The herald., 1898-03-01
AN OPEN LETTER
CENTRAL PRESBYTERIANS WILL
NOT ACCEPT FIRST CHURCH
And Demand That Their Share Of the
Proceeds Of the Sale Be Paid to
Them in Hard Cash

w. 49,
church, through committee. made prop
osition to transfer the whole church prol
erty, corner of Figueroa and Twenuet
streets, in settlement Of the controvers
which arose at the time the property cor
,er of Second street and Broadway wa
disposed Of The following answer wa
made yesterday:
N. II. Fife, d. D., Rev. j. H. Stewart.
George A. Howard. the PROVISIONAL
Session of the Westminster Prespy-
terian Church-Brethren: The PROPOSE
ton made by ]. c. SALISBURY !. D
Slauson. D. r. Brearley ana others,
committee. to settle the controversy
arising out of the division of the First
PRESBYTERIAN church. by transferring
the whole property, situate on Twen-
tieth and Figueroa streets, to such
grantee as you wish. subject to $lO,-
600 mortgage, though informal, and
not made by persons who could olno
either the Westminster church or the
First Presbyterian church. corpora
ton. having been referred to US py
YOU. we are gratified to receive q
proposition looking towards settle
ment Of the controversy.
The disposition Of the members OF
the Central church has always been
to settle the controversy peaceably,
and, with that object in view. during
the initial stage Of the controversy we
made several offers Of settlement, to
which we received no response. and,
until the present proposition was made,
neither the Westminster church nor
the trustees of the First Presbyterian
church, a corporation, have made a
proposition of any kind or shown any
disposition to settle on any basis what
soever.
The supreme court of this state has
determined that when the presbytery
divided the First Presbyterian church
the trustees thereof held its funds and
property in trust for the Central and
Westminster churches in proportion
to the membership Of each, and that 1t
was the duty of the trustees to pay and
transfer to the Central and West
minister churches the funds and prop
erty that belonged to each respectively.
and that to do anything else Herewith
was "at least inadvisable, If not i'm
possible"
The use by the trustees Of our portion
of the funds in the erection of the Fig
ueroa street church was unauthorized
by law and was in opposition to our
NlSOTOuS pTOlcSlS, anu AOt Ouly dS a
proposition of law, so we understand,
are the trustees personally responsible
to us, but at the time of the division
of the old First church their repre-
sentative publicly promised in an open
meeting of presbytery that if it
was ever determined in the civil courts
that we were entitled-to a portion of
the First church funds they would be
paid to US in cash and that we should
never have to resort to the church
property to satisfy our claim.
The whole contention between the
Westminster and Central churches was
as to the location of the church edifice,
and the Figueroa church building as
a church edifice would be useless to us
on account of its location.
We have never laid claim to any more
than our fair share of the funds, in
fact, we would be quite unwilling to
accept the part belonging to the West
minister church. but hope that the con-
troversy may be so adjusted that those
members of the Westminster church
who have remained loyal to Presby-
terianism may continue their work in
the vicinity of the Figueroa street
church.
Even though we should accept such
an offer with the idea Of disposing of
the property and building in the CEN
trail part of the city, we would be I'M
able to realize but a limited portion
of our claim out of the property, over
and above the mortgage; and. in order
that we may purchase lot and build
a. church in the central part of the
city, we will require, not only the
amount that we are entitled to from
the First church corporation, but as
much more besides, and as the mem
bers of the Central church are all per-
sons of only moderate means 1t will
tax our resources to provide the
amount that will be necessary, over
and above the amount we are entitled
to from the First church corporation,
to acquire for ourselves a church
home.
For these reasons we cannot accept
such a proposition as is refeued to in
the communication, but relying on the
assertion of Messrs. Salisbury Slau-
son, Brearley and others of the COM
mittee making the proposition that
their action was mot for gaining or
Withholding money" but "for the ul-
innate best interest of Christs king
dom on EARTH" we believe and trust
that final settlement of this matter
will be made by the payment to us of
our just proportion of the proceeds of
the sale Of the First church property.
A N. MBURNEY,
J. M. MPHERRON,
VIM. CHAMBERS,
]. NJ. QUINN,