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Exscinded!: the Schism of 1837 in the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America and the Role of Slavery

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Exscinded!: the Schism of 1837 in the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America and the Role of Slavery EXSCINDED!: THE SCHISM OF 1837 IN THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND THE ROLE OF SLAVERY by CATHERINE GLENNAN BORCHERT Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Dissertation Adviser: Dr. David C. Hammack Department of History CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY May 2009 2 Copyright © 2009 by Catherine Glennan Borchert All rights reserved 3 CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF GRADUATE STUDIES We hereby approve the thesis/dissertation of Catherine Glennan Borchert candidate for the Doctor of Philosophy degree *. (signed) David C. Hammack (chair of the committee) Timothy Beal John D. Grabowski Kenneth A. Ledford Kenneth Sawyer (date) December 8, 2008 *We also certify that written approval has been obtained for any proprietary material contained therein. 4 Table of Contents Preface 6 Abstract 7 Prologue I: The Nature of a Presbyterian 9 Chapter 1. Introduction a. A traditional explanation and a response, doctrine or slavery? 18 b. Historiography by era and topic 25 c. Overview of material presented 50 Chapter 2. The Nature of Presbyterians a. Decently and in Order 57 b. Schisms and Relations to Other Christians 63 c. Peace, Unity and Purity 68 d. Church and Society 81 Chapter 3. Past and Present Bring the Future: the Context that led to 1837 a. 1837 – Annus horribilis? 86 b. Presbyterians before 1837, a dip into history 1. Of the European origins of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America 102 2. The Presbyterian Experience in the Colonies, the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 112 3. Expansion in the new Republic, 1790-1833 129 4. General Assemblies, 1834-36 143 A. The General Assembly, 1834 144 B. Act and Testimony 151 C. Proceedings of the Pittsburgh Convention 152 D. The General Assembly, 1835 157 E. The General Assembly, 1836 163 Chapter 4. The General Assembly of 1837 in depth a. An orderly and ordinary beginning? 185 b. May 22, 1837 – The Strategy Begins 197 c. A New Week: Reports, Reports 210 d. Beginning of the End: Action and Protest 226 e. Done! Order Prevails, But Was It Decent? 265 f. Epilogue: Reaction, 1838 General Assemblies, Court Cases 280 Chapter 5. Through the Years: Slavery/Antislavery and the Presbyterian Church a. National Context 291 b. Official actions of General Assemblies and their Predecessors 295 c. Actions of Presbyteries and Synods 317 5 d. From the periphery: material from newspapers and other sources 325 Chapter 6. Conclusions 344 a. Power and control; peace, unity or purity; Presbyterian or Christian? 346 b. Role of Slavery in the excision of 1837 353 c. Relevance in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and Mainline Unrest in the early 21st century 360 Appendices: Transcriptions of various primary materials. A. The Adopting Act of 1729 367 B. Plan of Union of 1801 and Related Documents 368 C. Actions of the Synod and the General Assemblies 371 D. Act and Testimony document of 1834 382 E. Official Acts of Presbyteries 389 F. Testimony and Memorial, 1837 399 G. Newspaper articles, before and after the schism 402 H. The Auburn declaration, August 17, 1837 453 I. Official reporting of distribution serving Congregational churches, 1837 457 J. Extract from Chief Judge Gibson’s Opinion, 1839. 459 K. Voting Record from the General Assembly of 1837 460 Bibliography 6 Preface Twelve years after the founding of the Synod of the Western Reserve in Northeastern Ohio, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America voted at its annual gathering in 1837 to remove that Synod, its members, churches and presbyteries bodily from the national fellowship, treating the Synod and its constituents as if they had never existed. Nearly fifty years earlier the General Assembly itself had been founded with representation from and enthusiastic support of ecumenical church bodies; thirty-six years since the Assembly had acted to cooperate closely with the Congregational churches and Associations to found churches on the frontier, which included the Western Reserve of the state of Connecticut; and thirty-four years since that frontier was accepted into the federal union as part of the state of Ohio. In a time of rapid growth, enthusiastic change and national optimism about the nature of the federal union, this church body turned its back on its own union and its growth, choosing a path that ultimately caused it to be reduced by nearly half its former membership. What led to the outcome? Why did it happen at such a time? What was the nature of the body that participated in the split? How was it accomplished? Who were the men (for men only were able to participate in this vote) who found it necessary to excise a portion of their body, and why did they feel it necessary to take this action? This paper is an attempt to address all of these questions – and to note a way in which this exposition is relevant to the churches of the United States of America in 2009, a relevance beyond that of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) alone. 7 Exscinded!: The Schism of 1837 in the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America and the Role of Slavery Abstract by CATHERINE GLENNAN BORCHERT Twelve years after the founding of the Synod of the Western Reserve in northeastern Ohio, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America voted in 1837 to remove that Synod together with three other synods in Western New York, their members, churches, and presbyteries bodily from the denomination, treating the synods and their constituents as if they had never existed. In a time of rapid growth, enthusiastic change and optimism about the nature of the federal union, this church body turned its back on its own union and growth, choosing a path that ultimately caused it to be reduced by nearly half its former membership, and a new denomination to be formed of the exscinded portions together with like-minded others. This new denomination had the same name as the body that rejected it, but was popularly known as the New School of the Presbyterian Church. Many who wrote about this incident, both contemporaneously and subsequently, attributed the schismatical decision to differences in doctrine, theology, or governance. Relatively few noted the overarching societal concern about chattel slavery, the role of the church in sustaining or removing slavery from the country, and the way in which agitation 8 over slavery and anti-slavery affected both individual church members and the institutional church. In the early 21st century, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), together with other Protestant denominations, faces schism over the ordination of active homosexuals. Parallels between the two eras are used to shed light on the earlier split, with analyses of the nature of believers who are Presbyterian, insights from earlier Presbyterian church history, a close reading of the General Assembly actions from 1834 through 1837, and a review of anti-slavery agitation found in contemporary religious newspapers. The conclusion reached is that considerations surrounding slavery became key for conservatives in their successful strategy to take over the church and assure that the chaotic frontier could no longer control the Presbyterian Church. 9 Prologue: The Nature of One Presbyterian “History is nothing but a collection of fables and useless trifles, cluttered up with a mass of unnecessary figures and proper names.”1 Isaiah Berlin, in his analysis of Leo Tolstoy’s theories and philosophy of history, states that Tolstoy believed that historians choose an “apparently arbitrary selection of material” with a “no less arbitrary distribution of emphasis.”2 In the years since Berlin wrote The Hedgehog and the Fox, historians have wrestled anew with the meaning and content of the historical task, its capacity for objectivity and its ultimate purpose. A writer of history, therefore, is well advised to attempt to be clear as to the meaning, purpose, and value of the project that is undertaken. In a way that would seem very strange to the historians of the nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries in their search for the only and absolute “truth” of an historical event, current practice of the art and craft of history may include the placing of the explorer of historical facts into the narrative that is to be told, told through the particular view and vision chosen by the historian. In this way, the reader becomes a partner in discovery by being able to understand why a specific story is presented, rather than the myriad tales that might be told of the same incidents. The reader is encouraged to understand the “apparently arbitrary selection” which will frame the history through the special and specific lens chosen, and then judge its value or critique its insufficiency through that or another lens preferred by the reader. 1 Berlin, Isaiah. The Hedgehog and the Fox. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1953Ibid. p. 13. 2 Ibid. p. 15. 10 Tolstoy further stated, “History does not reveal causes; it presents only a blank succession of unexplained events.”3 In writing about an incident that occurred 170 years ago, with seemingly limited value for today’s world, I find this material relevant, exciting, challenging, and illuminating for the complex religious and political world of the twenty- first century. The “blank succession of unexplained events” may be given interpretations which show, at the least, a part of our journey to the present, uncover forgotten experiences, and reveal areas which our mythology of past greatness and purity would prefer to ignore or forget. Tolstoy was wrestling with a world which had newly discovered “science” and which therefore claimed that history was also a science in which absolutes could be discovered and passed down from generation to generation.
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