during the earlier part of the Nineteenth century. The custom in that day was to vest all property in the control of a board of lay trustees. This was soon found to be incompatible with a Catholic view of the relations between bishop or pastor and people. The latter frequently denied the bishop the power to appoint pastors unwelcome to them and frequently went so far as to retain as pastors clergymen unfit for the office. In some localities, like New Orleans and Charleston, this disagreement even went to the limits of open schism with deplorable results. Trusteeism died eventually, but only after having done incalculable injury to the Church wherever it existed.

Another highly irritating and frequent check to progress was the attempt of foreigners (Irish and French particularly) to regulate American affairs in the appointment of bishops. This involved delays, misunderstandings, hard feelings, etc. An instance of the evil effects of such meddling was the establishment of the See of Richmond in 1821 contrary to the wishes of the Archbishop of Baltimore. The foreign element on the other side were so ignorant of American geography as actually to believe Richmond further away from Baltimore than Alabama or Mississippi, which states therefore still remained attached to the Baltimore diocese. This evil was more short lived than Trusteeism, and soon met an inglorious defeat. About the only good it did was to bring over from Ireland the great Bishop England of Charleston, S. C., one of the most remarkable and able men both in or out of the Catholic Church in America.

Still, despite these drawbacks, the organized Church made comparatively steady progress everywhere, as the following statistics will show.

In 1790 Carroll estimated the Catholic population of his diocese, which included all the existing United States, exclusive of Louisiana then independent, at 30,000. About 1810 we find the total Catholic population in the United States estimated at 70,000, again exclusive of New Orleans; in 1820 Archbishop Marechal estimated it at 169,500, exclusive of Louisiana and also Cincinnati, which would have brought the figures up to 244,500. As to the South in particular, growth was not even then so rapid as in the North, to which the first waves of immigration were reaching. Louisiana, which came under Carroll's jurisdiction in 1805, had at this date about twentyone parishes with twenty-six priests, almost all of whom, however, left with the expiration of Spanish rule. Trusteeism with its attendant evils infected the rest, so that progress was slow for a long period. In fact, as late as 1825 there were just about as many parishes as in 1805. In Georgia and the Carolinas, despite the heroic labors of Bishop England, Catholics still remained a mere handful-in 1825 there being but three churches in South Carolina, three in Georgia, two in North Carolina. Kentucky and Tennessee (diocese of Bardstown) seemed to have prospered better-about 6,000 Catholics in 1808; 10,000 in 1815; Kentucky in 1826, fourteen log churches, ten of brick, two bishops, twenty-two priests; in 1821 there were but sixty Catholics in Nashville and about thirty more in the rest of Tennessee. Alabama in 1822 had 10,000 Catholics attended by one priest. Mississippi is included in Louisiana. Poor Florida was the worst off, hardly any remnant of the old Church being left to mark the past civilization of the Spaniard.

(3) Period of Immigration and more rapid development, 1829-1908. The year 1829 is a turning point in American history generally, particularly in

that of the Catholic Church, because after that date immigration had such a marked effect upon its growth. This immigration in 1845 exceeded 114,000; in 1846 it was 154,000; in 1847, 234,968. Of this vast number (chiefly from Ireland) the South received but few, comparatively speaking, owing, of course, to the existence of negro slavery, which barred out all seeking agricultural employment. But the North was changed by the incomers both racially and religiously. For instance, in one year (1851) the Catholics in the diocese of Hartford increased from 20,000 to 40,000. Still the South was making some progress. Thus Virginia counted 6,000 in 1841; the Carolinas, 20,000 in 1864; Louisiana between 75,000 and 100,000 in 1844; Alabama and Florida 10,000 in 1850; Texas about 10,000 in 1841; Maryland about 80,814 in 1857; all of which figures indicate considerable, even rapid growth, but still far behind that of the Church in the North, where New England was fast becoming New Ireland with a total Catholic population estimated at 3,000,000 in 1860. Far behind as was the South, the War of Secession put it back still further. Southern Catholics fared like all Southerners; their churches were desolated as well as their homes, not only by the actual horrors of war, but by all the evils following in its train- lack of organization, utter stop to immigration, poverty, etc. The diocese of Baltimore came to a standstill in growth. Others even retroceded. New Orleans in 1866 showed little advance over 1853; same for Mississippi and Kentucky. One thing, however, the war did not do. It created no split in the Catholic Church. Its members fought on both sides, its nuns nursed the wounded of both armies. But here, in passing, it is to be noted that had Catholic immigration flowed

Vol. 10-35

into the South as it did into the North, the disproportion of forces would not have been so great. Who knows but that had the Catholic Church been as strong in the South as in the North, Lee might not have laid down his arms out of the pure exhaustion of fighting vastly superior forces. Massachusetts out of its large Irish population could send two Catholic regiments to the front; an equally large proportion of Irishmen from Georgia or Texas would have been sent to meet them.

Since the war the Church has been more than making up her losses, though progress is still quite slow in localities like North Carolina. The subjoined table gives the present Catholic population of the Southern dioceses taken from the Catholic Directory for 1908:

The future of Southern Catholicity is bound up

largely with the future of the South.

like a platitude, but it has a meaning.

This sounds

I mean that

its progress will ever be comparatively slow so long