The origins of the Southern Baptist Convention: a historiographical study: the purpose of this paper is to describe how white Baptist church historians of the South have interpreted the founding of the Southern Baptist Convention since 1845

Baptist History and Heritage, Wntr, 2002 by Walter B. Shurden, Lori Redwine Varnadoe

One senses in Whitsitt, also, both the healing of time and hesitancy to fan past fires of hostility by resurrecting the knotty and emotional issues of history. While he certainly did not feel obliged to confess the sins of slavery of his southern ancestors, neither did he want to excoriate Northern Baptists for alleged constitutional violations. Consequently, he avoided a rehash of negative historical interpretations, seeking instead to reconstrue SBC beginnings in as positive a manner as possible.

Whitsitt's positive interpretations were fourfold. First, echoing one of Johnson's emphases, he declared that the separation "was happily circumscribed in extent." Whitsitt reminded his 1895 Southern Baptist audience that the schism "related exclusively to the missionary operations." Quoting Johnson's "Address to the Public," he said that "the fathers of that day were solicitous that this point should be clearly understood."

Second, while limited in scope, the division, said Whitsitt as Williams before him, was "unavoidable." "The best and wisest men in the North consented to a division because they regarded it as being ... a necessary evil," said Whitsitt, while "the wisest and best men in the South accepted the division as being imperatively required."

Third, Whitsitt, continuing with his positive spins, said that "in many respects the separation has also been of signal advantage." For one thing, the SBC exodus promoted peace and union between abolitionists of the North and those Northern Baptists who had remained neutral on the slavery issue. Moreover, the division intensified Southern Baptist missionary activity. He demonstrated with the increased financial giving records of Southern Baptists to home missions. For Whitsitt, this increased missionary zeal among Southern Baptists "was worth all the pain and sacrifice that we had to endure in breaking up the relations ... with our Northern brethren." In making this point, Whitsitt had a noble purpose, but the highlighting of missions in Southern Baptist history, ironically, has caused some of its historians to obscure the tragic legacy of racial prejudice.

Fourth, Whitsitt rejoiced that the 1845 rupture "was for the most part a peaceable one." Acknowledging the presence of unavoidable friction, "public negotiations on either side were marked by the dignity and moderation that become Christian brethren." (24)

Slavery: A Muted Factor, 1900-1950

During the period from 1900 to 1950, white Southern Baptist historians began producing some major books on Baptist history. A. H. Newman of McMaster University in Canada, John T. Christian of New Orleans Seminary, and Robert A. Baker and W. W. Barnes of Southwestern Seminary each wrote Baptist histories. Baker and Barnes are especially significant for this study because they focused their research on Southern Baptist history. No single pattern of SBC origins emerged from the four historians, but Barnes/Baker tended to follow a line of interpretation which, while identifying the centrality of slavery, abridged to some degree the impact of slavery on SBC history.