{"product_id":"1855-methodist-south-discipline","title":"1855 METHODIST SOUTH DISCIPLINE. South Carolina Methodist MSs Notes he Tires of Discussing Slavery","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eAn important example of \u003ci\u003eThe Doctrines and Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South\u003c\/i\u003e for 1855, issued just eleven years after the historic 1844 schism that fractured American Methodism along regional and slavery lines. The division was directly ignited when the national church demanded that Georgia Bishop James Osgood Andrew divest himself of enslaved people he had acquired through marriage, leading Southern delegates to secede and form a distinct denomination that explicitly sanctioned slaveholding among its members and clergy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis 1855 Nashville imprint, issued by denominational agents E. Stevenson and F. A. Owen, reflects the fully institutionalized pro-slavery theology of the Southern church, which stripped away or heavily modified the traditional anti-slavery restrictions present in earlier John Wesley-inspired Disciplines. By codifying a religious framework that defended human bondage as compatible with Christian orthodoxy and scriptural mandate, this volume serves as a vital primary document demonstrating how major American religious institutions institutionalized white supremacy, defended the plantation economy, and accelerated the national political sectionalism that ultimately led to the Civil War.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis the copy of, and extensively signed and notated by, Rev. William Adney McSwain, pioneering Methodist preacher in South Carolina. The often-substantive notes appear to have been taken in real time in Nashville during the General Conference of the Methodist Church South, which convened there in May of 1858. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePerhaps the most poignant note occures on page 30 in the General Rules for the Methodist Episcopal Church South. In the section on slavery, McSwain has crossed out \"The buying and selling of men, women, and children, with the intention to enslave them,\" and has notated in the margin, \"Leave off, and be done with it. 140 votes for. 8 Against.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eThe volume also contains an origin of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South which explicitly calls for \"the erection of the annual conferences in the slaveholding States into a separate ecclesiastical connection\" and includes a statement of their official position on States rights as primary.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt the rear, there is a handwritten docket of names of persons who had apparently attended  or been delegates to the General Conference in Nashville. They include Colonel William Henry Gist, one of the leaders of Secession and later Governor of South Carolina, and many others. Gist was himself an ardent Methodist and held significant roles in MECS leadership in South Carolina. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Doctrines and Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Nashville, Tennessee. E. Stevenson \u0026amp; F. a. Owen, Agents for the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 1855. 267pp. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGood - to fair in original cloth; rubbed as shown with some losses. A bit handled, r flyleaf torn with losses at bottom 1\/3. Pencil notes belonging to McSwain throughout. He has signed his name perhaps 50 times.  \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Specs Fine Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51302432899108,"sku":null,"price":650.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0093\/3910\/9435\/files\/08-26-2026SpecsFineBooks-2.jpg?v=1787858906","url":"https:\/\/specsfinebooks.com\/products\/1855-methodist-south-discipline","provider":"Specs Fine Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}