The Rise and Fall of Religious Liberty in America by C. M. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 3, 1908

The Rise and Fall of Religious Liberty in America

By C. M. S.

The Virginia Legislature Is Besieged by the Baptists

Among all those who struggled for religious liberty in the early days of Virginia, the chief credit must be awarded to the Baptists; for they alone pursued a consistent course, in their attitude toward the state and toward the establishment of religion by law. This statement has no reference to the Quakers; for, while their course was consistent, they can hardly be said to have struggled to attain liberty of conscience. They suffered under the conditions then prevalent, and did little to alter them. The Baptists, from the time of their entrance into the colony, insisted upon worshiping God according to the dictates of conscience, taught the inconsistency of state interference in matters of religion and of religious interference in matters of state, and stood opposed to the legal establishment of religion in any guise whatsoever. They suffered much, but their cause won adherents rapidly.

The Methodists, affiliating with the established church, upheld the church-state in its course, and opposed the efforts of the Baptists and Presbyterians to bring about a change in the oppressive conditions. The Episcopalians held tenaciously to the privileges they had so long enjoyed, and opposed every move looking toward liberty of conscience in Virginia. The Presbyterians, because of their agreement with Governor Gooch, were practically estopped from doing anything aggressive against the establishment until Revolutionary times. Nevertheless, they did protest against some of the oppressive conditions in Virginia, which affected them directly, as early as 1775.

In the year 1768 Baptist ministers began to be imprisoned in Virginia. Two years later the Baptists began to petition the House of Burgesses for a redress of some of their grievances. The House journal of May 26, 1770, has this record of the matter:—

A petition of several persons, being Protestant dissenters of the Baptist persuasion, whose names are thereunto subscribed, was presented to the House and read; setting forth the inconveniences of compelling their licensed preachers to bear arms under the militia law, and to attend musters, by which they are unable to perform the duties of their function; and further setting forth the hardships they suffer from the prohibition to their ministers to preach in meeting-houses, not particularly mentioned in their licenses; and, therefore, praying the House to take their grievances into consideration, and to grant them relief.

One week later the committee to which the petition was referred reported as follows:—

Resolved, That it is the opinion of this committee that so much of the said petition as prays that the ministers or preachers of the Baptist persuasion may not be compelled to bear arms or attend musters be rejected.

The recommendation to reject was agreed to by the House. The Baptists, however, were not discouraged, and two years after the rejection of their reasonable petition concerning their ministers serving in the militia, four petitions were presented to the House from the Baptists, all within the month of February, 1772. Concerning the first of these the House journal of February 12 has this record:—

A petition of several persons of the County of Lunenburg, whose names are thereunto subscribed, was presented to the House and read; setting forth that the petitioners, being of the society of Christians called Baptists, find themselves restricted in the exercise of their religion, their teachers imprisoned under various pretences, and the benefits of the Toleration Act denied them, although they are willing to conform to the true spirit of that Act, and are loyal and quiet subjects; and, therefore, praying that they may be treated with the same indulgence, in religious matters, as Quakers, Presbyterians, and other Protestant dissenters enjoy.

The first favorable mention of these petitions occurs in the journal of February 25, as follows:—

“Resolved, That it is the opinion of this committee that the petition of sundry inhabitants of the counties of Lunenburg, Mecklenburg, Sussex, and Amelia, of the Society of Christians called Baptists, . . . is reasonable.” The resolution was agreed to by the House, and the “committee for religion” was ordered to bring in a bill in harmony therewith. Accordingly, on February 27, this entry appears in the journal:—

“A bill for extending the benefit of the several Acts of Toleration to his majesty’s Protestant subjects in this colony, dissenting from the Church of England, was read a second time,” and “committed to the committee for religion.”

This committee, in harmony with its instructions, prepared a bill which was read the third time, on July 1, 1772; but it proved objectionable to both Baptists and Presbyterians, and never became a law. In the meantime another Baptist petition had been presented, this one from Caroline County. On account of the disagreement between the governor and the House of Burgesses, nothing was accomplished in the line of legislation between the years 1772 and 1774. It was just at this time that James Madison, a young college graduate of twenty-one years, began to be heard on behalf of liberty of conscience. His first known expression of sentiment upon this question occurs in a letter to a college friend at Philadelphia, by the name of Bradford. From that letter the following quotation is taken:—

I have nothing to brag of as to the state and liberty of my country. Poverty and luxury prevail among all sorts; pride, ignorance, and knavery among the priesthood, and vice and wickedness among the laity. This is bad enough; but it is not the worst I have to tell you. That diabolical, hell-conceived principle of persecution rages among some, and, to their eternal infamy, the clergy can furnish their quota of imps for such purposes. There are at this time in the adjacent country not less than five or six well-meaning men in close jail for publishing their religious sentiments, which, in the main, are very orthodox. I have neither patience to hear, talk, or think of anything relative to this matter; for I have squabbled and scolded, abused and ridiculed, so long about it, to little purpose, that I am without common patience. So I must beg you to pity me, and pray for liberty of conscience, to all.

The clergy of whom Madison speaks thus deprecatingly were the clergy of the established church; and the conditions which he depicts are the conditions that have always prevailed where religion, or a particular form of religion, has been established by law. The letter above quoted was written on Jan. 24, 1774. On the first day of the following April, Madison again wrote to the same friend in reference to the matter; and this letter is interesting, as showing the difficulties against which the advocates of religious liberty had to contend. He says:—

Our Assembly is to meet the first of May, when it is expected something will be done in behalf of the dissenters. Petitions, I hear, are already forming among the persecuted Baptists, and I fancy it is the thought of the Presbyterians also to intercede for greater liberty in matters of religion. For my own part, I can not help being very doubtful of their succeeding in the attempt. The affair was on the carpet during the last session; but such incredible and extravagant stories were told in the House of the monstrous effects of the enthusiasm prevalent among the sectaries, and so greedily swallowed by their enemies, that I believe they lost footing by it. And the bad name they still have with those who pretend too much contempt to examine into their principles and conduct, and are too much devoted to ecclesiastical establishment to hear of the toleration of the dissentients, I am apprehensive, will be again made a pretext for rejecting their requests. . . . That liberal, catholic, and equitable way of thinking, as to the rights of conscience, which is one of the characteristics of a free people, and so strongly marks the people of your province, is little known among the zealous adherents to our hierarchy.

The agitation then being carried on by the Baptists and Presbyterians, and such defenders as Madison and Jefferson, began to make the priests and officials of the established church fear for the continuance of their dominance and special privileges. Concerning this the historian Semple says:—

The zealots for the old order were greatly embarrassed. “If,” say they, “we permit them to go on, our church must come to nothing; and yet, if we punish them as far as we can stretch the law, it seems not to deter them; for they preach through prison windows, in spite of our endeavors to prevent it.”

The struggle was now on in earnest. It was the beginning of the grapple between the oppressor and the oppressed in Virginia.

From this year, 1774, the hierarchy began to lose ground. It was in this year that the Presbyterians first petitioned the assembly for relief from what they considered an unsatisfactory condition. Of this, and of the vigorous work which both Baptists and Presbyterians did from 1774 to the close of the Revolution, we will speak in another article.

C. M. S.