Beard v. Francis

• Decision Date: 09 July 1957
• Citation: 43 Tenn.App. 513,309 S.W.2d 788
• Parties: Milton BEARD et al., Complainants, Appellees, v. Rev. G. N. FRANCIS et al., Defendants, Appellants. 43 Tenn.App. 513, 309 S.W.2d 788
• Court: Tennessee Court of Appeals

Page 788

309 S.W.2d 788

Milton BEARD et al., Complainants, Appellees, v. Rev. G. N. FRANCIS et al., Defendants, Appellants.

43 Tenn.App. 513, 309 S.W.2d 788

Court of Appeals of Tennessee, Eastern Section.

July 9, 1957.

On Petition for Rehearing Aug. 19, 1957.

Certiorari Denied by Supreme Court Dec. 6, 1957.

[43 TENNAPP 514] Hugh C. Gallaher, Dayton, and J. Ralph Tedder, Rockwood, for appellants.

O. W. McKenzie, Dayton, for appellees.

McAMIS, Presiding Judge.

The bill in this case was filed by a minority group of members of the Evensivlle Baptist Church against the paster, Reverend G. N. Francis, and certain persons representing a majority of the church membership to enjoin defendants from using the church property. The theory of the bill is that defendants, by [43 TENNAPP 515] refusing to participate in the cooperative program of the Southern Baptist Convention, had departed from the true faith and purpose of the Church with the result that complainants constitute its only authentic membership and are entitled to the exclusive use of its property.

The defendants admit that they prefer to support various church causes and programs by direct contributions rather than through the cooperative program of the Southern Baptist Convention under which many churches combine and jointly administer their benevolences. The learned Chancellor, deciding the case without the benefit of the unreported decision of the Court of Civil Appeals in Beasley, et al. v. Gregory, et al., Troutsdale Equity, decided December 21, 1921, found that the refusal of defendants to participate in the cooperative program constituted such a deviation from accepted usages, practices and beliefs that they no longer constitute the true congregation of the Evensville Baptist Church and that complainants alone are entitled to use the church property.

Defendants have appealed and assigned a number of errors, but we think the correctness of the decree depends in the final analysis upon whether, as the Chancellor held, the refusal of defendants to cooperate and their withdrawal from all Baptist associations and conventions constitute such a radical departure from the fundamental principles and practices of the church that defendants can no longer be identified as the true exponents of its doctrine and faith and authentic members of the congregation.

The Evensville Baptist Church, with the assistance of accredited Baptist ministers, was organized in the early part of 1950. In the Fall of that year it became affiliated [43 TENNAPP 516] with the Tennessee Valley Baptist Association, an association of Baptist churches located in Rhea County and a portion of Hamilton County, and for some time thereafter it periodically sent messengers to the Tennessee Baptist Convention at Nashville. For some months the Tennessee Baptist Convention contributed $25 per month to the salary of its minister. There is evidence that it joined in the cooperative activities of the Southern Baptist Convention but that on another occasion, prior to the unfortunate events of March 1955, it had declined to cooperate, later, and prior to 1955, resuming its original affiliations and contributions to the cooperative program.

It is unnecessary to relate the events of March, 1955, except to say that at a congregational meeting regularly called a majority of those present including defendants voted to withdraw from the Tennessee Valley Baptist Association and discontinue future contributions to the cooperative fund. Defendants admit this action and give the reasons which prompted it but insist that these are procedural or administrative matters having nothing to do with Baptist belief or doctrine to which they profess complete adherence. They insist that they are still Baptists and that, in fact, there is no such thing as a Southern Baptist Church, each affiliating church being completely autonomous and independent.

The proof shows without substantial dispute that, under Baptist polity and practice, each congregation is free of all control by any higher ecclesiastical authority.

Pendleton's Manual, seemingly respected as authoritative by complainants, states:

[43 TENNAPP 517] 'Every church acts voluntarily in connecting itself with an association. There is not--there cannot be--compulsion in the matter. This results from the fact that the Scriptures recognize no higher tribunal than a church.

'It follows, of necessity, that an association is only an advisory body. It may recommend to the churches that they do thus and thus; but it can go no further. It can enact no decrees; and if it did, it would have no power to execute them. It is no Court of Appeals, whose decisions are to nullify those of the churches. Baptists must, with holy jealousy, watch and arrest the first encroachments on the independence of the churches.'

Being thus circumscribed the most that an association or convention can do is to 'withdraw the hand of fellowship' and refuse to receive the messengers of churches refusing to follow its wishes and recommendations. It can say, and apparently does say, that when a church withdraws from the local association it ipso facto withdraws from the State and Southern Conventions. But does this mean that it is no longer a Baptist church?

We are unable to see how the historic independence of Baptist congregations, with control by the majority, upon which all authorities seem to agree, can be reconciled with the principle urged by complainants that in respect to cooperation local churches are not free but, upon peril of having the title to their property brought in question by a minority, must conform to the program of an association of churches which they are free to join or not to join and from which they can withdraw at any time.

In the unreported decision of Gregory et al. v. Beasley et al., supra, a division of members arose in the Dixon's [43 TENNAPP 518] Creek Missionary Baptist Church of Lauderdale County over the election of a minister who refused to endorse the action of the Southern Baptist Convention respecting missions and who believed in 'supporting missions independently of the Boards and that a Church or a member can send his offering wherever he desires.' In sustaining the right of the majority to select a minister of that belief the Court of Civil Appeals said:

'The manner of giving to missions and the channel through which the gift shall pass, the Board or the State Convention or the Committee of the Gospel Mission Association being a mere vehicle for accepting or transporting the gift, is a question of methods * * *. If members of the Baptist Church differ as to the plan or method * * * they can both be perfectly consistent with their own conscience and both engage in a work, each according to his own plan or...