Daily union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1865-1866, 1866-05-27
POLITICO-RELIGTOU PREsBY-
TERRAIN CONTROVERSY.

Court Of the church, those gentlemen, Revs.
Stuart Robinson and 5. Il. Wilson and FL
ders Wicklife and Hardin, who represent
the Louisville Presbytery were excluded
from their seats. The action of the Assem-
| bly, il analogous TO that of the United States
Congress in regard to the Representatives
from the Southern States in that body
and it is perpetrated on the same preteNt-
lack Of LOYALTY TO the Government. The
controversy which it Unsolicited in that
intellectually and numerically great religious
| organization, is exciting general interest,
and iustifes observation from the sec
ular press, for the issue involved is the pre-
servation Of civil and religious liberty and
on such a theme there should be among free
men no restriction as 10 discussion. If
| Church or State assail either of these pro-
positions to fail to defend them, is inexcus-
able recreancy. We have lifted an earnest
voice against these usurpations by the State,
! and the Church is entitled to no immunity
when il enters upon the work of prescription
and intolerance. This much in preface to a
few remarks in defense Of the Commissioners
Of the Louisville Presbytery in their con-
test with the sectional and fanatical
majority who rule the General Assem-
bly,, and who are now about to COM
plete the degradation which, for five
years. they have been preparing for the
Presbyterian Church Of the United States.
| For the persons interested we care nothing
though STUART RoBINsoN, who is singled
out as a special mark in the proceedings in
| question, is intellectually and morally many
cubits in stature above many Of his malig-
ners, and by his heroism in defence of the
true principles of the Church of which he
is an ornament, has commended himself TO
the admiration Of all who know the history
Of his struggle 1t is the cause that he and
his colleagues represent tina. demands a
word.
The facts Of the case which has given this
question the importance it bears are substan-
TALLY these At the session of the General
Assembly in May 1861, at Philadelphia,
there was deliverance, ian ecclesiastical
phrase for what is secularly known as a res
slution,) touching the duties Of Synods,
Presbyteries Ministers, Elders and COM
municants in regard TO loyalty to the
Government, or TO speak more properly
support Of the war then Just Inaugural
! ted. In 1862, this was re-afirmed and
amended by adopting the whole Abolition
programme, and requiring adhesion to these
as the just standards of orthodoxy in
the Church In 1868 they were again en-
dorsed, and measures approved and senti-
ments avowed, looking to the establishment
Of an enginery of persecution and intolerance
of ministers and members who withheld
their assent to these tenets. In 1864 and
1865, the majority Of the General Assembly
reavowed their previous deliverances, and
approved all the proceedings had under
them; and the whole course of the Assem-
bly, since 1861 has been to hold itself pari
pdsSu with the most advanced Northern Ill
traists, in all Of the issues growing out of the
civil war.
Against this PROCLAMATION and prostitution
Of the church, and this wide departu re from
its true mission, there were protests even
throughout the North, both from churches
and individuals but they were unavailiug.
In Missouri and Kentucky, chiefly, was there
organized synodical and presbyterial resis-
lance. But in both States, the civil pow er
was called Indy the flithless churchmen who
adhered to the unrighteous dogmas of the
General Assembly to aid in extinguishing
it, and recalctrant ministers were exilcd
and slenced, and their symyathizing congre-
cations quoted into submission.
Attic meeting the Louisville Presbytery
last year. a paperwas adopted sty led the Decla-
ration and Testimony -testifying to the evan
gelical unsoundness of these deliverances-
the unchristian spirit which prompted them,
and the gross violation of the Presbyterian
Constitution which they involved and de
claring that, in so far as they assumed TO
control the domestic organization Of that
lt0N anu AllN ltllNlbNlN btllti anu NOll-
duct Of its members, they should have no
effect The sin Of adopting this protest is
made the ground of exclusion of this Pres
bytery from participation in the General As
sembly, and also a proposition to dissolve it |
As now organized, and commit it TO other |
hands, and, in effect, unchurching its pres |
ent representatives until they recant their
approval Of the Declaration and Testimony. |
How Justly, rightfully, or in church sense,
legally, this proceeding is, may be seen by
reading the paper to which we refer in the
outset of this article. We regard it, upon
the judicial points raised as unanswerable
it is rs impregnable as the great and sol
emn truths affirmed in the Declaration and
Testimony" which have never been met ex-
cept by clamor, and cheap appeals to that
unthinking thing called "loyalty"-a word
which, in the mouths of malicious conjnrers,
political and religious, is only used to evoke
all the evil spirits that infest the hos ms of
the damned; and to subserve the ends of
men, who, 10 erect into orthodoxy their own
views Of State and church polity, would not
scrurle TO overthrow all constitutions of
State and all ecclesiastical organizations,
and tramplc in the dust every tradition Of
civil and religions liberty. No rejecting
man can have failed to perceive that this is
the tendency Of the political bsdy in this
country, and this course Of the highest de-
Lucrative body, in, perhaps, the most con-
sentative church III the land, is clearly and
painfully in the same downward direction.
To one conversant with the history of
Presbyterianism, this fall from its high
estate must be regarded as a striking evi-
dence of the prevalent degencracy. In
all lands in every period since the reforma-
ton, and in the fires Of every persecution, it
has maintained stern and unyielding ad-
herence TO the one great object Of the gos-
pei mission, and as firm 4 resistance against
The intrusion of secular matters, and the in
reference of governments with the creed to
which its members were devoted. One of
the distinctive features OF It's system is the