752 



REFORMED CHURCHES. 



1875, was appointed chairman of the Committee 

 on Appropriations. He thus became virtually the 

 leader of the majority of the House, with an op- 

 position majority in the Senate. His long and 

 varied committee service had given him an un- 

 usual familiarity with the details of every de- 

 partment of government business, and his first 

 appropriation bill called for an expenditure of 

 $38,910,984.29 less than had been appropriated 

 the preceding year by a Republican Congress. 

 The debate on this bill was prolonged and bit- 

 ter, and raised a question as to the rights of the 

 Senate and House respectively in the matter of 

 the levy and disposal of the revenue. Mr. Ran- 

 dall responded to a vigorous attack on the bill. 

 " I take all the rights for this House which the 

 Constitution gives it, and will be satisfied with 

 nothing less." The bill was adopted in the 

 House and, in amended form, by the Senate. 



Speaker Kerr died in August, 1876, and on the 

 meeting of Congress, in December following, Mr. 

 Randall was elected Speaker. He assumed the 

 office, at a period of general political excitement, 

 resulting from the complications over the presi- 

 dential election. He personally witnessed the 

 counting of the Louisiana returning board, and 

 opposed the appointment of the Electoral Com- 

 mission ; but after the passage of the bill author- 

 izing the commission he counseled order and 

 acquiescence, and presided over the House with 

 marked dignity. He was re-elected Speaker in 

 1877 and 1879, and was defeated by John G. 

 Carlisle in 1883, when he was reappointed chair- 

 man of the Committee on Appropriations. Subse- 

 quently he lost the support of some of the 

 strongest members of his party by advocating 

 the appointment of the tariff commission, serv- 

 ing as a member of the Conference Committee, 

 and opposing the Morrison and Mills tariff bills. 



REFORMED CHURCHES. I. Reformed 

 Church in America. The following is a sum- 

 mary of the statistics of this Church as they are 

 given in the report of the acts and proceedings 

 of the General Synod of 1890 : Number of par- 

 ticular synods New York, Albany, Chicago, and 

 New Brunswick 4 ; of classes, 34 ; of churches, 

 551 ; of ministers, 560, with 6 licentiates ; of 

 families, 49,135; of communicants, 90,878; of 

 baptized non-com rnunicants, 38,472; of Sunday- 

 schools, 798, with 103,046 pupils; of catechu- 

 mens, 35,805 ; of baptisms during the year, 5,253 

 of infants and 1,389 of adults ; amount of be- 

 nevolent contributions, $313.499; of contribu- 

 tions for congregational purposes, $1,003,815. 



The Board of Direction reported to the Gen- 

 eral Synod the receipt and expenditure of $198,- 

 030. The balance sheet showed the amount of 

 all the funds under its care as $785,454. The 

 Board of Education returned permanent funds 

 amounting to $42,665. It had aided 93 students, 

 21 of whom had been received under its care 

 during the year. Reports were received from 

 the theological seminaries at New Brunswick, 

 N. J., Holland, Mich., and Arcot, India, from 

 Hope College, Holland, Mich., and from the 

 Northwestern Classical Academy. 



The receipts for the Widows' fund had been 

 $10,314, while $4,912 had been paid to annui- 

 tants. The amount of the fund was $78,753. 

 The principal of the Disabled Ministers' fund 

 was $55,076 ; its receipts $10,622. 



The Board of Domestic Missions had received 

 $31,658 in the Missionary Department and $11,- 

 228 in the Building Fund Department. The 

 Women's Executive Committee had received $11,- 

 350, and this, with interest on invested funds, 

 etc., added to the other items, made the total 

 amount received for domestic mission work $64,- 

 603. The missionary work is classified in the re- 

 port as done in the eastern and the western fields. 

 Together these fields returned 124 missions, 92 

 ministers, 5,160 families, and 7,798 church mem- 

 bers, with 660 received during the year on con- 

 fession, 10,803 persons enrolled in Sunday-schools, 

 and $35,994 contributed by the mission churches. 



The Board of Foreign Missions had received, 

 in contributions and legacies, $117,090. The 

 Woman's Board had received $28,517. The En- 

 dowment fund of the theological seminary in 

 India, paid and promised, amounted to $57,098, 

 of which $49,575 had been paid in. The mis- 

 sions are in India (classis of Arcot), China (clas- 

 sis of Amoy), and Japan. The mission in India 

 comprised 8 stations, 98 out-stations, 1,397 fami- 

 lies, 1,690 communicants, 1,916 baptized chil- 

 dren, and 111 schools with 3,566 pupils. In the 

 Chinese mission were recorded 886 members in 

 the Reformed Churches, 19 in the native Hak- 

 ka mission, and 888 in the English Presbyterian 

 mission, making a total of 1,763 members. The 

 Japanese missions are incorporated with the 

 United Church of Christ in Japan, which in- 

 cludes 5 presbyteries and 10,194 members. The 

 report of the General Synod's Committee on 

 Missions expressed regret that the proposed 

 union of the United Church of Japan with the 

 Congregational mission has as yet failed of con- 

 summation, but noted with pleasure the acces- 

 sion of the Cumberland Presbyterian mission to 

 the Council of Missions, bringing with it 14 mis- 

 sionaries, 9 churches, and 604 communicants to 

 the United Church ; and mentioned the prospect 

 of a union of the Presbyterian and Reformed 

 Churches in India, as foreshadowed in the report 

 of a committee on that subject to the Presbyte- 

 rian Alliance of India. The Board of Missions 

 had not seen its way clear to open a mission 

 among Arabic-speaking people, as the General 

 Synod had proposed to have done, but such a 

 mission had been independently established by 

 private subscriptions, and two young men from 

 the New Brunswick Theological Seminary had 

 gone out to engage in it. The remonstrances 

 addressed by this and other missionary boards 

 and religious bodies to the United States Senate 

 against the bill for the exclusion of Chinese from 

 the country had been followed by the defeat of 

 the bill. The hope was expressed that further 

 attempts to enact unfriendly legislation, which 

 might imperil missionary interests in China, 

 would be opposed and defeated by Christian 

 Senators and Representatives. The mission at 

 Arcot, India, was congratulated by the General 

 Synod on having graduated its first class in the 

 theological seminary. 



The General Synod met at Asbury Park, 

 N. J., June 4. The Rev. James Romeyn Berry, 

 D. D., was chosen president. The special com- 

 mittee which had been appointed by the General 

 Synod of 1887 on union of the Reformed 

 Churches reported as the result of its negotia- 

 tions with a similar committee of the General 





