METHODISTS. 



477 



ciders, and deacons: a publication house at Char- 

 lotte, N. ('. : 17 educational institutions of high 

 grade, including Livingston College, at Salisbury, 

 N. ('.. .(ones University, at Tuscaloosa. Ala.. Atkin- 

 son College, at Madisonville. Ky.. and Greenville 

 College, at Greenville. Tenn. : and occupies territory 

 in :!<> Stjites of the Union. Canada. Africa, and the 

 islands of the sea. It publishes a weekly general 

 newspaper. ;i " (Quarterly Review." an official direc- 

 tory. Sunday-school literature, a college magazine 

 (" The Livingstonia "). and of books, the Discipline. 

 3 histories, a hymnal containing 29 hymns by its 

 own ministers, 4 books of sermons, a number of 

 pamphlets, and smaller publications by authors who 

 are members of the Church ; and has in press a 

 "Centennial History." by Bishop Hood. 



Representatives of other Methodist Episcopal 

 Churches of both the white and colored races took 

 part in the celebrations and tendered the sympa- 

 thies of the bodies they represented. Bishop J. \V. 

 Hood, senior bishop of the Church, presided at the 

 opening meeting : Bishop Charles \V. Fowler, of 

 the Methodist Episcopal Church, preached the 

 opening sermon : and Bishop W. B. Derrick, of the 

 African Methodist Episcopal Church, delivered the 

 address of welcome. Other persons presided at the 

 succeeding meetings. Papers were read and ad- 

 dresses made on subjects pertaining to the history, 

 growth, and work of the Zion Church ; the '' Rela- 

 tions of the Union African Methodist Episcopal 

 Church to the American Methodist Episcopal Zion 

 Church." by Bishop J. II. Cook, of the Union Ameri- 

 can Methodist Episcopal Church : the " Relations 

 of the Colored Methodist Episcopal to the African 

 Methodist Episcopal Zion Church." by the Rev. C. 

 11. Phillips, D. D., editor of the " Christian Index " : 

 " The Attitude of the Protestant Episcopal Church 

 to the other Protestant Denominations," by the Rev. 

 Ilutchens Bishop ; on subjects related to missions, 

 the Young People, and the Christian Endeavor So- 

 cieties : the literature of the Church ; the Christian 

 Sabbath. The subject of " Religious Education the 

 Hope of the Afro-American " was presented by the 

 Rev. T. H. Johnson, D. D., editor of the " Christian 

 Recorder " of the African Methodist Episcopal 

 Church ; " The Resources of Africa " were de- 

 scribed, with especial reference to African emigra- 

 tion, by Bishop IT. M. Turner, of the African Meth- 

 odist Episcopal Church. One day was designated 

 as Woman's Day." when Mrs. Hood, wife of Bishop 

 Hood, presided, and papers were read by women of 

 the Church on " Woman's Work in the Missionary 

 Field '' ; " Our Women Preachers and their Influ- 

 ence " : " Woman as a Philanthropist " : Woman 

 in the Pioneer Work of the Church " : " Woman in 

 the Literary Field " : " Woman's Influence in the 

 Antislavery" Movement "; "The Old Ship of Zion"; 

 and " Africa as it was and is. from Sacred and Pro- 

 fane Sources," the last paper being by Mrs. Hilgard, 

 a returned missionary from Africa. The exercises 

 concluded Nov. 2 with a public meeting in Carnegie 

 Music Hall, at which the Hon. W. L. Strong. Mayor 

 of the city of New York, presided, and a banquet. 



V. Union American Methodist Episcopal 

 Church. According to the address of Bishop J. 

 IT. Cook at the centennial celebration of the Afri- 

 can Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, this body 

 was the result of the withdrawal of Peter Spencer 

 and other colored Methodists from Asbury Church, 

 Wilmington, Del., in 1805, who formed a local 

 church called ' Ezion Church." In 1823 Mr. Spen- 

 cer and William Anderson founded the Union 

 Church of African members. In organizing 

 churches in various places. Mr. Spencer established 

 schools wherever it was possible, and insisted on 

 the support of them. He died in Wilmington. Del., 

 July 25, 1843. This Church has not enjoyed the 



numerical and educational growth that have fallen 

 to the lot of the larger Methodist Episcopal ( 'liurcln- 

 of colored members, having been kept back. Bi-hop 

 Cook represented, by the failure in early tin; 

 establish an itinerant syMem. to make provisions 

 for the support of pa-tors, and to promote an edu- 

 cated ministry. The statistical reports of this 

 church for 1^96 give it 62 ministers, 60 churches, 

 and 2.642 nieml 



VI. Methodist Protestant Church. The re- 

 port of the Committee on Statistics to the General 

 Conference gave the following numbers : Of minis- 

 ters and preachers. 1.5,50: of unstationed ministers 

 and preachers. 1.116: of members of the Church, 

 179.01)2: of probationers, 4,624: of churches. 2.267: 

 of parsonages. 484 : value of church property (not 

 including college property), $4.519,357 ; number of 

 Christian Endeavor Societies, 595, with 27.693 mem- 

 bers; of Sunday schools, 2.01S. with 17,567 officers 

 and teachers and 107.490 pupils. The figures show 

 an increase in four years of 65 ministers and 

 preachers, 37.821 members, and $967,998 in the 

 value of church property. The reported number of 

 members includes 94 members of the Japan mis- 

 sion. 



The report of the Committee on Publishing 

 Houses showed that the publishing house at Pitts- 

 burg had an excess of $53,437 of assets over liabil- 

 ities, and the house at Baltimore of 8.271. 



The Board of Missions had received $52.261 dur- 

 ing the past four years, and had distributed $52,- 

 491. The Woman's Foreign Missionary Society 

 had distributed $17.822. The foreign mission is in 

 Japan, where reports were made to the mission 

 conference in 1895 from 10 charges with 25 ap- 

 pointments and 17 Sunday schools, 275 full mem- 

 bers of the Church, and 44 probationers. Two na- 

 tive theological graduates and 3 additional mission- 

 aries had been added to the force, and the whole 

 number of missionaries was 15. The school of the 

 Woman's Society at Yokohama returned 50 pupils, 

 with 2 missionaries, and 1 missionary and 4 native 

 Bible readers were engaged in evangelistic work 

 at Xagoya. 



The seventeenth quadrennial General Conference 

 met at Kansas City. Mo.. May 15. Dr. J. W. Hering, 

 of Westminster, Md., a layman, was re-elected pres- 

 ident. The president made an opening address re- 

 lating to his official transactions during the in- 

 terim since the preceding General Conference. Xo 

 powers are attached to the office except the purely 

 ministerial one of receiving and answering such 

 official correspondence as might be addressed to 

 him. Such correspondence usually grew out of dif- 

 ferences of opinion in regard to Church law as bear- 

 ing on the duties of the writers of the letters. Rec- 

 ognizing that he had no authority to make a bind- 

 ing decision in any case, the president had simply 

 given such advice and counsel as he deemed wise. 

 The president reported the result of the vote of 

 the annual conferences on three overtures that had 

 been sent down by the previous General Conference. 

 The first overture, to insert in the constitution 

 clauses prohibiting the election of women as rep- 

 resentatives to the General Conference, was lost, 13 

 conferences voting against it to only 1 in favor 

 of it, while 5 conferences were reported as not 

 voting. The second and third overtures, recog- 

 nizing presidents of Christian Endeavor Societies 

 and relating to the election of stewards, were car- 

 ried. A new overture concerning the position of 

 women in the Church was sent down, declaring, in 

 the affirmative form, that "the General Conference 

 shall consist of an equal number of ministers, either 

 male or female, and laymen, either men or Tvomen : 

 lii'xolml. That women be made eligible to the 

 order of elder in the Church." Another overture 



