Morris Brown moved to Philadelphia, where
he afterward became bishop of the African Church, and the whole Charleston
project was ended.[56] The bulk of the blacks returned to the white
congregations, where they soon overflowed the galleries and even the
"boxes" which were assigned them at the rear on the main floors. Some of
the older negroes by special privilege then took seats forward in the main
body of the churches, and others not so esteemed followed their example in
such numbers that the whites were cramped for room. After complaints on
this score had failed for several years to bring remedy, a crisis came
in Bethel Church on a Sunday in 1833 when Dr. Capers was to preach. More
whites came than could be seated the forward-sitting negroes refused
to vacate their seats for them; and a committee of young white members
forcibly ejected these blacks At a "love-feast" shortly afterward one of
the preachers criticized the action of the committee thereby giving the
younger element of the whites great umbrage. Efforts at reconciliation
failing, nine of the young men were expelled from membership, whereupon
a hundred and fifty others followed them into a new organization which
entered affiliation with the schismatic Methodist Protestant Church.
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