Barton v. Fitzpatrick

• Decision Date: 12 February 1914
• Docket Number: 588
• Citation: 187 Ala. 273,65 So. 390
• Parties: BARTON et al. v. FITZPATRICK et al.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

65 So. 390

187 Ala. 273

BARTON et al. v. FITZPATRICK et al.

No. 588

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 12, 1914

Rehearing Denied May 24, 1914

Appeal from City Court of Talladega; Cecil Browne, Judge.

Suit by W.F. Fitzpatrick and others against J.P. Barton and others. Decree for complainants, and defendants appeal. Affirmed.

Knox Acker, Dixon & Sims, J.W. Vandiver, and W.B. Castleberry, all of Talladega, for appellants.

Riddle & Burt, of Talladega, for appellees.

SAYRE J.

This litigation arose out of a dissension which consumed the vitals of Peace Baptist Church (colored), an unincorporated organization holding to the faith and practice of the Missionary Baptist Church. Some of the members ardently desired to be quit of the ministrations of the pastor Fitzpatrick, and sought to oust him from his pastorate others desired that he be retained. A majority of the board of deacons, some of whom had been placed upon the board by questionable means, adhered to Fitzpatrick, so that those members of the congregation opposed to him found it hard to get the question at issue before the body of the membership in a manner at once seemly and sanctioned by the practice of the church; Fitzpatrick and his faction refusing countenance to any movement looking to a meeting of the congregation for the disposal of the controversy. Finally, however, one of the opposing deacons arose in a meeting, held for worship, and gave notice that there would be a meeting of the congregation on a day named for the purpose of declaring the pastorate vacant and electing a successor to the then incumbent. This call for a meeting had not the approval of the pastor or a majority of the board of deacons, nor was the question whether such meeting should be called for the designated purpose put to the congregation then assembled for decision, and the clear effect of what Fitzpatrick in the pulpit did and said on that occasion was to indicate to the congregation that the notice amounted to nothing. A meeting was, however, held pursuant to the notice, with result that resolutions were there unanimously adopted purporting to oust Fitzpatrick and electing defendant Barton as his successor pro tempore. Deacons were also elected to replace those who adhered to Fitzpatrick. Since then Barton and his faction have held possession of the church property. At a later meeting they elected Barton pastor for an indefinite term. Fitzpatrick's faction ignored these meetings and took no part in them. The purpose of the bill, filed by Fitzpatrick and his deacons, was to have a legal determination of the right to the possession and control of the church property, and, it seems, complainants would have had the court to restore Fitzpatrick to his prerogatives as pastor. The court below very properly stopped with a decree settling the rights of the parties in the church property.

Appellees (complainants below) appear to have insisted in the court below that the meetings at which these things were done by the opposition were without authority and contrary to the established usage of the Missionary Baptist Church because the first meeting, upon which the claim of Barton and his party to represent the body of the local church depends for regularity, was not called or authorized by a majority of the board of deacons, nor by a majority of the congregation assembled on the occasion of the notice, and was itself composed of a minority of the entire membership. In the absence of a brief for appellees defining their position, we infer their insistence was as above stated, for the reason that the adversary brief is directed to this point, and appellees, so far as we are advised, had no other standing on the facts shown in evidence. If we might enter upon a consideration of the moral status of the opposing officials, in respect to which a good deal crops out in the record or if we could take cognizance of an informal expression of preference by a majority of the congregation acting individually, such as was shown by a paper put in evidence on the hearing of the motion to dissolve the preliminary injunction, there might be little difficulty in reaching the conclusion that appellants should prevail in this controversy; but it is quite clear that the court is not concerned about the moral worth of opposing officers of the church, that being a question for the church alone, nor can the court have regard for the wishes of the majority unless expressed in valid form, and that a paper circulated among the members of the congregation, however numerously signed by them, cannot supply the place of a decision by the congregation acting as an organized body in conformity with the law and practice of the church. Case of St. Mary's Church, 7 Serg. & R. (Pa.) 517.

It is familiar law that where factional differences occur in an ecclesiastical body, the...