ESTABLISHment of THE "METIIODIST.”

505

place of Hibbard as editor of the "Northern Christian Advocate"; Samuel H. Nesbit, of Baird, editor of the Pittsburg Charles Elliott, of Brooks, editor of the Central. William L. Harris was elected assistant corresponding secretary of the Missionary Society.

Soon after the adjournment of the conference, the "Methodist," a weekly paper, was established in the city of New York by an association of ministers and laymen. George R. Crooks, with whom Abel Stevens was afterward associated, was editor, assisted by an able staff of contributing editors. It took a conservative position upon the slavery question, was devoted chiefly to the advocacy of lay representation, and speedily obtained a very large cir culation, which materially diminished the patronage of the "Christian Advocate."

Two of the border conferences repudiated the new statute adopted by the Conference of 1860. The Baltimore by a unanimous vote determined "not to hold connection with any ecclesiastical body that makes non-slaveholding a condition of membership in the church." At a preachers' meeting held September 14, 1860, in Wesley Chapel, after a formal complaint against the action of the General Conference on the subject of slavery, a plan was proposed for concentrating at the following General Conference the conservative element of the church, and among the demands to be made were a repudiation of the new chapter and the placing of the control of the question with the Annual Conferences. A convention of laymen from within the bounds of the Baltimore, East Baltimore, Philadelphia, and West Virginia conferences was held on the 5th of December at the Eutaw Street Church in BaltiA delegation was present from New York on the 6th. Of the one hundred and sixteen churches in the Baltimore Conference, sixty-three were represented. An ad

more.

dress to the conference named was adopted, urging it to sever its connection with the General Conference.

Agitation arose in that part of the Philadelphia Conference known as the Peninsula, suggesting negotiations with the Baltimore and other border conferences. The subject was discussed at the Baltimore Conference without bringing matters to an issue; but Bishop Scott declined to ordain a candidate for elder's orders because he publicly excepted to the new chapter, stating the ground of his action in these words: "I regard myself restrained from ordaining any one who declines to take upon him the ordination vows without qualification or exception."

At the same time a convention of laymen, by a vote of ninety-one to thirty-two, passed resolutions recommending the adoption of resolutions to the effect that the unconstitutional action of the General Conference had destroyed the unity of the church, and that the Baltimore Conference does not recognize its jurisdiction. Should three quarters of the Annual Conferences within a year agree with it in abrogating the new chapter and in ignoring the whole subject of slavery in the Discipline, the Baltimore Conference would reunite with them in church-fellowship.

Scott refused to entertain motions relating to a division of the church, but subsequently allowed the secretary to put the question on the adoption of a similar series of propositions. On resuming the chair he ordered a paper to be spread on the " Journal " declaring the action null and void regarded as conference action, and proceed to finish the business of the session. One hundred and thirty-two of the one hundred and seventy-one members of the conference were present; eighty-three voted for immediate separation.1 Throughout the border excitement prevailed, and it spread to all parts of the church.

1 Matlack.

CHAPTER XX.

THE FRATRICIDAL WAR AND ITS SEQUELS.

THE state of the country became alarming. Discussions, of which the institution of slavery was the center, had necessitated its introduction into national politics, where it was complicated with the controversy upon the fundamental question as to whether the national government is a federal union of States or a federal union of the people. The relation of slavery to the Territories became a burning issue, upon which the newly formed Republican party took the ground that slavery had no constitutional standing in the Territories. The Democratic party divided between the followers of Douglas, who held that the people of the Territories should have the right to decide for themselves, and the main body, which declared that slave-holders settling in the Territories had a constitutional right to take with them their property in slaves.

The failure of the Republican party to elect John C. Fremont President did not give rest to the country, and a bitterness was engendered which could have but one result. The effort of the Union party, which nominated John Bell, of Tennessee, and Edward Everett, of Massachusetts, respectively for President and Vice-President, as an attempt to cast oil upon the troubled waters, though patriotic in purpose, was a failure.

The election of Abraham Lincoln in November, 1860, brought to a crisis the explosive elements which had been gathering beneath the surface of a wonderful national prosperity. When Fort Sumter was fired upon the distinction between conservatives and radicals in the Methodist Episcopal Church relatively to slavery disappeared.

The records of the Baltimore Conference show that sixty-six ministers of that body had withdrawn, headed by John S. Martin, the secretary, who carried the archives with him. The minutes contain the declaration made by them on the twenty-third day of March, 1861, and state that "if any of the above-named brethren be present and coöperate in the business of the conference at its next session, or shall sooner signify to the bishops their acknowledgments of the jurisdiction of the church, this conference will consider their act of withdrawal as null and void."

No returns were received at that conference from the Winchester, Lewisburg, Roanoke, Rockingham, and Potomac districts, which, the preceding year, had reported 16,756 members and 2193 probationers. These districts were afterward formed into a district of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. The next year a new district, entitled the Virginia, was formed, with John Lanahan as presiding elder. It consisted of only seven appointments, but the minutes contain a significant addendum: "Other appointments in the Virginia work will be announced as circumstances may require." The record of the Baltimore Conference for 1863 shows a decrease of 21,065 members.

The Rev. Anthony Bewley, who was a member of the General Conference of that year from Arkansas, and who joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1848, was hung by a mob on the 13th of September, 1866, at Fort Worth, Tex. He had been falsely charged with promoting an insurrection in Texas, and, not desiring trouble, had de

THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION.

509

parted from the State, but was pursued by his antagonists and brought back. So great was the prejudice against the Methodist Episcopal Church as an abolition body that on Sunday, the 13th of the preceding March, while Bishop Janes was conducting the Arkansas Conference and was about to preach, Judge Roberts, accompanied by a mob, entered the church and notified the bishop to leave within two hours, declaring that if that church did not cease its work in Texas "blood would be shed, and the responsibility would be on the bishop and conference."

The conferences, in most instances without a dissenting voice, passed resolutions pledging their influence to encourage and assist the army and navy to maintain the Union.

The Central Ohio Conference in 1861 passed resolutions contemplating the proclamation of universal freedom as the only solution of the existing difficulties. The same body forwarded a resolution, passed at Greenville, September 22, 1862, declaring: “We believe the time is fully come when, from a material necessity for the safety of the country, such a proclamation should be made; and we earnestly beseech the President of the United States to proclaim the emancipation of all slaves held in the United States, paying loyal men a reasonable compensation for their slaves. Before the communication reached Washington the President had issued a proclamation, to go into effect the first day of the new year.

A circumstance which Bishop MeTyeire' declares made a deep wound is thus described by him: "After the federal forces had occupied large sections of Southern territory, Bishop Ames, with preachers of the Methodist Episcopal Church, followed the victorious army with an order procured from Secretary of War Stanton, and

1 In his history.