The Idea of “American Protestantism” and British Nonconformity, 1829-1840

Abstract

In June, 1829 Ralph Wardlaw, Scotland's leading Congregationalist, wrote to his American friend, Leonard Woods of Andover, explaining the current fascination of America for British Dissenters. “An important experiment is going on there …, “ he noted, “of what Christianity when fairly excited can effect by her own native energies in the support and propagation of her cause, independently of the aids of civil power. I look to it … with high expectation, as I think it of vast consequence that a new practical manifestation of this should be given to the world.” Wardlaw was writing at the beginning of the Jacksonian era in America, a period when Nonconformists inspected American religion with a concentration never again quite equalled. For this scrutiny there were reasons beyond the general fascination with republican novelties. The emergence of a more vital and politically assertive Nonconformity, the eruption of voluntaristic controversy in both England and Scotland, the excitement of the Reform Age, and the perennial anticipation of revivals at home on the scale of the American awakenings all played roles in directing British attention overseas. And as Wardlaw indicated, the element of “American Protestantism” which most intrigued British evangelicals was the apparent vindication of the voluntary system, which with the accompanying phenomenon of revivals raised the prospect of a free spiritual and vital Christianity, indeed a new age in Christian history.Despite its prominence in the literature of the 1830s, this British examination of the American voluntary church has received only scant attention from scholars.