486 History of Methodism 



of Harding, lie and his triers, for all I know, may have belonged to 

 the State of Maryland, whose laws were concerned, and may all 

 have been reached by the officers of the law if they were deemed 

 to be offenders. But in the case of Bishop Andrew, a citizen of the 

 State of Georgia, whose laws are displeasing, say, to the people of 

 New Hampshire or the North, is arrested by a General Conference 

 composed (for two-thirds of it) of Northern men on an allegation 

 that he (the citizen of Georgia) conforms himself to the laws and 

 institutions of Georgia against the prejudices of the Northern peo- 

 ple; and for this it is proposed to suspend him. It is as though 

 you had reached forth a long arm from New Hampshire to Georgia 

 to bring a citizen of the latter State to be punished by the preju- 

 dices of the former for his loyalty to the State to which he be- 

 longs. Such a proceeding cannot be right; and yet, I repeat, it 

 appears to me that the present is very like such a proceeding. If 

 our ecclesiastical jurisdiction extends to citizens of all the States, 

 it must respect the laws of all alike, and oppose itself to none. 

 What should it avail to admit the obligation of inferior officers and 

 judicatures of the Church — such as deacons and elders, and Quar- 

 terly and Annual Conferences — to respect the laws of their several 

 States, while your highest officers and supreme judicature— your 

 bishops and General Conference — should be withheld from their 

 control, or even be allowed to censure or oppose them according to 

 your prejudices? Patriotism and religion both require that we 

 should bow to the supremacy of the laws, and to the supremacy of 

 the laws of all the States alike. Those of the North, acting in this 

 General Conference for the whole Church in all the States, have no 

 more right to run counter to the constitution and laws of the State 

 of Georgia than Ave of the South should have to oppose the laws of 

 any of the Northern States. And can it have to come to such a pass 

 with us that one is of the South because he respects the laws and 

 constitutions of Southern States, and another is of the North be- 

 cause he respects them not? South or North, the authority of the 

 laws is the same, and the obligations of the Christian citizen to ob- 

 serve the laws must be acknowledged the same. 



It has been urged that a bishop is only an officer of the General 

 Conference, and that his election, and not his consecration, gives 

 him his authority as bishop. And to prove this position, my re- 

 spected brother (Dr. Durbin) referred for testimony to Dr. Coke, 

 Mr. Asbury, and Mr. Dickens. But I could not but think there was 

 one small particular wanting in the testimonv, the lack of which 



