This Week in Texas Methodist History December 3

MECS Votes for Union Reveal Strong Support in Texas.  Less So in Other States

By this week in December 1937 the annual conferences of the MECS had conducted their sessions and were able to report on the votes for the Plan of Union between the MECS, MEC, and MP denominations.  

As Bishop John M. Moore wrote, It was a long road to Methodist Union.  The first split from the MEC had occurred in the period of Jacksonian Democracy.  The denomination had been founded on Anglican principles of episcopal governance, and the power of the bishops was inconsistent with Jacksonian Democracy.   The result was the Methodist Protestant denomination.  It did not have bishops but kept the same theology.  A larger split was the division on slavery in the 1840s.   

There were a few voices calling for reunion during Reconstruction, but those efforts went nowhere.  The most serious effort came in 1919-1920 when the three denominations held three sessions of delegates to try to work out a reunification.  Those efforts also failed, but in the 1930s the banner was hoisted again.

Delegates finally worked out a plan in sufficient detail to present to the annual conferences.   If 2/3 of the conference voted in favor, the Plan of Union would be implemented.  The price of Union was enshrining racism into the governance of the church.  Bishops have general authority, but the members of the MECS refused to entertain the idea of an African American bishop presiding over their conference so African American churches were put into a segregated jurisdiction so the racial bar could be maintained.

By December 1937 the votes were tallied and reported.   Texas Methodists were enthusiastically in favor.  Central Texas 305 to 9.  Texas Mexican Conference 30 to 2. Northwest Texas 246 to 11.  Texas 312 to 4.  West Texas 247 to 5.  North Texas 255 to 13.   

Other conferences were much closer.  Illinois was exaxctly 2/3  30 for and 15 against.  Memphis was also 2/3.    Baltimore 68%,  Upper South Carolina  151 to 106;  North Georgia was 65%.   

The only annual conference in which a majority voted against was North Mississippi    by a vote of 117 for and 125 against.  

The final tally was well above the 2/3 threshold  7667 in favor and 1247 against.   Thus the Uniting Confernce of 1939 was held in Kansas City and the Methodist Church was created from the three predecessor denominations.