There Can Be No Neutral Ground : Samuel B. McPheeters and the Collision of Church and State in St. Louis, 1860-1864

This paper examines the case of Samuel B. McPheeters, an Old School Presbyterian minister in St. Louis accused of disloyalty to the Union by a small faction of his church during the Civil War. In spite of an absence of specific evidence that would have demonstrated the preacher's disloyalty, this faction worked with Union military officials to have the minister arrested and his church closed on charges ofgeneral disloyalty. McPheeters appealed to the doctrine of the spirituality of the church in defense of his refusal to endorse either side in the war, and was able to obtain a meeting with President Lincoln in order to appeal his case in person. This essay argues that the McPheeters case presented Lincoln with the first major conflict of church and state in the war. The paper also examines the fate of religious liberty in Missouri under martial law, and demonstrates the political divide in that state regarding the federal military campaign to identify and punish civil disloyalty throughout the state.