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60 Jurist 85 (2000)
Episcopacy, Democracy, and Leadership in the United Methodist Church

handle is hein.journals/juristcu60 and id is 87 raw text is: THE JURIST 60 (2000) 85-102 EPISCOPACY, DEMOCRACY, AND LEADERSHIP IN THE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH WILLIAM B. LAWRENCE* On the eve of Ash Wednesday 2001, at Methodism's mountain retreat center called Lake Junaluska, an extraordinary event occurred. For the first time ever in the denomination's history, a special called session of a Jurisdictional Conference' assembled for the sole purpose of electing a bishop. The only thing truly extraordinary about it was the fact that a special session was called. The late Bishop Cornelius Henderson, who while battling a serious illness had just begun a new four year assignment in Florida on September 1, 2000, died on December 7, 2000. He was just three months into his term. Though a retired bishop could have been as- signed to serve the remaining period of the quadrennium, the Jurisdic- tional College of Bishops exercised its prerogative to call the special ses- sion in order to have a new bishop chosen.2 Since the jurisdictional system was created in 1939, no such called session had ever been sum- moned. Therefore, it really was an extraordinary occasion. However, everything else about the event was rather ordinary, at least in the way that United Methodist polity operates these days. From the nine states and fifteen annual conferences of the Southeastern Jurisdic- tion came five hundred and twenty four credentialed delegates (half of * Dean and Professor of American Church History, Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX. 1 In 1939, when three Methodist bodies (The Methodist Protestant Church, The Methodist Episcopal Church, and The Methodist Episcopal Church, South) reunited to form The Methodist Church, an organizational unit was created to satisfy some demands that the reunion be regionally and racially segregated. Six jurisdictions were established: five of them were regional (Northeast, Southeast, North Central, South Central, Western); the sixth jurisdiction was called the Central, and it included all of The Methodist Church's black congregations in the nation. In 1968, the Central Jurisdiction and its segregated structures were eliminated, with the predominantly African American United Methodist Churches being assigned to their regional jurisdictions. So the Jurisdictional Conference system has existed for a little more than sixty years, principally (though not exclusively) to elect and assign bishops. 2 The Book of Discipline of The United Methodist Church 2000 (Nashville: The Unit- ed Methodist Publishing House, 2000) 302, par. 519.2.

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