eastern Tennessee almost an entire conference (the Holston) voluntarily sought and was given a place among our annual conferences. The colored people had not lost property, for they had none to lose; they had no Church organizations nor buildings, and their Church membership, at best, was only nominal; all they had was their recently proclaimed freedom and their hands trained to toil.

“Picture to yourselves for the moment those to whom our Church found an open door—the impoverished and almost churchless white people, and the colored people, who were not only without homes, but without the relations of the home; not only without earthly possessions, but impoverished in the best elements of their nature. It may be no marvel that societies were soon gathered and conferences soon organized among the whites, for with them it was chiefly a work of reorganization and edification. But what of the work among the freed people—those who had only toiled as house-servants and slave-mechanics and field-hands? Here, among them, the very foundations of Church-work had to be laid, and our first movement in this direction—the necessary and the right movement—was to give them, at once, their normal relation in and to the Church.”

Let us examine the status of these two classes. The whites had been (1) “impoverished by the war,” whether they took sides with the Union or against it. If the latter was the case, it is evident that they had been slaveholders themselves or friendly to the slave oligarchy. And yet these same people had left them some “possessions and some kinds of business.” They had “church-buildings, however dilapidated. They were ready for reorganization.” It was not so with the colored people. “These were without homes, without the relations of home; not only without earthly possessions, but impoverished in the best elements of their nature.” These poor colored people had never had the advantages of any enlightening influences save such as came to “house-servants, slave-mechanics, and field-hands.” How true is it that “here among them the very foundations of Church-work had to be laid.” The Methodist Episcopal Church went down South hunting “the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” for whom no denomination seemed to care much at that time. The whites had for twenty years, more or less, worshiped with, or were members of, the Southern Methodist Episcopal Church; a few standing alone and waiting till a better day appeared. Here was an opportunity also to turn aside and give aid to this other class of our membership in the South, by teaching them the doctrine of the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Such men as Rev. John P. Newman and Bishop Gilbert Haven went down to help. Their eloquence, erudition, religious and moral force, told only here and there. Such men made but little headway toward the bringing in of “whole annual conferences” among the whites into our Church. They were unpopular save among the poor freedmen. Some of the white members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the South have no interest in the work of the Methodist Episcopal Church that does not come to them unencumbered by any reminiscences of the past or present relations of the two races. The growth of our white membership in the South during the last ten years has been considerable. Is it not strange that the whites and the blacks within the Methodist Episcopal Church in the South sustain to-day, in some places, the same relation to each other that the Jews used to sustain to the Samaritans? Do we not find, just along here somewhere, the key to the situation in the South within our Church, as well as cause for the action of the General Conference above referred to?

If required to state from our own knowledge what is positively believed to be an ungarnished truth, we would say that so far as a majority of our white membership in the South is concerned we, as a Church, have not succeeded in dislodging a single one of the old prejudices against “race and color.” It is known that there are beautiful exceptions, but they are like angels’ visits to earth nowadays. The only redeeming feature has been, that the Church, as such, has never yielded a single point in favor of caste in the South. We have known instances where white preachers of white congregations in our Church in the South stayed away from colored annual conferences to keep from being introduced as members of our Church. The instances in the South in which the white ministers demanded a separate conference, because of the relations of the two races, are not few. The Methodist Episcopal Church understood all the while that this was the condition of affairs in every nine cases in ten in the South where “a color-line conference” was desired. Hence, the heart of the Church being right, she always put in “a proviso” when authorizing the creation or division of conferences.

The action taken by the General Conference of 1876 on the question, corroborates the above statement. It is as follows:

“The committee have, by a large sub-committee, given much time to its consideration, and have investigated carefully the matter referred to them. They have considered the numerous memorials, petitions, and resolutions presented to the General Conference on the subject, whether from annual conferences, conventions, or private individuals. They have consulted with most, if not all, the delegates to the General Conference, who represent conferences particularly interested in the question of division, and have studied the history of the movements in several conferences seeking to effect or prevent division within a few years past, and report the following result of its investigation.”

Then follows a concise, yet full, statement of the reasons, pro and con, with this conclusion:

“From these facts, and after impartially inquiring into the whole subject, your committee recommend for adoption the following resolutions: