The Effects of Slavery on the formation and history of the African-American Church in America

As the division between the white people of North and South divided over the institution of slavery, the churches which included those people felt the same as the rest of the nation. The largest of the Protestant groups, the Methodist Episcopal Church, divided first. It had originally tried to keep the peace in the family by pushing the abolitionists out into the Wesleyan Methodist Church in 1843, but the next year it opened its general conference with consideration of the scandal of a bishop from Georgia who had inherited some slaves. Bishop Andrew refused to move from his home state, was unable by Georgia law to free his slaves, and planned to continue as an active, traveling bishop. The church, unable to resolve the issue, voted to divide itself into two jurisdictions. The outcome was a division of the church into the Methodist Episcopal Church and the Methodist Episcopal Church, South.

The Baptists faced a similar problem,

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he African-Americans and whites of St. GeorgeÆs Church in Philadelphia. The situation was intensified by the erection of a gallery to which African-Americans were relegated. The long-standing grievances came to a head on a Sunday morning in November 1787, when whites tried to pull several African-Americans from their knees at the altar rail. Richard Allen led a group of African-Americans out of the church, and they formed a church of their own. Allen was a former slave whose master had been converted by Freeborn Garrettson, a Methodist preacher. His master allowed Allen to buy his freedom. As a freeman he became a prosperous businessman and a licensed Methodist preacher. After leaving St. GeorgeÆs, Allen purchased an abandoned blacksmith shop, and in 1794 Methodist Bishop Francis Asbury dedicated it as Bethel Church. In 1799 Allen was the first African-American to be ordained as a deacon. Differences continued between the leaders of Bethel Church and St. GeorgeÆs. The former wished to be independent, but with a nominal allegiance to the Methodists. Finally, in 1816. the issues were settled in a court suit by which Bethel was granted full independence. In Baltimore, African-Americans at the two white churches formed an ind
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