We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2009
In 1868 Ulysses S. Grant remarked that there were three great parties in the United States: the Republican, the Democratic, and the Methodist Church. This was an understandable tribute, given the active role of leading Methodists in his presidential campaign, but it was also a realistic judgment, when set in the context of the denomination's growing political authority over the previous half century. As early as 1819, when, with a quarter of a million members, “the Methodists were becoming quite numerous in the country,” the young exhorter Alfred Branson noted that “politicians… from policy favoured us, though they might be skeptical as to religion,” and gathered at county seats to listen to the preachers of a denomination whose “votes counted as fast at an election as any others.” Ten years later, the newly elected Andrew Jackson stopped at Washington, Pennsylvania, en route from Tennessee to his presidential inauguration. When both Presbyterians and Methodists invited him to attend their services, Old Hickory sought to avoid the political embarrassment of seeming to favor his own church over the fastest-growing religious movement in the country by attending both—the Presbyterians in the morning and the Methodists at night. In Indiana in the early 1840s the church's growing power led the Democrats to nominate for governor a known Methodist, while tarring their Whig opponents with the brush of sectarian bigotry. Nationally, as the combined membership of the Methodist Episcopal Church [MEC] and Methodist Episcopal Church, South [MECS] grew to over one and a half million by the mid-1850s, denominational leaders could be found complaining that the church was so strong that each political party was “eager to make her its tool.” Thus Elijah H. Pilcher, the influential Michigan preacher, found himself in 1856 nominated simultaneously by state Democratic, Republican, and Abolition conventions.
1. Posey, Walter B., The Development of Methodism in the Old Southwest, 1783–1824 (Tuscaloosa, Ala.: Weatherford, 1933), 1;Google ScholarJones, Donald G.,The Sectional Crisis and Northern Methodism: A Study in Piety, Political Ethics and Civil Religion (Metuchen N.J.,: Scarecrow, 1979), 226–27;Google ScholarBrunson, Alfred, A Western Pioneer: or, Incidents in the Life and Times of Rev. Alfred Brunson, A.M., D.D., Embracing a Period of over Seventy Years (Cincinnati, 1872), 1:217–18, 344–45;Google ScholarClark, Robert D., The Life of Matthew Simpson (New York: MacMillan, 1956), 105–11;Google ScholarChristian Advocate and Journal (New York; hereafter cited as CA), 12 June 1856;Google ScholarPilcher, James E., Life and Labors of Elijah H. Pitcher (New York, 1892), 115–16.Google Scholar
2. Mathews, Donald G., “Evangelical America: The Methodist Ideology,” in Rethinking Methodist History: A Bicentennial Historical Consultation, eds. Richey, Russell E. and Rowe, Kenneth E. (Nashville: Kingswood, 1985), 91.Google ScholarThe “alternative value system” of early Methodists has long been a feature of the movement's historiography. Over the last twenty years or so, since Mathews, in Religion in the Old South (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977), offered an analysis of the egalitarian elements of Southern evangelicalism in the early republic, the countercultural and antielitist thrust of early Methodism has been the subject of increasing scrutiny, most notably inGoogle ScholarWilliams, William H., The Garden of American Methodism: The Delmarva Peninsula, 1769–1820 (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1984);Google ScholarHatch, Nathan O., The Democratization of American Christianity (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1989);Google ScholarRichey, Russell E., Early American Methodism (Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press, 1991);Google ScholarHeyrman, Christine Leigh, Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt (New York: Knopf, 1997);Google ScholarWigger, John H., Taking Heaven by Storm: Methodism and the Rise of Popular Christianity in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998);Google ScholarLyerly, Cynthia Lynn, Methodism and the Southern Mind, 1770–1810 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).Google Scholar
3. Richey, Russell E., Early American Methodism (Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press, 1991), xii–iii, xvii–iii, 33,35–44,102;Google ScholarHood, Fred J., Reformed America: The Middle and Southern States, 1783–1837 (University, Ala.: University of Alabama Press, 1988).Google Scholar
4. Richey, , Early American Methodism, 40–41,88–91.Google Scholar
5. Tefft, Benjamin F., The Republican Influence of Christianity: A Discourse (Bangor, Maine, 1841), 1–8.Google ScholarSee also Doggett, Daniel S., A Sermon on the Death of General William Henry Harrison, Late President of the United States, Delivered in the Chapel of Randolph Macon College, April 18, 1841 (Richmond, Va., 1841);Google ScholarPeck, George, National Evils and Their Remedy: A Discourse Delivered on the Occasion of the National Fast, May 14,1841 (New York, 1841);Google ScholarWestern Christian Advocate (Cincinnati; hereafter WCA), 24,31 July, 7 Aug. 1840, 24 Sept. 1841 (Leonidas Hamline), 19,26 Feb., 9 Apr. 1841 (Rezin Sapp), 21 May 1841 Qames B. Finley).Google Scholar
6. Marsden, George M., Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Evangelicalism, 1870–1925 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), 7, 85–93, 252.Google ScholarKleppner, Paul, The Third Electoral System, 1853–1892: Parties, Voters, and Political Cultures (Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 1979), esp. xix–xx, 185–97, distinguishes between “evangelical pietists,” who saw conversion as only part of a broader obligation to sanctify society, and “Salvationist pietists,” who felt no responsibility to transform the wider culture. His categories correspond respectively to Marsden's “Calvinists” and “pietists,” which are less cumbersome and no less theologically nuanced.Google Scholar
7. Hobart, Chauncey, Recollection of My Life: Fifty Years of Itinerancy in the Northwest (Redwing, Minn., 1885), 202–3;Google ScholarFletcher, Calvin, The Diary of Calvin Fletcher, eds. Thornbrough, Gayle, Riker, Dorothy L., and Corpuz, Paula, 6 vols. (Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, 1972–1977), 3:80;Google ScholarMiller, Thomas B., Original and Selected Thoughts on the Life and Times of Rev. Thomas Miller, and Rev. Thomas Warburton (Bethlehem, Pa., 1860), 17;Google ScholarBangs, Heman, The Autobiography and Journal of Rev. Heman Bangs (New York, 1872), 316;Google ScholarSmith, Leonard F., “Diary,” 29 August, 17 November 1860, Illinois State Historical Society, Springfield.Google ScholarWatson, Harry L., Jacksonian Politics and Community Conflict: The Emergence of the Second American Party System in Cumberland County, North Carolina (Baton Rouge: University of Louisiana Press, 1981), 240–41, identifies a high proportion of political abstainers among the Methodists of that county.Google Scholar
8. Northwestern Christian Advocate (Chicago; hereafter NWCA), 12 November 1856; WCA, 6 January 1843;Google ScholarMcAnally, D. R., Life and Times of Rev. S. Patton, D.D., and Annals of the Holston Conference (St. Louis, 1859), 239.Google Scholar
9. Moody, Granville, A Life's Retrospect: Autobiography of Rev. Granville Moody (Cincinnati, 1890), 311;Google ScholarLewis, William G., Biography of Samuel Lewis, First Superintendent for Common Schools for the State of Ohio (Cincinnati, 1857), 369;Google ScholarSpottswood, Wilson L., Brief Annals (Harrisburg, Pa., 1888), 39.Google Scholar
10. McDonald, William and Searles, John E., The Life of Rev. John S. Inskip, President of the National Association for the Promotion of Holiness (Chicago, 1885), 49; WCA, 25 June 1856;Google ScholarLawrence, William H., The Earnest Minister: A Record of the Life, Labors and Literary Remains of Rev. Ruliff S. Lawrence (Philadelphia, 1873), 29; New York Evangelist, 4 January 1844.Google Scholar
11. CA, 5 June 1829; Lee, Luther, Autobiography (New York, 1882), 233;Google ScholarLee, Luther, A Sermon for the Times: Prohibitory Laws (New York, 1852);Google ScholarClark, Davis W., Evils and Remedies of Intemperance: An Address (New York, 1847), 11, 13–15;Google ScholarGoodwin, Thomas A., Seventy-Six Years Tussle with the Traffic; Being a Condensation of the Laws Relating to the Liquor Traffic in Indiana from 1807 to 1883 (Indianapolis, 1883), 8–9.Google Scholar
12. McDonald, and Searles, , The Life of Rev. John S. Inskip, 49; WCA, 25 June 1856.Google Scholar
13. Berg, Barbara, The Remembered Gate: Origins of American Feminism: The Woman and the City, 1800–1860 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), 167–68;Google ScholarGinzberg, Lori, Women and the Work of Benevolence: Morality, Politics, and Class in the Nineteenth-Century United States(New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1990), 71–79;Google ScholarSpottswood, , Brief Annals,135–36.Google Scholar
14. J. C. Chambers to M. Simpson, 2 May 1850; J. L. Smith to M. Simpson, 23 May 1850; W. Daily to M. Simpson, 5 December 1850, M. Simpson Papers, Library of Congress;Google ScholarJohnson, Lorenzo D., Chaplains of the General Government, with Objections to their Employment Considered (New York, 1856), 63 and passim;Google ScholarSmith, George G., The Life and Times of George Foster Pierce (Sparta, Ga., 1888), 324;Google ScholarWade, John D., Augustus Baldwin Longstreet: A Study of the Culture of the South (1924; reprint Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 1969), 123–24;Google ScholarFitzgerald, Oscar P., John B. McFerrin: A Biography (Nashville, 1888), 91,116, 168–69,196–99,243.Google Scholar
15. Harrison Medal Minstrel: Comprising a Collection of the Most Popular and Patriotic Songs (Philadelphia, 1840), 3,21,65;Google ScholarLittell, J. S., The Clay Minstrel: or, National Songster (2nd ed.; Philadelphia, 1844), 235–36; J.Campbell to W. B. Campbell, 4 February 1840, quoted inGoogle ScholarAlexander, T. B., “Presidential Election of 1840 in Tennessee,” Tennessee Historical Quarterly 1 (1942): 26–27;Google ScholarThe Life and Public Services of…J.K. Polk (Baltimore, 1844), 5; WCA, 7 Aug. 1840; Jonesboro Whig, 9 May 1840.Google Scholar
16. Bloch, Ruth H., Visionary Republic: Millennial Themes in American Thought, 1756–1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 56, 61, 63, 204–5, and passim.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
17. New York Tribune, 25 July 1856;Google ScholarJonesboro Whig, 8 December 1847.Google Scholar
18. For ethnocultural approaches, see Benson, Lee, The Concept of Jacksonian Democracy: New York as a Test Case (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961), esp. 288–328;Google ScholarFormisano, Ronald P., The Birth of Mass Political Parties: Michigan, 1827–1861 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971);Google ScholarHolt, Michael F., Forging a Majority: The Formation of the Republican Party in Pittsburgh, 1848–1860 (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1969);Google ScholarKleppner, The Third Electoral System. The classic economic interpretation is Schlesinger, Arthur M., The Age of Jackson (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1945). Recent influential interpretations, based on the primary importance of a changing economy, include Watson, Jacksonian Politics and Community Conflict;Google ScholarAshworth, John, “Agrarians & Aristocrats”: Party Political Ideology in the United States, 1837–1846 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1983);Google ScholarSellers, Charles, The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815–1846 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991).Google Scholar
19. Boogher, Sophia Hogan, Recollections of John Hogan by His Daughter (St. Louis, 1927), 40–41.Google Scholar
20. CA, 4 November, 23 December 1840, 17 November 1841;Google ScholarFee, William I., Bringing the Sheaves: Gleanings from the Harvest Fields in Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia (Cincinnati, 1896), 134–37;Google ScholarAnthony, James D., Life and Times of Rev. J. D. Anthony: An Autobiography (Atlanta, 1896), 80–81;Google ScholarRivers, Richard H., The Life of Robert Paine, D.D., Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South (Nashville: Publishing House of the M.E. Church, South, 1916), 99.Google Scholar
21. Goodman, Paul, “The Social Basis of New England Politics in Jacksonian America,” Journal of the Early Republic 6 (1986): 23–58;CrossRefGoogle ScholarWatson, , Jacksonian Politics and Community Conflict, 23–24.Google Scholar
22. Baker, George C., An Introduction to the History of Early New England Methodism, 1789–1839 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1941), 41–9;Google ScholarNinde, Mary L., William Xavier Ninde: A Memorial (New York, 1902), 50–51.Google Scholar
23. Brunson, , Western Pioneer, 1:35–43,172–73.Google Scholar
24. Bangs, however, had his Methodist critics. Foster, Charles I., An Errand of Mercy: The Evangelical United Front, 1790–1837 (Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 1960), 223–48.Google Scholar
25. Brunson, , Western Pioneer, 1:344–45.Google Scholar
26. Bangs, Nathan, A History of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 4 vols. (New York, 1838–1841), 2:351;Google ScholarCartwright, Peter, Autobiography of Peter Cartwright: The Backwoods Preacher, ed. Strickland, W. P. (New York, n.d.), 64–72 and passim;Google ScholarCarwardine, Richard, “Unity, Pluralism and the Spiritual Market Place: Inter-denominational Competition in the Early American Republic,” in Studies in Church History: Unity and Disunity, ed. Swanson, R.N. (B. Blackwell, Oxford, 1996), 317–35.Google Scholar
27. Richardson, F., From Sunrise to Sunset: Reminiscence (Bristol, Term., 1890), 107–8.Google Scholar
28. CA, 14 December 1842; WCA, 18 November 1842; Carwardine, Richard J., Evangelicals and Politics in Antebellum America (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1993), 199–234.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
29. Sellers, , Market Revolution, 137–38, 157–61, 164–65, 178, 299–300;Google ScholarFletcher, , Diary, passim;Google ScholarBoogher, , Recollections of John Hogan, 18;Google ScholarCrane, William W., Autobiography and Miscellaneous Writings (Syracuse, 1891), 84–85;Google ScholarSmith, L. F., “Diary,” 9 October 1860;Google ScholarCarwardine, Richard J., “‘Antinomians’ and ‘Arminians’: Methodists and the Market Revolution,” in Melvyn Stokes andGoogle ScholarConway, Stephen, The Market Revolution in America: Social, Political and Religious Expressions, 1800–1880 (Charlottesville, Va.: University of Virginia Press, 1996), 282–307.Google Scholar
30. Williams, William W., The Garden of American Methodism, 174–75;Google ScholarBrunson, , Western Pioneer, 1:173;Google ScholarCartwright, , Autobiography, 98;Google ScholarSmith, L. F., “Diary,” 3 September 1860.Google Scholar
31. Holder, Ray, William Winans: Methodist Leader in Antebellum Mississippi (Jackson, Miss.: University Press of Mississippi, 1977), 103–4;Google ScholarCrane, , Autobiography, 79;Google ScholarBrunson, , Western Pioneer, 2:139 and passim;Google ScholarLewis, William G., Biography of Samuel Lewis, First Superintendent for Common Schools for the State of Ohio (Cincinnati, 1857), 200–2, 211;Google ScholarDictionary of American Biography, s.v. “David Rice McAnally”;Google ScholarJames, Edmund J., “Reverend Colin Dew James: a Pioneer Methodist Preacher of Early Illinois,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 9 (1917): 451.Google Scholar
32. For an extended discussion of this theme, see Carwardine, , Evangelicals and Politics, 199–234.Google Scholar
33. Gienapp, William E., The Origins of the Republican Party, 1852–1856 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), passim;Google ScholarAdams, B., “Diary,” 1, 4 11 1856, Methodist Center, Drew University;Google ScholarHaven, Gilbert, “The National Midnight,” in Gilbert Haven, National Sermons: Sermons, Speeches and Letters on Slavery and Its War (Boston, 1869), 120–21;Google ScholarAllen, Stephen, The Life of Rev. John Allen, Better Known as “Camp Meeting John” (Boston, 1888), 41;Google ScholarGienapp, William E., “Who Voted for Lincoln?” in Thomas, John L., ed., Abraham Lincoln and the American Political Tradition (Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986), 75;Google ScholarSmith, L. F., “Diary,” 8, 29 08, 3, 10 September, 15 october 1860; Chicago Tribune, 25 May 1860;Google ScholarHamilton, W. to M. Simpson, 23 02 1861, M. Simpson Papers, Methodist Center, Drew University.Google ScholarCfSwaney, Charles Baumer, Episcopal Methodism and Slavery: With Sidelights on Ecclesiastical Politics (Boston: R. G. Badger, 1926), 283, which underestimates Methodist support for Lincoln in 1860.Google Scholar
34. Fitzgerald, , McFerrin, 186;Google ScholarPittsburgh Christian Advocate, 30 April 1840; CA, 30 October 1844, 14 May 1845;Google ScholarStringfield, T. to his wife, 4 June 1844, Stringfield Papers, Southern Historical Collection, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. For the schism in the MEC in 1844, and its implications for the Union and for sectional alienation,Google Scholarsee Goen, Clarence C., Broken Churches, Broken Nation: Denominational Schisms and the Coming of the Civil War (Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 1985);Google ScholarSwaney, , Episcopal Methodism and Slavery.Google Scholar
35. Jones, Arthur E., “The Years of Disagreement, 1844–61,” inGoogle ScholarBucke, Emory Stevens et al. , eds., The History of American Methodism, 3 vols. (Nashville: Abingdon, 1964), 2:159–76;Google ScholarFee, , Bringing the Sheaves, 242–34;Google ScholarBascom, Henry et al. , Brief Appeal to Public Opinion, in a Series of Exceptions to the Course and Action of the Methodist Episcopal Church, from 1844 to 1848 (Louisville, Ky., 1848), 93–106,127–34; CA, 12 January, 24 May 1848.Google Scholar
36. Hibbard, Freeborn Garrettson, Biography of Rev. Leonidas L. Hamline, D.D., Late One of the Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church (Cincinnati, 1880), 192–93, 216;Google ScholarKnoxville Whig, 22 07 1846; CA, 3 November 1847, 24 May 1848; WCA, 27 September, 25 October 1848, 9 October 1850;Google ScholarSouthern Christian Advocate (Charleston, S.C), 9 06 1848.Google Scholar
37. Waugh, Lorenzo, A Candid Statement of the Course Pursued by the Preachers of the Methodist Church South, in Trying to Establish Their New Organization in Missouri (Cincinnati, 1848), 60–61;Google ScholarWaugh, L., Autobiography of Lorenzo Waugh (San Francisco, 1896) 164–66;Google ScholarKnoxville Whig, 25 August 1849;Google ScholarHibbard, , Hamline, 211–15;Google ScholarThompson, J. to Bond, T., 30 October 1846;Google ScholarTwiford, P. to Bond, T., 24 November 1846,Google ScholarBond, T. E. Papers, Dickinson College; CA, 5,12 October, 11,18, 25 November 1846, 20, 27 January, 3,10,24 February 1847.Google Scholar
38. WCA, 11 February, 17, 24, 31 March, 7, 28 April, 26 July 1848, 24 December 1851;Google ScholarCA, 19 July 1848, 21 March, 13 June 1850;Google ScholarSouthern Christian Advocate, 28 March 1845, 2,16 June 1848, 28 November 1851, 5,19 November 1852;Google ScholarKnoxville Whig, 24 January, 6 April 1849;Google ScholarBascom, et al. , Brief Appeal, 5;Google ScholarHibbard, , Hamline, 218–22;Google ScholarMyers, Edwin H., The Disruption of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 1844–46: Comprising a Thirty Years'History of the Relations of the Two Methodisms (Nashville, 1875), 151;Google ScholarJones, , “The Years of Disagreement, 1844–61,” 177–81;Google ScholarMoody, , Life's Retrospect, 227.Google Scholar
39. CA, 6 October 1847;Google ScholarBascom, et al. , Brief Appeal, 10,60,165–69.Google Scholar
40. Waugh, , Candid Statement, 70;Google ScholarWaugh, , Autobiography, 149–71;Google ScholarCA, 5 January, 15 March, 24 May, 19 July 1848, 17 October 1850;Google ScholarHibbard, , Hamline, 205;Google ScholarFee, , Bringing the Sheaves, 239–40;Google ScholarWCA, 27 September 1848;Google ScholarStewart, John, Highways and Hedges; or, Fifty Years of Western Methodism (Cincinnati, 1870), 260;Google ScholarThomson, Edward, Life of Edward Thomson, Late Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church (Cincinnati, 1885), 87–88.Google Scholar
41. WCA, 9 July, 17 September, 1 October 1856;Google ScholarDennis, L. B. to Simpson, M., 22 January 1856, M. Simpson Papers, Library of Congress.Google Scholar
42. WCA, 2, 23 May, 25 July, 15, 22 (quoting Central Christian Advocate), 29 August, 5, 26 September, 10 October, 7 November 1855;NWCA, 25 May, 29 October 1856;CA, 10 July, 7 August 1856.Google Scholar
43. Smith, Wesley, A Defence of the Methodist Episcopal Church against the Charges of Rev. S. Kelly and Others, of the M.E. Church, South (Fairmont, Va., 1855), 21, 42,45, and passim.Google Scholar
44. Richmond Christian Advocate, 13 January 1859;Google ScholarSouthern Christian Advocate, 11 February 1858, 16 June, 21 July, 11 August 1859;Google ScholarKnoxville Whig, 15 May 1858, 8 October 1859, 21 January, 18 February 1860.Google Scholar
45. Ridgaway, Henry B., The Life of Edmund S. Janes, D.D., LL.D. (New York, 1882), 224–29;Google ScholarCentral Christian Advocate (St. Louis), 26 September, 10 October 1860; CA, 27 September, 22 November 1860.Google Scholar
46. CA, 30 August, 27 September 1860;Google ScholarCentral Christian Advocate, 26 September 1860.Google Scholar
47. CA, 10–31 May, 7–28 June, 5 July, 27 September 1860 (for New Orleans Christian Advocate); Knoxville Whig, 30 06, 29 September 1860; Southern Christian Advocate, 2 August 1860; Texas Christian Advocate, 31 May 1860, quoted in Wesley Norton, Religious Newspapers in the Old Northwest to 1861:Google ScholarA History, Bibliography and Record of Opinion (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1977), 122;Google ScholarTexas Christian Advocate, 13 September 1860, quoted in Central Christian Advocate, 26 September 1860; North Carolina Christian Advocate (Raleigh, ), 6 November 1860.Google Scholar
48. Goen, , Broken Churches, Broken Nation;Google ScholarBucke, et al. , History of American Methodism. The Bewley affair is addressed inGoogle ScholarNorton, Wesley, “The Methodist Episcopal Church and the Civil Disturbances in North Texas in 1859 and 1860,” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 68 (1965): 317–11, andGoogle ScholarReynolds, Donald J., “Reluctant Martyr: Anthony Bewley and the Texas Slave Insurrection Panic of 1860,” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 97 (1993): 345–61.Google Scholar
49. NWCA, 13 September 1860.Google Scholar
50. NWCA, 13 September 1860.Google Scholar
51. See, for example, Albany Evening Journal, 19 September 1860.Google Scholar
52. Haven, , National Sermons, 179.Google Scholar
