TWO

FEMINIZATION, THE MARKET, AND PRESBYTERIAN ECCLESIOLOGY:

THE RULING ELDER

The success of the Old School in ridding itself of the New School in 1837-1838 forced it to address the identity of the continuing church. Most Old Schoolers assumed that their identity would remain unchanged–after all, they considered themselves the true heirs of historic Presbyterianism. But nothing remained unchanged in antebellum America. The defenders of historic Presbyterianism had created permanent boards to oversee a centralized program of ministerial training and foreign and domestic missions–something unheard of in traditional Presbyterian polity. Most Old School Presbyterians were attempting to retain an ecclesiastical version of Henry Clay’s American System. Perhaps national centralization was not desirable, but many Old Schoolers hoped that the church could provide a stable center to an increasing fragmented nation.[1]

But most Old School Presbyterians were not used to thinking “denominationally.” The 1840 General Assembly encouraged Presbyterians to maintain good relations with other denominations, but also pointed out that these denominations (primarily the Methodists and Baptists) could offer Presbyterians a useful model for action. “For they are imbued with a denominational feeling of long standing and mighty energy; among us, this feeling is in its infancy.” The Assembly urged Presbyterians to “emulate the zeal of other churches” in order to preserve the Old School as a “bulwark against the spirit of discord.” In the wake of the severe economic depression that still held sway in the east, and the growing unrest of the abolitionists it reminded the church that “Commerce, politics, religion, every earthly, every sacred interest has been touched with this demoniac wand [the spirit of discord] and thrown into wild confusion.”[2] Having borne witness to the errors of the New School, the Assembly urged the churches to greater zeal and fidelity in their support for the distinctively denominational work of the Old School.

1. Background

A. The Feminization Thesis

Ann Douglas has argued that the nineteenth century saw the “feminization” of evangelical protestantism, and therefore of American culture. She states that the liberal Protestantism of 1875 bore little resemblance to the sturdy Calvinism of 1800, suggesting that ministers and women joined forces through the production and consumption of novels and polite literature in the creation of a sentimental culture, yet one which continued “male hegemony in different guises.”[3]

There is much in the Presbyterian newspapers to commend Douglas’s thesis. Old School editors noted that women made up a large proportion of their readership, and most newspapers contained a significant amount of material designed for both women and children.[4] One Kentucky author pointed out that women were frequently between 60-80% of the communicant membership. He suggested that the reason was at least in part that “They have less to give up in making a profession of religion, and fewer temptations to resist in coming into the Church than the sterner sex.” Their main role, according to this author was to draw others (especially their men) into the church.[5]

When it came to women’s public roles, Old School Presbyterians appeared fairly unified. While Hannah More was often praised as an example of how a woman should comport herself in public, there was general contempt for those that formed “societies for the purpose of sitting in judgment and acting upon the affairs of church and state.”[6] Cortlandt Van Rensselaer spoke for most Old Schoolers when he professed to be horrified at the Woman’s Rights Convention in 1852.[7]

But Presbyterian women were heavily involved in the domestic reform movements of the day: teaching Sunday schools, going “from house to house, in quest of those whom they may gather into these sacred nurseries--or to administer to the poor relief--to the ignorant, instruction; to the afflicted, in body or mind, the needed balm; and who are unwearied in their labors to reform the vicious, and send abroad the light and consolations of divine truth.”[8] One woman writer urged the church to use the gifts of women to even better advantage. “Mary” reminded her readers that both the Old and New Testaments promised that “your sons and daughters shall prophecy,” though she agreed that women’s teaching should consist simply of teaching other women.[9] Another editor encouraged the church to utilize the widows of the church in the areas of mercy, visitation, and the distribution of tracts and religious literature.[10]

While women only wrote occasionally on theological and ecclesiastical issues,[11] most newspapers frequently published brief essays of a domestic character by women. These generally encouraged women to make their homes havens for their husbands, and exhorted them to teach their children and be active in their communities.[12]

But some recognized that the ideology of domesticity had created certain problems. Archibald Alexander expressed concern that female education was not preparing women for any “useful employment,” and urged parents and teachers to ensure that young ladies had sufficient practical skills to provide for themselves if the need arose.[13] William Swan Plumer, the editor of the Watchman of the South, understood the root of the problem. In a remarkable editorial, he called attention to

Plumer recognized that the economics of gender had changed since the eighteenth century, and that traditional employment opportunities for women had diminished. But while he recognized the problem, Plumer could articulate no solution.[15]

Nearly thirty years later the Missouri Presbyterian acknowledged that the situation had not improved: “The system at present in vogue of depreciating woman's labor, and paying her less than half price for the same amount of work when performed by a man. . . is at once the disgrace and the one tremendous crime of this age and people.”[16]

A similar problem was noted in Pittsburgh in 1862, during the war. David McKinney (1795-1873) noted that in his boyhood in Kentucky “women were in many a harvest-field, and at other out-door work. All this they have long since abandoned. Then, carding, and spinning, and knitting, and sewing were the daily, and weekly, and almost the perpetual employment of women; now the two former are utterly abandoned, and the two latter are rapidly going into disuse.” As machinery relegated such work to a thing of the past, “The result is that our women have become immense consumers, and add but little to the productive capacity of the country.” Therefore McKinney urged women to seek employment in “in-door work which may be adapted to their muscular power. Women could do much more in factories than they now do. They could well occupy nearly all our stores and shops. They could also do much of the writing and accountants' work, which is now performed by men.” Of course, remember the context. Part of this was a temporary measure in order to “relieve tens of thousands of able-bodied men, and turn these out to the army,” but there was a basic principle involved as well. “This change in the work of females would be also a kindness to them, in the way of health, and of independent feeling. It would elevate them. And it would open up a greatly needed means of livelihood for women who are bereaved of husbands and fathers, by the calamities of war.”[17] The assumption was that most women would be at home caring for their children, but at least some Presbyterian men recognized the problems that the economy of domesticity created.[18]

But while women were becoming more prominent in Presbyterian church life,[19] it would be inaccurate to say that men were becoming less prominent. If anything the ruling elders (who were exclusively male) came to greater prominence in the nineteenth century than at any previous time in American history. The sorts of forces that Douglas perceives certainly existed in the nineteenth century, but Presbyterians were quite aware of them and sought to retain a strong masculine presence in the life of the church.

B. The “Tranquilizing the Laity” Thesis and the Declining Status of the Minister

In this light, it may be partly accurate to say that Old School Presbyterians were attempting to uphold the ministry by including the laity in the government of the church. Belden Lane has argued that Samuel Miller was trying to “tranquilize” the laity by giving them a part in church government.[20] Put more positively, Presbyterians saw the role of the ruling elder as a vital element in church government. As the church’s official “Form of Government” put it, “Ruling elders are representatives of the people, chosen by them for the purpose of exercising government and discipline, in conjunction with pastors or ministers.”[21] Ruling elders visited the families of the church (often in pairs) and together with the pastor formed the session–the governing body of the local church. Ruling elders also had an equal voice and vote with ministers in presbytery and synod (the regional governing bodies of the church) and the national General Assembly. Presbyterianism had always emphasized the rule of the elders, as opposed to the rule of the congregation. As Old School Presbyterians saw the encroachment of New England congregationalism into their church, they were determined to purify the polity of the church in order to maintain vital orthodoxy. Indeed, reformers such as Robert J. Breckinridge argued that corruption in church order in 1801 had led to defections in doctrine.

Both the feminization thesis and the tranquilization thesis assume that the status of the minister was declining. Old School Presbyterians certainly concurred with that. They remembered a time when ministers were the center of a community’s life, and attempted to utilize that memory in order to retain as much respect for the ministry as they could.

In Scotland and Northern Ireland, the minister had an important place in society. Presbyterian churches traditionally had insisted upon a well-trained ministry that could take its place with the rest of genteel society. Therefore ministers tended to be well paid, and also tended to come from the middle and upper levels of society. As such, the Presbyterian minister in Scotland and Northern Ireland had a high social standing. But in antebellum America, the clergy sensed the decline of their position. Several historians have called attention to the anti-clericalism and democratization of religion in the wake of the American revolution.[22] The rise of the influence of ruling elders needs to be seen in the light of declining ministerial status.

While Presbyterian ministers were better paid than their Methodist or Baptist counterparts, there is no dispute that ministers were rapidly falling behind their counterparts in law and medicine. Of course, there were regional differences in what Presbyterian congregations were able or willing to pay their ministers. Unfortunately, the numbers for congregational giving are not available for the earlier period, since they were only recorded after 1850. But in spite of the comparative prosperity of 1860, it still reveals the disparity between rich and poor within the Old School.[23]

Figure 2.1. Giving for Congregational Purposes, 1860

# of churches Northeast Northwest Southwest South Other

$1,000+ 600 (17%) 242 (31%) 134 (10%) 108 (15%) 109 (15%) 7

$500-$1,000 585 (16%) 167 (21%) 236 (18%) 78 (11%) 103 (15%) 1

$0-$500 779 (22%) 166 (21%) 332 (25%) 179 (24%) 100 (14%) 2

Joint pastorates* 705 (20%) 61 (8%) 310 (23%) 142 (19%) 181 (26%) 4

not reporting** 921 (26%) 148 (19%) 327 (24%) 225 (31%) 216 (30%) 13

Total 3590 784 1339 732 709 27

*Joint pastorates records the number of churches which combined with one or more churches to pay a pastor or stated supply. Joint pastorates are connected with a church in the first three rows (usually the $500-$1,000 range).

**The vast majority of non-reporting congregations were vacant and unable to support a pastor.

Other consists of the Synods of the Pacific and Northern India

This table suggests that only about one-third of Old School churches (one-half if joint pastorates are included) were able to pay a salary of $500 or more. As might be expected, the northeastern churches were the wealthiest, with the other three regions more or less equal to each other. Urban churches generally paid from $1,000-$5,000, depending upon the size of the city (the cost of living was considerably higher in the larger cities), while rural and small town churches generally tried to come up with $500-$1,000 for their pastor, often combining with a neighboring church or two in order to share a minister.[24]

The financial situation for Virginia’s Presbyterians was one of the worst on the eastern seaboard. William S. White, pastor of the Lexington congregation, pointed out that only five or six of the thirty ministers in the two adjoining presbyteries of Lexington and West Hanover (covering the southern and western half of modern Virginia) were paid enough to provide for their families without requiring teaching or farming to supplement their income. This would not be very encouraging for a young man who was capable of making $3-4,000 per year as a lawyer or businessman.[25]

But it was not merely in Virginia that these problems were discussed. The Home and Foreign Record regularly spoke of the trials of domestic missionaries in the West, “dedicated men who live on next to nothing.” As one ruling elder from Western Pennsylvania wrote, after visiting Illinois and Iowa for six months in 1858, “Many in our old congregations have but a faint idea of the obstacles which our ministers encounter in the West., in building up feeble churches, gathering up scattered members, and organizing churches in destitute places.” One minister that he had met could not even afford a coat.[26] The Presbyterian reported that a brother in the West had written to say that his congregation could only pay him half of his $125 salary, “and but about fifteen or twenty dollars of that in money–a small dependence for the support of a minister with two little motherless boys, where the time that can be spared from pastoral duties is devoted to gratuitous missionary labour, leaving me no leisure for sustaining myself by teaching school or farming.” But this minister could not bring himself to seek a more lucrative field: “I cannot abandon it; yea, I desire to be thankful to the Lord who has sent me here in the midst of these vast desolations.”[27] Such stories convinced some that the American system of ministerial support was lacking. William Engles pointed out that the Free Church of Scotland, which he deemed to be less wealthy than the Old School, was still able to guarantee all ministers at least $650 per year plus a parsonage. He suggested that the problem was not a lack of resources, but an inadequate concern for the temporal needs of ministers.[28]

Another change in ministerial practice was the length of tenure. Whereas the older practice of all Protestant churches had encouraged “life-settlement,” by the 1850s fewer and fewer ministers were remaining in the same congregation for an extended period of time. J. F. M. visited 143 churches in four synods in 1852 as a traveling agent. Of those 143 churches, only 40 had the same pastor six years later.[29] As ministers became increasingly mobile, the importance of the ruling elder grew. Ministers might come and go, but now the ruling elder would provide the continuity that the pastor had once given. Indeed, many were beginning to think that ruling elders could fill in for the lack of ministers. In 1842 one ruling elder suggested in the Philadelphia Presbyterian that pious elders should relocate to destitute neighborhoods and villages in order to organize churches through establishing Sunday schools, bible classes and distributing Christian literature.[30] Likewise, the Rev. Benjamin Gildersleeve, editor of the Watchman and Observer, suggested that ruling elders could be appointed to supply destitute churches, or at least take over certain pastoral duties (such as visitation) to enable the pastors to do so.[31]

But a southwestern author in the True Witness pointed out that the same reasons for the lack of ministers also affected the ruling elders. He complained that many ruling elders “are too worldly-minded and grasping and seem to forget their high obligations to live for God.” While most elders were moral in their deportment, they seemed to lack a strong sense for “the spiritual interests of the church.”[32] One elder declared that “There are church sessions composed of men, who are hosts in themselves, on the court green, in the counting-house or at the forum, some of whom are wholly unqualified for the high spiritual office of a ruling elder in the church of Christ.” Elders needed to care for the spiritual needs of the church, not merely provide money; but proper spiritual care requires men who were themselves spiritually qualified to lead.[33] Some suspected that the underlying greed of the American economy was luring ruling elders from their devotion to Christ.[34]

C. Presbyterians and the Market

With leading lawyers, businessmen, and politicians in their churches, Presbyterian ministers and elders continued the tradition of addressing the political, social, and economic issues of the day. The published works and public actions of these ruling elders suggest that many maintained a strong connection between their Presbyterian identity and their chosen field.[35] Nonetheless, this connection was being eroded by the acids of modernity. Curtis D. Johnson in his book, Islands of Holiness, argues that churches in the 1820s and 1830s were still disciplining businessmen for economic sins, but that by the 1850s and 1860s this had almost completely vanished. Old School Presbyterian newspapers reflect the same trend. As late as the early 1840s there are still notices of economic sins, but by the 1850s and 1860s there are fewer notices, and the sermons on economic matters start to become more generic.[36] Nonetheless, ministers regularly expressed concern over the trajectory of American society. This concern, as Kenneth M. Startup has pointed out, existed at least as strongly in the south as in the north. Americans were obsessed with accumulating wealth, and ministers feared that the spirit of speculation and enterprise was overwhelming even the most pious.[37]

Old School ministers frequently addressed sermons, essays and books to the new economic world that they and their parishioners inhabited.[38] Henry A. Boardman, pastor of the Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, wrote The Bible in the Counting-House, warning against the temptations of the mercantile life.[39] In a review of Boardman’s volume in the Princeton Review Lyman H. Atwater praised his careful treatment of the subject. Agreeing with Boardman that the advancement of civilization had resulted in the minute division of labor, Atwater pointed out that bankers were the true rulers. “The power of these huge corporations is immense and ubiquitous”–and also dangerous.[40] Without Christian principles of justice and mercy, capitalism’s fierce competition could tend toward dishonesty and fraud. “Poverty and degradation grow apace with wealth, luxury, and refinement.”[41] But, he argued that socialistic remedies would only make things worse. The only true solution would be found in the preaching of the gospel, which could transform greedy businessmen into godly citizens.[42]

Likewise, Old School Presbyterians were troubled about the effect of a free market on Sabbath observance. The Sabbath was the economic issue most frequently addressed by Presbyterians.[43] But the interest in Sabbath-keeping pushed Presbyterians to consider other economic issues as well. The New School minister John P. Cleaveland, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Detroit, Michigan, urged the 1836 General Assembly to condemn not only the transaction of secular business on Sundays, but also owning “stock in such establishments as stages, steam boats, rail roads and the like, which are employed in violation of that holy day.”[44] Cleaveland argued that if a man owned stock in a company, then he was a part-owner of that company, and therefore was morally liable if he was aware of any sinful actions that his company committed. This logic would severely hamstring the capitalist system–which rests upon the pillar of limited economic liability for stockholders–by adding a moral liability that would require greater oversight of corporations.[45]

But the majority, led by Samuel Miller, disagreed with Cleaveland. Miller agreed that it was a bad idea to own stock in such a company, but Miller argued that stockholders were not owners–they were lenders. The stockholder loaned his money to the company in the hope of a good return on his investment. But while Miller may have had a better grasp of the principles of capitalist investments, he was not unconcerned about the moral implications of such investments. The Assembly accepted his amendment to Cleaveland’s report, and declared that “the owners of stock in the steam boats, canals, rail roads, &c. who are in the habit of violating the Sabbath, are lending their property and their influence to one of the most wide-spread, alarming, and deplorable systems of Sabbath desecration, which now grieve the hearts of the pious and disgrace the church of God.”[46]

The solution, for Miller and the majority of Presbyterians, was to focus on the Sabbath to the exclusion of making any statement about the general moral liability of stockholders. Instead they urged that “the friends of the Lord's day” should “establish such means of public conveyance as shall relieve the friends of the Sabbath from the necessity under which they now labour, of travelling at any time in vehicles which habitually violate that holy day; and thus prevent them from being partakers in other men's sins, in this respect.”[47] Throughout the antebellum era, Old School newspapers regularly praised companies that shut down on Sundays, and urged their readers to patronize such businesses.[48]

While sidestepping the question of the stockholder’s moral liability, the Old School did engage more directly the question of usury. The Reformed tradition had debated the question of usury for centuries,[49]1560‑1707 (Edinburgh, 1992). and the Old School followed similar tracks, though occasionally with greater economic sophistication. In principle, all Presbyterians agreed that the Old Testament civil laws were no longer binding, but they differed as to how far its “equity” went in suggesting principles for modern lawmakers. The question arose in the Presbytery of Louisville whether the church should discipline a man for usury who charged more than six per cent interest (Kentucky law prohibited charging more than six per cent). Following the arguments of William L. Breckinridge, the presbytery determined that the usury condemned in the Bible refers to illegal interest, and therefore the church should discipline those who charged more than six per cent interest because it was a violation of Kentucky law.

Breckinridge, who summarized his arguments in “A Discourse on Usury” in 1843, argued that usury is not merely lending at interest, but that measure “of interest on money loaned, which tends to eat up the substance of the borrower.” Suggesting that ten per cent interest ordinarily “has a certain tendency to a devouring issue,” Breckinridge called such interest “extortion.”[50] But Breckinridge’s interest was not merely exegetical or ecclesiastical. He also had a political goal in view–namely the defense of clear usury laws for the United States.

Breckinridge insisted 1) that government has the “high moral obligation of regulating, in detail, certain questions for the peace and order of society.” 2) Among those obligations are regulation of currency–whether of coin or of paper. “The state assumes the entire and sovereign control of the subject, and reason and all experience show that this is not only right, but necessary.” Trade could not exist if everyone were allowed to coin money.[51] Therefore 3) the government has the right to fix the rate of “compensation for the use of money”–namely, interest. Finally, this suggests that “human governments are bound, under the general principles of revealed religion, by the dictates of sound reason and the results of experience, to regulate by law the value of the use of money.” In other words, Kentucky’s six per cent restriction was just, and both the civil government and the church courts should enforce laws against usury.[52]

When the Synod of Kentucky reviewed the case, the Rev. James K. Burch of Lexington argued that usury referred to “interest of every kind, and was invariably used, when condemned, in connexion with poverty and distress. He remarked that the Bible forbid the taking of any per cent. at all of those who were in distress.” He objected to Breckinridge’s effort to interpret the law of God by the civil law. “He did not go to the civil law to find out what God meant when he denounced usury as a sin. . . . He contended that money was property, and as such, was taxed, and should be left like other commodities to regulate itself.”[53]

The Rev. Dr. Robert Davidson of Lexington replied with a more sophisticated grasp of economic history. The Hebrew law was designed for an agricultural people who “never borrowed money except when compelled by urgent necessity,” but could take interest from their neighbors (like the Phoenicians, who were traders). Since the modern economy was drastically different, the old Hebrew law did not apply any more. Tracing the history of usury through both civil and canon law, Davidson argued that since the Larger Catechism defined usury as sin, but does not define usury, it permits the view that simply oppressing the poor is condemned. For Davidson, Breckinridge’s attempt to make the Old Testament law fit the modern economy was an exercise in futility. Noting that Great Britain had removed its usury laws forbidding interest above a certain per cent, Davidson argued that the laws of the several United States (ranging from six to ten per cent) demonstrated that setting a just standard by law was no longer possible. Instead, he argued that the state should forbid extortion, but leave interest rates to equity–what is just and fair.[54] The Synod concurred and rejected the presbytery’s claim that charging more than six per cent interest could render a man subject to the discipline of the church.

But one other aspect of the debate is worthy of note. The Hon. James M. Preston (a ruling elder from Ebenezer Presbytery)[55] argued that “if a law be made by the proper law-making power in a State, and it be neither contrary to the constitution nor to the Bible, it is the embodiment in language of the national conscience, and every particular citizen, and much more every christian citizen ought certainly to obey it.”[56] Preston’s usage of the idea of a national conscience suggests that Old School Presbyterians still wanted to maintain a sense of corporate conscience, and that they wanted to maintain a place in defining what that corporate conscience said. As businessmen, bankers and lawyers became increasingly prominent in defining that corporate conscience, ruling elders would play a larger and larger role in expressing the vision of the church in American society.[57]

D. Providentialism and Its Critics

Presbyterian economic discourse often focused on the providential aspect of economic activity. Presbyterians frequently noted the connection between financial crises and revivals. In 1840, the annual “Narrative of the State of Religion” commented that urban churches had increased significantly in numbers during the “financial downturn” since 1837.[58] Likewise in 1857, William Engles, the editor of the Philadelphia Presbyterian noted in the midst of the commercial panic, “Credit is gone, and confidence, that foundation-stone of commercial transactions, no longer exists.” Urging businessmen to remember the providence of God, he suggested that success is not always good for the soul: “Just such times as these are doubtless often needed to cure men of their madness, and bring them to their reason.”[59]

But a few Presbyterians believed such pious comments fell far short of the needs of the poor. In 1851 an anonymous layman exploded a bomb in the evangelical urban community. New Themes for the Protestant Clergy claimed that while “Protestantism has gone before the world in liberality, it is almost a stranger to that charity which the Author of our faith preached and exemplified.” Claiming that Protestants had elevated theology over charity, he inveighed against the lack of charity in Protestant theology,[60] and argued that Jesus’ teaching and example demanded that the church care for the poor.[61] Initial speculation suggested that the author was probably a Unitarian or “Infidel” who delighted to attack Protestantism. But slowly the word spread that the author was an Old School Presbyterian ruling elder from Philadelphia (who was eventually revealed as Stephen Colwell). In 1853 he published again, this time under the pseudonym of “A Protestant Clergyman,” Charity and the Clergy to defend what he had written. Since the religious newspapers had replied with such hostility, he now ventured to prophesy regarding the future of Protestantism:

The deacons might coordinate the work, but Colwell insisted that there was no substitute for the members of the church actually conducting the work themselves. Charity must be individual and personal, even as it functioned in a corporate context.

The response to Colwell was generally hostile. William Engles, editor of the Presbyterian, was unwilling to concede that charity had been ignored by the churches. He claimed that all the charitable institutions in the country (except Girard College) originated from or were promoted by the clergy. But Engles insisted that spiritual poverty afflicted both poor and rich, and the wealthy could not be ignored either. Engles seemed to suggest that congregations should be gathered according to class.[75] Stuart Robinson, a young Baltimore pastor, recognized that Engles had missed the point. He asked Engles whether the Presbyterian church was gaining or losing its hold on the masses? Were Presbyterian charities “impressing the poor with the great idea that it is our religion and our love of Christ that leads to assist and care for them; and thereby drawing them toward our church and our gospel?” Because of the church’s failure to care for the poor, the poor were finding it in socialism, unions, economics, and masonry, not to mention “Popery.”[76] He admitted that he had initially disapproved of the tone of the New Themes books, but after reading the responses from the clergy, “I see more the necessity of this bold and warlike tone, in order to get even a hearing, and secure public attention.” However wrong they might be, the New Themes authors raised a worthy point: whereas the Protestant churches had developed unparalleled means for distributing gospel truth, there was a disturbing trend towards ministering solely to the wealthy. Very little was being done “for the relief of the physical wants of the poor and of labour for the moral and spiritual amelioration of the most ignorant and wretched members of society.” Robinson was becoming increasingly convinced that Colwell was right. The quest for “personal, family, and social ambition” was producing a “desire for show and parade in religion. The growing trend towards expensive and even luxurious church buildings signaled to Robinson that the church was no longer concerned for the poor. And why should they come once “there is no longer any gospel in ‘demonstration of the Spirit and in power’ to attract them.”[77]

But Engles still did not see any significant problems. Still upset by Colwell’s tone, Engles complained that the New Themes books “stigmatized the Church as obstinately blind and recreant to its duty. . . not so much [in] the evangelizing of the multitude as the cure of their temporal wretchedness.” He did not think that magnificent church buildings were likely to do much mischief. “Besides, it should be recollected that even by these means a large class of society may be brought under the immediate influence of the means of grace, which would otherwise stand aloof.”[78] Convinced that the church was headed in the right direction, Old School Presbyterians would ignore Colwell’s pleas and the New Themes controversy passed away and was forgotten.[79]

Indeed, Engles attitude was much more common in the newspapers. In 1857 a New Orleans writer went so far as to suggest that business could be a means of grace. He suggested that the one who followed the first answer in the Westminster Shorter Catechism and saw that his chief end was to glorify God and enjoy him forever, “is never more happy than when full of business. Let him connect his business with God. . . and he will find that his business, instead of being a hindrance, will be a help--a real means of grace to him. Instead of letting his business swallow up his religion, his religion will swallow up his business.”[80] Such statements lend credence to the theory that Calvinism and capitalism advanced hand in hand, in spite of the fact that many Calvinists had serious questions about capitalist values. And with the transformation of business and law during the market revolution, it was not surprising that these changes brought new questions to theology and ecclesiastical practice as well.

2. The Rejection of Reaction: R. J. Breckinridge and the Elder Question

On May 19, 1831, the newly-ordained ruling elder, Robert Jefferson Breckinridge, took his seat in the General Assembly at Philadelphia as a commissioner from Kentucky.[81] As the members of the Assembly took their seats, the clerks reported “a commission from Grand River [Presbytery] for a member of a Standing Committee, instead of a Ruling Elder.” Presbyterian church order only permitted ministers and ruling elders to sit in the church courts–not unordained committee members. But after considerable discussion, “it was resolved that the member be received, and enrolled among the list of members.” The Assembly proceeded to elect the Rev. Nathan S. S. Beman as moderator–the only New School moderator ever elected. A dozen years later, now a minister, Breckinridge commented, “This was the culminating point of New School influence in the Presbyterian church. . . and his elevation followed instanter the formal abrogation of one of the most important elemental principles of our polity.” This moment would live long in Breckinridge’s memory: “never shall I forget the impression then made upon me. From that hour, the total ruin or the thorough reformation of the church seemed to me altogether inevitable.”[82] In 1831 the Assembly settled on a compromise measure declaring the seating of committee men to be of questionable constitutionality, which Breckinridge declared in 1843 to reflect the nature of the Old School–a compromise between the hardliners (like himself) and the moderates. Breckinridge did not like moderates very much, and left no room for doubt what he thought of them. In the debates over the status of ruling elders, the venerable Samuel Miller (writing under the name of “Calvin”) was one of his leading opponents,[83] and Breckinridge asked “just what part he took in the troubles and trials” of the New School controversy. Speaking to the ruling elders of the church, Breckinridge ridiculed his nemesis, “What was that good Mr. ‘Calvin’ doing during. . . [while] the Assembly had virtually put down your office”?[84]

The irony was that Samuel Miller had been the first to ordain ruling elders by the laying on of hands at Powles Hook, New Jersey, in 1809. Miller was widely known as a champion of the rights of ruling elders, and had already written two books on the subject. But in the light of radical trends toward leveling the status of the minister with the laity, Miller wished to strengthen the uniqueness of the minister without denigrating the importance of the eldership.[85]

But even as Miller retreated from the democratizing trends he had once advocated, Breckinridge took the lead as the one who would continue the reformation that the Old School had started in 1837. And the first practice to be reformed was the standing of the ruling elder. Convinced that Miller was correct that ruling elders were New Testament presbyters, Breckinridge argued that ruling elders should participate in the laying on of hands at the ordination of ministers, and that no presbytery should be allowed to conduct business without at least one ruling elder present. In many respects these may sound like trivial questions. But situated in the midst of the Jacksonian era and Presbyterian ambivalence toward the process of democratization, these seemingly trivial questions begin to take on more significance. What exactly was the relationship between the minister and the ruling elder? At least four lines of argument were utilized by both sides of the debate: 1) the scriptural teaching on the eldership, 2) church history (especially Scottish practices), 3) church polity (the PCUSA’s Form of Government and its historic interpretation), and 4) American civics and the connection between Presbyterianism and republicanism.

Breckinridge argued that his reforms merely continued the “final deliverance of our church from the corruptions of Pelagianism and the errors of Congregationalism in 1837 and 1838.” The principle that led to the casting out of the New School would also lead to ruling elders laying hands on ministers: namely, “a strict adherence to the Word of God and the Constitution of the church.” The son of one of Thomas Jefferson’s leading advisors now argued that “simple adherence to the plain and obvious sense of our fundamental bonds” was at stake in this matter.[86]

But to the minds of most in the Old School, Breckinridge’s reformation sounded like a revolution. In 1839/40 his practice was challenged at the Synod of Philadelphia as an innovation without warrant in scripture or Presbyterian polity and history. Breckinridge replied that ruling elders had laid on hands in ordinations in Kentucky and other places in the church for more than eight years (a pedigree that was not likely to impress Philadelphians),[87] but while lacking significant precedents, he defended it vigorously from the logic of presbyterian polity. If a session is a presbytery, and a ruling elder may act in the ordination of ruling elders on the session, then the same should be true at the presbyterial level as well. If the ruling elder is lawfully a member of the presbytery, then he must take part in all that the presbytery does. There is no superiority of the preacher to the elder, “for Elder is Presbyter; and if Bishop, or Minister, or any thing else, be above Presbyter--good night to Presbytery.”[88] Some had claimed that the ruling elder did not have the authority to lay hands on a minister, because the elder does not have the power to convey an office that he himself does not hold. In reply Breckinridge offered a lesson in American civics: the “Governor appoints a Judge, a Senate confirms him, and a Notary Public swears him in: yet of all these, not one is a Judge, or can judge any body. . . The fallacy lies in supposing that the Ruling Elders in ordination, act privately--they act as elemental parts of Presbytery.”[89] It is ironic, Breckinridge thought, that by their votes, elders may hinder or force an ordination, but they cannot partake of the mere form.

This sounded dangerously prelatical to Breckinridge. Two years later he admitted that he feared that the Presbyterian church was being overrun by “high-churchism” and independency, both of which tended to make ministers “semi-prelates” and degraded the office of ruling elder. He marveled that ruling elders seemed unable to “see the absolute ruin that impends over their office.”[91] Although the newspapers rang with objections and complaints against Breckinridge’s views, he rather enjoyed the role of the embattled champion.[92] Breckinridge’s tendency towards grandstanding was only magnified by his sense of leading the minority (as he had during the Old School/New School conflict). In his open letter to the ruling elders of the Presbyterian Church, he gloried in the fact that both he and his brother were the only two ministers he knew who had once served as ruling elders, implying that those ministers who opposed his views were simply ignorant of the importance of the office of ruling elder.[93]

Breckinridge warned that there was “a systematic plan in operation, to have it settled as the law and practice of the church, that you are not to be henceforth ordained as other Presbyters are ordained, and as all Presbyters were ordained in apostolic and primitive times; and to deprive you of all direct part in all Presbyterial ordinations, Breckinridge declared that “the next step after this will be the practical abolition of your office, which Christ has established.”[94]

A. The Response to Breckinridge

Every Presbyterian newspaper printed sustained debates over the elder question from 1841-44. In most regions Breckinridge found little support. Only in the synods of Kentucky, Virginia, South Carolina and Philadelphia (in the latter it was mostly in his own Baltimore Presbytery) did he find significant support.[95] In fact, the Synod of Kentucky was the only synod to pass a resolution allowing elders to participate in laying on hands at the ordination of ministers (1842).[96]

The Presbyterian published a response to Breckinridge by “M” (apparently President John Maclean of the College of New Jersey), who became Breckinridge’s leading opponent in the Synod of Philadelphia. Maclean was appalled at the leveling of the offices of minister and ruling elder. “The office of a ruling elder is not the same with that of a Minister of the Gospel. It is an inferior office. . . . When therefore, a Ruling Elder lays his hands on the head of a candidate for the Gospel ministry for effecting his ordination, he affords an example of 'the less blessing the better,' which the Apostle represents as unnatural and improper.” Worse, in Maclean’s view, this “new measure adopted in the West, is a departure from the invariable practice of all the Presbyterian Churches on earth since the Reformation.” Insinuating that Breckinridge’s innovations were comparable to Charles Finney’s new measures of revivalism, Maclean voiced a common eastern fear that the “west” was too far removed from traditional European forms of Christianity and could revolutionize the church.[97] Tradition was strong in Philadelphia, and Breckinridge’s motion failed 19-42.

Figure 2.2. Breckinridge’s Supporters in the Synod of Philadelphia, 1842

Ministers: Birth Seminary Church Presbytery

Griffith Owen (1810-1871) Wales PTS 1840 Cohocksink, PA Philadelphia

Silas M. Andrews (1805-1881) NC PTS 1831 Doylestown, PA Philadelphia

Robert D. Morris (1814-1882) KY PTS 1838 Newtown, PA Phila 2^nd

Alexander G. Morrison (1798-1870) PA PTS 1826 Coatesville, PA New Castle

John Wallace (1791-1866) PA Private 1829 Pequa, PA New Castle

Robert P. DuBois (1805-1883) PA PTS 1835 New London, PA New Castle

Robert W. Dunlap (1815-1856) SC PTS 1837 Columbia, PA New Castle

John Pym Carter (????-????) ? Private 1838 Taneytown, MD Baltimore

Reese Happersett (1810-1866) PA PTS 1839 Havre de Grace, MD Baltimore

Robert T. Berry (1812-1877) VA PTS 1838 Georgetown, DC Baltimore

Robert J. Breckinridge (1800-1877) KY PTS 1832 2^nd Baltimore, MD Baltimore

John B. Spottswood (1808-1885) VA UTS/PTS 1833 Mt. Paran, MD Baltimore

Andrew B. Cross (1810-1889) MD PTS 1834 Bethel, MD Baltimore

James C. Watson (1805-1880) PA PTS 1830 Gettsyburg, PA Carlisle

Also ruling