THE BAHAMA ISLANDS 5 tO 



A Contest for Eeligious Equality. 



This contest was entered into by the dissenters with a determined spirit. 

 Their conduct was a part of the nineteenth century protest against a state 

 church system, transferred to a small corner of the British Empire. It had 

 its significance for the Bahamas. Some such contests had been fought out 

 in the British colonies on the continent, before they won their independence 

 from the British Crown. The Anglican Church had long been established 

 in the Bahamas. It had the prestige of the support of the government backed 

 by a great church system in the mother country. It had intrenched itself in 

 the very life of the Colony; it had acquired control not only of the schools 

 but also of other things as well. State and church went hand in hand, and 

 through the latter the former controlled much in the life of the Colony. The 

 majority of the upper classes of society attended its worship. The dissenters, 

 on the other hand, had become very active only Avith the emancipation of the 

 negroes, and gained influence chiefly among the lower classes. Their teach- 

 ing had become so widespread that at this time they were able to begin 

 taking privileges from the established church. The contest was now only 

 fairly begun. The sectarians were here contending for recognition in the 

 Colony of equal rights to all denominations of Christians. This partial vic- 

 tory was only a step in the long contest to deprive the established church of 



the contentment of the Carmichael pople. These and other things were reported 

 to Cockburn. The latter deprecated the tone of a letter that was written to these 

 people as filled with "designing insinuations and misrepresentations." (Ds. to 

 Russell, No. 104.) This letter enclosed in this despatch is in substance as follows: 

 " Do not be terrified by authorities into attending this or that place of worship. Go 

 wherever your heart inclines you. No man can interfere with you. If I cannot 

 obtain justice for you at Nassau I will in England. Do not fear that the Queen 

 will sanction your persecutors' conduct. You have the same rights as any white 

 man in the West Indies. If you can be compelled to attend to religious matters, I 

 can be also. Fear God and you have nothing else to fear." 



Capern's methods in enticing the negroes away from the established church 

 were odious to Cockburn. " The blacks of this island," he wrote, " are with few 

 exceptions his followers." The Governor also charged that the missionary was 

 misleading the people as to their duty to the state. " He seems to tell them that 

 they are not to be controlled by any opinion expressed by the authorities or by 

 recommendations from them, for Her Majesty had sent him out for their special 

 protection." 



Cockburn does not appear to have been justified in making so many com- 

 plaints against the conduct of this man. The secret of his feeling would appear 

 to be that the mission which Capern was conducting flourished at the expense of 

 the established church, of which in his own words, the Governor had " always 

 been a warm supporter." Ds. to Russell, No. 146. See also Ds. to Stanley, No. 

 11. See also above, note 550. 



