OUR LEGACY FROM THE PAST - NCCUMC
OUR LEGACY FROM THE PAST - NCCUMC
OUR LEGACY FROM THE PAST - NCCUMC
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88<br />
George, and Robert R. Roberts. At this Conference, a paper was<br />
submitted, called MUTUAL RIGHTS. This paper was sponsored<br />
by men like Nicholas Snethen and James O'Kelley. It was proposed<br />
in this resolution that a reformation of church polity, concerning<br />
the Episcopacy, should be made. That is, that the<br />
presiding elders should not be selected by the bishop, but that they<br />
should be elected by the Annual Conferences within the districts<br />
which they served. From 1824 to 1828 this agitation grew, with<br />
many "Union Societies" being formed and organized among the<br />
antagonists to the present form of episcopacy, who wrote<br />
memorials to the next General Conference asking for a thorough<br />
reformation of church polity. The General Conference convened<br />
in Pittsburgh in 1828.These memorials were rejected after much<br />
discussion. James O'Kelley and his followers were defeated.<br />
When they left the Conference, they began the organization of a<br />
Church. This Church was what we now call the Methodist Protestant<br />
Church. It was called for a number of years the' 'O'Kelleyite<br />
Methodist Church," because of the energetic efforts put forth by<br />
Rev. Mr. O'Kelley.<br />
On November 2,1830, the leaders of this branch of Methodism<br />
met in Baltimore, formed a discipline and constitution, and<br />
organized the Methodist Protestant Church, which has had a most<br />
honorable history.<br />
The striking relation of this event to local church history is,<br />
that the Methodists of this community formed a new society,<br />
banding themselves in loyalty to the mother faith and church, during<br />
this trying period of young American Methodism.<br />
Again, in the year 1828, at the General Conference in Pittsburgh<br />
Rev. William Capers was nominated and elected as the first<br />
fraternal delegate to the British General Conference of Wesleyan<br />
Methodism, with a vote of 72 to 62 against his opponent, to return<br />
fraternal greetings. For in the year 1824Dr. Richard Reece and<br />
Rev. John Hannah had come to our General Conference in<br />
Baltimore as the first formal fraternal delegates to American<br />
Methodism.
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