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JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES

IN

Historical and Political Science

HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor

History is past Politics and Politics present History.—Freeman

ELEVENTH SERIES

V-VI

CHURCH AND STATE IN NORTH
CAROLINA

BY

Stephen Beauregard Weeks, Ph. D.,

Professor of History and Political Science,
Trinity College, North Carolina.

BALTIMORE

The Johns Hopkins Press

published monthly

May-June, 1893

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Copyright, 1893, by The Johns Hopkins Press.

THE FRIEDENWALD CO., PRINTERS,
BALTIMORE.

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CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

Introduction.

Summary of an earlier paper on “The Religious Development in the Province of North Carolina,” 7. Purpose of the present paper, 8.

CHAPTER II.

Church and State under the Proprietors, 1711-1728.

Influence of Acts of 1711 on the Colony, 9. They legalize dissent by reaffirming the Toleration Act, 9. The Toleration Act; an “Act of Indulgence”; its value, 10. The first Church Acts met with rebellion; the latter fought along legal and technical lines, 11. The first Acts nominally repealed, but remain practically in force, 12. Vestry Act of 1715; parishes, vestrymen, oath, salary, tax, churches; reception, 13. Drawback to the work of the S. P. G. in North Carolina in the character of their missionaries, Brett, Blair, Gerrard, Rainsford, Taylor, Newman, Blacknall, and Bailey, 15. Biographies of Urmstone, Gordon, and Adams, 16. Bad influence of the missionaries on the people and on the development of the Colony, 22.

CHAPTER III.

Church and State under the Royal Government, 1728-1776.

Burrington made Governor in 1730; his instructions, 23. The eighty-second section re-enacts the Schism Act, 23. Terms of the Schism Act, 1714-1718, 24. Exasperating character of this Act and its probable enforcement, 24. Efforts of Burrington for an Establishment in 1731 and 1733, 26. The state of the Church and of the colony religiously, 27. Johnston made Governor in 1734; former instructions renewed, 27. His zeal for the Establishment leads him to misrepresent the Dissenters; their numbers, and character of their work, 28. Vestry Act of 1741; parishes, vestrymen, oath, tax, 29. Activity in ecclesiastical legislation; special taxes, 30. The Act of 1741 probably of little effect, 31. Dobbs made Governor in 1754; former instructions renewed, 32. The labors of Dobbs for the Establishment, 32. The ten years’ fight over the Church laws, 32. This fight due to the contested right of presentation, 34. Evil influence on the Establishment, 35. Encourages Dissenters; their character in 1760, 36. Their method of fighting the Establishment, 36. The Vestry Act of 1764 and its probable cause, 37. Tryon made Governor in 1765; his views of toleration, 38. Schism Act renewed; and enforced in New Bern, 1766; in Edenton, 1768; rumblings

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of discontent, 39. Martin made Governor in 1771; Church and Schism Acts renewed, 40. Schism Act enforced against Queen’s Museum in 1773, 40.

Marriage Acts, 1669, 1715, 1741; discussion of the latter, 42. The limitations sought for in the Clergy Bill of 1762, 43. The Marriage Act of 1766; its reception; protests from Mecklenburg, Tryon, Anson, Orange, and Rowan counties, 43. The Marriage Act and the War of the Regulation, 45.

The inequality of Muster laws, 46.

The Quakers and the Affirmation; the case of Borden, 47.

Summary: Little direct persecution; note on the Baptists in New Bern, 48. Persecution indirect by (1) tithes, extent, by (2) Muster laws, in (3) the Marriage Acts, by (4) the Schism Act, 50. Both English and Colonial governments responsible, 52.

CHAPTER IV.

The Fall of the Establishment.

The beginning of the end; Vestry Act of 1768 the last, 53. Gov. Martin’s contrast of Churchmen and Presbyterians and argument for the better establishment of the Church, 53. Churchmen generally faithful to the American cause, 54. Dissatisfaction with ecclesiastical laws highest in Mecklenburg, 54. Their instructions to delegates to Halifax Conventions of April and November, 1776, 55. The latter adopts a constitution and provides for religious freedom, 56.

CHAPTER V.

Epilogue.

The work of the Constitution completed by Acts of Assembly, 57. The absence of a guarantee of religious freedom in the Federal Constitution provokes much hostility in North Carolina, 58. Attacks of Abbot, Caldwell, Lenoir and Lancaster answered by Iredell, Johnston, Spencer and Spaight, 58. North Carolina neither “to ratify nor to reject,” but to propose a Bill of Rights and amendments; adopts Constitution after amendments are proposed by Congress, 60. The thirty-second clause of the State Constitution of 1776, 61. Gaston’s summary of the interpretation of this clause, 62. Probably aimed at but not enforced against Catholics, 63. Gaston’s interpretation and action in 1833, 63. Convention of 1835 substitutes “Christian” for “Protestant,” 64.

Bibliographical Note, 65.

Directory of Files  Chapter I►