Morning journal and courier., 1892-05-09
OMAHA, May 3.

egate-rhe Desire for a Colored Bishop.
 OMAHA, May 8. To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER. The routine observed in the organiza- ton of the Methodist general conference does not seen, to promise much in the way of entertainment. There are the usual devotions; then the roll call; then the seating of the delegates, and finally busi- ness. These are the items, simply stated, and one not familiar with such gatherings would expect dry preliminaries of this de- scription to pass off in the most humdrum style imaginable. But the Methodists are a very earnest people. What they believe they believe intensely. It is this charac- teristic which has made them the great power they are in all modern reforms, and in evangelizing the masses. Naturally, too, the same spirit of aggressiveness is seen in their great qusdrennial conclave. For real excitement the Methodist general conference can hold its own with the most lively of our political conventions, and in some respects it easily takes the palm from these. In political gatherings the interest is soon over; necessarily so because the meeting itself ends so soon. But in the general conference the excitement is long drawn out. It continues indeed with scarcely any fuctuation for a full month, and what is equally surprising, the tide of interest is as high usually at the beginning as when the business has proceeded for a week or two and the elections are in pro- gress.
 The reason for this is that almost always before the conference can get itself into l proper shape, there is some knotty | and delicate problem to solve. Four years | ago the women were knocking for admis- l sion, and the lords of creation, in confer
 ence assembled, were required, at the very threshold of their deliberations, to answer
 this summons and give decision there and then as to whether or not woman
 should be allowed a seat in that body This time the bone of contention was not | the lay woman, but the lay man. The
 conference consists of five hundred and
 five delegates. Amongst these the laymen
 cut a figure of only about hundred and
 eighty. Hence they are at a great dissd
 vantage. They have felt this, and have
 asked in constitutional manner for equal
 representation with the clergy. But the
 clergy for the present have negatived this
 request. The question, therefore, which
 presented itself was. how to make the
 most, for the time being, of the represen-
 tation they already possessed. This, il
 was concluded, could best be done by di
 viding the house. Heretofore laymen and
 ministers have sat together. Let us now
 sit apart, they said, or at least majority of them did, and finally, after 8 long and
 exciting debate, the conference gave its
 sanction to this project.
 Some of the most prominent of the lay
 men were opposed to this new departure
 Amos Shinkle, who has been & delegate tt
 every general conference since the laymer were first admitted in 1872, was decidedly , against 1t. It looked too much, he said
 like dividing the sheep from the goats
 But Postmaster Field, of Philadelphia
 said 1t would mark new era in Methodis
 legislation. and he was probably right ir this prediction. The division makes i
 certain that laymen will have a larger
 share in the debates, and equally certain
 that they will avail themselves more fire | quently than before of those constitution al rights by which, in certain contingen cies. the lay minority can pit itself witt | success, when vote l9 taken, against thu
 ministerial majority. Most of the lsymer
 who were not favorable to the change stil sit with their ministerial colleagues. This however, will hardly continue beyond tho present session, and 1t is reasonably cer tain, not only that from this time the two orders will continue to sit apart, but tha
 before very long they will be capitalized ir
 number.
 Beyond the change just noted there fl
 little in the aspect of the conference, or ir
 the conduct of its business, to distinguish 1t from its three latest predecessors. On, , misses, to be sure, 6 few honored form and few familiar voices. The cruel reap CT has gathered from us some of these, ana some others-a good many others-are no
 with us because their cruel brethren failed to vote for them. Dr. Buckley has esti 7 mated that something like nine-tenths O the members of this body are new men t | But who would suspect this if he were t a listen to the proceedings with his eye
 closed. The fact is that nearly all of tn "muchee talkee-talkee" which is done 5 sustained by the one-tenth, which, like th 8 poor, arc always with us. Not that tn
 others are not able to talk. Many of ther
 could keep the ball of oratory rolling. Q they had the chance, quite as we'll ss th . old timers do. But some of these, thoug they try hard enough, and 1t impossible gst the floor, and some others of them--t . the hsppy relief of sa' chairman and