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 Before the
American Revolution, there were no bishops in the colonies (partly because
the British government was reluctant to give the colonies the kind of
autonomy that this would have implied, and partly because many of the
colonists were violently opposed to their presence). After the Revolution,
the establishment of an American episcopate became imperative. Samuel
Seabury was the first American to be consecrated, in 1784 (see 14 Nov), and
in 1787 William White and Samuel Provoost, having been elected to the
bishoprics of Pennsylvania and New York respectively, sailed to England and
were consecrated bishops on 14 February by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the
Archbishop of York, the Bishop of Bath and Wells, and the Bishop of
Peterborough.
William White was born in Philadelphia in 1747, went to England in 1770 to
be ordained deacon and priest, returned in 1772 and became first an
assistant and then the rector of the Church of Christ and Saint Peter in
Philadelphia. He served as Chaplain of the Continental Congress from 1777 to
1789, and then as Chaplain of the Senate.
White was largely responsible for the Constitution of the Protestant
Episcopal Church in the United States of America. At his suggestion, the
system of church government was established more or less as we have it
today. (What follows is a rough draft. I welcome notes of correction and
clarification.) Only a bishop can ordain a deacon or priest, and only
bishops (normally at least three) can consecrate a bishop. When a bishop
dies or retires, a new bishop is elected by a convention in his diocese, in
which clergy sit in the upper house and lay delegates (elected by the
vestries of the local congregations) sit in the lower house, and a majority
in each house is required to elect. (Afterwards, a majority of bishops and a
majority of Standing Committees (each diocese has an elected Standing
Committee) are required to confirm.) National business is conducted by the
General Convention, which meets every three years and consists for voting
purposes of three Houses: Bishops, Clerical Deputies, and Lay Deputies. A
majority of each is required to pass a measure. (All the Deputies meet and
debate together and are called the House of Deputies, but they vote
separately whenever a few voters request it, which means whenever it might
affect the outcome.) In all this, the Episcopal Church undertakes to follow,
as nearly as modern circumstances permit, the government of the early church
as attested back at least to the second and third centuries. A section
follows from White's writings on Church Government.
The power of electing a superior order of ministers ought To be in the
clergy and laity together, they being both interested in the choice. In
England, the bishops are appointed by the civil authority, which was a
usurpation of the crown at the Norman conquest, but since confirmed by acts
of parliament. The primitive churches were generally supplied by popular
elections; even in the city of Rome, the privilege of electing the bishop
continued with the people to the tenth or eleventh century, and near those
times there are resolves of councils, that none should be promoted to
ecclesiastical dignities, but by election of the clergy and people. It
cannot be denied that this right vested in numerous bodies, occasioned great
disorders; which it is expected will be avoided, when the people shall
exercise the right by representation. Let us next take a view of the grounds
on which the authority of episcopacy is asserted. The advocates for this
form maintain, that there having been an episcopal power originally lodged
by Jesus Christ with his apostles, and by them generally exercised in
person, but sometimes by delegation (as in the instances of Timothy and
Titus) the same was conveyed by them before their decease to one pastor in
each church, which generally comprehended all the Christians in a city and a
convenient surrounding district. Thus were created the apostolic successors,
who on account of their settled residence are called bishops By Restraint;
whereas the apostles themselves were bishops At Large, exercising episcopal
power over all the churches, except in the case of St James, who from the
beginning was bishop of Jerusalem. From this time the word "episcopos," used
in the New Testament indiscriminately with the word "presbyteros"
(particularly in the 20th chapter of the Acts where the same persons are
called "episcopoi" and "presbyteroi"), became Appropriated to the superior
order of ministers. That the apostles were thus succeeded by an order of
ministers superior to pastors in general, episcopalians think they prove by
the testimonies of the ancient fathers, and from the improbability that so
great an innovation (as some conceive it) could have found general and
peaceable possession in the 2d or 3d century, when epicopacy is on both
sides acknowledged to have been prevalent. The argument is here concisely
stated, but (as is believed) impartially.
White was Presiding Bishop of Pecusa at its first General Convention in
1789, and again from 1795 till his death on 17 July 1836. He was mentor to
John Henry Hobart (see 12 Sep), Jackson Kemper (see 24 May), William
Augustus Muhlenberg (see 8 Apr), and others.
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