Old School-New School Controversy
Encyclopedia
The Old School-New School Controversy was a schism
Schism (religion)
A schism , from Greek σχίσμα, skhísma , is a division between people, usually belonging to an organization or movement religious denomination. The word is most frequently applied to a break of communion between two sections of Christianity that were previously a single body, or to a division within...

 of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America
Presbyterian Church in the United States of America
The Presbyterian Church in the United States of America was a Presbyterian denomination in the United States. It was organized in 1789 under the leadership of John Witherspoon in the wake of the American Revolution and existed until 1958 when it merged with the United Presbyterian Church of North...

 which began in 1837. Later, both the Old School and New School branches further split over the issue of slavery, into southern and northern churches. After three decades of separate operation, the two sides of the controversy merged, in 1865 in the south and in 1870 in the north, to form united Presbyterian churches, although these were still separated into two (as opposed to four) branches based upon the civil war divisions.

As a result of the Plan of Union of 1801
Plan of Union of 1801
The Plan of Union of 1801 was an agreement between Congregationalist and Presbyterian churches for mutual support and joint effort in the establishment of new congregations. It was important because it directly led to the Old School-New School Controversy in the Presbyterian Church in the United...

 with the General Association of Connecticut, Presbyterian missionaries began to work with Congregationalist missionaries in western New York and the Northwest Territory
Northwest Territory
The Territory Northwest of the River Ohio, more commonly known as the Northwest Territory, was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from July 13, 1787, until March 1, 1803, when the southeastern portion of the territory was admitted to the Union as the state of Ohio...

 to advance Christian evangelism. This resulted in new churches being formed with either Congregational or Presbyterian forms of government, or a mixture of the two, supported by older established churches with a different form of government, and often clergy in controversy with their own congregations that disagreed with their ecclesiology
Ecclesiology
Today, ecclesiology usually refers to the theological study of the Christian church. However when the word was coined in the late 1830s, it was defined as the science of the building and decoration of churches and it is still, though rarely, used in this sense.In its theological sense, ecclesiology...

. It also resulted in a difference in doctrinal commitment and views among churches in close fellowship, leading to suspicion and controversy.

The controversy reached a climax at a meeting of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia in 1837 in which representatives of several church synods (those of the Western Reserve, Utica, Geneva, and Genesee) were refused recognition as lawfully part of the meeting. These and others who sympathized with them departed and formed their own General Assembly meeting in another church building nearby, setting the stage for a court dispute about which of the two General Assemblies constituted the true continuing Presbyterian church. The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the court of last resort for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It meets in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.-History:...

 decided that the Old School Assembly was the true representative of the Presbyterian church and their decisions would govern.

While the debate raged for decades, the national crisis of civil war overshadowed the controversy and both sides moderated their position to some degree. By the time of reunion, most Presbyterians agreed that union was more important than the issues which caused division, and the minority was mostly silent. Some historians believe, however, that the reunion left seeds of the controversy which later erupted over Charles Augustus Briggs
Charles Augustus Briggs
Charles Augustus Briggs , American Presbyterian scholar and theologian, was born in New York City, the son of Alanson Briggs and Sarah Mead Berrian...

 and, ultimately, the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy
Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy
The Fundamentalist–Modernist Controversy was a religious controversy in the 1920s and 30s within the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America that later created divisions in most American Christian denominations as well. The major American denomination was torn by conflict over the...

 of the twentieth century.

Prominent members of the Old School were Ashbel Green
Ashbel Green
Ashbel Green, D.D. was an American Presbyterian minister and academic.Born in Hanover Township, New Jersey, Green served as a sergeant of the New Jersey militia during the American Revolutionary War, and went on to study with Dr. John Witherspoon and graduate as valedictorian from Princeton...

, William Latta, Charles Hodge
Charles Hodge
Charles Hodge was the principal of Princeton Theological Seminary between 1851 and 1878. A Presbyterian theologian, he was a leading exponent of historical Calvinism in America during the 19th century. He was deeply rooted in the Scottish philosophy of Common Sense Realism...

, William Buell Sprague
William Buell Sprague
William Buell Sprague was an American Congregational and Presbyterian clergyman and compiler of Annals of the American Pulpit , a comprehensive biographical dictionary of the leading American Protestant Christian ministers who died before 1850.-Biography:He was educated at Yale under Timothy...

, and Samuel Stanhope Smith
Samuel Stanhope Smith
Samuel Stanhope Smith was a Presbyterian minister, founding president of Hampden-Sydney College and the seventh president of the College of New Jersey from 1795 to 1812. His stormy career ended in his enforced resignation...

.

Prominent members of the New School were Albert Barnes, Henry Boynton Smith
Henry Boynton Smith
Henry Boynton Smith , United States theologian, was born in Portland, Maine.He graduated at Bowdoin College in 1834; studied theology at Andover, where his health failed, at Bangor, and, after a year as librarian and tutor in Greek at Bowdoin, in Germany at Halle, where he became personally...

, Erskine Mason, George Duffield
George Duffield (Presbyterian)
George Duffield was a leading nineteenth-century New School Presbyterian minister who bore the same name as his father and grandfather...

, Nathan Beman
Nathan S.S. Beman
Nathan Sidney Smith Beman was the fourth president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He was born in what is now New Lebanon, New York on November 26, 1785. He graduated from Middlebury College in 1807. He then studied theology and preached in Portland, Maine and Mount Zion, Georgia...

, Charles Finney, George Cheever, Samuel Fisher
Samuel Fisher (clergyman)
Samuel Fisher was an American clergyman and educator.His father, serving in the Continental Army at Morristown, New Jersey, died of disease just before his birth. His mother was living at the time with her brother-in-law, Dr. Samuel Ware, in Sunderland, Massachusetts...

, and Thomas McAuley.
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