of doing justice to the people whom they had so long persistently wronged." Further, it was also necessary for political reasons to remove the Negroes from Southern religious control.
For obvious reasons, however, the Southern churches wanted to hold their Negro members.

They declared themselves in favor of Negro education and of better organized religious work among the blacks, and made every sort of accommodation to hold them.

The Baptists organized separate congregations, with white or black pastors as desired, and associations of black churches.

In 1866 the Methodist General Conference authorized separate congregations, quarterly conferences, annual conferences, even a separate jurisdiction, with Negro preachers, presiding elders, and bishops--but all to no avail.

Every, Northern political, religious, or military agency in the South worked for separation, and Negro preachers were not long in seeing the greater advantages which they would have in independent churches.
Much of the separate organization was accomplished in mutual good will, particularly in the Baptist ranks.