Chapter I: The Undermining of Puritan Standards and Institutions (2)

Five years later, when the exemption law of 1752 expired and with it the exemption laws that previously had been passed for the relief of the Quakers, a new law was enacted governing both sects.[66] Henceforth a Baptist who desired exemption must have his name upon a list to be presented annually to the assessor and signed by the minister and three principal members of the Baptist congregation to which the applicant belonged, with the accompanying certification that the applicant was recognized as a conscientious and faithful Baptist. Quakers were placed under the same regulations. For thirteen years this law was in operation, with manifold instances of distress resulting, particularly in the case of Baptists.[67] Through difficulty in obtaining the certificates, goods were seized, expensive and otherwise irritating court trials were held, and not a few victims, either because of poverty or on account of conscientious scruples, found their way to prison. In some instances, despite the fact that the certificates were duly obtained and presented, they were waved aside and the payment of the tax required or the process of distraint invoked.[68] It is little wonder that the feeling in the minds and hearts of New England Baptists that there was a spirit of iniquity back of the oppressive measures of the Standing Order, came to have all the significance of a settled conviction.[69]

Further modifications in the exemption laws, made in 1770, were so slight, leaving as they did the certificate principle practically untouched,[70] that Baptist opposition was aroused even more deeply and the determination struck deeper root to push the battle for religious freedom to a decision. The times also were propitious. The near approach of the Revolutionary struggle focused attention upon the subject of tyranny and caused acts of oppression, whether civil or ecclesiastical in character, to stand out in a new relief before the eye of the public. That dissenters were quick to see the bearing of political events will appear from the following pithy comments in the address which the Committee of Grievances[71] drew up late in 1774 and presented to the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts:

It seems that the two main rights which all America are contending
for at this time, are,—Not to be taxed where they are not
represented, and—To have their causes tried by unbiased judges. And
the Baptist churches in this province as heartily unite with their
countrymen in this cause, as any denomination in the land; and
are as ready to exert all their abilities to defend it. Yet only
because they have thought it to be their duty to claim an equal
title to these rights with their neighbors, they have repeatedly
been accused of evil attempts against the general welfare of the
colony; therefore, we have thought it expedient to lay a brief
statement of the case before this assembly.... Great complaints
have been made about a tax which the British parliament laid upon
paper; but you require a paper tax of us annually. That which has
made the greatest noise, is the tax of three pence a pound upon
tea; but your law of last June laid a tax of the same sum every
year upon the Baptists in each parish, as they would expect to
defend themselves against a greater one.... All America is alarmed
at the tea tax; though, if they please, they can avoid it by
not buying tea; but we have no such liberty. We must either pay
the little tax, or else your people appear even in this time of
extremity determined to lay the great one upon us. But these lines
are to let you know, that we are determined not to pay either of
them; not only upon your principle of not being taxed where we are
not represented, but also because we dare not render homage to any
earthly power, which I and many of my brethren are fully convinced
belongs only to God. We can not give the certificates you require,
without implicitly allowing to men that authority which we believe
in our conscience belongs only to God. Here, therefore, we claim
charter rights, liberty of conscience.[72]

As the event proved, the Revolutionary period brought little legislative relief to dissenters in Massachusetts. Wherever the distractions of the war did not interrupt the ordinary course of ecclesiastical affairs, the state church continued to assert its time-honored prerogatives. The new constitution of the commonwealth which was adopted in 1780 gave conclusive proof that the Standing Order still had the situation well in hand. That instrument contained a bill of rights which reaffirmed the authority of the legislature to authorize and require the various towns and parishes “to make suitable provision, at their own expense, for the institution of the public worship of God”;[73] affirmed also that the legislature had authority to enjoin attendance upon public worship; that towns and parishes were to have the right to elect their ministers and make contracts with them for their support; and that moneys, in the form of rates paid by the people in the support of public worship, were to be applied according to the preference of the rate-payer, “provided, there be any [minister] on whose instructions he attends”; otherwise the minister selected by the town or parish was to receive the benefit of the tax.[74] There is no difficulty in discerning here the outlines of the old ideal of a state church. The day of deliverance for dissent was not yet.[75]

What did take place during the Revolutionary period to promote the cause of religious freedom and to hasten the day of its triumph was the publication of various pamphlets and treatises devoted to the cause of toleration or championing the closely allied cause of democracy in church and state.[76] Several of these[77] were from the pen of the indomitable Isaac Backus, whose unwearied advocacy of the rights of the individual conscience was exceeded by none. The likeness of the struggle which dissenters were making for freedom of conscience to that which the colonists were making for civil liberty was a favorite notion of this doughty penman; and such an argument presented when the imaginations of his countrymen were stirred by the political situation, could not fail of its appeal. Three years before the war broke out, in his _Appeal to the Public for Religious Liberty_, Backus had drawn for the benefit of the public a sharp distinction between the spheres of ecclesiastical and civil governments. The former was armed only with _light_ and _truth_, and was commissioned to “pull down the strongholds of iniquity,” to gather into Christ’s church those who were willing to be governed by His teachings, and to exclude those who would not be so governed; while the latter “is armed with _the sword to guard the peace and to punish those who violate the same_.”[78] In his _Government and Liberty Described, and Ecclesiastical Tyranny Exposed_, published in 1778, he attacked the notion of men “assuming a power to govern religion, instead of being governed by it,” and asserted that the essence of true religion is a voluntary obedience to God.[79] Here was strong meat for a people for whom the word freedom was rapidly coming to have an enlarged signification.

The most convincing exposition of the democratic tendencies of the age came from another quarter, and in a sense belonged to the past. Spurred by the fact that at the beginning of the century a resolute effort had been made, both in Massachusetts and Connecticut, to obtain more compact and rigid ecclesiastical control,[80] the Reverend John Wise, of Ipswich, Massachusetts, in 1710 had issued a satirical tract entitled, _The Churches’ Quarrel Espoused_, and later, in 1717, a more serious production entitled, _A Vindication of the Government of the New England Churches_. In 1772 a new edition of these tracts, published by subscription, came from the Boston press.[81] The enduring quality of the task Wise had performed is shown by the fact that, while these two slight volumes had been conceived as a protest against the encroachments of ecclesiastical tyranny in the first two decades of the century, they now, a half-century later, served equally well to voice the deep passions and impulses of a people who for the moment were engrossed in the concerns of civil government.[82] Wise rejected the ideals of monarchy and aristocracy for the church, and took his stand upon the proposition that democracy alone stands the test of reason and revelation.[83] Of all systems, democracy alone cherishes the precious interests of man’s original liberty and equality. It alone serves effectually to restrain the disposition to prey and embezzle, and to keep the administration of government firmly fixed upon the main point, “the peculiar good and benefit of the whole.” “It is as plain as daylight, there are no species of government like a democracy to attain this end.”[84]

Such literary assaults upon the usurpations of government, upon the violation of individual rights, and upon obstructions erected in the path of democracy, were frontal. As has been said, they were also happily timed. The oppressed would have to content themselves a little longer with a type of toleration which seemed but the shadow of genuine freedom; but the broad dissemination of such principles as those proclaimed by Backus and Wise had had the effect of altering appreciably the spirit of the times.

The close of the struggle for political freedom gave early proof that the cause of religious toleration had passed into a new stage. Dissent had grown in numbers and influence.[85] Distant voices, too, were being heard. Virginia’s noble example in adopting the _Act Establishing Religious Freedom_ had given a practical demonstration of the complete severance of church and state. The impression created by this determination of the issue of religious freedom on the broadest possible basis had been profound throughout the country. When the Constitution of the United States was before the people of Massachusetts for ratification, in the fall and winter of 1787–88, they found in it a single provision concerning religion. Article VI provided: “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust in the United States.” So far had the eyes of dissenters in Massachusetts been opened to dangers lurking in legislative measures that a large proportion of the Baptist delegates in the state constitutional convention voted against the adoption of the instrument.[86] Besides, their hearts were set on some broad and yet specific guarantee of religious freedom under which their liberties would be safe. The First Amendment to the Constitution, which Congress proposed in 1789, seemed to fulfil their desire. It provided that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” With the adoption of this law by the majority of the states, the principle of full liberty of mind, conscience, and worship, had been written finally into the law of the land.

Yet this pronouncement of the national government could not bring to a full end the long struggle which had been waged. Only the sphere of the federal government was involved, and individual states were still free to deal with the institutions of religion and the rights of individuals as they might feel disposed, as long as the national welfare was not involved.[87] What actually happened in Massachusetts is well expressed by Isaac Backus: “The amendment about liberty of conscience is kept out of sight.”[88] The goods of Baptists continued to be levied upon to meet the ministerial tax.[89] Dissensions continued to arise in parishes over the settlement and support of ministers, dissenting minorities usually contesting the right of the majority to saddle upon them clergymen for whose ministrations they had no desire.[90] The annoyances and disabilities that dissenters and disaffected members of the Establishment suffered were clearly not so numerous nor so severe as they had been in the past;[91] none the less they were able to keep alive the impression that nothing but a spirit of bigotry and obdurate tyranny could explain the prolonged attitude and policy of the Standing Order.[92]

(b) _Connecticut_

Before directing attention to the effect which this weakening of the forces of ecclesiastical domination had upon the minds of the leaders of the Establishment, it will be necessary to review briefly the course which affairs took in Connecticut.[93]

Despite the fact that the founding of Connecticut had directly resulted from the ecclesiasticism of Massachusetts, the forces of ecclesiastical tyranny proved to be more strongly entrenched in Connecticut than in the parent state.[94] This was due in part to the homogeneity of the population,[95] but more largely to the degree of oversight of the religious life of the people, unusual even for Puritan New England, which the General Court of Connecticut exercised from the first.[96] In this connection it is to be observed that the impulses that lay back of the oppression of dissenters in Connecticut were not the same as those that shaped the situation in Massachusetts. The founders of Connecticut were out of sympathy with the theocratic ideal that prevailed in the mother colony; they frowned upon the harsh measures of repression which the authorities of Massachusetts adopted.[97] They held before them the ideal of a state wherein the maintenance of religion and the exercise of individual freedom should not be incompatible.

Yet as the event proved, the hand of religious tyranny fell heavily upon their posterity.[98] This happened, not because they were disposed to exercise harsher repressive measures than their fathers in curbing dissent, but because, in their extraordinary devotion to the churches of their own order, in their extreme care and watchfulness to strengthen them and to safeguard the whole range of their interests, they came into open conflict with the interests of dissenting bodies.[99] As early as 1669 the Congregational church was formally adopted as the state church.[100] From that day forward an intimate and intense paternalism characterized the attitude of the civil government toward the Establishment. Its most serious and permanent, as well as its lighter and occasional concerns, all were provided for with equal constancy. Contingencies of every description were either prudently anticipated or, arising suddenly, received the immediate and painstaking attention of the magistrates.[101]

The following list, though far from complete, will serve to illustrate this point. Without the consent of the General Court, churches could not be organized,[102] nor bonds be severed between pastors and their flocks.[103] The formation of new parishes and the fixing of their limits,[104] the calling of new ministers,[105] the determination of the time at which arrearages in ministers’ salaries must be paid fully,[106] the fixing of the location of new houses of worship,[107] the disposition of cases of discipline appealed from the decisions of local church courts,[108] the settlement of the question as to who were to be permitted to receive the Lord’s Supper,[109] the proffer of counsel concerning the behavior offended members were expected to manifest toward pastors for whom they entertained no affection nor respect[110]—these all were regarded as part of the proper business of the General Court.

The dangers inherent in such a system are not difficult to divine. The churches themselves upon which such paternal legislative care was imposed generally found their affairs taken out of their hands. Civil authority disciplined them and their members, and made independent ecclesiastical rule little more than a fiction. Again, the committal of the political government to a particular type of religious polity and worship aroused antagonisms in the minds of men who hated the palest shadow of the principle that the religion of a prince or government must be the religion of the people. However tolerant toward non-conformity such a state may show itself to be—and none will deny that Connecticut rose to comparatively high levels of justice in this regard[111]—the favoritism of government puts dissent at a disadvantage; and when narrow and intolerant men are at the helm of state, disadvantage passes rapidly into positive deprivation and injury. Once more, so close an alliance between politics and religion as the Standing Order in Connecticut represented, invites similar combinations on the part of men, some of whom have political and some religious objects to serve, and who, therefore, in the presence of a common foe gladly make common cause. All of which we shall see illustrated later.

Another general aspect of the situation in Connecticut concerns the development of synodical government within the Congregational church. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, out of a sense of the decay of religion in New England, as evidenced by the loosening of discipline and the weakening of ministerial influence,[112] the clergy of Massachusetts attempted to buttress church government and ministerial authority through the “Proposals of 1705.” These provided for the grouping of ministers in Associations which were to function in the following ways: pastors were to adopt their advice in all difficult cases; ministerial candidates were to be examined and licensed by them; pastorless, or “bereaved” churches were to be urged to apply to them for candidates; they were also to exercise a general oversight of religion, and to inquire into charges made against the character, conduct, or faith of any of their members. The “Proposals” also made provision for Standing Councils to be made up of delegates from these Ministerial Associations and lay members of the churches. These Standing Councils were “to consult, advise, and determine all affairs that shall be proper matter for the consideration of an ecclesiastical council within their respective limits.” Their judgments were to be accepted as final and obedience was to be enforced on penalty of forfeiting church-fellowship.[113] This bold step in the direction of bringing the churches of Massachusetts under more rigorous ecclesiastical control was not destined to succeed. Liberalizing elements stirred up powerful opposition, the legislature failed to give to the “Proposals” its support, and the movement fell through.[114]

A very different situation developed in Connecticut. The yearning for the strengthening of church government in the interests of a general improvement of religion was if anything stronger in that commonwealth; and a propitious hour for the inauguration of such a movement came when, in 1707, the most influential minister of the colony, Gurdon Saltonstall, of New London, was raised to the governor’s chair. The following May the General Court issued the call for the famous Saybrook Synod.[115] Ministers and messengers of the churches were to assemble in their respective county towns, “on the last Monday in June next ... to consider and agree upon those methods and rules for the management of ecclesiastical discipline which by them shall be judged agreeable and conformable to the word of God.”[116] By these county councils ministers and delegates were to be chosen to meet at Saybrook, at the commencement of the “infant college” (_i. e._, Yale), there “to compare the results of the ministers of the several counties, and out of them and from them to draw a form of ecclesiastical discipline which by two or more persons delegated by them shall be offered to this Court ... to be considered of and confirmed by them.”[117]

The directions of the General Court were complied with. The doctrinal results of the Saybrook Synod are no part of our concern; but this is not so with regard to its ecclesiastical formulations. The principles contained in the “Proposals of 1705” were accepted and worked out in more complete detail. Churches were to be grouped in Consociations, one or more in each county as the churches might determine. Cases of discipline too difficult of management in local congregations were to be heard and determined by these Consociations. Refusal to answer to the summons of a Consociation, or to submit to its decision, incurred excommunication, whether a church or a pastor might be the guilty party. All matters relating to the installation, ordination, and dismissal of ministers were to be submitted by the churches to these Consociations. In like manner the ministers of the various counties were to be grouped together in Associations to consult concerning the affairs of the church, provide ministerial licensure, examine complaints, and make recommendations to the legislature concerning the settlement of pastors with “bereaved” churches.[118]

The result of the deliberations of the Saybrook Synod was laid duly before the sessions of the General Court, in October, 1708, and formally adopted by that body in the following terms:

This Assembly do declare their great approbation of such a
happy agreement, and do ordain that all the churches within
this government that are or shall be thus united in doctrine,
worship, and discipline, be, and for the future shall be owned and
acknowledged established by law. Provided always, that nothing
herein shall be intended and construed to hinder or prevent any
society or church that is or shall be allowed by the laws of this
government, who soberly differ or dissent from the united churches
hereby established, from exercising worship and discipline in their
own way, according to their consciences.[119]

This reëstablishment of the Congregational church in Connecticut determined the course of events, as far as the religious interests of the commonwealth were concerned, for a hundred years to come. By this it is not meant that the ecclesiastical system which was thus worked out and imposed upon the churches of the colony continued to operate in full force for that period; the Saybrook Platform was abrogated in 1784. But the Congregational church in Connecticut, by the act of 1708, “attained the height of its security and power,”[120] and, as one of the chief consequences of the act, ministerial domination was accorded a recognition and support, the tradition of which outlived by at least a quarter of a century the system by which it had been so firmly established.

Thus to the paternalism of the state the authority and sense of importance of the clergy had been added. These principles established, it was to be expected that the religious history of Connecticut during the eighteenth century would reveal the following characteristics and tendencies: a disposition on the part of the state to treat the clergy of the Establishment as the pillars of conservative thought and custom; and a disposition on the part of the clergy to exercise a controlling hand over all the religious activities of the people, as well as to react violently against all radical impulses and movements which appeared to endanger centralization of government, whether ecclesiastical or political. Certainly these were the tendencies, expressed in the attitude of mind and the activities of the Standing Order, with which the forces of non-conformity and democracy had to contend throughout the whole of the century.

We may now turn to take a brief survey of the more important events in the course of this conflict. The concluding statement of the act whereby the Connecticut General Court adopted the recommendations of the Saybrook Synod,[121] gave evidence of a tender regard for the consciences and rights of dissenters which subsequent occurrences far from justified. The fact is, the act of reëstablishment did not stand alone. Earlier in the same year (1708) the General Court had written into the law of the colony another statute whose provisions were in no way affected by the later act. For the worthy object of granting liberty of worship to sober dissenters, a liberty which they were to be permitted to enjoy “without let, or hindrance or molestation,” it was provided that dissenting congregations were to qualify (_i. e._, obtain license) under the law.[122] It was likewise provided that this permission to qualify should in no way operate to the prejudice of the rights and privileges of the churches of the Establishment, or “to the excusing any person from paying any such minister or town dues, as are now, or shall hereafter be due from them.”[123] This double burden of obtaining license and supporting the state church was not to be borne easily. An agitation to obtain relief promptly began.[124]

After two decades of effort the Episcopalians were the first to meet with any measure of success. Henceforth their rate money was to be spent in the support of their own ministers and they were no longer to be required to help build meeting-houses for the state church.[125] Two years later, relief was granted to Baptists and Quakers. The exemption laws passed in their behalf, however, made necessary the presentation of certificates vouching for the claims of the holders that they were conscientious supporters of the principles and faithful attendants upon the worship of one or the other of these bodies.[126]

The introduction of the custom of requiring certificates encountered the same sense of injustice and bitter resentment that dissenters in Massachusetts manifested. Besides, the exemption laws just referred to failed to operate in a uniform and equitable manner. Episcopalians and Baptists, particularly, found frequent occasion to complain of the miscarriage of this legislation and to groan under the double burden of taxation from which they had obtained no actual relief.[127]

But as in Massachusetts, so in Connecticut, the greatest hardships befell the Separatists who went out from the fold of the orthodox church. Unable to achieve within the Establishment that reformation of doctrine, polity, and spiritual life which they deemed requisite, they associated themselves together in churches committed to their own convictions. Opposition confronted them at every turn. Obstructions were thrown in the way of their efforts to obtain legal permission to constitute their churches; the civil power persisted in treating them as law-breakers and incorrigibles; their ministers were drastically dealt with by Consociations which regarded them as wicked men filled with the spirit of insubordination.[128] A group of laws as severe and intolerant as any the statute books of Connecticut ever contained were enacted in 1742–43 to curb and if possible to eradicate the Separatist defection.[129] Ordained ministers were forbidden to preach outside the bounds of their parishes unless expressly invited so to do.[130] Ministerial Associations were restrained from licensing candidates to preach outside the territorial jurisdiction of the Association granting licensure.[131] Ministers of the Establishment were empowered to lodge certificates with society clerks, attesting that men had entered their parishes and preached therein without first having received permission. No provision for ascertaining the facts in such cases was contemplated by the law. Justices of the peace were forbidden to sign a warrant authorizing the collection of a minister’s rates until they were assured that no such certificate had been lodged against the clergyman involved.[132] Heavy bonds were to be imposed upon ministers from outside the colony who might venture to preach within its limits without invitation, with the added provision that such men were to be treated as vagrants and bundled out of the colony as speedily as possible.[133] Ministers who had not been graduated from Yale or Harvard, or some other Protestant college or university, were debarred from all benefits of ministerial support as provided by law.[134]

The climax of the high-handed measures of the supporters of the Establishment was doubtless reached in this legislation. A retrograde movement in the cause of religious toleration set in,[135] the direct effects of which were not quickly overcome. Henceforth dissenters were to be annoyed and hampered as they had not been before. The necessity of appearing in person before the General Court when seeking exemption from ecclesiastical burdens,[136] the embarrassments and hardships that dissenting ministers suffered in their efforts to supply religious counsel to their people,[137] the growing aversion of the General Court to granting permission to unorthodox and dissenting groups to organize,[138] all serve to indicate the strength of the reaction that had set in.

The impressions produced by this excess were even more significant than the direct results, deplorable as the latter were.[139] In the middle of the eighteenth century the Standing Order in Connecticut had gained for themselves an unenviable record for bigotry and persecution from which the events of the latter half of the century by no means cleared them.

For a quarter of a century following the enactment of the legislative measures just considered, no advance step, general in its nature, was taken. Here and there a little larger measure of freedom was doled out to this or that aggrieved dissenting minister or church; but the situation as a whole was not materially changed. “Restriction was the rule, freedom the exception, and government the absolute and irresponsible dispenser of both.”[140] Finally, in 1778 some evidence that a change in sentiment was under way appeared in the fact that Separatists were exempted from taxes to support the state church. Six years later, in 1784, more satisfactory proof was forthcoming. That year, by the passing of an act entitled, “An Act for Securing the Rights of Conscience in Matters of Religion, to Christians of Every Denomination in this State,”[141] the General Court tacitly abrogated the Saybrook Platform and set the institutions of religion in Connecticut upon a new base. The act declared

That no Persons in this State, professing the Christian Religion,
who soberly and conscientiously dissent from the Worship and
Ministry by Law established in the Society wherein they dwell, and
attend public Worship by themselves shall incur any Penalty for not
attending the Worship and Ministry so established, on the Lord’s
Day, or on account of their meeting together by themselves on said
Day, for public Worship in a Way agreeable to their consciences.

It was further declared that Christians of every Protestant denomination, “whether Episcopal Church, of those Congregationalists called Separates, or of the people called Baptists, or Quakers, or any other Denomination who shall have formed themselves in distinct Churches or Congregations,” and who helped to maintain their worship, were to be exempted from the support of any other church than their own. Further, all such dissenting congregations were to enjoy the same power and privileges in the support of their ministry, and in the building and repairing of their houses of worship, as those churches which were established by law. Such persons as did not belong to any of these dissenting bodies were to be taxed for the support of the state church.[142]

The spirit of toleration had traveled far; but that the struggle for complete religious freedom was yet by no means won will immediately appear from the following restrictions: (1) Protestants only were contemplated as beneficiaries under the act; (2) the principle of taxation for the support of the state church was retained; (3) the obligation to support some form of Christian worship was required; (4) the benefits of that provision of the act which guaranteed to dissenters exemption from ecclesiastical taxation were to be available only on the condition that a certificate, signed by an officer of a dissenting congregation, should be deposited with the clerk of the state church near which the dissenter lived.

A formidable number of the objectionable features of the older legislation were thus retained. The state church was still in existence. Taxation for the support of religion was still the law of the commonwealth. Dissenters were still compelled to put themselves to the trouble and humiliation of obtaining the detested certificates. Besides, the ghost of religious persecution was not yet laid. Goods and chattels of the religiously indifferent, or of conscientious dissenters, continued to be seized and sold by officers of the law, to discharge unsatisfied levies made for the support of the Establishment.[143]

The principle of requiring certificates proved to be the chief bone of contention between the Standing Order and dissenters as the century drew to its close. The rapid growth of dissenting bodies in the period following the Revolution, aided as they were by a zeal for proselyting on the part of their leaders and by a set of the public mind decidedly favorable to their propaganda because of their democratic leanings, was met by corresponding anxiety and sternness on the part of the supporters of the Establishment. Confusing, as they habitually did, the interests of the state church with the cause of religion, the representatives of the Standing Order led themselves to believe that a contagion of irreligion was spreading alarmingly, and therefore restrictive religious legislation was in order.[144] In line with this conviction, in May, 1791, the legislature enacted a law requiring dissenters to have their certificates signed by at least one, and preferably two, civil officers, instead of as provided in the act of 1784. This law proved peculiarly distasteful to dissenters.[145] A powerful opposition developed; and the authorities, made aware of the fact that they had over-reached themselves, six months later withdrew the obnoxious act, substituting for it another which permitted each dissenter to write and sign his own certificate, but requiring him, as before, to file it with the clerk of the state church near which he lived.[146] The momentary wrath of dissenters was thus mollified; however, the retention of the certificate principle continued to gall and to excite them. A disagreeable discussion dragged itself along, marked by acrimony, pettiness, and personal attacks on both sides; by a consolidation of the forces and interests of dissenters and Republicans on the one hand, and a growing sense of injured innocence and of concern for the fate of religion on the part of the Standing Order.[147]

(c) _Summary_

By way of summary, a few general comments, based upon the situation in Massachusetts and Connecticut jointly considered, are now in order. Looking back upon the activities of the Standing Order after the lapse of something more than a century, we see that they were zealously contending for an ideal which had won their whole allegiance—a body politic safeguarded and made secure by a state church. To prevent deterioration of the state and its people the bulwark of a religion established by law seemed imperative.[148] The interests involved were far too serious to put them at the mercy of a voluntary support of the institutions of religion.[149] Moreover, an established church seemed to this group of men no necessary enemy of non-conformity. The degree of toleration possible under an establishment of religion was deemed sufficient actually to favor the growth of sects, and at the same time to make the sway of orthodoxy secure.[150]

How, then, were men of such opinions to interpret the ever-growing agitation for a larger measure of toleration, accompanied as it was by an ever-growing resentment toward the political influence and activities of the Standing Order, as anything other than a covert attack upon religion itself? These bitter complainings over the religious measures adopted by government, these flauntings of authority through stubborn refusal or passive resistance to the payment of ecclesiastical rates, these unrelenting efforts to dispossess the clergy of the Establishment of their traditional honors and emoluments—what were they all but so many proofs of the impiety of the age and an abominable conspiracy to drive pure religion from the land? As the representatives of the Standing Order saw the situation, the church was obviously in grave danger and to steady the tottering ark of the Lord was the most imperative duty of the hour.

On the other hand, in the light of the growing liberality of the times, it was impossible for the forces of dissent to be patient with such men. They were men of the past, callously unresponsive to the spirit of the new age. They were an embittered minority, exerting themselves to keep a struggling and confident majority a little longer under their thumb. They were mischievous meddlers in the affairs of others, using religion as a cloak to hide their social and political self-seeking. As for the cry, “The church is in danger!”, that was to be regarded as the most signal proof of the hypocrisy of those who raised it.[151]

FOOTNOTES:

[47] Lauer, _Church and State in New England_ (Johns Hopkins University Studies in History and Political Science. Tenth Series), pp. 95 _et seq._

[48] The term “Standing Order” was generally employed in the speech and literature of the period, and had reference to the alliance between the party of the Establishment and the party of the government.

[49] The scope of inquiry prescribed by the special object of this dissertation renders both unnecessary and unprofitable the tracing of this struggle in detail. Valuable special studies in this field are available. Among these the following are to be commended as of exceptional usefulness: Burrage, _A History of the Baptists in New England_; Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_; Reed, _Church and State in Massachusetts, 1691–1740_; Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_; Ford, _New England’s Struggle for Religious Liberty_. Lauer’s excellent treatise has already been cited. Of contemporaneous treatments, Backus, _A History of New England, with Particular Reference to the Denomination of Christians called Baptists_, though deficient in literary merit, is doubtless the most trustworthy and replete. The citations made from the latter work refer, unless otherwise indicated, to the edition of 1871 (2 vols.).

[50] _The Charter Granted by Their Majesties King William and Queen Mary, to the Inhabitants of the Massachusetts-Bay in New-England_, Boston in New England, 1726, p. 9. The principle of church membership as a qualification for voting was set aside for a property qualification.

[51] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. i, pp. 446 _et seq._ _Cf._ Reed, _Church and State in Massachusetts_, 1691–1740, pp. 23 _et seq._

[52] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. i, p. 448.

[53] _Charters and “Acts and Laws” of the Province of Massachusetts-Bay, With Appended Acts and Laws_, Boston, 1726–1735, p. 383. The law provided that “all persons who profess themselves to be of the Church of England”, and who were so situated that “there is a Person in Orders according to the Rules of the Church of England setled [_sic_], and abiding among them and performing Divine Service within Five Miles of the Habitation, or usual Residence of any Person professing himself as aforesaid of the Church of England”, might have his rate-money reserved for the support of the Episcopal church.

[54] _Charters and “Acts and Laws” of the Province of Mass._, _etc._, p. 423. The five-mile limitation formed a part of this legislation, also.

[55] Burrage, _History of the Baptists in New England_, p. 105.

[56] Palfrey, _A Compendious History of New England_, vol. iv, pp. 94, 95.

[57] _Acts and Resolves, Public and Private, etc._, vol. iii, p. 645.

[58] _Ibid._

[59] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 140.

[60] _Ibid._

[61] _Ibid._

[62] Separatists or Separates were the names by which those were commonly designated who withdrew from the orthodox churches on account of the controversies occasioned by the Great Awakening. See Blake, S. Leroy, _The Separates or Strict Congregationalists of New England_, Boston, 1902, pp. 17 _et seq._

[63] Hovey, _A Memoir of the Life and Times of the Rev. Isaac Backus_, p. 171.

[64] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 96 _et seq._ Backus himself suffered imprisonment under this act. See _ibid._, p. 109.

[65] Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 235 _et seq._ The process of absorption referred to had much to do with the breaking up of the Separatist movement. Few of these congregations continued to exist until the struggle for religious freedom was fully won. Other contributory causes in the breaking up of the movement were the poverty of the members of these congregations, the difficulties they experienced in securing pastoral care, and the dissensions that arose among them in the exercise of their boasted rights of private judgment, public exhortation, and the interpretation of the Scriptures.

[66] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 140 _et seq._

[67] Backus, _op. cit._, p. 141.

[68] _Ibid._

[69] _Cf._ _Minutes of the Warren Association for 1769_, quoted by Burrage, _History of the Baptists in New England_, pp. 108 _et seq._ _Cf._ the following, taken from a statement and appeal to Baptists, in the _Boston Evening Post_, Aug. 20, 1770: “To the Baptists in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, who are, or have been, oppressed in any way on a religious account. It would be needless to tell you that you have long felt the effects of the laws by which the religion of the government in which you live is established. Your purses have felt the burden of ministerial rates; and when these would not satisfy your enemies, your property hath been taken from you and sold for less than half its value.... You will therefore readily hear and attend when you are desired to collect your cases of suffering, and have them well attested; such as, the taxes you have paid to build meeting-houses, to settle ministers and support them, with all the time, money and labor you have lost in waiting on courts, feeing lawyers, &c.; and bring or send such cases to the Baptist Association to be held at Bellingham; when measures will be resolutely adopted for obtaining redress from another quarter than that to which repeated application hath been made unsuccessfully. Nay, complaints, however just and grievous, hath been treated with indifference, and scarcely, if at all credited”. (Quoted by Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 155.)

[70] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 156 _et seq._

[71] This standing committee of the Warren Association is itself a token of the strengthened purpose of the Baptists.

[72] The address is given in full in Hovey, _A Memoir of the Life and Times of Isaac Backus_, pp. 218–221. It drew a kindly response from the Provincial Congress, signed by John Hancock as president, pleading the inability of the Congress to give redress and advising the aggrieved parties to submit their case to the General Court of Massachusetts at its next session. This step was taken in September, 1775; but beyond the fact that a bill, drawn to give redress, was once read in the sessions of the Assembly, nothing came at the matter. “Such”, remarks Backus, “is the disposition of mankind”. (_Cf._ Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 202 _et seq._ _Cf._ Burrage, _History of the Baptists in New England_, pp. 113 _et seq._)

[73] _The Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Passed from the Year 1780, to the End of the Year 1800_, vol. i, pp. 19, 20.

[74] _Ibid._

[75] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 228 _et seq._, for cases of persecution under the operation of the bill of rights.

[76] The contribution made by the newspapers must not be overlooked in this connection. From about 1770 on there may be traced a growing disposition on the part of dissenters to air their grievances in the public journals. Supporters of the Establishment were not slow to respond.

[77] In addition to the two specifically referred to, Backus published the following: _Policy, as well as Honesty, Forbids the Use of Secular Force in Religious Affairs_, Boston, 1779; _Truth is Great, and Will Prevail_, Boston, 1781; _A Door Opened for Equal Christian Liberty, etc._, Boston, 1783.

[78] Backus, _op. cit._, p. 13.

[79] Quoted from Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 223.

[80] Walker, _History of the Congregational Churches in the United States_, pp. 206–209.

[81] _Cf._ _A Vindication of the Government of the New-England Churches, etc._, Boston, 1772. The first edition of 500 copies was quickly subscribed for, and a second was published the same year.

[82] An edition of Wise’s tracts was published as late as 1860, by the Congregational Board of Publication. From that edition the citations are drawn. The following from the “Introductory Notice” is of interest: “ ... some of the most glittering sentences of the immortal Declaration of Independence are almost literal quotations from this essay of John Wise [_i. e._, _Vindication of the Government of New-England Churches_]. And it is a significant fact, that in 1772, only four years before the declaration was made, a large edition of both those tracts was published by subscription in one duodecimo volume. The presumption which this fact alone suggests, that it was used as a political text-book in the great struggle for freedom then opening, is fully confirmed by the list of subscribers’ names printed at the end, with the number of copies annexed.” Page xx _et seq._

[83] _Ibid._, pp. 48–50, 54, 56.

[84] Wise, _op. cit._, p. 56.

[85] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 391–401, furnishes the following table of Baptist strength in New England in the year 1795: Churches, 325; ministers, 232; members, 20,902. Methodism had emerged in New England within the last quarter of the century, and Methodist ministers were indefatigable in their labors. By the close of the century as generous-minded a Congregational minister as Bentley could not altogether cover over his chagrin on account of the growth and influence of the “sects”. _Cf._ _Diary of William Bentley_, vol. ii, pp. 127, 409, 419.

[86] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 235. _Cf._ Burrage, _History of the Baptist in New England_, pp. 121 _et seq._

[87] Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, pp. 509–511.

[88] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 341.

[89] _Ibid._, pp. 351 _et seq._, 379.

[90] Backus, _op. cit._, pp. 353 _et seq._

[91] _Ibid._, p. 379.

[92] Actual disestablishment did not come in Massachusetts until 1833.

[93] Since the particular purpose of this chapter is to explain the bitter spirit existing between the orthodox party and dissenters in New England near the close of the eighteenth century, rather than to re-write the history of the struggle for full religious toleration, much that occurred in the long process of severing the bond between church and state may be passed over. Attention will be focused upon the character rather than the chronology of the struggle.

[94] Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, p. 238; Fiske, _The Beginnings of New England_, pp. 123 _et seq._

[95] Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, p. 121; Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, p. 243.

[96] Cobb, _op. cit._, pp. 244, 246.

[97] _Ibid._, pp. 240 _et seq._; Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 62 _et seq._, 68.

[98] It was the judgment of Isaac Backus that “oppression was greater in Connecticut, than in other governments in New England”. (_History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 404.)

[99] Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, p. 244. Cobb’s statement concerning the lack of harshness and ungentleness which characterized the attitude of the supporters of the state church toward dissent is extreme. The controlling spirit of the Standing Order was doubtless a positive concern for the welfare of the Establishment rather than a desire to weed out dissent; but the clash of interests became so sharp and bitter that motives did not remain unmixed, and in many an instance dissent in Connecticut was compelled to reckon with a spirit of actual persecution.

[100] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. i, p. 21.

[101] Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, pp. 246 _et seq._

[102] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. i, p. 311.

[103] _Ibid._, pp. 356, 362; vol. ii, pp. 99, 240; vol. iii, pp. 78, 82 _et seq._

[104] _Ibid._, vol. iii, pp. 13, 18, 101, 216 _et seq._

[105] _Ibid._, vol. iv, pp. 67, 127, 136 _et seq._

[106] _Ibid._, vol. vii, p. 554.

[107] _Ibid._, pp. 334, 335.

[108] _Ibid._, vol. iii, p. 183.

[109] _Ibid._, vol. i, pp. 437 _et seq._

[110] _Ibid._, vol. iii, p. 104.

[111] Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, p. 247.

[112] Walker, _The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism_, pp. 465 _et seq._

[113] Walker, _A History of the Congregational Churches in the United States_, pp. 202 _et seq._; Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 133 _et seq._

[114] Walker, _The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism_, pp. 491–494.

[115] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. v, pp. 51 _et seq._

[116] _Ibid._

[117] _Ibid._

[118] Walker, _The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism_, pp. 502–506, where “The Saybrook Meeting and Articles” are printed in full. For expositions, see Backus, _History of New England_, vol. i, pp. 470 _et seq._; Palfrey, _A History of New England_, vol. iii, p. 342; Dexter, _The Congregationalism of the last Three Hundred Years_, pp. 489, 490.

[119] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. v, p. 87.

[120] Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, p 151.

[121] _Cf. supra_, p. 53.

[122] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. v, p. 50. It seems clear that either through neglect or evasion a considerable number of congregations failed to qualify under the law. In any event the legislature deemed itself warranted in passing an act, May, 1721, imposing a fine of five shillings on persons convicted of not having attended “the publick worship of God on the Lord’s day in some congregation by law allowed.” (See _ibid._, vol. vi, p. 248.) Churches which for doctrinal or other reasons withdrew from the Establishment suffered serious embarrassments on account of this law respecting the licensing of congregations.

[123] _Ibid._, vol. v, p. 50. Any infraction of this law was to be punished by a heavy fine. Failure to pay the fine involved heavy bail or imprisonment.

[124] Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 191 _et seq._

[125] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. vi, p. 106.

[126] _The Pub. Records of the Colony of Conn._, vol. vi, pp. 237, 257. Unlike the Massachusetts exemption laws passed on behalf of these two bodies, these were perpetual.

[127] _Collections of the Connecticut Historical Society: Talcott Papers_, vol. v, pp. 9–13; Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 98 _et seq._

[128] Parker, _History of the Second Church of Christ in Hartford_, pp. 117, 119; _Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society_, vol. iv: _The Bradford Annals_, pp. 318 _et seq._; Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 57 _et seq._, 79 _et seq._ For the account of the difficulties of a particular Separatist congregation, see Dutton, _The History of the North Church in New Haven_, pp. 25–28. _Cf._ _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. xi, pp. 323 _et seq._; also Beardsley, _The History of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut_, vol. i, p. 140.

[129] The bigoted and unfeeling spirit which controlled the authorities is well expressed in the act of May, 1743. Proceeding on the assumption that the Separatists, taking advantage of the act of May, 1708, were responsible for the disruptive tactics and measures of the times, by means of which “some of the parishes established by the laws of this Colony ... have been greatly damnified, and by indirect means divided and parted,” the General Court repealed the act in question, and put in its place the following: “And be it further enacted, that, for the future, if any of His Majesty’s good subjects, being protestants, inhabitants of this Colony, that shall soberly dissent from the way of worship and ministry established by the laws of this Colony, that such persons may apply themselves to this Assembly for relief, where they shall be heard. _And such persons as have any distinguishing character, by which they may be known from the presbyterians or congregationalists, and from the consociated churches established by the laws of this Colony, may expect the indulgence of this Assembly_ [Italics mine.—V. S.], having first before this Assembly taken the oaths and subscribed the declaration provided in the act of Parliament in cases of like nature.” (_The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. viii, p. 522. _Cf._ Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 58.)

[130] _The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut_, vol. viii, p. 454.

[131] _Ibid._, p. 456.

[132] _The Pub. Records of the Colony of Conn._, vol. viii, p. 456.

[133] _Ibid._, p. 457.

[134] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 57.

[135] Cobb, _The Rise of Religious Liberty in America_, pp. 274 _et seq._ Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 244 _et seq._

[136] _Cf. supra_, note 1, p. 57.

[137] Backus, _History of New England_, vol. ii, pp. 59 _et seq._, 62, 65 _et seq._, 77 _et seq._, 81 _et seq._

[138] Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 248–262. The difficulties experienced by three congregations in New Haven, Canterbury, and Enfield, are dealt with in detail.

[139] A revision of Connecticut laws took place in 1750. The unjust legislation of 1742–43 and of the following years was quietly left out.

[140] _Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society_, vol. iii, pp. 398 _et seq._

[141] _Acts and Laws of the State of Connecticut, in America_, p. 21.

[142] _Acts and Laws of the State of Connecticut, in America_, p. 21.

[143] Parker, _History of the Second Church of Hartford_, pp. 170, 171. _Cf._ Beecher, _Autobiography, Correspondence, etc._, vol. i, p. 302. The latter’s account of the situation is much softened by his sympathies with the dominant party.

[144] By this time dissenters and Anti-Federalists had largely consolidated their interests. The political program of the latter drew upon the former all the suspicions and antagonisms which the Standing Order entertained toward the foes of Federalism. The acrimonious discussion which arose at this time over the disposition of the Western Reserve and the funds thus derived, admirably illustrates the cross-currents of religious and political agitation in the last decade of the century. _Cf._ Greene, _The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut_, pp. 380–392.

[145] This is readily explicable in view of the fact that most of the magistrates were adherents of the Establishment. The comment of Backus touches the pith of the matter, as dissenters saw it: “Thus the civil authority in the uppermost religious party in their State, was to judge the consciences of all men who dissented from their worship.” (_History of New England_, vol. ii, p. 345.)