The year was 1793. The date was Dec. 2. As Thomas Jefferson recorded the incident in his diary, a group of Federalist-leaning senators was gathered around the Senate chamber fireplace on the east side of Independence Hall in Philadelphia. Included in the group were John Langdon of New Hampshire, who had been president pro tem of the first Congress; George Cabot of Massachusetts; and mostly other Northern senators. Jefferson described the group as “growling together” because it had just lost a vote to a group of Republican-leaning senators.
Jefferson was suspicious of the Federalists, fearing their goal was to establish a monarchy in the United States similar to that of England and most other European nations of that time. The Federalists feared the Republicans, thinking they wished to destroy most semblances of order and follow the pattern of the French Revolution and the resulting French Republic.
In this atmosphere, Cabot declared “Ah! Things will never go right till you have a president for life, and an hereditary Senate.” This was Jefferson’s worst fear. Cabot voiced the position favoring a privileged role for a special class of people. Jefferson’s commitment was to representative government with participation by all the people.
Though noble born, he would have nothing to do with entitlements for special classes of society.
Jefferson even feared that President George Washington, a Virginian like himself, had been influenced by the Federalists, but he was encouraged by the president’s reaction when told of the comment.
Jefferson wrote of Cabot’s comment, “The president seemed struck with it, and declared he had not supposed there was a man in the United States who could have entertained such an idea.”
History affirms the commitment of the United States to democracy in the political arena and the rejection of privileged rights for those “high born.” This nation chose democracy over monarchy, a representative government gaining its legitimacy from the vote of the people. Though some of its steps were stumbling, the United States embraced the dignity and equality of all people, not just a special class. Indeed this was a “noble experiment,” a new beginning for the rights of man, for freedom.
While new in the political world, Baptists had contended for freedom in the religious realm and elsewhere for nearly 200 years at the time Cabot made his comment. Famous English philosopher John Locke said of Baptists in 1689, “The Baptists were the first and only propounders of absolute liberty — just and true liberty, equal and impartial liberty.”
In one of their earliest confessions of faith, Baptists had written in 1612 “that the magistrate is not by virtue of his office to meddle with religion, or matters of conscience, to force or compel men to this or that form of religion, or doctrine; but to leave Christian religion free, to every man’s conscious … .”
Baptists champion the value and rights of every person because of our understanding of God, of man and of salvation. And those understandings impact how Baptists live and work together in the church.
Baptists understand that God alone is sovereign over all and that this sovereign God chose to make man in His own image. That means that God is able to reveal Himself to His human creation.
At creation, mankind was given the capacity to know and relate to God. God can communicate with humanity, and humanity can understand and respond to God.
This means God can communicate with a person directly and personally and that each soul is accountable to God.
Baptists call this “soul competency,” each soul able to hear and respond to God. Salvation is possible only when one responds in belief in the atoning death of Jesus Christ to establish a right relationship with God the Father.
Society cannot bring salvation nor can one’s family. Not even the church can produce salvation. It is a personal relationship between the individual and God.
All intrusions into the sacred space between God and mankind are inappropriate, for they interfere with a person’s ability to relate to God. This is religious liberty. God alone is sovereign over the conscience.
Soul competency is the dynamic that allows individuals to think, to grapple with issues and to render moral judgments. This ability is in all people, not just a special class of people. That is why Baptists embrace democracy as a form of church government.
To be clear, it is not the will of the majority that is sought in the church but the will of God. Still Baptists believe all of God’s people are able to discern the will of God. This is a necessary conclusion of Baptist commitment to soul competency and religious liberty. That is why the vote of the church is the foundation of Baptist polity, the way we do church together.
That an individual or group can err under the banner of soul competency is certainly true. Baptist statements of faith have often lifted up the Scriptures as corrective and a guide to the individual conscience. The Baptist Faith and Message affirms the role of the church in correcting and guiding the individual conscience.
That again affirms the role of the congregation in thinking about, grappling with and making decisions about issues that impact the church. The final decision rests with the church, not with an individual nor with a privileged group.
With soul competency come accountability and responsibility. This is part of the spiritual birthright of every Christian, and it cannot be bargained away. God holds one accountable and responsible because He has made each one competent whether we like it or not.
This does not mean a congregation must vote on every issue. A church has the right to delegate, but how the church does its business must be determined by the congregation. It cannot be determined by a privileged group or a special person who deems himself or herself worthy of the task.
Baptists’ commitment to the importance of the individual, the competency of each soul and religious liberty for all means we affirm the dignity and equality of all church members and reject the idea of a privileged group acting as if it deserved special rights.
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