This resolution was passed by the Southern Baptist Convention Annual Meeting in San Antonio, TX. June 12-13, 2007. You can view and search past resolutions from the Southern Baptist Convention at the Annual Meeting Website.
Southern Baptist Convention 2007 Annual Meeting – Resolution No. 3 – ON THE 150TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE DRED SCOTT DECISION
WHEREAS, March 6, 2007, marked the 150th anniversary of the infamous Dred Scott Decision by the United States Supreme Court; and
WHEREAS, The majority opinion of the Court concluded that people of African ancestry and their descendants “had no rights which the white man was bound to respect” and ruled that an entire race of people did not have personhood nor right of citizenship; and
WHEREAS, We affirm the Declaration of Independence which says, “we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights”; and
WHEREAS, This deplorable decision required action by all three branches of government to eventually overturn: Emancipation Proclamation (1863); Brown v. Board of Education (1954); and Civil Rights Act of 1964; and
WHEREAS, We are complicit with this erroneous Supreme Court decision when we fail to love, minister to, and share the Gospel with people because of their ethnicity, ability, or station in life; and
WHEREAS, We are all born as slaves to sin and have no rights to the throne of God except through Jesus Christ; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That the messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in San Antonio, Texas, June 12-13, 2007, wholly lament and repudiate the Dred Scott Decision and fully embrace the Lord’s command to love our neighbors as ourselves; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we reaffirm the historic action in 1995 of the Southern Baptist Convention to “unwaveringly denounce racism, in all its forms, as deplorable sin,” and to view “every human life as sacred…of equal and immeasurable worth, made in God’s image, regardless of race or ethnicity”; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we fully concur that “racism profoundly distorts our understanding of Christian morality”; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we commend our churches who intentionally reach out to all persons regardless of ethnicity, and we encourage all other Southern Baptist churches to emulate their example, as the Body of Christ is commanded and called to do; and be it finally
RESOLVED, That we pray for and eagerly await the day that the scourge and blight of racism is totally eradicated from the Body of Christ so that the world may see the love of Christ incarnated in and through us.
The interesting thing about this resolution is it is “too little and too late” by about 223 yrs. (ever since the Declaration of Independence was adopted). What is worse still is that Baptists of the South would enlist in the cause of the South, thinking they were defending their home land when the ostensible issue was slavery (and the hidden one was a planned war by outside forces that wanted to reduce the population, increase their wealth, further a certain agenda of preparing America for the next century, etc.). One Southern Baptist stated that Baptists would fight in defense of slavery. When the War began, a cannon ball from Ft. Sumter smashed its way into his grave like an exclamation point from God. 650,000+ casualties resulted, and it took the casualties from the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Indian Wars, the War with Spain, World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam (when the casualties there exceed 58,000 ) to equal that one war. My prospectus for the doctoral dissertation at Columbia University was on the subject, “The Baptist and Slavery.” It was to have been an investigation into the tremendous Christian personalities that God produced in the African Americans during slavery (I had come across materials in Baptist Records which pointed to that reality as, e.g., when Whites would purchase the freedom of Blacks so they could preach. In one case in Va. a Black minster pastored a white church for ten yrs). I could say more, but let me add that I did my doctor of ministry project on Chrstian Love & Race Relations without the support of the institution that conferred the degree. The person in charge of my project said to me, “You ought to have known better than to select a controversial topic like this. If that church fires you, I will be right there behind them, supporting them.” When I did the project (10 sermons on I Cors.13 & 10 lectures in Black History) without getting fired, then I felt like the director started nit picking me to death. I got riled. So on the Friday before the Graduation ceremonies (which began on the next Friday and continued on the Saturday after), I called an official of the seminary and stated the issue rather plainly and added, “that I wanted this matter changed, that if it was not,… Read more »