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Baptists and Race in the American South1 84 Journal of European Baptist Studies 19:2 (2019) Baptists and Race in the American South1 Kenneth B. E. Roxburgh The essay explores the attitude of Baptists in the American South towards race, indicating that the issue is long lasting. It includes a survey of racism in the early nineteenth century, culminating in the civil war, but extending to the Jim Crow era and the more recent expressions of white supremacy. Special attention is paid to the formation and development of the Southern Baptist Convention, and the ‘repentance’ of the Convention at the 1995 Southern Baptist Convention with respect to its origins in 1845 over the issue of slavery. The article also examines the way in which integration at Samford University, a Baptist school in Alabama, illustrates the struggle for equality between the races. Keywords Race; slavery; Jim Crow era; white supremacy; racial reconciliation Introduction Baptist life in the American South has a long and troubled history, marked by remarkable growth and yet facing various issues of discerning the will of God, especially in regard to race. Up until the Revolutionary War in 1776, significant westward expansion had been halted at the Appalachian Mountains. Following the Revolution there was a sense of national identity, optimism, and hope. The economy was strong and the population was growing. The Louisiana purchase of 1803 would double the size of the country, as over 900,000 square miles were purchased for fifteen million dollars. The territory was carved into thirteen states, or parts of states, and put the United States in a position to become a world power. New railroads enabled the nation to expand westward. From 1795 to 1810 a broad rekindling of Christianity took place throughout the emerging country. During this period of time, Alabama became a significant centre of Baptist life. By the middle of the nineteenth century Marion, Alabama was the headquarters of the Southern Baptist Home Mission Board, along with Howard College, preparing men for ministry and Judson College, educating women. The first Baptist congregation in Alabama was constituted in October 1808, the first of many small congregations which emerged in the frontier. 1 This material was first presented as the biennial Hughey Lecture at the International Baptist Theological Study Centre in Amsterdam in January 2018. Roxburgh, Baptists and Race in the American South 85 Wayne Flynt speaks of the ‘blossoming of evangelical religion on the Alabama frontier’, which he describes as being as prolific as corn and cotton.2 By 1812 there were nearly 200,000 Baptists in America, half of them in Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia, and Kentucky. By 1850 the number was about 1.6 million. While the population of America increased from 7.2 million in 1810 to 23.2 million in 1850, the number of church members increased even faster. By the middle of the century an estimated one-third of the population affiliated to some form of organised religion, twice the percentage of 1776. The Baptist congregations which emerged in Alabama defined themselves, both individually and also within Baptist Associations,3 in various statements of principles or abstracts of faith, to clarify their understanding of their faith. By 1823, the one hundred and twenty congregations which had been established belonged to seven geographic associations. By 1839 there were ‘thirty associations with 500 churches, 300 ministers, and 25,000 members’. The majority of these congregations were Calvinistic in their theology. The Flint River Association, formed in 1814, declared their faith in ‘the doctrine of election; and that God chose his people in Christ before the foundation of the world’.4 In 1818, the Salem-Troy Association amplified its statement on election to include ‘detrimental (i.e. reprobation) and particular election’.5 A minority view was expressed by the United Baptist Churches of Jesus Christ in 1843, when they expressed their belief in ‘the doctrine of free salvation and a general atonement’.6 These early Baptists took their theology seriously. Despite the fact that most of the ministers were bi-vocational farmers and preachers, they maintained a high view of ordained ministry, arguing that ‘no ministers have a right to the administration of the ordinances, only such as are regularly baptized, called and come under the imposition of hands by the presbytery’.7 Ordination was ‘by the imposition of hands by a presbytery of ministers gathered to evaluate the applicant’s character, mental 2 Wayne Flynt, Alabama Baptists: Southern Baptists in the Heart of Dixie (University of Alabama Press, 1998), p. 4. The state of Alabama was constituted in 1819. 3 Flynt, Alabama Baptists, pp. 7, 11. 4 Larry Hale, Flint River Baptist Association Minutes and Historical Articles 1814-2004 (No Publisher, 2005), p. 8. The Cahawba Association, formed in 1818, adopted an identical Abstract of Principles. 5 Harold D. Wicks, Salem-Troy Baptist Association: Past and Present (Troy, 1990), p. 22. See also Glenda Brack, County Line Baptist Church (No Publisher, 2005), p. 1. 5 Harold D. Wicks, Salem-Troy Baptist Association: Past and Present (Troy, 1990), p. 22. See also Glenda Brack, County Line Baptist Church (No Publisher, 2005), p. 1. 6 They adopted the name of North River United Baptist Association. In their fifth article they stated: ‘We believe that Jesus Christ, the son of God, did make atonement for all men in general, but the benefits of the atonement specially are only received by the true believer.’ 7 Hale, Flint River, p. 8. 86 Journal of European Baptist Studies 19:2 (2019) qualifications, and doctrinal soundness’.8 So, in 1849, The Alabama Baptist, the State Baptist Newspaper, asked ‘whether in our whole connection, a church can be named, in which a member would not be promptly excluded, who would venture to administer baptism or the Lord’s Supper, in the absence of regular ordination as a Minister’.9 This led to communion services being celebrated on a quarterly or semi-annual basis, as many congregations only met on a monthly basis for public worship, their pastors being shared with surrounding congregations. During the first half of the nineteenth century, Baptists united around missions. In May 1814, thirty-three delegates met at the First Baptist Church in Philadelphia to form the General Missionary Convention of the Baptist Denomination in the United States for Foreign Missions. This is often referred to as the Triennial Convention, because it would meet every three years. Although the majority of delegates came from the North, they chose a President, Richard Furnam, from Charleston, South Carolina. In 1817, at its second meeting, the Convention extended its work to Home Missions. In 1824 the Baptist General Tract Society was formed and in 1832 the Triennial Convention split their responsibilities into two, with the American Baptist Home Mission Society being formed to promote the preaching of the gospel in North America. By 1844 Baptists had seventy- nine overseas missionaries and thirty-two in America. As the century progressed, one issue began to undermine the unity which Baptists had known on mission – chattel slavery. There had been anti- slavery societies in Kentucky by 1808, in Tennessee by 1815, and in North Carolina by 1816. Indeed, by 1826, there were forty-five societies in the South. However, from the 1820s to the 1840s, anti-slavery sentiment among Baptists and other evangelicals in the South disappeared and an elaborate economic, political, and biblical defence of slavery emerged. While Baptists in the North agitated for abolition, believing that slavery was an awful sin before God, Baptists in the South followed the arguments of Richard Furman concerning the biblical basis of slavery. Richard Furman published his Treatise on Slavery in 1822, arguing for the ‘lawfulness of holding slaves – the subject being considered in a moral and religious point of view’.10 Furman argued that in the Old Testament ‘the Israelites were directed to purchase their bond-men and bond- maids of the Heathen nations’ and in the New Testament, when those who had slaves were converted, the relationship between ‘masters and slaves 8 Hosea Holcombe, History of the Rise and Progress of Baptists in Alabama (Philadelphia, 1840), pp. 311- 322. 9 See ‘Communications’, The Alabama Baptist, 16 May 1849, p. 3 (italics original). 10 Richard Furman, Treatise on Slavery (1822), pp. 82-86. Roxburgh, Baptists and Race in the American South 87 were not dissolved’. For Furman, the ‘Divine Law never sanctions immoral actions’. While arguing against cruelty, ‘servitude may be consistent with such degrees of happiness as men usually attain in this imperfect state of things’. Indeed, he maintained that the ‘manner of obtaining slaves from Africa is just…..[it had been] the means of saving life…..even piety has been originally brought into operation in the purchase of slaves’ and transporting them from Africa ‘has been the means of their mental and religious improvement, and so of obtaining salvation’. Slaves, in the providential purposes of God would then be able to take the message back to their home continent. Rather than seeking their release, ‘slavery, when tempered with humanity and justice, is a state of tolerable happiness’ and ‘a master has a scriptural right to govern his slaves so as to keep them in subjection, to demand and receive from them a reasonable service and to correct them for neglect of duty’.11 Paul Harvey speaks of how ‘Sermons in defense of slavery became a religious ritual in the antebellum South.’12 Both Baptist agencies, the Home Mission Society and the Triennial Convention, attempted to be neutral on the issue. Two events in 1844 thwarted this and led to schism between the North and the South. First of all, Georgia Baptists nominated a slave-holder for appointment by the Home Mission Society to test the waters.
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