Robert L. Dabney (1820-1898). Ecclesiastical Relation of Negroes. Speech of the Rev. Robert L. Dabney, in the Synod of Virginia, Nov. 9, 1867; Against the Ecclesiastical Equality of Negro Preachers in Our Church and their Right to Rule over White Christians. Richmond, Virginia: the Office of the "Boys and Girls Monthly," 1868.

8vo. Original wrappers, string-bound. FIRST EDITION.

A very scarce early Reconstruction-era imprint of a speech advocating white supremacy in the Presbyterian Church delivered by Southern Presbyterian Robert Lewis Dabney (1820-1898). From a prominent family that were early settlers of Virginia, Dabney served as a chaplain of the 18th Virginia Infantry in the Confederate Army.

Here, he argues against any inclusion of Black preachers within the Church with [pretended] theological prohibitions. He rails against any suggestion that a white parishioner ever be "under" the preaching or ecclesial authority of a Black preacher. He concludes his screed: "I would make no black man a member of a white Session, or Presbytery, or Synod, or Assembly; nor would I give them any share in the government of our own church, nor any representation in it. 'It is confusion.'" 

VERY RARE. Only two copies have ever sold at auction, and none since 1970.

[Civil War, Union, Confederate] [African Americana, African American History, Black History, Slavery, Enslavement, Abolition, Emancipation]  [Ephemera, Pamphlets, Publications, Booklets] [Reconstruction, Thirtheenth Amendment, Fourteenth Amendment, Fifteenth Amendment]