 | The history of Truro Parish in Virginia, |  |
The Disestablishment of the Church in
Virginia
To one of the old Vestrymen of Truro has been
accorded by universal acclaim the title of Father
of his Country, chiefly because of his pre-eminent
leadership in her struggle for Independence.
To another of these Vestrymen belongs the title
of the Father of Religious Liberty. It is to
George Mason that religion in America is indebted
for the first clear and certain note proclaiming her
right to be free, proceeding not from the bias of
the partisan but from the wisdom of profound
statesmanship. To him, too, more than to any
other, the Church in Virginia owes her emancipation
from the bonds of her vassalage to the State;
bonds which had been her support once, and on
which she still leaned with a woeful persistency,
but which had almost crushed out her very life.
From the dawn of American independence Mason
saw not only the political necessity and the inherent
justice of the complete separation of the
Church from the State, but must have recognized
also, with many others, that the existence of the
Church of which he was a devoted adherent would
ultimately depend upon her being freed from her
voluntary and intelligent support of her own children.
Having adopted these views he pursued
them to the end with a consistency and clearness
of vision which was rare among his contemporaries.
The various Acts of the General Assembly by
which the complete disestablishment of the Church
was brought about were the following.
On the 12th of June, 1776, the State Convention,
composed almost wholly of Churchmen,
adopted without a dissenting voice, that famous
"Declaration of Rights" which declared in its concluding
article "That religion, or the duty which
we owe to our CREATOR, and the manner of discharging
it, can be directed only by reason and
conviction, not by force or violence, and therefore
all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of
religion, according to the dictates of conscience;
and that it is the mutual duty of all to practice
Christian forbearance, love, and charity, towards
each other." This "Bill of Rights," as it is usually
called, was from the pen of Mason, and while it
is quite possible that some in the Convention
failed to perceive its full significance, it led, as it
was mean to lead, to the withdrawal by the State
of all support or supervision of religion.
The first General Assembly of the Commonwealth
under the new Constitution met in October,
1776. Among its earliest Acts was the one
of Dissenters from contributing to the support
and maintenance of the church as by law established,
and its ministers, and for other purposes
therein mentioned." Mason was Chairman
of the Committee which brought in this Act, and
it is supposed to have been written by his own
hand. The Act is very long, almost every section
having its own explanatory preamble. The first
section repeals within this Commonwealth all Acts
of Parliament directed against dissent or dissenters.
The second exempts all dissenters from the
established Church from all levies, taxes, and impositions
whatever towards supporting and maintaining
the said Church or its ministers. The
Vestries, however, could still levy on all tithables
for arrears in the salaries of ministers, for parochial
engagements already entered into, and for
the poor. Section four contains this important
provision: "That there shall in all time coming be
saved and reserved to the use of the Church as by
law established the several tracts of Glebe lands
already purchased, the churches and chapels already
built,—all books, plate, and ornaments, belonging
or appropriated to the use of the said
church," and to each parish all private donations
which may have been made to it. The next sections
reserve for future determination, when the
opinion of the country shall be better known, the
question whether the support of ministers and
shall be provided for by a general assessment
or be left to voluntary contributions. And because
the support of the clergy might fall too heavily
on the members of the established Church in
some parishes under the exemptions allowed dissenters,
they were left to be supported for the
present by voluntary contributions, and all acts for
the support of the clergy by levies were suspended
until the end of the next session of the Assembly.
The remaining sections provide for taking lists of
tithables.
The act for the support of the clergy continued
to be suspended from time to time by the Assembly
until the session of October, 1779, when so
much of that act, and of every other act, as provided
for salaries for the ministers of the Church
of England, and authorizing levies for the same,
was finally repealed.
The question between assessments and voluntary
contributions was, however, still undecided.
During the session of Assembly beginning October,
1784, a measure was introduced known as the
Assessment Bill, providing for the legal support of
ministers and teachers of religion of all denominations
by a general assessment upon the people of
the State. It was supported by Edmund Randolph,
Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee, John
Page, Edmund Pendleton and others, while a determined
opposition was led by James Madison.
in having the final vote deferred until the
next session. In the meantime, at the urgent suggestion
of Mason, Nicholas and others, he prepared
the famous "Memorial and Remonstrance"
which was printed and circulated broadcast for signatures.
Of these it received so many that at the
following session of the Assembly the bill was
readily defeated, and the principle of the support
of religion by voluntary contributions was tacitly
adopted.
Mason was active in circulating the Remonstrance,
and among others he sent a copy to General
Washington, his late fellow Vestryman.
Washington wrote him in reply from Mount Vernon,
Oct. 3rd, 1785: "Although no mans sentiments
are more opposed to any kind of restraint
upon religious principles than mine are, yet I must
confess that I am not amongst the number of
those who are so much alarmed at the thought of
making people pay toward the support of that
which they profess, if of the denomination of Christians,
or declare themselves Jews, Mohammedons,
or otherwise, and thereby obtain proper relief."
But he thought the bill unfortunate at that time,
and that it would be impolitic to make it a law.
The fight over this measure was one of the most
strenuous and persistent that had ever engaged
the Virginia Legislature. That it should have
been advocated by so many great Statesmen and
day. The tradition and custom of many centuries
was hard to be overcome, and the maintenance of
religion without the sanction and support of the
government in some form was to them an untried
experiment, and of very doubtful success. Their
opportunism was the child of their fears for religion
and the Church.
But the public sentiment manifested in the response
to the Remonstrance paved the way for
the adoption of the Statute of Religious Freedom,
inspired by Mason, written by Jefferson, and
passed through the efforts of Madison. This bill
had been reported in 1779 by the Committee appointed
in 1776 for the revisal of the laws, consisting
of Thomas Jefferson, George Wythe,
George Mason, Edmund Pendleton, and Thomas
Ludwell Lee, all of them old Vestrymen of the
Church. Mr. Mason resigned from the Committee
on the ground that he was no lawyer, and Mr.
Lee died, before the report was made, but not until
the plan of the work was settled and in a considerable
degree carried into execution. This act,
however, was not passed until 1785. The kernel
of this famous bill, the "first act of religious freedom
that ever passed a legislative assembly on the
face of the earth," is contained in the words,—
"That no man shall be compelled to frequent or
support any religious worship, place, or ministry
whatsoever,—but that all men shall be free to profess,
in matters of religion," &c.
The real disestablishment of the Church had occurred
a year before in the "Act for Incorporating
the Protestant Episcopal Church." This was
passed in response to a petition of the Clergy, who,
it would appear, desired to be themselves incorporated.
But the Assembly would have none of
this, and formed the minister and Vestry of each
parish respectively a body corporate and politic,
empowered to hold, acquire, and dispose of property
for the use of the Church, and to make rules
and orders for managing its temporal affairs. All
present vestries were dissolved, and the method
of electing the Vestries every three years is prescribed.
All former acts relating to the powers or
duties of vestries or ministers, and all acts touching
upon doctrine, discipline, or forms of worship
are repealed. The vestries were authorized to regulate
all the religious affairs of the Church in Convention,
to consist of two deputies from each parish,
of whom the minister, if there was a minister,
should be one. This Act was repealed two years
later, but not until under its sanction the first Convention
of the Church met, and the Diocese of
Virginia was organized, May 18th, 1785.
So far the legislation affecting the Church had
been guided, and in large part induced, by Her
own sons, nourished at her side. Of that which
followed another story might be told. The repeal,
episcopal church," (sic), the Act of 1802 confiscating
the glebes, solemnly saved and reserved for
the use of the said Church by two previous Acts of
the Assembly, and claiming the right, though forbearing
to exercise it, of confiscating the church
buildings also, and the persistent refusal through
many years to allow the Church to hold charitable
funds or secure incorporation for her educational
institutions; these show an animus which we rejoice
to believe has almost disappeared, giving
way to the sweeter claims of reason and charity.
| The history of Truro Parish in Virginia, | |