THE FIRST COUNCIL OF THE VATICAN

THE FIRST COUNCIL OF THE VATICAN:
THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

JAMES HENNESEY, S.J.

HERDER AND HERDER

Imprimi potest : John J. McGinty, S.J. Provincial, New York Province
Nihil obstat : Edward J. Sutfin, Ph.D.
Censor librorum Imprimatur : † Robert F. Joyce Bishop of Burlington June 22, 1963

1963 HERDER AND HERDER New York
232 Madison Avenue, New York 16, N.Y.

Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 63-18150

CONTENTS.

Foreword 9
Introduction 17
Abbreviations 15

I The Bishops Go to Rome 23
II The First Phase 59
III Preliminaries to the Debate on Infallibility 82
IV The Constitution Dei Filius 130
V Preparations for the Debate on Infallibility 172
VI Primacy and Infallibility 218
VII Close of the Council 273
VIII Return of the Bishops 294
Epilogue 328
Index 333

Foreword

"OF all the prelates at Rome, none have a finer opportunity, to none is a more crucial test now applied, than to those of the United States." Deeply depressed by the fear that the First Vatican Council would endorse the Syllabus of Errors, and by the more certain prospect that the fathers would define the pope's infallibility, it was as though William Ewart Gladstone were staking his final hope on the Americans to turn the tide when he addressed these words to Lord Acton in the early summer of 1870. Alas, the Americans did not measure up to Gladstone's test, for in the final vote on July 18 twenty-five bishops from the United States were counted in favor of papal infallibility, twenty-two either absented themselves from the closing session or had already left for home, and one, Edward Fitzgerald, Bishop of Little Rock, Arkansas, joined the Bishop of Cajazzo in southern Italy to provide the only two votes registered against the definition.

At a time when American interest has been quickened by the presence of more than 200 bishops from the United States who constitute the second largest national delegation in the Second Vatican Council, it is a decided advantage for the educated reading public to have at hand in Father Hennesey's work a lively and thoroughly documented account of American participation in the council of 1869-1870. True, the representatives of the United States (forty-eight bishops and one abbot) achieved no such prominence as that of some of their brother prelates from France and Germany, the traditional rank and theological heritage of whose churches were much older and richer than those of the American Catholics. Yet the American contribution to the stirring debates of that historic winter and spring was not negligible. In fact, the American contribution had begun more than a year before the opening of the council when James A. Corcoran, a priest of the Diocese of Charleston, arrived in Rome as the sole representative of the United States among the approximately 100 theologians, canon lawyers, and other ecclesiastical scholars whose task it was to prepare the various schemata for the use of the bishops.

Dr. Corcoran was both a keen observer and a conscientious reporter of the currents of thought in the preparatory commissions. Soon after his arrival he informed James Gibbons, the future cardinal, that he felt the subject matter being proposed would "create animated and prolonged discussion" in the council. And revealing a good prophetic sense, he added, "Theologians here may have considered them all cut and dry and simply ready for acceptance. But the Bishops, many of them at least, will think otherwise. . . ." Many of the American bishops did, indeed, think otherwise with their thoughts ranging all the way from the conservative Bishop William Henry Elder of Natchez who assured the Archbishop of Baltimore that if manifestations of nationalism should develop in the council, "I should not want to lessen by even one voice the weight of thorough Romanism-'Ubi Petrus ibi Ecclesia'. . ." to what some considered the Gallicanism of a man like the Sulpician Augustin Vérot, Bishop of Savannah and later of Saint Augustine in Florida.

The reader of 1963 will find a number of interesting contrasts between the attitudes of 1869 and those of his own day, for example, on ecumenism. Whereas the representatives of the other Christian churches invited in a somewhat awkward and illconsidered manner to serve at the First Vatican Council either declined or ignored the invitation, in the present council forty or more observers have occupied a conspicuous position in Saint Peter's and have reported in a highly favorable way of the sessions. The abundant sources and printed literature for the First Vatican Council, which Father Hennesey has examined with critical perception, offered in the earlier gathering no such prospect, either before or during the conciliar sessions, as the remarkable statement of Augustine Cardinal Bea advocating universal religious freedom delivered at the annual brotherhood dinner in Rome on January 13, 1963. On that occasion he made it known that man had a right to decide freely according to his own conscience regarding his own destiny. "From this freedom is born the right and duty of man," said the cardinal, "to follow his own conscience, and it is the duty of the individual and of society to respect this freedom and right that man has to decide for himself." Furthermore, Cardinal Bea made it known that this principle would be sponsored in the second session of Vatican Council II by Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity of which he is president.

In another aspect of the problem notable changes will be found in the language and approach of the bishops of 1869 and those of 1963. For example, a writer in a leading Catholic journal like the Dublin Review in October, 1868, predicting what the coming council might or might not do on a number of points, confidently asserted: "There is one thing, however, which the world may be certain the Council will not do; it will put forth no declaration against either the principle or the expediency of union between Church and State." And the writer was correct, for the subject had not the faintest chance of winning conciliar approval in 1869-1870. Yet the Americans at that time were basically of the same mind as their successors in 1963, for in the earlier council they were on guard lest the European concept of Church-State relations should receive endorsement at their hands, and thus they were at pains to distinguish civil and external tolerance such as obtained in their own country from the technical theological term. Nor did bishops like Thaddeus Amat of Los Angeles, Michael Domenec of Pittsburgh, and Patrick Lynch of Charleston hesitate to remonstrate strongly against the use of the word "intolerance" to define the Church's attitude toward non-Catholic groups. In that connection one of the most unequivocal pronouncements ever made on the subject was prepared at this time by John B. Purcell, Archbishop of Cincinnati. When he found that he would not have an opportunity to put his views before the council he summarized them at a reception held in his honor after his return to his see city. Referring to his statement on Church and State he said:

In it I took occasion to show that ours is, I believe, the best form of human government. . . . I said that our civil constitution grants perfect liberty to every denomination of Christians . . . and that I verily believe this was infinitely better for the Catholic religion, than were it the special object of the State's patronage and protection; that all we want is a free field and no favor. . . . Truth is mighty and will prevail. . . . If they approve our religion, they will embrace it; if not they will stay away from it. I believe this is the best theory.

As it turned out, the First Vatican Council became so absorbed by the issue of papal infallibility and kindred doctrinal questions that the pastoral approach which Pope John XXIII has so strongly urged on the present council was at a disadvantage in the earlier gathering. But that did not mean that it was forgotten. Peter Richard Kenrick, Archbishop of St. Louis, for one, reminded the council on March 22, 1870, of this fact when he said: "We must remember that we have been summoned to the council not to compose a course in theology, and still less to pass judgment on philosophical systems, but to protect the faith by explaining it and condemning errors opposed to it." Doubtless many of the fathers agreed with Kenrick, but the feeling for and against infallibility was so high that all other issues suffered in consequence. And on this all-important subject the Americans were clearly divided between the two opposing camps. The redoubtable Bishop of Rochester, Bernard J. McQuaid, for example, was an inopportunist from the outset, and he was distinctly annoyed at the Jesuits and others whom he thought were pushing the definition. A week before the council opened he told the rector of his cathedral back in Rochester that "if in any way the harmony of the Council is disturbed it will be by the introduction of this most unnecessary question." The harmony of the council was, to be sure, disturbed by bringing on the infallibility question, and on the opposite extreme from McQuaid stood another American, August Martin, Bishop of Natchitoches, who was in such anguish of spirit at the tactics of the inopportunists that he told his New Orleans friend, Father Napoleon Perché: ". . . we have to wrestle with a turbulent and agitated opposition, which considers all means good. Freedom of discussion is unlimited, but unlimited also is the abuse that is made of it. Some are real revolutionaries, others servile creatures of power, others more or less avowed enemies of the Holy See, others those who from their youth have sucked the poison of heresy."

The Americans had their say, then, whenever they felt disposed to say it, and that whether on the major question of papal infallibility or on ecclesiastical discipline and other topics that came before the council. To these men from the far side of the Atlantic it must have been an extraordinary experience to be personal witnesses to the great drama as first Manning of Westminster, the whip of the majority party, and then Dupanloup of Orléans, his opposite number, moved forward, was temporarily halted, or perhaps thrown back. There were days of tedium as well as moments of high excitement, and there were occasions when one might say that both were combined as on the day in early January when the Bishop of Saint Gall made a speech that prompted Bishop William Ullathorne of Birmingham to comment: "We have got home from a meeting of the Council where we were almost stunned by a Swiss bishop, who spoke for an hour, and roared as if he were talking from one mountain to another against wind and thunder."

All of this--and much more-- Father Hennesey has told with engaging candor and unfailing dignity, for he never loses sight of the sacred character of the issues upon which the bishops debated and at times differed with so much vehemence and sincerity. Father Hennesey's scholarship is beyond question, his literary style attractive and compelling, and his sense of history both real and reverent. Readers of this book will find a fascinating story of the American participation in the First Vatican Council that will enlighten them concerning the participation of the bishops of today in the Church's twenty-first ecumenical council. In fine, here is the unusual combination of a first rate subject treated in a superior fashion by one who understands that if the history of the Church is to be taken seriously it must conform to the canons of scientific research, and if it is to be read with lasting profit by the children of the Church, it must be handled with reverence and respect.

JOHN TRACY ELLIS

AAB Archives of the Archdiocese of Baltimore
AAC Archives of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati
AAD Archives of the Archdiocese of Dublin
AAHC Archives of All Hallows College, Dublin
AAM Archives of the Archdiocese of Malines-Brussels
AANO Archives of the Archdiocese of New Orleans
AANY Archives of the Archdiocese of New York
AAS Archives of the Archdiocese of Seattle
AASF Archives of the Archdiocese of San Francisco
AASP Archives of the Abbey of St. Paul outside the Walls, Rome
ADC Archives of the Diocese of Charleston
ADCL Archives of the Diocese of Cleveland
ADSA Archives of the Diocese of St. Augustine
AIC Archives of the Irish College, Rome
ASMP Du Boÿs Family Archives, St.-Martin de la Place
(Maine et Loire)
ASS General Archives of the Society of St.-Sulpice, Paris
ASV Vatican Secret Archives, Vatican City
Collectio Lacensis Acta et Decreta Sacrorum Conciliorum Recentiorum. 5 vols. Freiburg, 1870-1900.
Conzemius Transcripts Manuscript collection of Acton-Döllinger correspondence loaned by the Reverend Victor Conzemius, Munich.
Mansi Joannes D. Mansi. Sacrorum Concili- orum Nova et Amplissima Collectio.
Vols. XLIX-LIII. Ed. L. Petit and J. B. Martin . Leipzig, 1923-27.
UND Manuscript Collections, University of Notre Dame.

Introduction

ON December 6, 1864, Pope Pius IX intimated to the cardinals at Rome his hope of summoning an ecumenical council, the first such assembly since that of Trent, 300 years before. Two and one-half years later, on June 29, 1867, in the presence of nearly five hundred bishops who had come to Rome to commemorate the eighteenth centenary of the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul, the pope formally announced that a council would be held; and, exactly a year later, on June 29, 1868, the bull of convocation Aeterni Patris was promulgated. Pius IX presided at the solemn inauguration of the twentieth ecumenical council--the First Council of the Vatican --on December 8, 1869. Nine months later the Italian army of Victor Emmanuel II occupied the Eternal City, and, on October 20, 1870, the pope adjourned the council indefinitely by the bull Postquam Dei munere. Its sessions were never resumed.

The story of the First Council of the Vatican has been told several times over and in several languages, but scant attention has been paid to its history as seen from an American point of view. 1 There are reasons for this. In the eighty-nine general congregations which took place between December, 1869, and September, 1870, only eight of the forty-nine American prelates in attendance ventured to speak from the rostrum. The council was set in the context of a clash between liberal and conservative tendencies in the European Church, and the Church in the United States knew little of such doctrinaire controversies. Even

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1 The only previous general study of the subject is that of Raymond J. Clancy , C.S.C., "American Prelates in the Vatican Council," Historical Records and Studies, XXVIII ( 1937), 1-135.

the possible definition of papal infallibility, focal point of much of the European discussion, was not a burning issue in the American Church. Church-State relations and the question of religious toleration were problems shared by Europeans and Americans alike, but even in these areas they had differing frames of reference. The First Vatican Council was truly ecumenical. Nevertheless, its primary emphasis was European. The bishops from the United States were novices here, the council, an introduction to their episcopal function of responsibility for the whole Church. They brought with them as their contribution their own problems and some uniquely American solutions to those problems and to others. If their impact on the council was not as marked as it might have been, their very presence was extremely significant. For the first time in the eighteen-hundredyear history of ecumenical councils the New World was represented, and the bishops of the United States were part of its delegation. The following pages tell the story of their participation in the council, and, through their eyes, the story of the council itself. 2

One of the more pleasant tasks which confronts a writer is to make due acknowledgment of the many generous collaborators who have assisted him in his work. In the present instance, thanks must go first and foremost to the Right Reverend John Tracy Ellis of the Catholic University of America. Without his enthusiasm, help, and encouragement this study could never have been brought to completion. I am grateful also to the Very Reverend Louis Arand, S.S., and to Dr. John K. Zeender, both of the Catholic University, for their careful reading of the manuscript.

A host of fellow Jesuits in the United States and in Europe contributed generously of their time, hospitality, and help while

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2 American participation in the council really began with the fall, 1868 arrival in Rome of Dr. James A. Corcoran, the United States hierarchy's representative in the work of preparing the conciliar agenda. See James J. Hennesey , S.J., "James A. Corcoran's Mission to Rome; 1868-1869," Catholic Historical Review, XLVIII ( July, 1962), 157-81.

the work of research and writing was in progress. This corporative expression of thanks is all too small a recompense for their fraternal charity.

It is impossible to list all the diocesan and other officials who made various archival deposits available. I can only single out for special mention the Reverend J. Joseph Gallagher and Miss Eizabeth Bradley of Baltimore; the Reverend Thomas T. McAvoy, C.S.C., of the University of Notre Dame; the Right Reverend Jeremiah J. Brennan of New York; the Very Reverend Cornelius M. Power and the Reverend John McCorkle, S.S., of Seattle; the Very Reverend Joseph L Bernardin of Charleston; the Right Reverend Charles J. Plauché of New Orleans; the Right Reverend Joseph J. Schneider and the staff of the archives of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati; and Sister Mary Paul Fitzgerald, S.C.L., of St. Mary College, Xavier, Kansas. The Most Reverend Paul J. Hallinan not only opened the archives of the Diocese of Charleston to inspection, but also supplied information from his own research in the archives of the Diocese of Cleveland.

In Rome, Cardinal Amleto Cicognani and the Right Reverend Martino Giusti made available pertinent documents in the Vatican Archives, and two Benedictines, the Very Reverend Lambert Dunne and the Reverend Oliver Kapsner, arranged for a visit to the archives of the Abbey of St. Paul outside the Walls. One of the most important collections used was the archives of the Society of St.-Sulpice in Paris, which were placed at my disposal by the Reverend Irenee Noyé, P.S.S., who also provided an introduction to M. Jacques Gadille of the University of Dijon. M. Gadille generously supplied transcripts of the Albert du Boÿs papers. Mr. Douglas Woodruff of the London Tablet allowed me to use the Acton papers in his possession. The Most Reverend John Charles McQuaid, C.S.Sp., the Right Reverend John M. O'Regan, and the Reverend Kevin Condon, C.M., of Dublin, and the Very Reverend Raphael Canon Tambuyser of Malines-Brussels facilitated access to manuscripts in their custody.

One of the most important single contributions to the story of the American bishops at the Vatican Council was made by the Reverend Victor Conzemius, a priest of the Diocese of Luxembourg. Under the auspices of the Bavarian Academy of Science, Father Conzemius is preparing for publication the collected correspondence of Johann Ignaz Döllinger and Lord Acton at the time of the council. He lent me his manuscript and gave full permission to quote passages from the Acton-Döllinger letters which pertained to the American hierarchy.

A number of fellow American historians have also assisted in various phases of the project. The names of the Reverend Oscar Hugh Lipscomb of Mobile, and of the Reverends Michael V. Gannon of St. Augustine and Damian McElrath, O.F.M., must stand for the rest. Finally, it is impossible to enumerate the many services rendered by Mr. Fritz Samson, Librarian of Woodstock College, and his assistant, Mr. Robert Matthews. To them and to all who have in any way assisted me in this work, this small expression of gratitude is wholly inadequate.

JAMES HENNESEY, S.J.

Fordham University College of Philosophy and Letters Shrub Oak, New York April 20, 1963

THE FIRST COUNCIL OF THE VATICAN

CHAPTER I
The Bishops Go to Rome

As the year 1869 wore on, there were signs of quickening interest in the forthcoming Vatican Council among the bishops of the United States. Archbishops Martin J. Spalding of Baltimore and John McCloskey of New York were among the first to think about plans for the trip to Rome. On February 8, the Archbishop of Baltimore inquired how many bishops from the New York area would be going, adding that he hoped to sail from Baltimore about November 1. ¹ McCloskey answered that, as far as he knew, all his suffragans planned to attend the council.

However, not all the bishops were anxious to leave their dioceses for an indefinite stay abroad. One of the first to make his excuses was John Baptist Miége, S.J., Vicar Apostolic of the Indian Territory East of the Rocky Mountains. Miége thought that the problem of clearing the $100,000 debt on his newly constructed cathedral at Leavenworth, Kansas, was more pressing than attendance at the council, and in September, 1868, he asked the Jesuit General if he could be excused. His request was refused. 2 Seventy-two-year-old Bishop Augustin Blanchet of Nesqually was ultimately successful in his petition for exemption, although he had to write twice to Cardinal Barnabò before his petition was approved. 3 At least two other bishops made the

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1 AANY, A-35, Spalding to McCloskey, Baltimore, February 8, 1869.
2 Gilbert J. Garraghan, S.J., The Jesuits of the Middle United States ( 3 vols.; New York: 1938), III, 21-2.
3 AAS, Historical Archives, V, A. M. Blanchet Register, April 23, 1869 and August 4, 1869.

journey to Rome after having sought or received permission to absent themselves. Augustus Martin of Natchitoches told Archbishop Odin of New Orleans, in April, that he had asked Barnabò if he might stay home, remarking that they were both old men ("vieillards") who could well leave representation of the Province of New Orleans to its other four bishops. 4 Whatever the answer Martin received from Cardinal Barnabò, both he and Odin were in Rome when the council opened. Financial reasons prompted Bishop Patrick Lynch of Charleston to ask that he be excused, but he was another who decided to make the trip, after he had received permission to be absent. 5 One last comment came from William Henry Elder, Bishop of Natchez. He had also considered asking exemption, but did not do so and wrote to Spalding: "In case there should be manifestations of nationalism, I should not want to lessen by even one voice the weight of thorough Romanism--'Ubi Petrus ibi Ecclesia'--and I shall try hard to overcome what obstacles are rising before me." 6

The final results of American participation in the council were impressive. In 1869 there were fifty-five bishops active in the United States. Forty-eight of them and one abbot, Boniface Wimmer, O.S.B., of St. Vincent's Abbey in Pennsylvania, came to Rome for the sessions. Thomas A. Becker of Wilmington; Augustin Blanchet of Nesqually; Thomas L. Grace, O.P., of St. Paul; John H. Luers of Fort Wayne; Sylvester Rosecrans of Columbus and two vicars apostolic, Joseph Machebeuf of Colorado and Utah and John Baptist Salpointe of Arizona, all active American bishops, were excused. At least three of these named priests as procurators to represent them. Isaac Hecker, C.S.P. acted for Rosecrans, John Ireland for Grace, and Bartholomew Delorme for Augustin Blanchet. Five other American

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4 AANO, Odin Papers, Martin to Odin, Natchitoches, April 2, 1869.
5 ADC, Lynch Papers, Spalding to Lynch, Baltimore, April 1, 1869, and Barnabò to Lynch, Rome, September 10, 1869.
6 AAB, 36A-G-20, Elder to Spalding, Canton, Mississippi, July 17, 1869.

bishops were absent: Celestin de la Hailandière, formerly of Vincennes, and Frederick Résé, still technically Bishop of Detroit, were living in retirement in Europe; James Duggan of Chicago became mentally incompetent in the spring of 1869 and was confined to an asylum; James Whelan, O.P., former Bishop of Nashville, and Michael O'Connor, who had resigned the See of Pittsburgh to enter the Society of Jesus, were living in communities of their respective religious orders. None of the five bishops consecrated in the United States while the council was in session attended any of its meetings. These bishops were: Napoleon J. Perché, consecrated titular Bishop of Abdera on March 21, who became Archbishop of New Orleans on May 26; Peter Baltes of Alton; Caspar Borgess, titular Bishop of Calydon and Administrator of Detroit; Thomas Foley, titular Bishop of Pergamum and Administrator of Chicago; and Augustine Toebbe of Covington.

The mass movement of forty-nine prelates and their secretaries to Europe demanded a certain amount of logistic planning. Three immediate problems occasioned considerable correspondence in the spring and summer of 1869. The bishops wanted to know how they would get to Rome, where they would live when they got there, and what they would need in the way of robes and vestments. This last problem must have seemed minor to Spalding's European correspondents, but, he reminded Cardinal Barnabò that many of the Americans did not possess a complete episcopal outfit, 7 not even the Archbishop of New York.

Before leaving for Rome, most of the bishops addressed pastoral letters on the council to their respective dioceses. For the most part, these letters, and the sermons which were preached on them, stressed the need for prayers that the council's work might be successful. On May 22, Archbishop Spalding published the apostolic letter of Pope Pius IX, issued on April 11, which announced a jubilee indulgence on the occasion of the

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7 AAB, Spalding Letterbook, p. 583, Spalding to Barnabò, Baltimore, Match 24, 1869.

opening of the council. Spalding instructed his clergy to add the prayer of the Holy Spirit to all Masses said between June 1, 1869 and the end of the council, and that the Mass of the Holy Spirit be celebrated every Thursday, in all parish churches and college and convent chapels, for the success of the council. 8 The pastoral of Bishop Whelan of Wheeling traced the history of the church councils from that of Jerusalem in apostolic times down to the present, asked prayers for the coming twentieth council, and explained the jubilee indulgence. 9 In proclaiming the jubilee, Bishop Bayley of Newark expressed his opinion that no new definitions on matters of faith would be proposed at the council, which he thought would concern itself principally with pastoral matters. 10 More practically, John McGill, the Bishop of Richmond, was careful to stress that the requirement of the Mass of the Holy Spirit was not obligatory in the United States. He pointed out that the very wording of the Roman decree made it clear that it referred to the ecclesiastical organization of Europe, where there were collegiate churches, canonical parishes, benefices, and so on. ¹¹

Some of the bishops used the occasion to comment on what they felt was the lamentable state of contemporary religious life. Archbishop Joseph Sadoc Alemany, O.P., of San Francisco, devoted the first eight pages of his pastoral to a detailed and documented exposé of depravity in the ancient world, from the time of the Egyptians and Babylonians to that of the Greeks and Romans. He then added nine more pages on the iniquities of modern secret societies and concluded with a request for prayers for the council. 12 Augustin Vérot, S.S., Bishop of Savannah, struck a more optimistic note. He asked prayers, praised Pius IX for his zeal, firmness, and prudence, and addressed him-

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10 Freeman's Journal ( New York), June 19, 1869. Bayley's pastoral letter was dated May 26, 1869.
11 Catholic Mirror, July 3, 1869.
12 AASF, Alemany Papers, Pastoral Letter, September 15, 1869.
8 Catholic Mirror, May 22 and 29, 1869.
9 Catholic Mirror, June 5, 1869.

self to his Protestant neighbors, inviting them to compare the Catholic Church on the eve of ecumenical council with their own denominations, which, he claimed, were more often than not marked by religious apathy and indifference. 13 One American prelate who predicted with some accuracy the intentions of the Roman authorities for the council was Bishop Williams of Boston. In a sermon delivered in Holy Cross Cathedral two days before his departure for Europe, Williams referred to the prevalent errors of the day which had been condemned by Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors of 1864. He told the congregation that the work of the Roman assembly would be "to place these errors before the world, again to make a protest against them, and to condemn them anew." 14 Another sermon is interesting as indicative of the American frame of mind on the eve of the council. This time the preacher was not a bishop, but the Superior-General of the Paulist Fathers Isaac Hecker. He laid great stress on the infallibility of the Church, and was optimistic in his hopes, as he said:

The Catholic faith teaches that the Church founded on the rock of Peter is infallible. . . . In an oecumenical council, where the universal episcopate is gathered together under the presidency of its head, the successor of Peter, as Vicar of Christ, the Catholic Church is organized for deliberation and action in the most perfect way possible.

In the same sermon he emphasized the infallibility of conciliar decisions and cited his own experience as testimony that "there is no place where there is so much freedom of opinion and discussion as Rome." He also took issue with critics of the Syllabus of Errors.

One of the best travelogues of the mass migration of the bishops was kept by Archbishop Francis Norbert Blanchet of Oregon City. 15 It started with his sixteen-clay, 2800-mile trip

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13 Banner of the South ( Augusta, Georgia), September 8, 1869.
14 Lord Robert H., John E. Sexton, and Edward T. Harrington, History of the Archdiocese of Boston ( 3 vols.; New York: 1944), III, 30-33.
15 AAS, " Journal de l'Archevêque d'Oregoncity á Rome pour le concile oecumenique, 1869," cited hereafter as F. N. Blanchet Journal.

from Portland, Oregon, to New York City, by ship, stagecoach, and railroad. At San Francisco, Thaddeus Amat, C.M., the Bishop of Monterey-Los Angeles, joined Blanchet's small party, and together they reached New York on October 21, booking passage on the France which sailed on the following day. The fare from New York to Liverpool was $80.00, and the archbishop shared a cabin with the two companions who had accompanied him from Oregon, a priest and a seminarian. Among the several other clergymen aboard was Father John Ireland, who was enroute to Rome as the representative of the Bishop of St. Paul. Transatlantic sailing time was twelve and one-half days, and Blanchet records frequent rough weather and seasickness.

A diary like that of Archbishop Blanchet re-creates something of the atmosphere of the time and points up the difficulties faced by the bishops going to Rome for the council. The trip to Rome also had another aspect. In many instances it brought American bishops face to face, for the first time, with the troubled ecclesiastical scene across the Atlantic. Even a relatively wellinformed prelate like Archbishop Spalding had not appreciated all the ramifications of the quarrels that were the steady diet of churchmen in most of the countries of Europe. The Archbishop of Baltimore, perhaps with a bit of rhetorical exaggeration, later dated his change of heart on the need for a definition of papal infallibility from his days aboard the Baltimore. Just before embarkation someone had given him a copy of a "Letter from Munich," and in Paris he read Bishop Félix Dupanloup's November 11th letter to his clergy, which Butler has charac- ` terized as "the most public and clearest popular formulation of the case of the 'Inopportunists."' 16 Spalding asserted that this

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16 Cuthbert Butler, O.S.B., The Vatican Council: The Story Told From the Inside in Birhop Ullathorne's Letters ( New York: 1930). The "Letter from Munich" was probably one of the many pamphlets which a peared in Germany in the wake of Johann Döllinger Der Papst und das Konzil, published at Leipzig in 1869 under the pseudonym of "Janus."

reading persuaded him that he had been wrong in believing that Gallicanism was dead in the Church. 17

Even more important for the future history of the council were the contacts made enroute to Rome by Peter Richard Kenrick, Archbishop of St. Louis, and Isaac Hecker, procurator for the Bishop of Columbus. Kenrick visited Ireland and Paris, and in Paris he had a chance meeting in the Cathedral of Notre Dame with the Archbishop of Westminster, Henry Edward Manning, who invited him to dinner.

For the last leg of the journey, Kenrick joined Archbishop Thomas L. Connolly, O.F.M. Cap., of Halifax, and Father Hecker. After visiting Strasbourg and Munich, they crossed the Brenner Pass, stopped at Trent, where the last general council was held, and made their way to Rome by December 1. 18 It was during this trip that Kenrick made indirect contact with Johann von Döllinger, who had by that time established himself as the chief antipapal voice in Germany. The intermediary was Hecker.

On the way to Paris, Father Hecker and Archbishop Connolly had visited London, where they met Richard Simpson, the close friend and collaborator of Lord Acton, who was in turn Döllinger's favorite disciple and a leader of the liberal party among English Catholics. Acton was then in Rome. After the Connolly-Hecker visit, Simpson wrote to him:

I have taken the liberty of giving Father Hecker, the American Paulist of New York, a letter of introduction for you. You will be very glad to know a man of such energy of character. He has great

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17 AAB, 39-N-10, Draft of a letter from Spalding to Dupanloup. The letter was probably written in April, 1870. Spalding's change of heart was not as sudden as he later claimed. On December 1, 1869, he told the Sulpician Superior-General, Henri Icard, that he had no doubts as to the doctrine itself, but had not yet decided whether a definition would be opportune. ( ASS, H. Icard, " Journal de mon voyage et de mon séjour à Rome, 1869-1870." p. 14). This will be cited hereafter as Icard Journal.
18 John Rothensteiner, "Archbishop Peter Richard Kenrick and the Vatican Council," I llinoir Catholic Historical Review, XI ( 1928), 9. Rothensteiner's source is a letter of Kenrick's secretary, Constantine P. Smith, originally addressed to the editor of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat and reprinted in the Catholic Standard and Times ( Philadelphia), Match 21, 1896.

influence with the Episcopate of the U.S. and Canada and he thinks that the former at least will go the right way and withstand to the last any innovation. He and the Archbishop of Halifax dined with me on Sunday. Renouf [the Egyptologist, Sir Peter Le Page Renouf] met them. He has every confidence in Hecker and much confidence in the Archbishop whose acknowledged ignorance might make him the dupe of men like Manning. But he has at present the grace to think Manning an imposter if not a hypocrite. The American U.S. Bishops want to hold earnest meetings at the American College and to secure some German Bishops as their spokesmen. Hecker asked me about it, and I said that I would rather trust the Archbishop of St. Louis than Hefele to stand stiff against the allurements and terrors of the Curia. . . . I think that the English and Irish Bishops should be acted on through the Americans who are perfectly misunderstood at Rome. They have the art of hiding an uncompromising resistance under the show of most hearty loyalty and so they are more listened to than we are, who if we resist, usually resist without that show. Hecker as a missionary to convert the semi-literary class in the U.S. puts this truth into the first place--that it is impossible to believe against evidence and not only impossible but wicked to attempt it. So he is toto coelo opposed to the Jesuit school whose triumph he thinks would be the greatest of calamities. 19

A second letter to Acton contained more details. This time the writer was Döllinger, who reported:

Bishops are now passing through Munich daily, and one hears much about their frame of mind. The Bishop of Strasbourg asserted in conversation with me: The North American bishops are strong adherents and supporters of the infallibility doctrine, as are also a considerable part of the French.

But Döllinger had also had another guest, and this one disagreed with the Bishop of Strasbourg. Döllinger's letter continued:

Father Hecker from New York spoke to me yesterday for two hours about conditions in America and the prospects of the Catholic Church there; he is also on the way to Rome, along with some American bishops. According to his assurances, they are all opponents of the dogma of infallibility, but at the same time very devoted to the Pope

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19 Conzemius Transcripts, Simpson to Acton, Clapham, November 9, 1869.

personally. He has a letter from Simpson, and it is certainly advisable to cultivate his acquaintance. He seems profoundly convinced that the triumph of ultramontanism would be fatal to the Church in America. Hecker asserts, and from firsthand knowledge, since he has just been in Ireland, that the Irish bishops, especially MacHale of Tuam, are also opponents of the infallibility dogma. But unfortunately all of them, Germans, French, Americans, etc., choose to fight the battle on the unhappily chosen ground of inexpediency; there they are already half beaten before they start. 20

A balanced judgment of Isaac Hecker's role at the Vatican Council must await the opening of the Paulist Archives on the subject. Hecker had been anxious to attend the council, and in April, 1869, he reported to Spalding that Archbishop Dechamps of Malines and Count Charles de Montalembert were encouraging him to come to Rome. He added that he wanted to be on hand as a member of a religious community, as a man active in the apostolate of the press, and as an American. He told Spalding that he had asked if he were not entitled to a seat as SuperiorGeneral of the Paulists, but had received a negative reply from Cardinal Barnabò. In May he noted with regret the news sent him by the Archbishop of Baltimore that bishops would not take theologians with them. Finally he was appointed in June as procurator for Bishop Rosecrans of Columbus. As will be seen, he played a prominent part in the preliminary activities of the council. 21

The American bishops were received by the pope in groups, very few private audiences were given. Typical was the audience attended by Blanchet on November 27. The invitation was delivered by a mounted dragoon on November 26, and next day, at 11:00 A.M., sixteen Americans were received by the pope. The audience lasted twenty minutes, and Pius IX was most gracious. On leaving, many of the bishops lefts sums of silver or paper money on a table. Blanchet himself contributed 800

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20 Conzemius Transcripts, Döllinger to Acton, Munich, November 22, 1869.
21 Hecker's Letters to Spalding are in AAD 36-A-K-5, 7, 8.

gold francs as an offering from the people of his archdiocese. Climbing the long staircases of the Vatican Palace, he came upon Archbishop Odin of New Orleans, who was out of breath and stopping every other moment. 23 Bishop Gibbons later wrote to his brother that the pope had subsequently ordered that Odin be carried to papal audiences in a sedan chair. What must have been one of the more startling incidents in this series of audiences occurred when Bishop Eugene O'Connell of Grass Valley was received by the pope. It was reported that the bishop from the Gold Rush country brought with him ingots and nuggets of silver and gold as gifts from the people of northern California. One block of silver came from an Irish immigrant, Denis J. Oliver. It weighed 350 pounds, was valued at 1,000 pounds sterling and had to be carried into the audience chamber by half a dozen soldiers. 24 But despite all the novelty and pageantry, not all the Americans were happy in Rome. Bishop McQuaid was frankly bored, and he wrote to Father Early in Rochester: "If I had my own way, without having as yet seen the tenth part of Rome, I would soon start for home. I am quite tired of being away from my usual duties, whilst the curiosity to see sights and places is growing less." 25

The first session of the council was a presynodal congregation held in the Sistine Chapel at 10:00 A.M. on December 2. The pope delivered an exhortation on unity to the four or five hundred prelates present, and then one of the cardinals read out the names of the officers of the council. Five presidents were appointed: Cardinals Karl von Reisach, Antonio de Luca, Giuseppe Bizzarri, Luigi Bilio, and Annibale Capalti. Josef Fessler, Bishop of Sankt Pölten in Austria, was named secretary, with

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22 AAS, F. N. Blanchet Journal, November 27, 1869.
23 James Gibbons to John Gibbons, Rome, January 19, 1870, printed in the Morning Star and Catholic Messenger ( New Orleans), February 20, 1870.
24 Morning Star and Catholic Messenger, February 6, 1870.
25 McQuaid to Early, Rome, December 16, 1869, in Henry J. Browne (ed.), "The Letters of Bishop McQuaid from the Vatican Council," The Catholic Historical Review, XU ( January, 1956), 413.

Monsignor Luigi Jacobini and Canons Camillo Santori and Angelo Jacobini to assist him. Of the forty-four other functionaries appointed, all were Italians except one of the votecollectors and two of the ushers. Twenty-three stenographers also took the oath of office on December 7. They came from the various national colleges in Rome and included two Americans, Peter Geyer of Cincinnati and Theodore H. Metcalf of Boston, whose appointments Father Corcoran had announced to Archbishop McCloskey the preceding March. ²⁶

The main business of the presynodal congregation was promulgation of the apostolic letter Multiplices inter, the parliamentary handbook of the council. By this decree the right of proposing questions for deliberation was reserved to the pope. However, the pope would name a special congregation or committee of members of the council to which individual fathers might submit proposals. The apostolic letter provided for two types of meetings, the more common general congregations and the solemn public sessions. At general congregations the fathers were to discuss schemata previously prepared by the preliminary commissions. Anyone could speak; it was only necessary that they register their names with the cardinal presidents. If the schemata needed revision, this would be done by one of four deputations to be elected by the fathers. When the final draft of a constitution had been completed, decrees would be voted upon in public session, in the presence of the pope. At general congregations three types of votes were possible, namely: approval ( placet ), disapproval ( non placet ), and conditional approval ( placet juxta modum ). In public sessions conditional votes were not to be allowed. All voting was to be by roll call, but in general congregations written ballots were also acceptable. Finally, the apostolic letter reminded the fathers of their obligation to

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26 Theodor Granderath, S. J. Histoire du Concile da Vatican ( 3 vols.; Brussels: 1907-19), II, 1, 9-14. Cardinal Reisach died on December 29, and was succeeded by Cardinal Filippo de Angelis. For the work of the stenographers, see Leone Dehon, Diario del Concilio Vaticano I ( Rome: 1962).

secrecy about the affairs of the council and informed them that they were not to quit Rome without explicit permission. ²⁷

The French statesman Émile Ollivier has made a comparative study of procedure at the Vatican Council and at that of Trent 300 years before. The most striking difference he found was the tendency to shift the initiative from the fathers to the pope. At Trent there was no previously prepared agenda, and no regulations were laid down ahead of time. Matters under consideration were first debated in a public assembly of theologians, often with as many as 2,000 spectators present. The theologians submitted topics to general congregations composed of those with a decisive vote and certain others who were permitted consultative voice. General congregations were private. Each father was asked his opinion, and absolute freedom of speech was guaranteed. Secrecy was ill-kept, and many of the speeches were long, but the papal legates never did more than exhort the council on these points. In public sessions the legates were unsuccessful in efforts to restrict the votes to placet or non placet. Deputations to revise and formulate decrees were not set up beforehand, but appointed by the fathers as the need arose. Ollivier concluded his analysis by singling out the following as the principal procedural differences between Trent and the Vatican: The preparatory commissions held their sessions before the Vatican Council convened, and their members were chosen solely by the Holy See. Debate in the general congregations was not preceded by a report from the theologians, but only by presentation of an already formulated schema. Committees to revise the schemata were not set up ad hoc by the fathers, but elected at the beginning of the council. Several questions which had continued in dispute, all during the Tridentine sessions, were resolved: Conditional ballots and written ballots from absent fathers were not allowed in public sessions; the right of proposing topics for discussion was reserved solely to the pope, with the concession that fathers might submit proposals to the

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27 Mansi, L. 215 * -22 * .

special papal commission; and, finally, the secrecy which had been recommended at Trent was absolutely imposed at the Vatican. 28 Ollivier's comparison was made in terms of Multiplices inter. Further procedural revisions were made during the Vatican Council's sessions, but they did not alter substantially the points of contrast between the two councils.

One more minor problem had to be solved before the council started. On October 10, 1869, the ceremonial commission had decided that fathers should be seated in the council hall by rank and then, in the case of those in episcopal orders, according to date of election and not of consecration. The commission also recommended that primates be allowed precedence over other archbishops. 29 In December, 1869, there were fifty-five cardinals, eleven eastern and western patriarchs, and nine primates. The primatial See of Armagh was vacant, and several other such sees and the Patriarchate of Venice were held by cardinals. Although the Seventh Provincial Council of Baltimore had asked in 1849 that the Archbishop of Baltimore be declared primate of the United States, no action had ever been taken by the Holy See, and Archbishop Spalding had only the "Prerogative of place" among the American archbishops which had been conceded to the occupant of the See of Baltimore in a letter of Cardinal Barnabò dated August 15, 1858. 30 Spalding entered a petition that he be allowed a seat among the primates, but Fessler, the Secretary of the council, informed him that his precedence was local to the United States, and did not entitle him to a special place in Rome. 31 The leader of the American hierarchy found himself seated ninety-third among the 124 primates and archbishops present at the first public session,

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28 Émile Ollivier, L'Eglise et L'Etat au Concile du Vatican ( 2 vols.; Paris: 1879), I, 466-501.
29 Mansi, L. 187 * -9 * .
30 Peter Guilday, A History of the Councils of Baltimore, 1791-1884 ( New York: 1932), pp. 157, 202.
31 AAB, 36A-T-5, Fessler to Spalding, Rome, December 7, 1869. Those recognized as primates were the archbishops of: Antivari, Braga, Gniezno, Lyons, Malines, Salerno, Salzburg, Sao Salvador da Bahia, and Tarragona.

and only Archbishop McCloskey, among the American metropolitans, was placed below him. 32

The bishops had to rise early on December 8. Archbishop Blanchet recorded the fact that he got up at 4:00 A.M., said Mass at five, took coffee at seven, and was on his way to St. Peter's by eight. 33 The day was a dismal one. Bishop Bayley wrote that "the opening was a grand affair, but unfortunately the weather was very bad. It rained on S. Bibiana's day [December 2] & has been raining ever since to fulfill the proverb." 34 According to an American journalist, the rain did not fall in torrents, but in "slow and measured showers." The scalpers were out in force, and it cost from one to two dollars for a half-mile carriage ride. St. Peter's Square was jammed with people and the soldiers were unable to budge the crowd. 35 Even Bishop McQuaid had difficulty getting into the church, and he wrote that he intended sending his chaplain home after the Christmas holidays because, as he said:

Bishops' chaplains here at grand ceremonies should be valets. They were treated most shabbily at the opening of the Council. Even Father [Francis] McNeirny [Abp. McCloskey's secretary] was pushed to one side. . . . I had to do some rough work myself to pass through the crowd and reach the vestry room. I succeeded and made way for half a dozen more bishops. 36

Archbishops and bishops put on white miters and copes in a room over the portico of St. Peter's, and at nine the procession started down the Scala Regia and moved across the porch of the basilica and into the central nave. Over 700 prelates took part. Papal Zouaves kept a narrow passage clear as the fathers walked down the center of the church, uncovered their heads before the Blessed Sacrament exposed on the papal altar under the cupola, and turned to the right into the north transept. The council hall had been prepared there, complete with Brussels

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32 Mansi, L, 22-35.
33 AAS, F. N. Blanchet Journal, December 8, 1869.
34 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, December 11, 1869.
35 The Catholic ( Pittsburgh), January 8, 1870.
36 McQuaid to Early, Rome, December 16, 1870, in Browne, p. 413.

carpeting donated by the King of Prussia and with the fathers' places covered in red, purple, or green damask, according to their rank. Noble Guards and Knights of Malta stood at the main entrance, and the Swiss Guard was posted at the other doors. The processional hymn was the Veni Creator Spiritus. The pope, who had been carried to the main door of St. Peter's in the sedia gestatoria, walked the length of the nave on foot, intoned some prayers before the Blessed Sacrament, and entered the hall, where his throne was located at the far end, in front of the altar of Saints Processus and Martinian. Cardinals and patriarchs took their places in the apse, and the rest of the fathers were ranged in long rows of choir stalls, eight rows deep, which ran the length of the chapel.

The dean of the sacred college, Cardinal Constantino Patrizi, celebrated Mass at 10:00 A.M., a full hour after the start of the procession. Before the last gospel a sermon was preached by Archbishop Luigi Puecher Passavalli, O.F.M.Cap., a curial official. After the Mass each of the fathers made his obedience to the pope; cardinals kissing his hand, bishops of all ranks his knee, and abbots and religious superiors his foot. A series of prayers and litanies followed, and Pope Pius gave a brief exhortation. The session should then have been closed to the public, but the presence of a number of royal personages and ambassadors in the tribunes made this awkward, and so the hall was not cleared when Antonio Valenziani, Bishop of Fabriano and Matelica in the Papal States, read a formal decree declaring the council opened. The fathers gave unanimous approval to this by voice vote. A second decree announced that the next public session would be held on January 6. The Te Deum was then sung, and the meeting adjourned. It was approximately 4:00 P.M. The services had taken seven hours. Archbishop Blanchet closed his account of the day's events with some wry comments about the difficulties attendant on so long a stay in the hall. 37

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37 Granderath, II, 1, 20-33; Butler, I, 162-5; AAS, F. N. Blanchet Journal, December 8, 1869; "The First Oecumenical Council of the Vatican," Catholic World, X ( 1870), 693-705.

According to official figures, 698 fathers attended the opening session. Of these, forty-five were from the United States. Bishop McQuaid's name is missing from the list, but he was most emphatically present. The same was true of Abbot Wimmer of St. Vincent's. The Rome correspondent of the Pittsburgh Catholic reported that the abbot was the first father to enter the council hall, and that could have been his place in the procession, since the abbots preceded the bishops and cardinals, while other religious superiors followed the pope. 38 The final count of Americans should probably be set at forty-seven. 39

The first general congregation was held on December 10.40 After an introductory address by Cardinal de Luca, the subsecretary Monsignor Jacobini read the names of those appointed by Pius IX to the congregation for receiving proposals. Among the twenty-six prelates designated was Archbishop Spalding,

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38 The official list is in Mansi, L, 22-35. See also the Catholic, January 8, 1870.
39 The Americans present were: Archbishops Joseph Sadoc Alemany, O.P. ( San Francisco); Francis N. Blanchet ( Oregon City); Peter R. Kenrick (St. Louis); John McCloskey ( New York); John B. Purcell (Cincinnati); and Martin J. Spalding ( Baltimore); Bishops Thaddeus Amat, C.M. ( Monterey-Los Angeles); David W. Bacon ( Portland); James R. Bayley ( Newark); John J. Conroy ( Albany); Michael Domenec, C.M. ( Pittsburgh); Claude M. Dubuis, C.M. ( Galveston); William H. Elder ( Natchez); Patrick Feehan ( Nashville); Edward Fitzgerald ( Little Rock); James Gibbons ( North Carolina); Louis de Goesbriand ( Burlington); Michael Heiss ( LaCrosse); John Hennessy ( Dubuque); John M. Henni ( Milwaukee); John J. Hogan (St. Joseph); John B. Lamy (Santa Fe); Louis Lootens ( Idaho); John Loughlin (Brooklyn); Patrick N. Lynch ( Charleston); Francis P. McFarland ( Hartford); John McGill ( Richmond); Bernard J. McQuaid ( Rochester); Augustus M. Martin ( Natchitoches); Joseph Melcher ( Green Bay); John B. Miége, S.J. ( Kansas); Ignatius Mrak (Sault-Ste.-Marie and Marquette); Tobias Mullen ( Erie); Eugene O'Connell (Grass Valley); James O'Gorman, O.C.S.O. ( Nebraska); William O'Hara ( Scranton); Ignatius Persico, O.F.M. Cap. (titular of Gratianopolis); John Quinlan ( Mobile); Amadeus Rappe ( Cleveland); Stephen V. Ryan, C.M. ( Buffalo); Maurice de St.-Palais ( Vincennes); Jeremiah Shanahan ( Harrisburg); Augustin Vérot, S.S. ( Savannah); Richard V. Whelan ( Wheeling); John J. Williams ( Boston); James F. Wood ( Philadelphia); and Abbot Boniface Wimmer, O.S.B. (St. Vincent's Abbey). Archbishop John M. Odin, C.M., of New Orleans was in Rome on December 8, but did not attend the public session.
40 Mansi, L, 45-8.

who had received notice of his selection in a letter from the papal Secretary of State on December 7. ⁴¹ The next order of business was the election of two committees, one to grant leaves of absence and the second to handle controversies which might come up with regard to seating, precedence, and so on. Each father was first asked to write down the names of five members of the council whom he wanted as "judges of excuses." The votes were then to be collected and tabulated, and they would proceed to the choice of "judges of complaints and controversies." However, instead of filling out a ballot, Archbishop Kenrick sent a note to Cardinal Bilio, one of the presidents, suggesting that a totally different procedure be adopted. He asked that seven fathers be designated to retire from the hall and draw up a list of candidates for the committees from among those present. Those elected should be of different nationalities and languages. Kenrick also wanted the elections postponed to the next general congregation, when the fathers would vote for the suggested slate or for others of their own choosing. His proposal was ignored, and a request by Bishop Joseph Strossmayer of Diakovár--that the elections be held over until the fathers had had time to make one another's acquaintance--was also denied. 42 The elections continued as planned, and it was announced that the results would be made known at the congregation of December 14. Two documents were also distributed on December 10. One of them was the schema on Catholic doctrine, the other the bull Cum Romanis pontificibus, which automatically suspended the council in case the pope should die during its sessions and provided that the election of a successor should be carried out in the normal way by the College of Cardinals. 43

The Strossmayer and Kenrick protests at the first congrega-

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41 AAB, 39-K-1, Antonelli to Spalding, December 7, 1869.
42 Granderath, II, 1, 79-82.
43 Ollivier, I, 463-6, puts this bull into historical context. Other popes had laid down similar provisions, but Pius IX made a rule for all time.

tion were not isolated phenomena. As early as mid-December forces were already at work which would ultimately divide the council on very basic issues. The surface manifestation of this division was a series of petitions directed to the pope or the presidents on a number of procedural points. Under the surface, a good deal of maneuvering went on, and two antithetic groups began to take shape. The first petition was sent to Pius IX and was granted. Thirteen fathers headed by Cardinal Prince Friedrich zu Schwarzenberg, Archbishop of Prague, asked that only the deputation on faith be elected at the December 14th congregation, with the remaining three deputations to be chosen at subsequent sessions. All the signers of this petition were Austrian, German, or Hungarian except the Archbishop of Paris Georges Darboy and Archbishop Purcell of Cincinnati. 44 Another letter along the same lines was addressed to the cardinal presidents by Archbishop Victor Dechamps, C.Ss.R., of Malines. 45

A second petition struck more closely at some of the provisions of Multiplices inter. It was forwarded to the pope by nineteen bishops, most of them French, but including Strossmayer and two Americans, Kenrick and McQuaid. The petitioners were concerned that the liberty of the council be made apparent. They therefore suggested that the fathers be permitted to elect additional members to the appointed committee on proposals. They also wanted sessions of the deputations thrown open to all members of the council, and they asked that the deputations be polled frequently. Since the deputations were to play such an important role in the practical elaboration of decrees, they felt that it was imperative that their membership be drawn from the most capable fathers available, and not merely left to chance. Another suggestion was that nothing be presented to the council until it had been thoroughly considered in the appropriate deputation, so that the initiative in proposing topics

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44 Mansi, L, 40-41.
45 Mansi, L, 41.

would seem to rest with the fathers. Finally the petitioners pointed out that it was customary in modern times to give publicity to parliamentary proceedings, and they asked that the rule of secrecy with regard to journalists be relaxed, so that unnecessary suspicion of the Church and of the council could be avoided. 46 This petition was rejected in a verbal communication from Fessler to one of the signers, Bishop Felix de Las Cases of Constantine and Hippo, on January 28. Fessler told Las Cases that the pope intended Multiplices inter to stand as written, although he would entertain requests for modifications as the occasion warranted. 47

A third unsuccessful petition was obviously American in origin. It went to Cardinal de Luca on December 14, and was an appeal on behalf of the procurators sent to represent absent bishops. The signers asked that the procurators be allowed a consultative vote, as had been done in past councils, and that they be seated after the superiors-general of religious orders. All the American archbishops, except Spalding and Odin, and twenty-nine American bishops signed the request. Among the thirty other signatures, there was not one from a prominent European prelate. 48

As December ended, petitions were still being handed in. Two Peruvian bishops asked that speeches delivered in the council be printed and distributed. They received no answer. 49 The German-Austrian-Hungarian group presented two more petitions on Multiplices inter, both on January 2, 1870. The first repeated the request for elected members of the congregation on proposals and asked free access to its meetings for all the fathers. Pius IX replied through Bishop Fessler that the apostolic letter prejudiced no episcopal rights, the requests had no foundation, and Multiplices inter would not be revised. Arch-

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46 Mansi, L, 41-4.
47 Mansi, L, 44.
48 Mansi, L, 44-5.
49 Mansi, L, 51.

bishop Kenrick was the only signer of this petition from a country outside the central European bloc. 50

The second petition of January 2 raised a number of practical difficulties. This time all the signers were from Germany and Austria-Hungary. They asked that the council be divided into smaller language groups, suggesting that each of these could then send two delegates to present their views at deputation meetings. They also spoke of the difficulty that many of the fathers, who were not accustomed to speaking Latin, had and intimated that, although the council hall was admirably situated near the tomb of St. Peter, it was not really suitable for genuine discussion. Another cause of complaint was that stenographic reports of the discussions had not been distributed as had been promised. In lieu of these, they requested permission for the fathers to have their speeches printed and circulated. Finally they asked to have the schema on discipline given out, so that it could be compared with the one on doctrine, which was then under consideration. Again Fessler answered in person. He said that it had never been customary to let the fathers of a council know all that they were to discuss, and he claimed that special reasons forbade it in the present instance. Private meetings were not forbidden, the secretary said, and delegates could be sent to speak at general congregations, but they had to speak in their own name and not as representatives of any group. Lastly, Fessler stated that there was no need to have the speeches printed, since the deputations took account of them in their revision of the schemata. 51

The story behind these petitions is vital to an understanding of the subsequent history of the council. They represented the thought of those members of the hierarchy who felt that the council should approximate to some degree a parliamentary assembly. They were also among the first skirmishes in the great battle over a definition of papal infallibility. Bishop

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50 Mansi, L, 52-4.
51 Mansi, L, 54-8.

Ullathorne explained this when he wrote on December 16: "We are now in the agony of electing the special deputation de Fide. Everybody feels that on the twenty-four [members of the deputation] much will depend when the question comes on." 52 The deputation elections, which will be considered next, and the petitions, which have just been seen, were all part of a pattern. They manifested a basic divergence of view between those who placed emphasis in church government on the monarchical role of the papacy and those who felt that somehow the stress should fall on co-operative rule by the pope and the bishops. It would be easy, but inaccurate to the point of falsification, to call one party--those who emphasized the papal role--"Ultramontanes," and the other "Gallicans." Neither is it necessary here to sort out all the varying shades of opinion within these two parties. This will be done for the American bishops when their role in the council is studied later, and this approach seems preferable to "typing" them beforehand. It is better, therefore, to adopt a purely pragmatic norm in the matter of nomenclature, and to speak simply of the majority and the minority. The petitioners of December and January belonged to the minority. By and large they remained in the minority on the question of the deputation elections and on the question of defining papal infallibility. Given a greater or lesser degree of "papal-episcopal" orientation in their thinking, in the broad sense already suggested, the consistency and inevitability of their position in the three controversies mentioned is obvious, just as the same is true, from the opposite standpoint, of those who opposed them and who, in point of numbers, constituted the majority of the fathers.

In his December 16 letter, Ullathorne mentioned that different national groups met in the early part of that month to select candidates for the all-important deputation on faith. He commented that the Irish, the English, and the Americans were

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52 Butler, I, 167.

co-operating, but he reported a split in the ranks of both the Germans and the French. As for the Spaniards, they "had put out a lithograph list, taken up by all the sheep tribe who follow at a gap." ⁵³

The "lithograph list" was not in fact a Spanish production. Archbishop Manning and Bishop Ignaz von Senestréy of Regensburg have written its history. Manning told how he, Senestréy, Dechamps, and the Bishops of Paderborn and Carcassonne"began meeting in order to watch and counteract the French and German bishops who were united in an International Committee." They met at first in Manning's apartment, then in the rooms of Senestréy and of Conrad Martin, the Bishop of Paderborn, and finally obtained permanent use of a room in the Redemptorist generalate, the Villa Caserta, near the Basilica of St. Mary Major. ⁵⁴ Two more names should be added to those of the leaders of this group. They were Gaspard Mermillod, Auxiliary Bishop of Geneva, and Bishop Charles Plantier of Nimes. Senestréy's diary described the purposes of the committee and its tactics. They approached the election to the deputation on faith as preliminary to what they envisioned as the major issue facing the council, definition of papal infallibility. More than forty bishops, including Michael Heiss of La Crosse, met at the Villa Caserta. They set it down as a fundamental rule that no one should be elected to the deputation who was known to oppose the definition. Candidates were then selected from various countries, and the names given to Manning, who prepared the final list of twenty-four names. This was submitted for approval to Cardinal Filippo de Angelis, the future first president of the council, and then Senestréy had it lithographed and distributed to the fathers. ⁵⁵

Granderath has tried to show that de Angelis played only

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53 Butler, I, 167.
54 Edmund S. Purcell, Life of Cardinal Manning, Archbishop of Westminster ( 2 vols.; London: 1895), II453-4; Butler, I, 171; Granderath, II, 1, 87.
55 Mansi, LIII, 157-9.

a very secondary part in all these proceedings. Two letters from Mermillod indicate that the cardinal's role was important, perhaps as important as that of Archbishop Manning, who has generally been considered the prime mover in the Villa Caserta committee. The Auxiliary Bishop of Geneva wrote to Archbishop Dechamps as follows:

I do not have any influence for the list. You must have the goodness to write to Cardinal de Angelis or to Monsignor Manning. Do it directly by a word to Cardinal de Angelis. I will do it for my part. It is important that it be soon. I am sad at the answer of the Bishop of Orléans to Monsignor Manning. It stirs up false-heartedness and instigates accusations against the Church.

In another letter to Dechamps, Mermillod wrote:

I do not know if His Eminence Cardinal de Angelis has sent you the plans of the lists. I do not yet have them. It is important to distribute them as quickly as possible and to recommend to the Belgians, Dutch and others whom you see to support the lists without any modification, so as to prevent the partisans of a parliamentary church from slipping in through the links of misunderstanding. ⁵⁶

Of the twenty-four names on the majority list, only one later opposed the definition of papal infallibility. He was Archbishop Janos Simor of Esztergom, who had issued a pastoral in line with the majority viewpoint before leaving Hungary, but joined the minority party when he reached Rome. 57 Two American names were included, those of Archbishop Spalding and Archbishop Alemany.

The Villa Caserta committee was not the only one to offer a list of candidates. Opponents of a definition of papal infallibility had also organized their forces. Implementing a scheme

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56 AAM, Dechamps Papers, Mermillod to Dechamps, Rome, "Wednesday evening," and "5 Sunday of the year 1869." The election to the deputation on faith took place on Tuesday, December 14. The Wednesday in question is probably December 8, the day of the first public session, or it may have been earlier, although this is doubtful. The Sunday is probably December 5. In the original French, the dateline reads: "5 dimanche de l'année 1869."
57 Butler, I, 175.

originated by Hungarian Archbishop Lajos Haynald of Kalocsa, they built upon national groups which sent delegates to an international co-ordinating committee. 58 By December 12, four major national groups were represented: the French headed by Cardinal Jacques Mathieu of Besançon and Archbishop Darboy of Paris, the Austro-Germans under Cardinals Schwarzenberg of Prague and Rauscher of Vienna, the Hungarians led by their primate, Archbishop Simor, and the North Americans, whose chief spokesmen were Archbishop Kenrick and the Canadian Archbishop Connolly of Halifax. There was also a scattering of representatives from other nations, including the Italian anti-infallibilists. 59 Information on the international committee is sketchy. Apparently the inner circle in the formative period was small. Besides those already mentioned, Bishops Dupanloup and Strossmayer played leading roles, with the former being looked upon as the leader of the group. Father Hecker also assisted in the work of the committee. On December 11, he brought the American list to Schwarzenberg, 60 and on January 4 Lord Acton made grateful mention of his help in a letter to Döllinger. 61 Acton himself was at the center of the anti-infallibilist activities. Albert du Boÿs, a confidant of Dupanloup, noted in his memoirs that some fifteen or twenty North American prelates, among them Kenrick and Connolly, frequented Acton's salon and met there with their German counterparts. 62

Another bishop from the United States who interested himself in the composition of the deputation on faith was Augustin Vérot of Savannah. His activity indicated the comparative ignorance of the Americans about the personalities and issues in-

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58 F. Lagrange, Vie de Mgr. Dupanloup, Evêque d'Orléans ( 3 vols.; Paris: 1884), III, 156.
59 Granderath, II, 1, 86. For the Italians, see the somewhat naïve study by Nicola Menna, Vercovi Italiani anti-infallibilisti al Concilio Vaticano ( Naples, 1958). Eighteen Italian fathers opposed the definition, or seven per cent of the Italian episcopate.
60 Cölestin Wolfsgruber, O.S.B., Friedrich Kardinal Schwarzenberg ( 3 vols.; Vienna: 1906-17), III, 231.
61 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 4, 1870.
62 ASMP, Du Boÿs Papers, Memoirs of the Council, p. 5.

volved in the fundamentally European disputes with which they were confronted. Henri Icard, Superior-General of the Sulpicians, was in Rome as theologian to Archbishop Victor Bernardou of Sens. In his diary for December 9, Icard related that Vérot, a fellow Sulpician, had called to see him while he was out. Immediately upon learning of the visit, Icard went to the American College and found that Vérot wanted to inquire about the French lists for the deputation. The Bishop of Savannah was also interested in the nature of the disagreements within the French hierarchy, and he asked Icard what was meant by the term "Liberal bishops," and if it were true that they were of one mind on the expediency of defining papal infallibility. Icard told him that the lists were nor yet ready, and explained that he thought the French bishops agreed on fundamentals, but differed in matters of practical policy. Then the Sulpician superior gave a rather Machiavellian interpretation of the mind of the liberals, saying that none of the French doubted that freedom of the press, of worship, and of assembly were evil in themselves, but that some of them felt that the Church should accommodate itself to these modern "aberrations" and even use them to its own profit, while others were more reserved in this regard. According to Icard, Vérot agreed with the liberal approach as he had described it, and claimed that these sentiments reflected the thinking of the American bishops. Icard also told the Bishop of Savannah that anyone who thought that the great majority of the French bishops believed a definition of infallibility expedient was ill-informed, although he conceded that circumstances might alter the complexion of things. 63

The list of candidates for the deputation on faith prepared by the international committee represented a majority opposed to the definition, but at least seven proponents were included, among them two of the Villa Caserta nominees, Archbishop Manuel Garcia Gil, O.P., of Saragossa and Bishop Antonio

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63 ASS, Icard Journal, December 9, 1869.

Monescillo of Jaen. There were only twenty-one names. Besides Kenrick, three Canadians represented the North Americans: Connolly, Bishop John Lynch, C.M., of Toronto, and Coadjutor Bishop Louis La Flèche of Three Rivers. 64

The election to the deputation was held at the second general congregation on December 14, and all those supported by the Villa Caserta committee were elected, including Archbishops Spalding and Alemany. 65 The results were announced at the third congregation on December 20, at which the election for a second deputation, that on ecclesiastical discipline, took place. Again there were competing lists, and again what was now clearly the majority party carried the day. Two Americans were chosen, Archbishop McCloskey and Bishop Heiss. 66 Heiss was of course associated with the majority, but McCloskey was not. His name appeared on both lists, and he led the poll. 67 The second and third choices, Ullathorne and MacHale, were also acceptable to the minority. Kenrick and Bishop Richard Whelan were nominated by the international committee, but failed of election. 68 A particularly pathetic figure among the minority candidates was the Armenian Archbishop of Antioch, Placide Casangian, who later made a melodramatic exit from Rome

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64 Butler, I, 174-5. The complete list of minority candidates is in Johann Friedrich, Tagebuch wäbrend des Vatikonischen Concils (Nördlingen, 1871), p.27.
65 Mansi, L, 47-8.
66 Mansi, L, 28-50; 119-35.
67 In his funeral eulogy of McCloskey, the then Archbishop James Gibbons spoke of his work on the deputation: "He was deemed worthy of being made a member of the Committee on Discipline, one of the most important in the Council, and Cardinal Capalti, who presided over the Committee, spoke in terms of highest admiration of the wisdom of the Archbishop of New York." ( Sunday Democrat [ New York], October 18, 1885.) On the same occasion Manning wrote to Archbishop Michael A. Corrigan: "We met in Rome during the Vatican Council in a way to make me know his worth, & I have always venerated him for his grace and gentle character." ( AANY, C-2, Manning to Corrigan, Westminster, October 11, 1885.)
68 Friedrich, p. 30. The minority had nominated Ullathorne for the discipline deputation, but not MacHale, although the latter had been put forward for that on faith.

during the council and became the leader of a schism in the Armenian Church. 69

Two more deputations were subsequently elected, but without the excitement which had attended the selection of the deputations on faith and on ecclesiastical discipline. On January 3, the names of the deputation on religious orders were announced, Bishop Ryan of Buffalo representing the United States, 70 while Bishop de Goesbriand of Burlington became a member of the deputation for eastern churches and foreign missions. 71 The international committee made no effort to put up candidates in this last election. Archbishop Kenrick, however, let it be known that he had handed in a blank ballot in protest against the lithographed list distributed by Cardinal de Angelis. 72

Kenrick's futile gesture in the final deputation election bespoke the feelings of a number of the fathers. 73 But not all the Americans shared the same view of the proceedings. Bishop William Henry Elder of Natchez was one who was considerably less disturbed. Writing to William Fortune, Rector of All Hallows College in Dublin, he scoffed at reports that there had

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69 Louis Veuillot, Rome pendang le Concile ( 2 vols.; Paris: 1872), II, 390, commented that on packing up to leave Rome he found the minority list among his papers. He continued: "I see there names on which time has projected an interesting light. Two among others, who were not yet well known, have been disastrously illuminated; one is Mgr. Kenrik [ sic ], Archbishop of St. Louis in the United States; the other is Mgr. Kazagian [ sic ], Bishop of Antioch of the Armenian rite, now an apostate."
70 Mansi, L, 161.
71 Mansi, L, 358; 397.
72 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 22, 1870; Johann Friedrich, Gerchichte des Vatikanischen Konzils ( 3 vols.; Bonn: 1877-87), III, 1, 437.
73 Granderath, II, 2, 95-6, gives several examples of protest ballots which were handed in during the different elections. On December 20, one father deposited a blank ballot with a note asking Cardinal de Angelis to fill in the names of those bishops who enjoyed his protection. Another complained at the third election that the distribution of lithographed lists had made a farce of the secret ballot. Two blank ballots were also handed in at this election, one of them torn in three pieces. In the final election, one of the fathers wrote a note saying that he was abstaining because no account was taken of the wishes of the minority.

been a scene in the council hall, and that Dupanloup and others had stalked out in disgust. Of the second congregation he stated: "The whole business was an election in which no words were uttered [except] by the officers asking for tickets--and we separated quietly & pleasantly--only with some good-natured grumbling that we were losing time by such short sessions. 74 Bishop Bernard McQuaid was not quite so tractable. In late December he wrote the rector of his cathedral:

We have not yet got through with the voting for committees. The voting, however, is all one way. One of the Italian Cardinals, Archbp. Manning and the Jesuits prepare and print a list of their candidates. The Italians, the Spaniards, South American Spaniards and others vote it. They have the whole thing in their own hands. Archbp. Manning picks out such American Bishops as he chooses, nearly always going against the expressed unanimous choice of the American Bishops. Although we, more than half of the French Bishops, nearly all the Germans, most of the Irish, English, English Colonial and Eastern Bishops vote one ticket, it has no chance against what is called the Jesuits' ticket. This is a difficulty, however, that cannot be remedied. The majority carries the day, and they have the majority. The English Bishops voted for Dr. Grant [ Thomas Grant, Bishop of Southwark] as their representative but Dr. Manning was placed on the prepared ticket and of course elected. 75

The complicated story of the deputation elections was bound to have repercussions within the American delegation, and it also brought at least some of the bishops into clearer focus for European observers. The visitors from across the sea had been something of an enigma when they first arrived in Rome. The correspondent of the Times of London, Thomas Mozley, made an inaccurate and superficial analysis in a letter dated November 26: "The British and American Bishops, it is said, will be as ultramontane as can be desired, for they will not thereby offend the intellect or the taste of their flocks. 76 A week later Mozley

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74 AAHC, Natchez File, Elder to Fortune, Rome, December 26, 1869.
75 "McQuaid to Early, Rome, December 28, 1869", in Browne, p. 416.
76 Thomas Mozley, Letters from Rome on the Occassion of the Oecumenical Council ( 2 vols. London: 1891), I, 22-3.

wrote: "The English, Irish and American Bishops represent the reaction against Anglicanism and its manifold progeny of free sects. Of course they are most faithful." 77 Estimates like these were echoed by the New York Herald on December 12. Contrasting the bishops of the United States with the French and the Germans, the newspaper editorialized that it was "a strange spectacle for the world at large--the bishops from the land that is foremost in all that material progress which is thought to be leading the nations . . . accepting the utmost the Church can require, and leaving their brethren of the less progressive countries to assert the necessity for greater freedom of thought." ⁷⁸

A more careful and better informed observer, and one who was vitally interested in the true state of opinion among the Americans, was less sure of himself. On November 22, Lord Acton reported to Döllinger that there was growing apprehension in Rome. One reason for this was that the North Americans were not as devoted as had been expected. 79 Four weeks later Acton was still optimistic, as he reported that at least half the Americans and Canadians belonged to the minority party. 80 By the end of December there was some doubt. On December 21, Döllinger sent Acton a set of six questions about the situation in Rome. Number five asked: "Don't you know any details about the Americans and the Irish?" 81 Acton replied that he felt they could count provisionally on the Americans, but that no one knew how strong and firm they would be. 82 This hesitation over the American stand is reflected in the Letters from Rome on the Council which Döllinger published

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77 Ibid., p. 48.
78 New York Herald, December 19, 1869, quoted in J. Ryan Beiser, American Secular Newspapers and the Vatican Council, 1869-1870 ( Washington: 1942), p. 119.
79 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, November 22, 1869.
80 Ibid., Acton to Dölinger, Rome, December 18/19, 1869.
81 Ibid., Döllinger to Acton, Munich, December 21, 1869.
82 Ibid., Acton to Döllinger, Rome, December 24, 1869.

under the name "Quirinus," and which were based on information supplied by Acton, Johann Friedrich, and one anonymous correspondent. In the first Quirinus letter, Döllinger stated in one place that among those opposed to the infallibilists and to "that great ecclesiastical polypus, with its thousand feelers and arms, the Jesuit Order," are "all the French, American and Irish Bishops who possess any culture and knowledge," but earlier in the same letter he had said: "One knows least of the votes of the Italian and United States Bishops, who, like the Irish, will probably be divided." 83

While Acton, Mozley, and others were attempting to chart the course of the Americans, the bishops of the United States had themselves taken steps to organize and orientate their forces. They inaugurated a series of meetings at the American College and also began talks looking to the establishment of a common policy on the part of all the English-speaking bishops, who, after the Italians, formed the largest single-language group at the council. ⁸⁴ Only fragmentary minutes of the meetings of the American hierarchy have survived. Sessions were held frequently, often once or twice a week. 85 Archbishop Spalding served as chairman, and, at least in the beginning, Bishop Lynch of Charleston was secretary. The Blanchet diary mentions meetings on December 19 and 27. 86 The first set of minutes found was taken by Lynch on December 22. ⁸⁷ Most of the sessions dealt with purely domestic issues, such as promulgation of the decrees of the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore, the hotly contested question of establishing canonical parishes in the United States, and certain formalities connected with the ordination of priests and their transfer from one diocese to another.

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83 Quirinus, Letters from Rome on the Council ( New York: 1870), pp. 74; 66.
84 Emilio Campana, Il Concilio Vaticano ( 2 vols.; Lugano; 1926), II, 749.
85 Freeman's Journal, January 22, 1870.
86 AAS, F. N. Blanchet Journal, December 9 and 27, 1869.
87 ADC, Lynch Papers, Minutes of the Meeting of the American Bishops, December 22, 1869.

On January 24, Spalding explained t he operation of the "initia- tory committee," the congregation on proposals to which he had been appointed. ⁸⁸

The January 24 meeting also marked a change in the status of Father Hecker. The Paulist Superior-General had been closely associated with the minority party in the struggle over the deputation elections, and he had continued that association during the initial stages of discussion on the infallibility question proper. His name occurred for almost the last time in the Acton-Döllinger correspondence on January 22, after he had told Acton that not five of forty-five United States bishops would sign a petition asking that infallibility be defined. 89 On January 24 he was admitted to the deliberations of the American hierarchy as theologian to Archbishop Spalding, whose petition for an implicit definition had been submitted on January 3. Hecker had come to the council as procurator for the absent Bishop Rosecrans of Columbus, but the latter told Archbishop Purcell: "Contrary to your very natural supposition, Father Hecker does not keep me posted--in fact has never written a line to me since he reached Rome. On this account I did not care about his having a vote as he does not know me well enough to present my views without instructions." 90 Hecker wrote home after his selection:

The Archbishop of Baltimore has made me his theologian of his own accord. This gives me the privilege of reading all the documents of the Council, of knowing all that takes place in it, its discussions, etc. As his theologian I take part in the meetings and deliberations of the American hierarchy, which is, as it were, a permanent council concerning the interests of the Church in the United States, in which I feel a strong and special interest. 91

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88 Ibid. , January 24, 1870.
89 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 22, 1870. Ten fathers from the United States had signed such a petition, which was submitted on January 3. ( Mansi, LI, 650-57.) The Spalding petition was signed by five American bishops ( Ibid. , LI, 663-4 ).
90 UND, Purcell Papers, Rosecrans to Purcell, Cincinnati, April 23, 1870.
91 Walter Elliott, The Life of Father Hecker ( 4th ed., New York: 1898), p. 362.

The action of the bishops in Hecker's case helped to relieve an embarrassing situation. The earlier petition of the American hierarchy and a petition of their own, addressed to the pope on January 11, had been ignored, and the procurators still had no access to general congregations. 92 The bishops also agreed to admit John Ireland to their deliberations as soon as some one of them should adopt him as theologian. Two other items from the American gatherings are of importance. Archbishop Purcell later reported that at a meeting attended by twenty bishops, Spalding had encouraged the framing of a petition opposing the definition of papal infallibility. 93 This was the document drawn up by Purcell and submitted on January 15 with the signatures of twenty-seven English-speaking fathers. 94 It will be seen in context in a later chapter. The second item was a report submitted at the January 24 meeting which told of efforts to promote concerted action with bishops from various territories of the British Empire. 95

Butler has told the story of the proposed English-speaking co-operation from the letters of Bishop Ullathorne. 96 The initiative came from Cardinal Barnabò, who told Ullathorne in early December that he should get the English bishops to meet with the Americans and others and prepare a list of common proposals. Negotiations continued through the month. When the question of the deputations arose, the Irish, the English, and the Americans agreed to support each other's candidates. The Americans proved to be the most aggressive in presenting their wants. Ullathorne described how he had felt it his duty to temper their enthusiasm for united action, and he reported that some of the leading Irish bishops were "a little shy of the goahead Americans," although the Australians were more enthusi-

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92 Granderath, II, 1, 140-41, has the text of the January 11 petition, signed by Ireland and Hecker.
93 Catholic Telegraph, August 25, 1870.
94 Mansi, LI, 681-2.
95 ADC, Lynch Papers, Minutes of the Meeting of the American Bishops, January 24, 1870.
96 Butler, I, 160, 167-8, 177, 183, 192.

astic about them. Collaboration was organized more formally after December 22, when Archbishops Kenrick and McCloskey were deputed to represent the American interest. They met with Ullathorne on December 23 and drew up a plan according to which the bishops of the British Empire and of the United States would submit proposals to a conference of two delegates from each nation, which would meet at the American College. Manning and Ullathorne were selected to represent England. The first joint meeting took place on the last day of 1869. It lasted two hours, and another session was scheduled for January 4. Meetings apparently continued through January, but the American report of January 24 stated that a unified policy had thus far proved to be impracticable. Kenrick and McCloskey suggested that further attempts be made and that a committee be selected to draw up the American proposals. They were assigned the task, together with Archbishop Purcell and Bishops Amat, McFarland, and Quinlan. 97 No record has been found of subsequent meetings. By the end of January, divisions among the fathers which transcended national lines had become sharp, and the issues which faced the council did not lend themselves readily to action by particular language groups.

The first phases of the conciliar proceedings had proved to be a liberal education for the bishops from the United States. They had come a long way from the days when they worried about whether to buy copes at Lyons or Rome, or where they would find lodging. They learned a great deal about the Roman way of doing things, and many of them found the city an uncomfortable place to live. They also learned a great deal about the state of the European Church and its controversies, which were the primary concern of the council. By and large, the Americans made a quick adjustment to the situation, and, considering the fact that they were virtually unknown in November, several had achieved substantial prominence before the council

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97 ADC, Lynch Papers, Minutes of the Meeting of the American Bishops, January 24, 1870.

completed its first month. The spotlight fell particularly on two men, Spalding and Kenrick, whose influence was destined to grow in the course of the next few months.

It soon became clear that Peter Richard Kenrick was no more overawed by a council in Rome than he had been by one in Baltimore, where he had spoken his mind freely and forthrightly on what he thought were procedural irregularities. He was the first father of the Vatican Council to enter a protest during the sessions, with his note to Cardinal Bilio on December 10. During December Kenrick became the acknowledged leader of the sizable group of Americans who joined the minority, and he represented them on the international committee. But he had only begun to make his mark on the work of the council. His role grew as the months passed.

Archbishop Spalding's position was harder to define. He came to Rome as the recognized, if unofficial, head of the American Church. His guidance had been accepted in the appointment of James Corcoran as the hierarchy's representative on the preparatory commission, and he had been consulted about arrangements for the trip to Rome. He retained chairmanship of the bishop's conference during the council, and Bishop Lynch spontaneously affirmed his primary position when, in recording Father Hecker's nomination as theologian, he wrote that Hecker had been named theologian "to the Archbishop." There were six other metropolitans, but Spalding was "The Archbishop." Further recognition came to the Archbishop of Baltimore with his nomination to the congregation on proposals and his election to the deputation on faith, the two most important committees of the council. Nevertheless, as December came to an end, there were two very large question marks concerning "The Archbishop": had he lost effective leadership of the American hierarchy, and had he compromised his convictions for the sake of preference?

The first question can be answered adequately only after all the data are in, and the whole story of American participation in the council has been studied. For the present, it is suffi- cient to observe that it would be misleading to speak of the Americans as a bloc which could be led by anyone. When they came to Rome in 1869, the bishops of the United States frequently found themselves faced with problems which were not of their own making, and which had little reference to the actual situation of their dioceses. For the most part, they approached these problems as individuals, and there was never a discernible "American policy" in the council, even if at times individual bishops from the United States gave evidence of a distinctively American approach to particular items of conciliar business. Spalding was not the leader of the American bloc, because no such bloc existed. Neither he nor anyone else could have formed one.

The second question is much more serious. Its very asking demands an explanation. The charge came down to this, that the Archbishop of Baltimore had come to the council an "inopportunist," opposed to the definition of the pope's infallibility, and that he had abandoned that position in return for seats on the two committees. It is as bald and direct as that. On January 29, 1870, a correspondent of the New York Daily Tribune claimed that Spalding had been preferred over others either because he was an ultramontane, or because "he has not yet crucified the love of human favor." 98 In itself, the Tribune 's accusation is no more worthy of notice than most of the journalistic chaff that came out of Rome in those days, but its substance was repeated in the course of later controversy in a letter published over the signatures of Archbishops Kenrick and Purcell. Writing to Bishop Dupanloup in the name of "several" bishops of the United States, the two Midwestern metropolitans observed that Spalding had changed his mind about the expediency of a definition, and asserted that this had occurred "since the honorable prelate has found himself a member of two deputations of the Council." 99 Finally, a St. Louis Catholic newspaper, the

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98 New York Daily Tribune, January 29, 1870, quoted in Beiser, p. 53.
99 The original of this letter is in the Sulpician archives in Paris. It will be studied in detail in a later chapter. A translation appeared in the Freeman's Journal, May 21, 1870.

Western Watchman, a zealous defender of Archbishop Kenrick, summarized the whole line of argument in an attack, made toward the close of the council, on an address which the clergy of Baltimore had presented to Spalding. The Watchman 's editorial ran in part as follows:

These generous clergymen proclaim Archbishop Spalding as the first and greatest of American prelates. We fail to see the claims of this prelate to this high distinction. Will the clergy of Baltimore tell us whether it was on account of his having maneuvered so masterly a flanking movement on his colleagues, upon his assignment to the two deputations? If changing one's lifelong convictions in the short space of twenty-four hours be sufficient to make a man great, then is the distinction a positive mark of disgrace. 100

These charges are not set down as an accurate portrayal of Archbishop Spalding's mind or of his motivation. The consistency of his position must be judged in the light of evidence which is yet to come. He himself dealt with imputations on his sincerity, and this will be seen in its proper place. For now, it is sufficient to know that accusations of this kind were made, and that they constituted, at least in certain quarters, part of his public image. 101 The harsh interpretation of his conduct, made even by fellow bishops, also indicated the depths of feeling aroused at the council. These emotional overtones are important for an understanding of the debates and of the extra-conciliar activities of the fathers. They are likewise testimony of a remarkable degree of involvement on the part of American bishops who, until the very eve of the council, had seemed for the most part unaware of the issues which would be discussed and on which they would be asked to sit in their capacity as "judges of the faith."

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100 Western Watchman ( St. Louis), July 16, 1870.
101 At least one outside observer thought he could detect hostility to Spalding on the part of the latter's colleagues. Albert du Boÿs wrote in his memoirs of the council that the Archbishop of Baltimore was "not very popular in his own country, as far as one can see." ( ASMP, Du Boÿs Papers, Memoirs of the Council, pp. 14 -5). The remark was made in connection with Spalding's efforts during January to enlist support for his compromise solution on the infallibility question. This will be considered at length in Chapter III.

CHAPTER II
The First Phase

ON December 26, Bishop Bayley wrote to Father Michael Corrigan: "We have done little or nothing here yet. Though 'hornets-nests' await me at Newark, yet I would rather be home." 1 The net accomplishment of the three weeks since the council's grand opening had been the election of two deputations and two minor committees. Comparative idleness fanned the flames of speculation and anticipation. All had not gone smoothly with the deputation elections, and it was clear that parties were forming among the fathers. Back in the United States, most of the Catholic newspapers contented themselves with more or less general accounts of events in Rome or ran explanations of some of the issues--like the Syllabus and papal infallibility-which were likely to come before the council. James A. McMaster , editor of the New York Freeman's Journal, was a notable exception. 2 McMaster's general thesis was that the

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1 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, December 26, 1869.
2 John Talbot Smith, The Catholic Church in New York ( 2 vols.; New York: 1905), II, 395-7, summed up McMaster and the Journal as follows: "It was a noisy and pompous sheet, very poorly edited, offensive in its orthodoxy, and half the time on the wrong side. . . . His {McMaster's} service to the development of sound thought on public questions was vitiated by his bitter attacks on all opponents. Whoso did not agree with him was heretical and foredamned. On this method he conducted his journal for over thirty years. He had a certain following, because many have a taste for unscrupulous denunciation. His pomposity provoked laughter. . . . The secret of his method was that he admired Louis Veuillot, the noted editor of the violent, hateful, and popular L'Univers of France, a capable and poetic writer, who thought society and the Church could not be saved except through his methods.

bishops had been summoned to Rome to learn a new lesson in faith. 3 He conceded that the "few noisy talkers" among them would be heard out, and he spoke scornfully of "rancid Gallicans" and "the little handful of frivolous men in episcopal position who want to make a fuss," but he could not bring himself to believe that anyone would actually oppose the schemata in what he called the "general sessions" of the council. However, the first debate on the proposed constitution on Catholic doctrine belied his prediction.

This schema on Catholic doctrine had been distributed to the fathers on December 10. It contained eighteen chapters, the first eleven of which dealt with more general aspects of Catholic teaching and the errors opposed to it. Among the topics covered were materialism, rationalism, pantheism, divine revelation, mysteries, the nature of faith and the motives for belief, and the interrelation of faith and natural science. The final seven chapters discussed specific doctrines, namely, the mystery of the Holy Trinity, creation, the Incarnation and Redemption, the origin of the human race from Adam and the state of original justice, original sin, eternal punishment, and grace. 4 Butler has remarked that "it may be surmised that the average elderly bishop, whose recollection of theological niceties had grown dim in the work of the pastorate, must have perused this very stiff bit of theology for the subject matter of debate with feelings akin to consternation." 5 This may well be true, but it did not prevent thirty-five prelates from addressing the six general congregations which were held between December 28 and January 10. Two of these were from the United States, Archbishop Peter Richard Kenrick of St. Louis and Bishop Augustin Vérot of Savannah.

The debate opened at the fourth general congregation with a speech by the Archbishop of Vienna Cardinal Rauscher which

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3 Freeman's Journal, January 29, 1870.
4 Mansi, L, 59-74.
5 Butler, I, 187.

set the tone for most of the subsequent discussion of the schema. Rauscher's approach was practical and pastoral and displayed an awareness of the actual contemporary religious situation. He pointed out that it was not heresy with which the modern Church had principally to contend, but the much more fundamental denial of God's role in human affairs. What was wanted, said the cardinal, was a vigorous and pointed reaffirmation of the Church's stand, and not a theology textbook in the guise of a doctrinal decree. Succeeding speakers made the same points and added others. There was general dissatisfaction with the treatiseform of the constitution, which was thought to depart from the more traditional conciliar practice of first enunciating Catholic doctrine positively and only then mentioning opposite errors. In addition some fathers complained that there was no need to re-enunciate already defined dogmas, while others felt that too much emphasis was placed on forgotten errors and that there was a tendency to demand too uniform an acceptance of positions which had hitherto been freely disputed among Catholics. Opposition was by no means unanimous. Seven Italian fathers and several others praised the schema, while asking slight modifications, but the opponents were in the majority, and they were outspoken, even if all did not go quite as far as Archbishop Connolly of Halifax, who suggested that the best thing that could be done with the constitution was "to bury it with honor." 6 Among those who had strong reservations were the two American speakers.

Bishop Gibbons later recalled that Archbishop Kenrick spoke Latin "with admirable ease and eloquence" and without the aid of notes. 7 Kenrick's speech on the opening day was the shortest one delivered at that session. He found the proposed constitution impossibly long and remarked that it attempted to cover the whole gamut of revealed truth. In itself, he had no objection to

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6 Granderath, II, 1, pp. 109-62, summarizes the debate.
7 Cardinal James Gibbons. A Retrospect of Fifty Years ( 2 vols.; Baltimore: 1916), I, 22-3.

a comprehensive statement of Catholic belief, but he wanted it to be that, and not a compilation and refutation of errors. Repeating the approach which he had taken at the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore, he called for a simplified decree in conformity with the usage of past councils. 8 Finally, he warned against confusing theological argumentation with the actual doctrines being proposed, "lest reasons brought forward to prove the faith seem to pertain to faith itself." Kenrick closed his speech with the recommendation that the schema be reworked along the lines which he had indicated. 9

The French-born Sulpician Augustin Vérot had spend thirteen years as a bishop in Florida and Georgia. A dedicated and zealous pastor, he quickly identified himself with his people. During the War between the States he was a staunch Southern patriot. His active concern for the conversion of his non-Catholic neighbors led him to preach a Catholicism which, while it was wholly orthodox, was closely geared to the practical demands of the apostolate in a predominantly Protestant area. Vérot had become thoroughly American and he was convinced that the Church could become American too, without being any the less Catholic. This American outlook was a theme that ran through all his speeches at the council. He was also possessed of a quick mind and a sharp wit, and was ever ready to spot the incongruous and the ridiculous and to use them to illustrate his argument. Unfortunately these humorous sallies frequently distracted his hearers from the point which he was making, and the memory of them has earned him the reputation of having been l'enfant terrible of the council.

The debate ended at the ninth general congregation on January 10, with no further American participation. However, Vérot had made a considerable impression, both on his hearers in the council and on those outside who heard somewhat garbled reports of what he had said. Perhaps the most eloquent comment

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8 Rothensteiner, p. 12.
9 Kenrick's speech is in Mansi, L, 126.

was the one penned in his diary by Dupanloup. It read simply: " Vérot-- en voilà un!" 10 Johann Friedrich recorded the fact that the American's homely examples had amused the fathers and caused laughter in the hall. 11 The Chicage Tribune paid the bishop the dubious compliment of stating that his speech had been "the most remarkable ever heard in the eternal city since the days of { Cola di } Rienzi," the fourteenth-century demagogue. 12 The Boston Advertiser had its own fanciful account of the speech and quoted Vérot as having said: "As a man of the age and of progress, I protest against the doctrines of the Jesuits, which are not those of the Church of Jesus Christ. The Church should not, cannot put science on the Index." 13 Catholics in the United States were not yet used to the idea that some of their bishops were going to speak out strongly at the council, and their information was as confused as that reaching the secular press. Sometime early in 1870, Father Joseph O'Reilly of Madison, Indiana, wrote to James A. McMaster that the Catholic Telegraph of Cincinnati had printed a dispatch said to be from the hand of Archbishop Purcell, which reported Vérot as having "denounced emphatically, calmly, firmly, the Roman Congregation of the Inquisition and its judges" for having condemned Galileo's theories. O'Reilly added that the same assertion now made by the archbishop had been made by John Quincy Adams in a public speech on Mount Adams in Cincinnati in 1844, and he recalled that at that time the former President of the United States had been censured for his statement by the Telegraph. 14 One final piece of reporting occasioned by the lack of any official facilities for the press at the council appeared in the Baltimore Catholic Mirror, which printed as an example of "that malevolent spirit which is sure to err against truth and charity whenever Catholicity is in question," the following item from the Courier des États-Unis

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10 ASS, Dupanloup Journal, January 3, 1870.
11 Friedrich, Tagebuch, p. 61.
12 Chicago Tribune, February 6, 1870, in Beiser, p. 243.
13 Boston Daily Advertiser, January 27, 1870, quoted in Beiser, p. 265.
14 UND, McMaster Papers, O'Reilly to McMaster, Madison. . . . 1870.

des États-Unis : "The Bishop of Savannah delivered a discourse which was a curiosity in its way to us who are behind the times. He demands a revision on the judgment in the case of Galileo, on the ground that there is no such thing as revealed science; and that the plain duty of the Church is to refrain from imprudent meddling in things which do not concern her." 15

Bishop Vérot's forthrightness and his knack for colorful illustration made his maiden speech memorable, but again these features tended to obscure somewhat the points which he had made. Granderath dismissed his effort with the remark: "He said of himself that he had been a professor of astronomy; and his speech is indeed the best proof that he had occupied himself more with experimental science than with theology and philosophy." 16 The German historian of the council also observed that Vérot reflected the national characteristics of the United States, but he neglected to point out that the bishop had demonstrated his pronounced pastoral interest as well. In Vérot's speech we can see clearly the different emphasis in this regard that marked off so many of the bishops from the theologians who had framed the schema.

Bishop Vérot asked for a positive, simple, clear-cut conciliar pronouncement on the nature of man and the human species. It may be that in this demand for a "market-place theology" he misunderstood the function of an ecumenical council. He certainly spoke in categories different from those of the scholastic theologians who had formulated the schema. His suggestions for a revision of the terminology with regard to original sin and the fate of unbaptized infants were likewise foredoomed to failure. The technical expressions to which he objected, and which explained the underlying reality accurately only when provided with a theological exegesis, had become too deeply embedded in tradition and past conciliar teaching to be eliminated. As matters turned out, neither of the issues he raised were acted

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15 Catholic Mirror, February 19, 1870.
16 Granderath, II, 1, 127.

upon by the council, and, as will be seen later, the final constitution on Catholic faith differed considerably from the first schema. Both Kenrick and Vérot played a part in bringing the deputation on faith to effect the revision, but it cannot be said that their individual suggestions had any traceable effect, except insofar as they were part of the ensemble of objections made by many fathers. The final decree was simpler and shorter, as Kenrick had wished. It did not adopt any of the specific recommendations made by Vérot.

Before the conciliar debates were quite two weeks old, some of the bishops had begun to have their doubts that the sessions would ever come to an end. Relaying news received from his brother, the Archbishop of Cincinnati, the Reverend Edward Purcell wrote to a nun: "I fear you will be without a Bishop for years. The last accounts from Rome intimate that the council will most probably continue for years, or as they say--it will not be one of the shortest. Indeed it is most probable that many a mitred head will lie down to rest on Roman soil." 17 Bishop McQuaid was no more optimistic, as he told Father James Early:

Unless an escape is found from the present way of getting on, the council will not be over for years, I would not like to say how many. One book or pamphlet of matter has been under discussion for two weeks; the discussion is not yet over, and the probability is that the book will have to be rewritten. There are, we are told, some twenty such books. The first one now under discussion was supposed to have been so easy that it would be adopted almost without discussion. We have listened to some twenty speeches, in duration from 15 to 60 minutes. Saturday next will bring on five more. ¹⁸

There was one break in the monotony of the initial debate. It took place on January 6, when the members of the council made

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17 AAC, Purcell Papers, Purcell to M. Baptista Freamer, O.S.U., Cincinnati, January 14, 1870.
18 McQuaid to Early, Rome, n.d., in Browne, pp. 417-8. The Saturday session referred to must be that of January 8. The debate had begun on Tuesday, December 28, and the letter was, therefore, probably written toward the end of the week of January 2-8.

their solemn profession of faith in the presence of Pius IX. The ceremonies at this second public session resembled those which had been held on the opening day. Forty-five Americans were present, all of those who were actively participating in the council with the exception of Bishops Amat and Wood. ¹⁹

After the ninth general congregation on January 10, the constitution on Catholic doctrine was referred to the deputation on faith. Two new schemata had been given out on January 8. They dealt with canonical matters concerning the episcopal office and with the government of vacant sees. Debate on these questions began at the tenth general congregation on January 14 and continued until the sixteenth congregation on January 25. It is surprising that none of the bishops from the United States had any comments to make on either constitution, since they covered areas in which the Americans had had some experience, such as the holding of synods and local councils, and also raised pastoral problems like the residence of a bishop in his diocese, diocesan visitation, the selection of candidates for the episcopacy. It is probable that they were discouraged by the wording of the decrees, which had been prepared by the commission on ecclesiastical discipline and reflected the absence of any American intervention in their formulation. That on vacant sees was written wholly in terms of a diocese which had a cathedral chapter and a vicar capitular, a form of government virtually unknown in the United States. The constitution on the office of bishop was phrased largely in terms of the duties of bishops and called, among other things, for close co-operation between the hierarchy and the civil power. This last point was one which came in for criticism during the debate. Several fathers also complained that the schema spoke only of the duties of bishops, while ignoring their rights and the dignity of their office. Perhaps the most lively clash followed the call of Cardinal Schwarzenberg, seconded by Bishop Strossmayer, for a reform of the College of Cardinals and of the Roman Curia. Cardinal Camillo di Pietro

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19 Mansi, L, 218-32.

made a spirited defense of the Roman cardinals at the sixteenth congregation in which, without naming him, he informed Strossmayer that the subject was not one for conciliar discussion, but that anyone was welcome to present a petition about it to the pope. 20 The debate ended inconclusively, and the schemata were sent to the deputation on discipline, from which the one on vacant sees emerged briefly during the following summer. Whatever the reason for their abstention, the American prelates gave in this instance some substance to the charge of the New York Evening Post that in the council they were "as silent as the grave." ²¹

Two more minor constitutions were considered by the fathers during January and February. The first of these dealt with clerical deportment. It was brief--only three chapters long--but it gave rise to a comparatively lengthy discussion which lasted through eight congregations. This debate revealed more clearly than anything which had gone before the great divergence of opinion which existed in the Church on what constituted the proper role of the priest in the modern world. The Bishop of Paderborn ran into strong opposition when he asked that priests be forbidden to accept decorations from the civil government, but no one spoke for or against his further suggestion that the clergy of the western Church be allowed to wear beards. Many of the Spanish and Italian bishops delivered impassioned pleas for the wearing of the tonsure and soutane, and one of them alleged as a scriptural warrant for the latter practice the fact that Christ had worn a long robe at His ascension into heaven. Another pointed out that riding a horse was no excuse for adopting a shorter version of the clerical habit, since the Lord had not done so when He entered Jerusalem on the first Palm Sunday. The Latin prelates also wanted strict precautions taken

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20 Granderath, II, 1, 199-208, outlines the schemata, and pp. 208 -36, summarizes the debate.
21 The Evening Post ( New York), February 8, 1870, quoted in Beiser, p. 75.

against concubinage, and they emphasized the need for priests to shun the contagion of the world by avoiding all places where lay people gathered.

Augustin Vérot was the only American prelate to speak in the debate on clerical life. He prefaced his remarks at the seventeenth general congregation with an explanation of an incident which had happened after his last appearance in the pulpit on January 3. The next speaker on that occasion had been Lorenzo Gastaldi, Bishop of Saluzzo, whose statements sounded suspiciously like the long-condemned doctrines of Michael Baius, the precursor of Jansenism. Specifically, the Piedmontese bishop seemed to have defended the thesis that immortality and integrity (or freedom from concupiscence) were natural to man and not gratuitous gifts of God that had been lost by Adam. 22 Vérot understood the regulations of Multiplices inter as permitting intervention from the floor, and he had risen to a point of order. But Cardinal de Angelis refused to recognize him, and the Bishop of Savannah waited until January 27 to explain the matter.

Vérot's speech on the life of the clergy concentrated on three issues, namely, the recreations permissible to priests, their obligation to make formal retreats at stated intervals, and the divine office which they were obliged to recite daily. Once more the Georgia prelate's somewhat humorous presentation distracted his audience from the solid arguments which he advanced, and he was interrupted twice and finally compelled to quit the pulpit by the president, Cardinal de Angelis.

The first contretemps occurred when Bishop Vérot recommended deletion of lessons such as the one in which St. Augustine discussed the cure of the paralytic who had been sick for thirtyeight years. Augustine, Vérot said, proved that thirty-eight was the "number of infirmity" by an algebraic process. Taking forty as the "perfect number," he subtracted two--representing the precepts of love of God and neighbor--and thus came up with

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22 Gastaldi's original statement is in Mansi, L, 175. He defended himself on February 8 ( Mansi, L, 677-9).

thirty-eight. On this the Bishop of Savannah commented: "I must admit that I have never been able to read this without distractions." Cardinal de Angelis interrupted with the admonition, "Let the Most Reverend orator speak with greater reverence of the holy fathers." Vérot's answer was immediate: "I wish to speak with all reverence of the holy fathers, Eminence, but even good Homer nods sometimes. I shall say nothing more about that."

The bishop's next target was St. Gregory, but the cardinal presidents were in no mood to listen to further argument, and he did not get very far. He pointed out that, in one of his homilies, Gregory had predicted the proximate end of the world. This had been 1,200 years ago, and the end had not yet come. Vérot then started to discuss a fact which he found "certainly curious enough," that the Church had its priests read an office from which it was sufficiently clear that St. Gregory had incurred excommunication. He was about to prove this when Cardinal de Angelis sounded the bell. The following dialogue ensued:

De Angelis: We are dealing here with the schema on the life and deportment of clerics, and the most reverend bishop has already sufficiently expressed his desire for a reform of the breviary, and it is enough.

Vérot: I would also like to add something about corrections which have been made, and I shall say it in a word, although the matter is serious, and very serious.

De Angelis: If he does not speak of the deportment of clerics, let him make way for another speaker.

Vérot: I shall obey willingly, Eminent President, although it seems to me that I can say this, that it has a necessary and intimate relation with the divine office, namely that that office be recited with due reverence. Nevertheless, I acquiesce in your decision, Eminent President, and leave the pulpit. 23

There is no need to evaluate the merits of Vérot's various proposals. They would seem to be obvious. He received support in some particulars, notably from Archbishop Melchers of

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23 For Vérot's speech, see Mansi L, 539-43.

Cologne and from Archbishop Haynald of Kalocsa, but in the end all the speeches came to nothing. The constitution was returned to the deputation on discipline on February 8 and was never brought to the floor again.

Along with the schema on the clergy, a second constitution had been distributed to the fathers on January 14. It proposed adoption of a universal elementary catechism based on the one composed by Robert Bellarmine which was then used in Rome. Once more there was a division along national lines. Those bishops who opposed the centralizing tendencies of the Roman Curia saw the universal catechism as another step toward unnecessary uniformity. Archbishop Guibert of Tours and Bishop Dupanloup of Orléans both spoke in this sense. Further opposition came from the Germans, who were loath to abandon the catechism of Peter Canisius, which had served their people well since the time of the Reformation. The debate lasted through six general congregations, and forty-one prelates spoke. Again Bishop Vérot was the only American participant. ²⁴

The Bishop of Savannah, for all his good humor, had been hurt by the treatment accorded him at his last appearance in the pulpit. When he rose to speak on the catechism at the twentyfifth congregation on February 14, he began with an allusion to the former occasion and promised to deliver his message without explanations or recriminations. He was wholeheartedly in favor of a common catechism and said that the need for such a book was obvious in the United States where there were so many immigrants who had come to America with a wide variety of catechetical training. The bishop was so anxious for a standard catechism that he offered to accept it immediately in place of the work which he had issued just before coming to the council. To expedite matters, he suggested that the translation into various vernaculars be done right in Rome while the council

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24 Granderath, II, 1, 256-83, has a somewhat unbalanced account of the debate, which is hostile to those who opposed the schema. See also Butler, I, 228-30. Interruptions by the presidents and murmuring from the floor became more common during this debate.

was in session. "There are so many bishops," he said, "who are not burdened with many occupations, for whom the translation of a few pages will certainly not be an intolerable task."

These minor constitutions are less important for themselves than they are for the effect which the debates on them produced in the council. February 22, the last day of discussion on the schema about the common catechism, was really a turning point. For one thing it marked the beginning of a three-week recess, ostensibly to allow the council hall to be renovated and to permit the deputations to catch up with the mass of material which had been submitted to them for revision. Secondly, a new set of regulations for the conduct of the council was promulgated. Thirdly, the fathers were asked to submit written observations on the first ten chapters of a new constitution, the one on the Church, within a like number of days. Before considering the new regulations and the reaction to them, it will be well to retrace our steps and see the reaction of the American bishops to the whole procedure of the council.

Protests came from both the majority and the minority. Writing to his vicar-general, Henry Muehlsiepen, on March 6, Archbishop Kenrick summed up his feelings as follows:

Most of us are very tired of Rome and would willingly leave it. The Council has now been three months in session and nothing has been done. The body is too big for work, unless divided into sections; and those who had the management of matters were, and are, unwilling to attend to the suggestions made to them by those who had experience in similar assemblies. 25

The archbishop recommended that Muehlsiepen read an article which had appeared several weeks previously in the French newspaper Moniteur Universel on the state of affairs at Rome, which contained, he said, a detailed and realistic account of the difficulties which had attended the sessions. The Moniteur article summarized the problems under seven headings, then recapitu-

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25 Kenrick to Muehlsiepen, Rome, March 6, 1870, in John Rothensteiner, History of the Archdiocese of St. Louis ( 2 vols.; St. Louis: 1928), II, 305-306.

lated them and offered its own solutions. In the process it presented most of the complaints of the fathers of the minority.

The first complaint antedated the Council itself. It was about the composition of the preparatory commissions and the seeming semi-finality of their work. The French journal pointed out that the task of framing schemata had been entrusted to a body of theologians better known for speculative knowledge than for practical experience. Bishops had been refused advance knowledge of the agenda and in consequence had had no opportunity to prepare themselves for the discussions. It looked very much as if the intention of the organizers had been to bring the fathers to Rome simply to ratify a fait accompli. Everything was in the hands of the pope. Ardent papal partisans like Louis Veuillot did not help matters, the paper continued, by stating that this had been done deliberately so as "to take from bishops freedom to do evil." The Moniteur also rehearsed all the complaints which had been made at the time of the deputation elections and concluded that the power of the five commissions, backed up by the omnipotence of the pope who had reserved final judgment to himself, effectively excluded 700 bishops from any really decisive role in the council's business.

On the matter of numbers there was another grievance. It was said that the Italians and the vicars apostolic taken together counterbalanced the votes of all the German, French, and United States bishops combined. Alone, the Italians outnumbered the Germans and the French by a ratio of about three to one. The article estimated that 140 of the 700 fathers represented more than ninety million Catholics, or over half the population of the Church. And, it added, these 140 prelates came from the most civilized nations. A final difficulty was inadequate information about what was going on in the debates. The council hall was said to be hopeless from an acoustical point of view. Voluminous schemata on complicated questions were handed out piecemeal only a few days before they were to be debated, the discussion was disorganized, printing of speeches was forbidden, and many fathers refused to speak since they could not be heard. The result of all this was a notable lack of common deliberation with the fathers being deprived of the opportunity to share their views with one another. The Moniteur considered this last as essential to a genuine council. It suggested that a partial solution to the many problems which were vexing the fathers would be to allow formation of smaller groups which could discuss issues and come to some common policy, which several of their members would then present to the deputations. This was, of course, a plan that had already been rejected by the pope. It will be seen, however, that many of the American bishops were among those who agreed substantially with the criticisms outlined by the French writer. 26

As early as December 16, Bishop McQuaid had written home about the difficulties of the council hall. He remarked to Father Early that not even the best voice could fill an auditorium that measured 150 by 90 by 150. 27 A week later, Bishop Ullathorne reported that he had made an appointment to go with an American bishop to check on the suitability for debates of the great hall of the Quirinal Palace, but nothing came of the effort. 28 Several of the Americans recorded the ennui that had settled over the fathers. On January 8, James Roosevelt Bayley of Newark informed Father Michael Corrigan: "The Council is very tedious, will kill off a great many Bishops before it will be over." He added that some had fainted at the second public session on January 6. 29 Two weeks later the Bishop of Newark came up with a gloomy prediction: "The Council is going on very slowly--and if things be not accelerated some way or other, we will be here three years." 30 Bernard McQuaid of Rochester gave further details in a February letter to Corrigan: "How I

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26 The article from Moniteur Universel, " La situation des choses à Rome au 14 février 1870," is reprinted in Johann Friedrich, Documenta ad illustrandum Concilium Vaticanum anni 1870 ( Nördlingen: 1871), pp. 131-46.
27 McQuaid to Early, Rome, December 16, 1870, in Browne, p. 414.
28 Butler, I, 177.
29 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, January 8, 1870.
30 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, January 20, 1870.

long to go home!" he wrote, "At home there is work for me and here the whole life is so contrary to my notions and habits that I am fairly sick of it." He reported that they had spent two months without completing action on a single decree. There was no telling when the council would end--it might be in June, or it might not be for years. McQuaid found the sessions "very long and quite tiresome," and, while many of the speeches were "interesting, eloquent and practical," others were "long, tedious and not to the point." Sessions were held three or four times a week, and each one lasted for four hours, which he thought must be trying to the patience and endurance of the older bishops. His own health, he wrote, was good, but his spirits were flagging "under this enforced do-nothingness." He closed his letter with a reference to Corrigan's own ordinary: "Rome does not agree with Bishop Bayley; he is often 'out of sorts' although he has not had anything seriously the matter with him." 31 Two days after this letter from McQuaid, Bayley confirmed the diagnosis and summed up his own feelings when he wrote: "My eyes are very bad. The weather is very bad. There is much sickness." He told Corrigan that Bishop David W. Bacon of Portland had already left for home, and said that he was going to try for the same permission "by and by." 32

The letters of Bayley and McQuaid reflect accurately the atmosphere of Rome in the winter of 1870. They also summarize some of the principal complaints against the management of the council. These were the inadequacy of the council hall, the lack of any concrete achievement, the time-consuming, boring, and pointless debates, and the fact that the talents of so many bishops were going to waste while work piled up in the deputations. This last point recalls Vérot's suggestion that some of the idle fathers could profitably be employed in translating the new universal catechism. Dissatisfaction with the proceedings was fairly general, but there was a large area of disagreement as to

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31 AANY, C-3, McQuaid to Corrigan, Rome, February 6, 1870.
32 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, February 8, 1870.

the proper remedy. Hovering always in the background was the big question of the council, papal infallibility. Although it had not yet been officially proposed, it was on everyone's mind. In his monumental study of the council's history, Granderath sees this as the crux of the matter and judges everything else by it. His explanation is disarmingly simple: There were two parties among the fathers. One of these (the majority) wanted to work within the rules of Multiplices Inter. If they had had their way, all would have proceeded smoothly. The second party (the minority) was composed of malcontents who were abusing the liberty allowed them to engage in a filibuster. Their aim was to delay as long as possible any discussion of infallibility. 33 Émile Ollivier had long since made a similar analysis of the minority's tactics. He wrote that the leaders of the opposition had adopted the policy of prolonging the discussions by lengthy speeches in the hope that the heat of the Roman summer would force an adjournment before infallibility could be brought to the floor. While they had no hope of converting their minority into a majority, the contemplated departure of the vicars apostolic for their far-flung mission stations would reduce the majority's advantage, and, with time, other factors might enter in to alter the situation. ³⁴

Abbot Butler's chapter, "Atmosphere of the Council," is a better-balanced account. He discusses the fears, reasonable and unreasonable, which had been aroused by the organization of the council and by the considerable extra-conciliar agitation, and he concludes with a summary of some of the legitimate apprehensions of the bishops of the minority. 35 There is no doubt at all that the idea of a "delaying action" entered into the calculations of the opposition. But to deny them the right to that parliamentary tactic raises a much more fundamental question which is beyond our present scope. It would involve an investiga-

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33 Granderath, II, 1, 284-6.
34 Ollivier, II, 67.
35 Butler, I, 254-68.

tion into the deliberative nature of an ecumenical council, and its relation to the monarchical papacy.

Whatever may be said of the French or the Germans or others, it is obvious that no Americans engaged in a filibuster during January and February. Apart from Kenrick's brief opening address, none of them had spoken except Vérot, and he spoke for himself and for the causes in which he believed, with no ulterior motive. American complaints referred principally to the inefficient conciliar machinery and represented a plea that the bishops be allowed to get on with the job for which they had come to Rome. It is true that most of the objectors belonged to the minority, and that American supporters of infallibility were more ready than some to acquiesce in whatever was put before them by the authorities of the council; but this was the result of conflicting views on the nature of the Church's hierarchical structure and on the function of bishops in council. It was entirely possible to call for a greater degree of episcopal responsibility without at the same time being completely, or at all, motivated by the narrower political aim of blocking consideration of a particular dogma. As time went on, the latter goal became inextricably linked with the fortunes of those who felt that bishops should have a greater role in church government. The dogma of infallibility went, in fact, to the heart of the papal-episcopal question. Nevertheless, in the early stages of the council the American bishops gave little sign that they had fully grasped this deeper implication. As will be seen, they did engage in petitions for and against presentation of the infallibility question. But all their objections to the running of the council were not subsumed under this one all-embracing objective. They were still very much interested in the more comprehensive goal of working out of all the schemata which had been prepared.

Among the flood of petitions which went to the pope and to the presidents of the council on the subject of a more efficient operation of the council was one signed by Archbishops Kenrick and Purcell and by the Bishop of Wheeling Richard V. Whelan.

The other signers were predominantly French, but Hungary, Canada, and Ireland were also represented. The petitioners had two requests to make. They asked that another assembly room be found, in which speeches could be heard. Pointing out that the bad acoustics in St. Peter's provided a pretext for those who claimed that freedom of speech had been denied the fathers, they said that a remedy was imperative now that the time was approaching when the council would be called upon to make solemn definitions and pronounce anathemas. The second request was an old one. It called for the division of the bishops into smaller groups which would meet before general congregations to discuss the schemata and then appoint representatives to speak for them in the plenary sessions. The secretary Bishop Fessler noted that an effort would be made to accede to the first demand, and that the second was under consideration. 36 The answer actually came with the new rules of February 22. The reasonable tone of the petition, which was the only one on this subject signed by any Americans of the minority, seems to confirm the judgment which has already been made on their frame of mind in January and February.

Not all the Americans were unduly disturbed by the state of affairs. Bishop James Gibbons of North Carolina, a moderate infallibilist, sent home a whimsical description of the sessions in mid-January. His letter was addressed to his brother John, a grain dealer in New Orleans. Gibbons wrote as follows:

There is the most ample liberty of discussion in the Council. No matter how much a speaker in the chamber may tire his audience, he is patiently heard to the end of the chapter. Those that desire to speak have only to notify the president the day before. It is true you will not hear fifty bishops shouting at the top of their voices, "Mr. President, Mr. President," nor will you hear Mr. President "bringing down" his hammer and making confusion more confounded. You will not see bishops proving the liberty of the Council by taking the liberty of throwing ink-bottles at their brothers on the opposite side. You will observe no bishop trying to assert his independence by reading a

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36 Mansi, LI, 1-2.

New York Herald in a horizontal position. Such exhibitions, fortunately for the reputation of the Vatican Council, are hardly essential to true freedom of debate. 37

Another bishop from the United States was even more pleased with the way the sessions were going. John Baptist Miége, the Jesuit Vicar Apostolic from Kansas, wrote the following lines to an old friend in France, Canon Joseph-François Alliaudi of Moûtiers:

These long sessions, where we have to listen to endless repetitions, are fatiguing enough, but it's always agreeable to attend them. It is a whole world, but a world of men from 55 to 80 years old, almost all aged workers in the vineyard of the Lord, who love the Church and the venerated Pontiff who governs it. You have there all the manners, all the costumes, all the colors of beards, all the diversity of languages. But the good Latin language is understood by all, save for some orientals who use interpreters. You have there all the oriental majesty, French and Italian style and gravity, American candor, German dullness, Spanish fire. In a word, it is beautiful, my dear canon, but I would have to have the ability to describe it and have the time to do so. Both are lacking to me. 38

Two American bishops who belonged to the majority expressed their opinions during February. Bishop Augustus Mary Martin of Natchitoches, an ardent proponent of infallibility, wrote on February 7 to Father Napoleon Perché of New Orleans that nothing was happening at the council. He reported that obstacles were being thrown up to delay as long as possible the discussion of the question that was on everyone's mind. 39 Bishop Michael Heiss of La Crosse was the only prelate from the United States to sign a majority petition about the debates. It was a moderate document, and Heiss's co-signers were the

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37 Gibbons to Gibbons, Rome, January 19, 1870, in Morning Star and Catholic Messenger, February 20, 1370.
38 Miége to Alliaudi, Rome, January 30, 1870, in J. Garin, Notices Bibliographiques sur Mgr. J.-B Miège, Premier Vicaire Apostolique du Kansas et sur les Prêtres de las Paroisse de Chevron ( Savoie ) ( Moûtiers: 1886), 148. Miége altered the accent on his name after coming to the United States. Garin uses the traditional form.
39 UND, New Orleans Papers, Martin to Perché, Rome, February 7, 1870.

Archbishop of Udine, the Bishops of Treviso and L'Aquila, Bishop Senestréy, and Bishop Mermillod. They protested the lengthy and repetitive speeches which had been tolerated and which took no account of the temper of the fathers. The petition also noted that some speakers had been lacking in reverence for the Roman congregations and for the usages of the Roman Church. Among the suggestions they made was that a time limit be set on each speech, and that the speeches themselves be concise and to the point. They also brought up the idea of cloture and proposed that, when a sufficient number of speakers had been heard, the council should vote whether to continue the debate. As alternatives, they suggested that this vote could recommend adoption of the schema as it stood, minor modifications to it, or its consignment to the appropriate deputation. ⁴⁰

Account was taken of the various proposals and protests, and on February 22, a new set of conciliar regulations was distributed to the fathers. There were fourteen points. Five of these outlined a new feature, the submission of written observations prior to debate in general congregation. These comments were to be handed in to the secretary of the council, who would pass them along to the proper deputation, where they would be duly considered. In the congregations, speeches were to be given either on the whole schema or on some part of it. Representatives of the deputations would be recognized out of their normal turn if they wished to speak on some objection that was raised. A provision for cloture was introduced. Any ten fathers could petition the chair to bring the matter to a vote, and a simple majority would be sufficient to end the debate. The new rules further provided that voting should take place in three stages. First came the ballot on individual parts of a constitution and on the emendations proposed for each section. A member of the deputation would report on these written emendations before the vote and recommend their adoption or rejection. The fathers would signify their "yea" or "nay" by rising in their place at the appropriate time. The second stage of the balloting was the

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40 Mansi, LI, 57-9.

vote on the schema as a whole. Here it would still be possible to vote placet, non placet, or placet juxta modum. However, this last conditional approval had to be accompanied by a written explanation of the voter's reservations on the constitution. The third vote was left as before, and it would take place in solemn session. With these regulations the cardinal presidents hoped that the work of the council would be speeded up and the legislative deadlock broken. 41 The reaction to the new arrangement was, predictably, varied, and American bishops found themselves adopting contradictory positions.

The first indication of American displeasure came in a letter from Acton to Döllinger, written on February 25. He reported that many bishops were upset by the fact that unanimous consent was no longer to be demanded for doctrinal decrees. Among those who had spoken to him on the matter were Archbishop Kenrick, Bishops Dupanloup, Clifford, and Maret, and Archbishops Landriot and Haynald. 42 Protests along these lines were formalized in a series of petitions signed by representatives of a variety of countries. One such document, drawn up by the German-Austro-Hungarian group, attacked virtually every provision of the new rules and added that if moral unanimity of the fathers were not demanded for the promulgation of dogmas, the signers feared that the council's acts would be called into question. Ignatius Mrak, Bishop of Sault-Sainte-Marie and Marquette, added his name to those of twenty-one prelates from the three central European nations on this petition 43 Mrak was the only bishop from the United States to lodge a formal protest. Döllinger later reported that the Americans had held a meeting to discuss their stand, but that they could come to no decision. 44 His informant, Acton, complained to him that the bishops from North America did not fully appreciate the significance of

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41 Mansi, L, 854-6.
42 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, February 25, 1870.
43 Mansi, LI, 23-8.
44 Quirinus, pp. 324-5.

the new decree and he reported that Kenrick felt that it was so impractical that its net result would be to delay the council proceedings still further. ⁴⁵

Whatever might have been his views as to the practical effect of the decree, the Archbishop of St. Louis was not at all pleased with its terms, and he told Father Muehlsiepen that he found the new regulations "highly objectionable and scarcely reconcilable with the liberty a Council should have." 46

The story of the practical operation of the new regulations belongs to the later history of the council. Their promulgation on February 22 brought to an end the first phase of the debates. From a technical standpoint, the results achieved in two months' work were so minimal as to be almost unnoticeable. Five schemata had been proposed, and none of them had passed. All were in the hands of the deputations. The Roman authorities had not foreseen the extent of the opposition, and they were unprepared to cope with it. The most sensible thing to do seemed to be to prorogue the council for some weeks and then to attempt a fresh start. This was done with the adjournment of February 22 to March 18. As will be seen, a great deal of activity went on during those three weeks which was to have a dramatic impact on the future work of the council. But even if no decrees were adopted, the first two months had hardly been wasted. It must be remembered that the council numbered some 700 fathers, most of them previously unknown to one another, from every quarter of the globe. Moreover, the last general council had finished its sessions 300 years before that of the Vatican opened. The world of 1869 was a great deal different from the world of 1563, and the Church had undergone drastic, although not essential, changes in its internal structure and in its relations with the nations and people among whom it worked. A period of adjustment was inevitable.

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45 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, February 25, 1870.
46 Kenrick to Muehlsiepen, Rome, March, 6, 1870, in Rothensteiner, History, II, 305.

CHAPTER III
Preliminaries to the Debate on (Papal) Infallibility

THE somewhat bewildered state of mind of the American hierarchy at the state of affairs which confronted them upon their arrival in Rome was expressed by Bernard McQuaid in a letter written on December 1 to Father James Early:

Since coming to Europe, I have heard much of the question of the infallibility of the Pope, which with us in America was scarcely talked of. The feeling is very strong, pro and con. It seems that the Jesuits have been at the bottom of it, and have been preparing the public mind for it for the past two years. They have not made friends for themselves by the course they have followed, and if in any way the harmony of the Council is disturbed it will be by the introduction of this most unnecessary question. The probability now is that in consideration of the opposition already manifested that it will not come before us. Still there is no telling what the Jesuits will do, and from the manner in which they are sounding out the Bishops, I am inclined to think that they will succeed in having the question forced upon us. In my humble opinion, and almost every American Bishop whose opinion I have heard agrees with me, it will be a great calamity for the Church. My great hope is on the prayers of the whole Church that the Holy Ghost may guide us aright. ¹

McQuaid's forebodings proved correct, and the question of infallibility did come before the council. Very nearly every other issue which arose among the fathers bore some relation to it, although it was not placed on the agenda until March and was

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1 "McQuaid to Early, Rome, December 1, 1869", in Browne, pp. 412-3.

not debated until mid-May. During the intervening months the particular merits of various proposals engaged the attention of the bishops, but infallibility was always in the background and very often in the foreground, even when the discussion ostensibly centered on the nature of the human species or the composition of a universal elementary catechism.

Acton's initial letters to Döllinger traced the evolution of the American impact on the Roman scene. On November 22 he reported that the bishops from North America were not as submissive as had been reported. 2 Two weeks later he reported that Isaac Hecker, Johann Friedrich, and Bishop Dupanloup had arrived in the city and at this point gave his first summary of probable opponents of the dogma of infallibility. According to the Englishman's calculations, the opposition could count on the following votes: the majority of the French; half the Bavarians; all the Prussians, except Conrad Martin of Paderborn and Mieczislaw von Ledóchowski of Gniezno; the majority of the Austrians; most of the oriental-rite bishops, and some of the Americans and Irish. Acton also reported that the opposition was not yet organized, since three of its leaders had not put in an

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2 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, November 22, 1869. Reports of on-the-scene observers testify to the fact that Acton was in a good position to know the sentiments of the English-speaking bishops. Albert du Boÿs, the lay confidant of Bishop Félix Dupanloup, termed the Englishman's residence "the center of an anti-infallibilist opposition which included all the countries of the English and German languages." Among the fifteen or twenty American prelates who frequented Acton's salon, du Boÿs noticed particularly Archbishop Connolly of Halifax and Archbishop Kenrick of St. Louis. (ASMP, du Boÿs Papers, "Memoirs of the Council.") The American author and educator, Charles Eliot Norton, called Acton "the lay Head of the opposition to the Ultra-Clerical Party." ( Sara Norton and M. A. DeWolfe Howe [eds.], Letters of Charles Eliot Norton [ Boston: 19131, I, 379.) The British diplomatic agent in Rome, Odo Russell, later said of Acton in a letter to Lord Clarendon, the Foreign Secretary: "To Lord Acton's marvellous talents, science, energy and zeal the enlightened opposition in the Council owes its present existence and strength. Without him the Germans, French, Americans and English could not have agreed and acted together, so different are their national theological standpoints." ( Noel Blakiston [ed.], The Roman Question ; Extracts from the Despatches of Odo Russell from Rome, 1858-1870 [ London: 1962], p. 419.)

appearance. 3 By mid-December the predicted American opposition had risen to "at least half" of the prelates from the United States and Canada, and the whole of the Portuguese hierarchy had been added. ⁴ On December 22, Acton sent Döllinger a quotation which perhaps explained why so many Americans were flocking to the anti-definition party. It was taken from the Controversial Catechism, which had been recommended by Archbishop John Hughes of New York and four other bishops, and had sold 24,000 copies in North America and England in the past quarter of a century. The citation read as follows:

Q. Must not Catholics believe the Pope in himself to be infallible?

A. This is a protestant invention; it is no article of the Catholic faith: no decision of his can oblige under pain of heresy unless it be received and enforced by the teaching body; that is, by the bishops of the Church. ⁵

In the summations which Döllinger made from the reports reaching him from Rome and published as the Quirinus letters, he was at first hesitant about the attitude of the American bishops, but toward the end of December he had grown more confident and in the fifth letter he devoted a long paragraph to an analysis of their position:

The opposition of German and French Bishops to the new dogma was more or less anticipated here; what was not expected was that the

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3 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, November 28/ December 5, 1869. Russell's breakdown of the parties was more general than that of Acton. On December 8 he reported to Clarendon: "The Roman Papal, Jesuit or ultramontane party is said to be composed of the Italian, Spanish, South American, English, Irish, Belgian and half of the French Bishops, whilst the other half led by Dupanloup commands the votes of the Austrian, German, North American, Bohemian, Hungarian and Portigese Bishops. The orientals are still wavering. . . ." ( Russell to Clarendon, Rome, December 8, 1869, in Blakiston, p. 370.)
4 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, December 18/19, 1869.
5 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, December 22, 1869. The citation appeared in Stephen Keenan, Controversial Catechism: or Protestantism Refuted and Catholicism Established ( 2nd ed.; Edinburgh: 1849), p. 102. The second edition carried the recommendation of two Scots vicars apostolic and a notice to the effect that a first edition had been approved by Hughes.

Orientals, numbering about sixty, and the North American Bishops, would pronounce against it . . . . The Americans ask how they are to live under the free constitution of their Republic, and maintain their position of equality with their (Protestant) fellow-citizens after committing themselves to the principles attested by Papal Infallibility, such as religious persecution and the coercive power of the Church, the claim of Catholics to exclusive mastery in the state, the Pope's right to dispense from oaths, the subjection of the civil power to his supreme dominion, etc. The inevitable result would be that Catholics would be looked upon and treated as pariahs in the United States, that all religious parties would be banded together against them as common enemies, and would endeavour, as far as possible, to exclude them from public offices. One of the American Bishops lately said, 'Nobody should be elected Pope who has not lived three years in the United States, and thus learnt to comprehend what is possible in this day in a freely governed commonwealth.' 6

While Döllinger was prone to indulge in overdramatization, there is no doubt that infallibility was beginning to loom large in the minds of the bishops from the United States. The Sulpician Superior-General Henri Icard had recorded a visit which he paid on December 1 to the American College. There he met Archbishops Spalding and Purcell and Bishops Vérot and Williams. Spalding was most interested in finding out the views of the French hierarchy about infallibility, and he told Icard that, although he did not doubt the doctrine itself, he was not at all sure that a definition was opportune. The Archbishop of Cincinnati did not speak directly about infallibility, but he was very upset that Pius IX had recently complained to the bishops about the supposedly lax state of discipline at the college. Purcell reported that he and others had protested that the house was quite regular and edifying, and he commented to Icard that the complaint had been inspired by the Jesuits, who wanted to take over direction of the seminary. Williams apparently maintained his customary taciturnity, but Bishop Vérot took the occasion to raise the question of Dupanloup. He told Father Icard that the

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6 Quirinus, pp. 107-108. Döllinger does not identify the American bishop whom he quotes.

Bishop of Orléans' position was amply justified by the provocative attacks which had been made upon him, and he singled out for special condemnation the intemperate polemic of Louis Veuillot and his newspaper, L'Univers. ⁷

Archbishop Purcell was one who had for some time been interested in the evidence of tradition for the primacy of the Roman See and the infallibility of its occupant. In February, 1868, he had written to ask Martin J. Spalding's opinion on certain documents connected with the third-century controversy over the validity of baptism conferred by heretics. In that dispute St. Cyprian of Carthage had challenged the decision of Pope St. Stephen I that such baptism was valid. A letter, purported to have been written by Firmilian of Cappadocia, supported Cyprian's position. This letter was at the same time a violent attack on the pope's orthodoxy and, by a reverse twist, an indirect testimony to the pre-eminent position in the Church of the Bishop of Rome. Archbishop Vincenzo Tizzani, a professor at the Roman University of the Sapienza, had recently questioned the authenticity of the Firmilian letter, and Purcell remarked to Spalding that he was inclined to agree with him. 8 Nearly two years later, the Archbishop of Cincinnati was still wondering about Firmilian, as we learn from a letter written to him by Dr. Francis J. Pabisch of the seminary of Mount Saint Mary of the West. Pabisch cited a long list of authorities who had expressed doubts about the provenance of the letter attributed to the Cappadocian. He then went on, apparently in answer to another question posed by Purcell, to catalogue a wide range of evidence for the fact that Pope Honorius I had been condemned by the Sixth General Council, that of Constantinople, in the year 680. 9 Purcell had also come under the influence of Dupanloup, and he was reported to have written home as follows: "The powerful argument of Mgr. Dupanloup on Papal Infallibility

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7 ASS, Icard Journal, December 1, 1869.
8 AAB, 35-s-31, Purcell to Spalding, Cincinnati, February 29, 1868.
9 UND, Purcell Papers, Pabisch to Purcell, Cincinnati, December 19, 1869.

is the universal topic of conversation; even those who do not agree with him, admit that the pastoral [probably the "Observations" of November 11, 1869, addressed to the clergy of Orléans] was written in the spirit of truest devotion to the highest interests of the Church, and is remarkable, like the many productions of his pen, for its force and learning." ¹⁰

Two other American bishops testified to the increased activity in late December. Bernard McQuaid informed Father Early on December 16: "It seems that disciplinary questions affecting the position of the Church in quasi-Catholic countries are most likely to stir up diversity of views and strong feelings. Fortunately it is not a matter that concerns the American Church to any great degree." But the same could not be said about infallibility, and the letter continued: "The other disturbing element is that of the definition of the infallibility, about which the Jesuits have been so busy to their own detriment. Nothing is said about the dogma, but a great deal about the expediency or advisability of any definition." 11 Archbishop Blanchet of Oregon City noted in his diary that the fathers were kept amply supplied with reading matter. On December 11 he received two pamphlets on the Gallican Church, on the 19th, several unspecified tracts were delivered, and on the 21st, four volumes on infallibility. On the last of these days Bishop Dupanloup left his calling card, and Blanchet also reported hearing from Paris that his companion at the Palazzo Malatesta, Bishop Demers of Vancouver, was ill in the French capital and unable for the moment to return to Rome. The letter that brought this news also conveyed the latest Parisian bon mot, a play on the name "Dupanloup." The wags were saying of the Bishop of Orléans, " de pavone lupus "--"the peacock has become a wolf." 12

The role of the unofficial majority and minority committees in the deputation elections has already been described, and we

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10 Catholic Telegraph, December 23, 1869.
11 McQuaid to Early, Rome, December 16, 1869, in Browne, p. 414.
12 AAS, F. N. Blanchet Journal, December 11, 19, and 21, 1869.

have seen that a series of petitions on procedural points also issued from the minority group. The main objective of both parties was to promote their own particular views on infallibility. There was a third group as well, which initially centered around Archbishop Spalding of Baltimore. The competing efforts of these organizations brought the infallibility question for the first time directly into the open.

The diary of Bishop Ignaz von Senestréy of Regensburg has provided us with a detailed account of the operations of the majority committee. Meetings of the majority leaders seem to have begun about the middle of December. Of the five prelates beside himself whom the Bishop of Regensburg mentioned as having been present at the first session, three were from the Tyrol and represented the only segment of the Austrian hierarchy which did not follow the lead of the cardinals of Vienna and Prague. They were Vincenz Gasser of Brixen, Benedikt von Riccabona of Trent, and Johann Zwerger of Seckau. Three of those in attendance were members of the deputation on faith, namely, Senestréy, Gasser, and Bishop Conrad Martin of Paderborn. Martin belonged to the congregation for receiving proposals. Two members of the deputation for disciplinary matters were also on hand. They were Zwerger and the Bishop of La Crosse Michael Heiss who seems to have been the only American associated with the majority committee at this point. Senestréy's diary added that others were present at the first meeting, but gave no more names. The committee's first project was to frame a petition for the admission of infallibility to the agenda of the council. Several different formulas for this petition were discussed at the initial session. The committee met again on December 23 at the Villa Caserta. The three Tyrolese bishops absented themselves, but the representation from the committees of the council was even more impressive than it had been at the first meeting. There were now three members of the all-important congregation on proposals: Archbishops Dechamps and Manning and Bishop Martin. The deputation on faith was represented by the same three and Senestréy and Bishop Pierre de Preux of Sion, Switzerland: the deputation for discipline by Heiss and Bishops Georg von Stahl of Würzburg, Stephan Marilley of Lausanne and Geneva, and Leo Meurin, S.J., Vicar Apostolic of Bombay. Other delegates were Baron Franz von Leonrod, Bishop of Eichstatt, a member of the deputation on religious orders, and the Vicar Apostolic of Luxembourg Nickolaus Adames.

The third meeting of the majority committee took place on December 28. The wording of the petition was decided upon and it was also agreed that no member of the congregation on proposals would sign, since it was to that committee that the petition had to be presented. The names of those fathers who were thought to favor the petition were printed on it. This document--petition and signatures--was then to be circulated among the bishops for further signatures. Bishop Gasser favored sending a copy to all the members of the council, but he was overruled and circulation was limited to known partisans of infallibility. Senestréy remarked that even many of these refused to lend their support. An added note asked recipients not to publicize the petition, but the committee later decided that this caution was neither necessary nor useful.

Most of the original signers came from Germany, Austria, and France, but Spain was represented by José Caixal y Estrade of Urgel and the oriental bishops by Patriarch Hassun of Cilicia. The sole American was Bishop Heiss. Two of those whose names had been printed on the petition, the Bishops of Seckau and of Ermland, asked that their signatures be dropped. 13 This first petition was circulated among the fathers under the date of December 30. 14 Four days later a second draft, with an enlarged list of names, was distributed. Attached to this second petition was a statement of the committee's proposition, that the authority of the Roman pontiff should be defined as "su-

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13 Collectio Lacensis, VII, 1695-6.
14 Mansi, LI, 644.

preme, therefore free from error, when in matters of faith and morals he has set down and commanded what must be believed and held by all Christians and what must be rejected and condemned." 15 A list of reasons for the doctrine was appended, and then a summary of statements by recent local councils, including a long citation from the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore with pertinent phrases italicized. The passage read as follows:

Living and infallible authority exists only in that Church which was founded by Christ the Lord upon Peter, the head, prince and pastor of the whole Church, whose faith He promised would never fail, and which always has its legitimate pontiffs, who take their origin from Peter himself, who sit upon his chair and are heirs and vindicators of his doctrine, dignity, honor and power. And since the Church is where Peter is, and since Peter speaks through the Roman pontiff and through his successors continues to live and exercise judgment and offer the truth of faith to those who seek it, therefore divine revelation must be accepted in that sense alone in which it is and has been held by the Roman chair of Blessed Peter, which is the mother and teacher of all churches and has ever kept the faith given by Christ the Lord whole and inviolate, and has taught it to the faithful, showing to all the path of salvation and the doctrine of incorrupt truth. 16. .

By the end of January, Bishop Senestréy counted some 410 fathers as having signed petitions favoring the definition of papal infallibility. There were several other petitions besides the one put out by the Villa Caserta, but, apart from the formula prepared by Archbishop Spalding, none of them bore any American signatures. Ten prelates from the United States lent their support to the main majority effort. The documents preserved in the Vatican Archives list the signers in groups, each of which put their names down on a separate page. The pages were then collected and attached to the petition. It is therefore possible to determine from the groupings something of the way in which individual fathers were approached. It has already been seen

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15 Mansi, LI, 645-6.
16 Mansi, LI, 646-50.

that Bishop Heiss was a member of the committee which drew up the petition. His name appears alone, as do those of two Vincentian bishops, John Mary Odin of New Orleans and Claude Dubuis of Galveston. Apart from the notice of his death on May 25, this is the only mention of Odin in the acts of the council. Eugene O'Connell of Grass Valley signed together with the Prior-General of the Augustinians. Bishop Ignaz von Senestréy must have canvassed the Benedictine abbots since his name headed a list of them which included Boniface Wimmer of St. Vincent's. Louis Lootens, the Vicar Apostolic of Idaho, and Augustus Martin of Natchitoches added their signatures to those of the Archbishop of Toulouse and the Coadjutor Bishop of Three Rivers. The latter, Louis La Flèche, had been one of the three Canadian candidates proposed unsuccessfully by the minority for the deputation on faith. Archbishop Blanchet and Bishop Louis de Goesbriand of Burlington, Vermont, signed a page which contained the names of a number of bishops from Canada. Finally, John Baptist Miége's name is found among those of other Jesuit vicars apostolic in a list which also includes that of the general of his order, Petrus Beckx. 17 The fate of the majority petitions which made the rounds of the fathers during January will be seen presently. It is time to turn to the activities of the minority and then to those of Archbishop Spalding.

Like the Villa Caserta committee, the international committee of the minority had begun operations at the time of the deputation elections. Its complete failure at that juncture has already been noted. The next step was an effort to counter the infallibility petitions being prepared by the majority group. On December 26, Bishop Dupanloup held a strategy session with Archbishop Kenrick and the Archbishops of Halifax and Rheims. 18 Three days later he received a letter from Archbishop Darboy of Paris. Darboy reported that he had spoken with

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17 Mansi, LI, 650-60.
18 ASS, Dupanloup Journal, December 26, 1869.

Cardinal Rauscher of Vienna about a meeting place for the minority bishops and that the cardinal did not think his own residence, the Palazzo Nardi, suitable. The Archbishop of Paris suggested instead that the minority meet on the following evening at the Palazzo Salviati. He asked Dupanloup to make the necessary arrangements with Duke Salviati for the use of his home. If this suggestion was not acceptable, Darboy offered his own apartment, or, as an alternative said that he would speak to Rauscher again about the Palazzo Nardi. ¹⁹ Bishop David Moriarty of Kerry supplied the rest of the story in a letter to John Henry Newman:

We have made a little reunion at the Palazzo Salviati. Cardinal Rauscher of Vienna, Archbishop of Paris, Bishop [ Jacques Ginoulhiac] of Grenoble, Bishop of Orléans, Archbishop Kenrick of St. Louis, Archbishop Connolly of Halifax, Strossmayer of Bosnia, Ketteler of Mayence, the Bishops of Ivrea [ Luigi Moreno] and [illegible] representing north and south Italy, and I.

It is well appointed with the sharp intellect of Mgr. Darboy, the ardent zeal of Dupanloup, the massive intellect of Ketteler, the strategic ability of Ginoulhiac of Grenoble, the Irish slap-dash of Halifax, and the brilliant eloquence of Strossmayer, all presided over by the aristocratic gentleness of Cardinal Rauscher. We are all thoroughly of one mind. Manning works hard and cleverly on the other side. 20

On January, 4, Lord Acton informed Döllinger of the activities of the international committee, and he had the following comments to make on the North American representatives:

The Americans Connolly ( Halifax, therefore English subject) and Kenrick (St. Louis, brother of the late theologian) have expressed themselves already. Hecker is active in the same sense. Hopes are high. Yet I do not much believe in the depth of their conviction and

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19 ASS, Dupanloup Papers, Darboy to Dupanloup, Rome, December 29, 1869.
20 "Moriarty to Newman, Rome, January, n.d., 1870", in Butler II, 28. In late January, Odo Russell informed Lord Clarendon that the international committee was composed of twelve members, and he gave eleven of their names: Schwarzenberg, Rauscher, Darboy, Dupanloup, Ginhouliac, Strossmayer, Ketteler, Haynald, Connolly, Kenrick, and Clifford. ( "Russell to Clarendon, Rome, January 23, 1870", in Blakiston, pp. 383-384.)

count on only a few. The battle will be fought by the French and the Germans. Still Hecker speaks well of his own people. ²¹

Bishop McQuaid was discouraged at the controversy which he saw shaping up and wrote to the rector of his cathedral: "The Jesuits and some others are bent on bringing out the definition of infallibility. If the question were left where it belongs, in the Council, no one could complain, but their schemes and tricks outside of the Council are many and mean. Pray God to direct all things for the best." ²² By the time the minority's petition was sent to the deputation, it had been divided into five separate addresses. The work of smoothing out differences and collecting signatures occupied almost the entire month of January.

As early at the first week of the new year, Döllinger's informants had advised him that there might be difficulty in coordinating the minority's forces. This apprehension was reflected in the eighth Quirinus letter which bore the date of January 8. Döllinger wrote: "The question now is, whether the minority of some 200 Prelates have spirit and harmony enough for a counteraddress." ²³ On January 11 Dupanloup attended a meeting "at the cardinal's," probably at Rauscher's residence in the Palazzo Nardi. The American and English opposition bishops were present and put their names to a three-point petition drawn up by the former. ²⁴ Three days later, the picture had clouded over, and Dupanloup was not so sure. The notations in his diary for January 14 read: "Sad reflections . . . the Americans hesitate . . . have not signed the three demands." ²⁵ Acton had more optimistic news, and he informed Döllinger on the following day that there were already twenty-five signatures on the American address. ²⁶ The main petition was that of the German-

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21 Conzemius Transcript, Acton to Döllinger, January 4, 1870.
22 McQuaid to Early, Rome, n.d. [week of January 2-8], 1870, in Browne, p. 418.
23 Quirinus, p. 132.
24 ASS, Dupanloup Journal, January 11, 1870.
25 Ibid., January 14, 1870.
26 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 14/15, 1870.

Austrian bloc, and it seemed to be moving along well. By January 15, Quirinus was able to report that thirty-five prelates had agreed in writing to sign it. He added that one reason for the delay in getting out the petition was that papal censorship prevented its being printed, although this had been allowed in the case of the majority address, and that the minority had scruples about having the printing job done beyond the borders of the Papal State. 27

Meanwhile, the Austrian and German bishops agreed on a formula prepared by Cardinal Rauscher at a meeting in the Palazzo Nardi on January 9. 28 Seven days later it was reported that all the Hungarian hierarchy except the primate Archbishop Simor of Esztergom and the Roumanian-rite Bishop Jozsef Papp-Szilágyi had accepted the German text. An Italian version which corresponded substantially to the German was being prepared. The French opposition fathers met on January 15 at the residence of Cardinal Jacques Mathieu of Besançon. Thirtythree of them adopted a wording which eliminated some of the clauses found in the German and Italian petitions, but retained the same essential ideas. The North American text followed that of the French. 29 Lord Acton was one observer who regretted the alterations made by the French and the Americans. He told Döllinger that he felt the German and Italian petitions made a splendid defense of the honor of the bishops, of the council, and of the Church, but that the French and American formulas, while they surrendered nothing essential, weakened the force of a united front by insisting on their own changes. 30 Archbishop Paulus Melchers of Cologne disagreed with Acton's view of the matter, as did the Archbishop of Salzburg, Maximilian von Tarnoczy, and at a meeting of the German bloc on January 20 it was only the strong protest of Archbishop Hay-

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27 Quirinus, p. 153.
28 Friedrich, Geschichte, III, 384-5.
29 Quirinus, pp. 187-8.
30 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 16/19, 1870.

nald of Kalocsa which prevented substitution of the American version for that proposed by Cardinal Rauscher. Melchers and Tarnoczy feared that some of Rauscher's passages might be construed in such a way as to promote disrespect for the Holy See. ³¹

The collection of signatures continued during the third week of January. Johann Friedrich claimed that many American bishops were saying that they would not dare return to their dioceses if infallibility were proclaimed. He added that Archbishop Manning had declared that he could not return to England if the dogma were not proclaimed. 32 Considering the lack of any overwhelming American public interest in the question, Friedrich's report was obviously exaggerated. What was probably a more typical attitude among the United States bishops was that expressed by Archbishop McCloskey of New York. According to Acton, the archbishop refused to sign the petition of the Villa Caserta committee with the remark that he had enough to do in defending religion against its enemies, without having to defend it against Catholics also. 33 Maurice de St.-Palais, the Bishop of Vincennes, was one American prelate who refused to sign petitions for either side, but he told Father Icard something which helped to explain the tendency of his fellow countrymen to opposition. They were still smarting, he said, at the almost universal rejection of the candidates whom they had proposed for the deputations. 34 Another report which circulated in the city during this period was not calculated to win for the majority the good will of the American bishops, who depended on the Congregation de Propaganda Fide for the conduct of their Roman business. According to Friedrich, Archbishop Connolly of Halifax had let it be known that Cardinal Barnabò, the Prefect of Propaganda, had threatened him with

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31 Friedrich, Tagebuch, p. 126.
32 Ibid., p. 108.
33 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, January 16/19, 1870.
34 ASS, Icard Journal, January 16, 1870.

the weight of the congregation's displeasure if he did not cease his collaboration with the international committee. 35 Friedrich later claimed that Connolly subsequently severed formal relations with the committee and alleged that his reason for so doing was the pressure to which he had been subjected by Propaganda. ³⁶

Two bishops from the United States viewed the mounting support for the opposition with some dismay. John Baptist Miége regretted that his "dear Americans" had allowed themselves to be "taken a bit in tow by the Gallicans and the Germans," but he was confident that at the decisive moment the great majority of them would be found on the side of the definition. He felt that the French were less dangerous adversaries than the Germans and Hungarians, but he expressed his hope that the Holy Spirit would influence even the latter. There were some hopeful signs, Miége thought, and he reported that three Portuguese bishops who had been dissuaded from signing the majority petition by Dupanloup had changed their minds after reading the attacks made on the doctrine by the French priest Auguste-Alphonse Gratry. His own convictions were clear, and, after communicating this last bit of information, he added:

It is thus that the good work is done and will continue to be done. If the Holy Father lives, and if the Council can continue its work, despite the underhanded scheming and intrigues of certain spirits, the personal infallibility of the Pope will-- positis ponendis --be defined, declared and proclaimed for the happiness of the children of the Church and for the good even of its enemies.

In another passage of the same letter Miége continued in the same vein: "What day more beautiful than that when, by an almost unanimous vote, the Pope will be declared infallible! Let us pray that this may be one of the alleluias of Easter." ³⁷

Bishop Augustus Martin of Natchitoches was much less

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35 Friedrich, Geschichte, III, 409.
36 Ibid., III, 811.
37 Miége to Alliaudi, Rome, January 30, 1870, in Garin, pp. 147-8.

happy about the situation than was Miége. He penned a forceful denunciation of the minority in a letter to Father Napoleon Perché of New Orleans on January 18:

What shall I say to you about the council? It moves, but slowly and in the midst of a thousand difficulties. In truth, human nature is a sad thing, and the frailty of the human element of the Church is the most evident demonstration of the presence and the power of Him who alone is its light and its way. Two-thirds and more of the council have but one heart and one soul: but we have to wrestle with a turbulent and agitated opposition which considers all means good. Freedom of discussion is unlimited, but unlimited also is the abuse that is made of it. Some are real revolutionaries, others servile creatures of power, others more or less avowed enemies of the Holy See, others those who from their youth have sucked the poison of heresy. They form together a phalanx which grows tighter each day. They wish, and they admit it, to impede the progress of the council, and to drag it out, so as to force the Holy Father to adjourn it, or at least to force the withdrawal of at least 300 missionary bishops who are a hindrance to them and who do not have, as they do, the means to choose at Rome a very expensive residence. I am ashamed of the French episcopate, ashamed also of our own, of which 25 or more let themselves be taken in tow by 2 factious Archbishops and the celebrated ex-Redemptorist, Father H. Tu quoque. . . . The Holy Father is saddened. His cardinals are discouraged. Nevertheless let us hope. The good God remains the master. 38

Martin's letter had its effect in Louisiana, and the Lenten pastoral for 1870 which Perché issued as Administrator of the Archdiocese of New Orleans exhorted the faithful to pray for the success of the Roman assembly, which was, the administrator said, threatened by "diabolical machinations of Gallicanism, Caesarism and liberalism seeking to disturb and impede the operations of the Council and make it fruitless." All religious communities in the archdiocese were requested to offer a weekly general Communion of reparation for the same intention. 39 The letters of Miége and Martin, and Perché's reaction to the

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38 UND, Perché Papers, Martin to Perché, Rome, January 18, 1870.
39 Roger Baudier, The Catholic Church in Louisiana ( New Orleans: 1939),p. 434.

latter, revealed again the deep division that existed in the ranks of the American hierarchy, a division that was further aggravated by the feverish activity over the petitions.

As January moved into its fourth week, the tempo increased. On Saturday, January 22, Cardinal Rauscher wrote to Cardinal Schwarzenberg that he had learned from the Archbishop of Cologne that the majority address was already in the hands of the congregation on proposals. Archbishop Melchers had received this information from Bishop Conrad Martin of Paderborn. Rauscher added that the French fathers of the opposition had best not delay longer over their own petition. 40 On the next day, the cardinal reported that he had the French address in hand, and that it bore forty-one signatures, including those of some Portuguese bishops. He had also been assured that the petitions of the Italians, the Greeks, and the Americans would be delivered to him by the evening of January 24th. He found the delay disagreeable, but he felt that the sacrifice was worth the possibility of presenting all five petitions simultaneously. He hoped, he said, that this could be done on the 24th. ⁴¹ The difficulties of the minority were a well-kept secret. On Sunday, January 23, when Rauscher was in possession of only two of the five petitions, the British diplomatic agent in Rome, Odo Russell, paid a visit to the Austrian embassy in the Palazzo Venezia and came away with the following misinformation, which he communicated to Archbishop Manning:

I have tried in vain to get the opposition petition, which is not printed, but I heard to-night at the Austrian embassy that Cardinal Rauscher had sent it up to the Pope to-day under cover to Monsignor Pacca. It was to have been presented to his Holiness by four archbishops, but each of them declared that three would be sufficient!

The petition is composed of five documents signed by different nationalities, the German one has forty-seven signatures, of the other ones I know nothing positive. ⁴²

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40 "Rauscher to Schwarzenberg, Rome, January 22, 1870", in Granderath, II, 1, p. 185.
41 "Rauscher to Schwarzenberg, Rome, January 23, 1870", in Granderath, II, 1, 185-6.
42 "Russell to Manning, Rome, January 23, 1870", in Purcell, II, 438.

A meeting of either the international committee or of the German-Austrian group was scheduled for Wednesday, January 26, but the minority's problems had not yet been ironed out, and Cardinal Rauscher told Cardinal Schwarzenberg:

I still have no news from the Archbishop of Paris; doubtless he does not know what to say; I believe that Your Eminence should not wait any longer for the Orientals, but send your package to the Maestro di camera before today's meeting. If the bishops learn to-day that nothing has yet been done, it could produce upon them an impression very prejudicial to the affair, and discourage them. 43

It is not clear whether Schwarzenberg, who had been commissioned to submit the petitions, attempted to get them to the pope or not. This had been the original intention of the international committee, and each of the documents was addressed to Pius IX. In any case, the pope refused to entertain any petition, whether from the majority or from the minority, and referred them all to the congregation on proposals. 44 Schwarzenberg's covering letter to the congregation is dated January 29. The German and French memorials bore the date of January 12, that of the English-speaking bishops January 15, and those from the orientals and the Italians January 18. 45

Forty-five Austrian, German, and Hungarian prelates signed the main petition. The sole outsider to join them was Bishop Ignatius Mrak of Sault-Sainte-Marie and Marquette, Michigan, a native of the Austrian Empire. The signers freely conceded the primary place of the See of Rome in the Church, and they acknowledged that obedience was owed to its decrees. They mentioned that pious and learned men taught that papal decrees ex cathedra were to be considered irreformable. Their present objections they phrased under four headings. First, they expressed astonishment that members of the council had been asked to commit themselves to a definition of papal infallibility

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43 "Rauscher to Schwarzenberg, Rome, January 26, 1870", in Granderath, II, 1, 186.
44 "Ullathorne to Newman, Rome, February 4, 1870", in Butler, I, 215.
45 Mansi, LI, 677-84.

before any discussion on the subject had taken place. Next, they declared that the struggle of the Church in the nineteenth century was not with internal enemies, but with those outside who were hostile to its interests. Since no Catholic called the prerogatives of the Holy See into question, the petitioners saw no reason for adding to the obligations in this regard which had already been laid down by the Councils of Trent and Florence. The final point in the petition was a reminder that the definition would provide a weapon for the Church's enemies and afford European governments a pretext for interference in ecclesiastical affairs. The French and Italian texts--neither of which was signed by bishops from the United States--covered these same arguments. What they omitted was another section of the German memorial which declared that it was impossible to propose the doctrine of Papal Infallibility as divinely revealed dogma until the many historical problems which attended it had been solved. Like the French and Italian versions, the address presented by the Eastern-rite bishops did not incorporate the German reference to historical difficulties. Instead, the oriental prelates simply suggested that the conciliar declaration of Florence on the subject be accepted. 46

The fifth petition was entered over the signatures of twentyseven English-speaking bishops. The burden of its argument was that a definition would be inopportune. There were only three paragraphs. In the first of these the signatories declared that discussion of the question would serve to reveal a lack of unity and especially of unanimity among the fathers. Secondly, they claimed that in the peculiar circumstances of their own countries, which were predominantly non-Catholic, the result of a definition would be to alienate those whom they were trying to gain for the Church. The third point looked to the future and foresaw interminable quarrels which would impede the work of the Church and prevent any beneficent effect that

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46 Schwarzenberg's covering letter and the German petition are in Mansi, LI, 677-80; the other petitions follow these.

the work of the council might have among those outside its ranks. The names of five archbishops headed the list of signatures. They were Purcell, Kenrick, Mc Closkey, Connolly, and George Errington--the former Coadjutor Archbishop of Westminster. England was also represented by Bishop William Clifford of Clifton, and Canada by two bishops from New Brunswick, James Rogers of Chatham and John Sweeny of St. John. The only Irish prelates to affix their signatures were David Moriarty of Kerry and the Dominican Bishop of Dromore John Leahy. The remaining seventeen were from the United States and, together with the archbishops, brought the total American count to twenty. The following bishops were listed: Thaddeus Amat, CM., of Monterey-Los Angeles; David W. Bacon of Portland; James Roosevelt Bayley of Newark; Michael Domenec, C.M. of Pittsburg; Patrick Feehan of Nashville; Edward Fitzgerald of Little Rock, John Hennessy of Dubuque; John Martin Henni of Milwaukee; John Joseph Hogan of St. Joseph; Patrick N. Lynch of Charleston; Francis McFarland of Hartford; Bernard J. McQuaid of Rochester; Joseph Melcher of Green Bay; Tobias Mullen of Erie; James M. O'Gorman, O.CS.O., of Nebraska; Augustin Vérot, S.S., of Savannah; and Richard V. Whelan of Wheeling. ⁴⁷

Caution must be used in attempting to determine the exact intention of any individual bishop who signed the minority petition. The most that can be said without further evidence is that as of January 15, 1870, each of the signatories believed that it would be unwise to raise the question of papal infallibility in the council. This was the gist of the statement to which they lent their names. Bishop McQuaid later filled in something of the background of the petition in a letter to Father James Early. He emphasized that the Americans had asked only one thing, namely, that the question not be brought before the council. Their arguments were external to the doctrine itself, and did not enter into its merits, as did the German text. McQuaid dis-

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47 Mansi, LI, 681-2.

tinguished four categories among the bishops who were approached for their support. One group refused to sign any petition at all. Others agreed that a definition was inexpedient, but did not want to appear hostile to the doctrine. Of the twenty who actually signed the petition, the bishop wrote: "All who signed it were opposed to the doctrine, as understood by the leaders of the other side, except two or three." 48

The qualifying phrase in the sentence just quoted from McQuaid's letter is of supreme importance, not only for an understanding of the mind of many of the bishops from the United States, but also for a balanced understanding of all the subsequent discussion of the question in the council. As of January 15, no official formula for a definition of papal infallibility had been laid before the fathers. The majority had expressed their own understanding of the prerogative in words that were susceptible of a very broad interpretation. Before the doctrine had been discussed and refined in the council, there existed a wide divergence of views as to the meaning, object, and extent of infallibility. There was certainly room for legitimate apprehension, even on the part of those who might be willing to accept a clear-cut and theologically precise formulation of the dogma. Overzealous partisans fed this apprehension by statements which were at best theologically unsound and at worst approached the blasphemous. We have already seen examples of the mentality of James A. McMaster. In England, William George Ward summarily dismissed the role of theologians as interpreters of papal pronouncements and found infallible declarations even where they were not so intended by the pope. Louis Veuillot perpetrated some of the worst outrages. Two of the more celebrated instances occurred in the pages of L'Univers during October and November, 1869. In one case, he printed as a hymn to the "pontiff-king, Pius IX" words taken from the Veni, Sancte Spiritus, which the liturgy of the Church applied to the Holy Spirit on Pentecost Sunday. On another

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48 McQuaid to Early, Rome, May 24, 1870, in Browne, p. 433.

occasion he published a parody of the breviary hymn for the canonical hour of None, beginning with the words, " Rerum, Pius, tenax vigor." In the original, the hymn is addressed to God. Excesses were not confined to lay dabblers in theology. Auxiliary Bishop Gaspard Mermillod of Geneva, one of the leaders of the majority committee and a future cardinal, had preached openly before the council on "the three incarnations of the Son of God," that is, in the womb of Our Lady, in the Eucharist, and in the pope. This sort of theologizing was certainly sufficient to give pause to any member of the council who took seriously his role as judge of the faith. ⁴⁹

In addition to theological difficulties the fathers were also influenced by political and by what we should call today ecumenical considerations. Ultimately each one of the opponents must be considered as an individual, and his individual reasons for opposition must be weighed on their own merits. There was no necessary correlation between a signature on the petition of January 15 and a vote against the definition in July. In many cases, the correlation existed. A more profound study of the issues caused some bishops to pass over to the majority, while others moved in the opposite direction. Still others who were inopportunists in January had conceived theoretical and historical difficulties before the debates were finished. These developments will be revealed in subsequent chapters.

In the case of three of the American signers of the minority petition, there is explicit evidence that they were not opposed to the doctrine of infallibility. Even before the petition had been handed in, Acton told Döllinger that Bishop Lynch of Charleston was one of "several friends of the dogma" who had nevertheless agreed to go along with the protest. 50 Two months later, Bishop Hogan wrote from Paris to Archbishop Spalding

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49 An excellent survey of the thought of Ward and Veuillot is found in Ward, pp. 234 -74. See also Roger Aubert, Le Pontificat de Pie IX (1846-1878) ( Paris: 1952), pp. 301-303. The examples are taken from these sources.
50 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 22, 1870.

and asked him, in his capacity as a member of the deputation on faith, to have his name erased from the document. He had been influenced, he said, by the fears of some prelates that a definition would mean the end of state subsidy to the Church in France and the withdrawal of French troops from Rome. But now that he had spent two weeks and three days in France, the Bishop of St. Joseph was convinced that such apprehensions were groundless, and therefore the reason for his opposition had vanished. 51 James M. O'Gorman was another who later formally retracted his signature. It is probable that he had originally consented to the petition at the behest of Archbishop Kenrick, his metropolitan, upon whom he had long been dependent for advice in matters affecting the Church at large. His retraction did not explain the reasons for his change of heart on infallibility, but it did make it quite clear that he had never been more than an inopportunist. After his return to the United States in the spring of 1870, he wrote to the Secretary-General of the Trappists: "I wish to repair any offense that I may unintentionally have given by signing my name to the letter of the inopportunists." If it were at all possible, O'Gorman wanted his vote cast by proxy in favor of the definition and he asked the secretary to commission either the Abbot of La Grande Trappe or Bishop James Gibbons to do this favor for him. 52

The name of Martin J. Spalding was conspicuously absent from both the majority and minority petitions. In his letters to Cardinal Barnabò and Dr. Corcoran during 1869, he had been inclined to take an inopportunist line. Although he later claimed that he had come to realize the extent of Gallican influence in the Church from the reading which he did while enroute to Rome--and stated that this had determined him to a more positive course in respect to the definition--he was, as we have seen, still wavering on the question when he spoke to

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51 AAB, 34-G-8, Hogan to Spalding, Paris, March 8, 1870.
52 O'Gorman to Father Stanislaus, Omaha, June 9, 1870, in Mansi, LI, 682.

Father Icard on December 1. Archbishop Purcell claimed that Spalding had encouraged the American minority petition of January 15, and had refrained from signing it himself only because he was a member of the deputation on faith, to which it would presumably be referred. This incident was said to have occurred during a meeting of twenty bishops at the American College. 53 There is no other evidence to connect Spalding with the January 15 petition, although its tenor coincided with his own previously expressed views. Certainly, Döllinger's informants saw in the Archbishop of Baltimore an enemy of their own projects. On January 7, for example, Acton wrote: "Despite Hecker's assurances, Spalding's example will draw over many of the Americans." ⁵⁴

Further confirmation of this estimate of Archbishop Spalding as hostile to the minority was contained in an erroneous notation which Johann Friedrich made in his diary. Although the German theologian's information was incorrect, in that he associated Spalding with the leaders of the majority, he did make it clear that the Baltimore prelate was considered no friend of his party. The diary passage read: "The infallibilists, with their priority-petition, which has gone out from Archbishops Manning, Spalding and Dechamps, have finally brought the opposition to a determined stand." 55 Döllinger summed up reports reaching him from Rome in the ninth Quirinus letter, which was dated January 9. He claimed that pressure from Napoléon III's government was about to force Piux IX to make Archbishop Georges Darboy of Paris a cardinal, and he added: "Some consolation for it is found on the now openly proclaimed apostasy from the anti-definition side of Archbishop Spalding of Baltimore, who had hitherto been wavering, for it is hoped that other

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53 Purcell made this statement in a speech delivered on August 21, 1870, at Mozart Hall in Cincinnati. (Catholic Telegraph, August 25, 1870.)
54 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 6/7, 1870.
55 Friedrich, Tagebuch, p. 87. Odo Russell reported to Lord Clarendon on January 10 that the leaders of the infallibilist group were Spalding, Mermillod, and Manning. ( Russell to Clarendon, Rome, January 10, 1870, in Blakiston, p. 379.)

American Bishops will follow his example." 56 In these statements, the Quirinus group drew a picture of Spalding that was too simple. Whatever may have been his relations with the minority, one thing is certain, and it is that in early January he was not associated with the activities of the Villa Caserta committee, of which Manning and Dechamps were among the chief representatives. Instead, he was attempting to find a middle ground which would be acceptable to all factions.

Canon Roger Aubert has pointed out that it is an oversimplification to speak as if there were only two parties at the council, one of them for the definition of infallibility and the other against. 57 There were clearly defined extremes, but within the extremes there existed a considerable body of opinion which may be called moderate. Even within this moderate camp, a distinction must be made. One group wanted the council to make some affirmation of infallibility, another thought it inexpedient, but was open to possible compromise. Among the bishops of the United States, many of the Franco-American prelates belonged to the strongly infallibilist party, but Augustin Vérot opposed the definition, while Amadeus Rappe of Cleveland and Maurice de St.-Palais of Vincennes were moderate proponents. Bishops Elder and Heiss were also strongly in favor of the definition. Archbishop Kenrick was the most prominent American anti-infallibilist. The support which he was able to muster for his position will be seen presently. Spalding was the leader of the American moderates. Aubert claims that his position was shared by most of the prelates close to Pius IX, including the Secretary of State Giacomo Antonelli. He summed up their stand in a delightful phrase: "Italians have a ready appreciation for adjustments, and the Roman prelates in particular have little taste for violent solutions." Other moderates, all of whom accepted infallibility as a doctrine, were Archbishop Dechamps of Malines, Bishops Ullathorne and Martin of Pader-

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56 Quirinus, p. 146.
57 Roger Aubert, "Documents concernant le tiers parti au concile du Vatican," Abhandlungun über Theologie and Kirche; Festschrift für Karl Adam (Ed. Marcel Reding et al.; Düsseldorf: 1952), p. 241.

born, and the General of the Jesuits, Petrus Beckx. ⁵⁸ However all the moderates were not of one mind, as Spalding was to discover. For example, three of those just mentioned, namely, Dechamps, Martin, and Beckx, were signers of the majority petition.

The move to find a middle-of-the-road solution was encouraged and even promoted by official circles in Rome. On January 18, Bishop Karl Joseph von Hefele told Johann Friedrich that he had been asked by the secretary of the council Bishop Fessler to accept the leadership of a moderate group. ⁵⁹ Hefele rejected the suggestion, but Fessler continued his activities, and Count Trauttmansdorf, the Austrian Ambassador, reported them to Vienna on January 22. ⁶⁰ Four days later the French Ambassador, the Marquis de Banneville, informed his government that a compromise document was already being circulated among the fathers. This was apparently a formula drawn up by Archbishop Spalding. ⁶¹

According to his nephew and biographer, Spalding had prepared his text for an indirect and implicit definition of papal infallibility before being named to the congregation on proposals. ⁶² It is probable that James A. Corcoran had a hand in its composition, if he was not completely responsible for its wording. ⁶³ There were two separate texts. The first and shorter version found its way into the acts of the council over Spalding's own signature. It contained three condemnations. The first of these was directed at anyone who appealed to a future council as if it were superior to the pope. The second condemnation referred to those who held that only external assent was owed to papal pronouncements, and the third recalled the tortuous evasions of the Jansenists by proscribing the opinion of those who held that the pope, in condemning certain propositions, had

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58 Ibid. , pp. 241-2.
59 Friedrich, Tagebuch, pp. 111-2.
60 Aubert, "Documents," p. 243.
61 Ibid. , p. 244.
62 John Lancaster Spalding. The Life of the Most Rev. M. J. Spalding, D.D. ( New York: 1873), p. 395.
63 Corcoran's authorship is affirmed by James F. Loughlin, "James Andrew Corcoran," The Catholic Encyclopedia IV, 356.

not fully understood their meaning. ⁶⁴ The second Spalding schema included the same three points and added a fourth condemnation, namely, of those who attempted to divide the pope and the bishops by entering into disputes as to the relative importance of the pontiff and the episcopate, "as if an assembly of brothers, whom Peter is commanded, even in his successors, to confirm, could ever be severed from him whose faith, by the promise of Christ, shall never fail; or as if they who are to be taught and confirmed by Peter could ever lawfully teach and confirm in opposition to him." 65

There is no date on either text, so that it is impossible to determine when they were presented. One or both were accompanied by a pair of covering letters. The first, written in Italian, commended the proposals to Cardinal de Angelis, the first president of the council. It was signed by Bishop James F. Wood of Philadelphia. The second letter, in Latin, was addressed to Cardinal Constantino Patrizi, the senior member of the congregation on proposals. Wood's name headed the list of signatures. He was joined by Bishops John Quinlan of Mobile, John Conroy of Albany, John Williams of Boston, and William Henry Elder of Natchez. 66 Appended to the second formula were two long quotations confirmatory of the doctrine just enunciated, and a list of six reasons why the schema was thought to be expedient. The first quotation repeated the address of loyalty made to Pius IX by over 500 bishops on the occasion of the eighteenth centenary of the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul in 1867. 67 The second passage was the citation from the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore which had been incorporated in the majority address. It consisted in a concatenation

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64 Mansi, LI. 663-4.
65 Mansi, LI, 664. Also, in English and Latin, in Spalding, pp. 386-7. Martin Spalding's manuscript copy is in AAB, 39-N-4, and 39-L-2 and 3.
66 Mansi, LI, 664.
67 Dupanloup had had a hand in preparing the 1867 address and had seen to it that the word "infallible" was left out, despite the protests of Manning. See Aubert, Pontificat de Pie IX, p. 310.

of statements from the Councils of Chalcedon, Ephesus and Trent, from Saints Ambrose and Peter Chrysologus, and from an encyclical letter of Pope Pius IX.

Archbishop Spalding's first reason for preferring his formula was the hope that it would win nearly unanimous approval from the bishops. In one of his early drafts he wrote that it contained "principles already settled & accepted by all except Gallicans, who are a mere hand full [ sic ]," but this comment was omitted in the copy submitted to the cardinals. ⁶⁸ He felt that unanimity in such a serious matter was not only good, but seemed to be demanded, and he felt that whatever definition was made should, if possible, be made with no one dissenting. This second point is one to which we shall have to return, since it later involved the archbishop in an acrimonious controversy with Bishop Dupanloup. Thirdly, Spalding warned that the Church had enough external enemies without having to stir up discord within its own household. His fourth reason was that the formula which he proposed was clearer and simpler and more comprehensive than a formal and explicit definition, and less open to theological quibbling. The fifth point was that the schema made the pope's infallibility the logical corollary of his primacy, and its limits the same as the infallibility of the Church. Finally, Spalding felt that he had avoided one of the great difficulties that seemed to be looming ahead, since his definition was prospective and not retrospective. He hoped that it would escape the historical arguments that were certain to be used against a formal definition. ⁶⁹

Circulation of Spalding's proposal gave rise to considerable speculation in Rome. Albert du Boÿs wrote in his memoirs that the scheme had been elaborated without consultation of either

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68 AAB, 33-M-8.
69 All the official documents connected with the Spalding proposal are in Mansi, LI, 663-6. They are found, in both English and Latin, in J. L. Spalding , pp. 387-94. Manuscript copies of the schema are in AAB, 39-L-2 and 3, and 39-N-4. Manuscript copies of Spalding's reasons for preferring his schema to a formal definition are in AAB, 33-M-8 and 39-N-1.

majority or minority fathers, and that the text has been distributed without its author's name being mentioned. ⁷⁰ Odo Russell sent two reports on the affair to Archbishop Manning. In one of these, he said that he had been shown a document which was supposed to have emanated from Bishop Conrad Martin of Paderborn, Spalding, and Manning himself, and he declared that the minority found it ",quite inadmissable." ⁷¹ In a second note to the Archbishop of Westminster, Russell relayed the information that the Prussian and Bavarian diplomatic representatives to the Holy See had told him that the compromise plan was the work of Manning, Spalding, and Dechamps. He had, he went on, expressed his surprise and doubt at the truth of the rumor since he could not see that any compromise was necessary in the matter. ⁷²

One further piece of contemporary evidence strikes an oddly jarring note. On the evening of February 6, Henri Icard paid one of his periodic visits to the American College. He found the Archbishop of Cincinnati highly exercised over portions of the text of the recently distributed schema de ecclesia. Purcell also confirmed what Icard said he had himself thought all along, that the formula which had come to be known as that of the "third party" was the work of "the Bishop of St. Louis and the Archbishop of Baltimore." 73 This is the only suggestion that has been found of collaboration between the two archbishops-Kenrick and Spalding--in the matter of the petitions. On the face of it, such collaboration would appear to have been unlikely, although in January their aims did coincide to the extent that both wanted to avoid an outright confrontation of the council with the question of infallibility. It must be remembered that Kenrick was the prime mover in the American minority petition of January 15, and that that petition relied solely on the argument of inexpediency. Even the gingerly German approach

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70 ASMP, Du Bÿys Papers, Memoirs of the Council, pp. 14 -5.
71 Russell to Manning, Rome, n.d., in Purcell, II, 441.
72 Russell to Manning, Rome, "Sunday," Ibid. , II, 440.
73 ASS, Icard Journal, February 6, 1870.

to historical difficulties connected with the dogma had been deliberately omitted in the American version. It is also possible that Acton was referring to the Spalding petition when he remarked to Döllinger on January 28: "ArchbishopKenrick of St. Louis, one of the calmest men in Rome, does not at all believe in the count of 400 [claimed by Manning for the majority petition]. Consequently, this will be withdrawn, and the opportune assistance of the milder address will become necessary through want of success." ⁷⁴

Archbishop Purcell is the sole certain witness for the supposed Kenrick-Spalding collaboration--if Icard understood him correctly. His is also the only testimony we have about Spalding's encouragement of the petition of January 15. Interpretation of the Acton letter just quoted as confirmatory of the collaboration is rendered doubtful by the general tone of the Englishman's other comments on Spalding's plan. He was quite hostile to it, and at the same time he was extremely close to Kenrick. We would expect him to have informed Döllinger if the Archbishop of St. Louis were connected with a proposal that conflicted with the views held by the Quirinus group. Kenrick and Spalding had previously disagreed sharply over the management of the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore. Their disagreement on the question of infallibility erupted into a public and rather bitter debate during April, 1870.

On January 20 Lord Acton reported that the Archbishop of Baltimore had put his program before the French minority group. The French prelates rejected the scheme, he said, and told Spalding that they were not interested in any compromises. ⁷⁵ The next piece of evidence we have comes from Ullathorne's letter of February 4 to Newman. According to the Bishop of Birmingham, Cardinal Bilio, president of the deputation on faith, had told an American archbishop--presumably

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74 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 28, 1870.
75 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, January 19/20, 1870.

Spalding--that there had originally been no intention of presenting the council with a schema on infallibility, but that attacks made by the two Frenchmen, Bishops Dupanloup and Henri Maret, had forced the issue. However, the cardinal promised that the proposal would be moderate in tone. Ullathorne commented, in an obvious reference to the Spalding plan which he had already mentioned in his letter, "My general knowledge enables me to say that this, amongst other things, implies the omission of the word 'infallible,' and I apprehend also the limitation to some such terms as the obedience due to Pontifical decisions and their irreversibility." Parenthetically, it should be added that the majority bore at least equal responsibility for forcing the issue. Ullathorne wrote: "I, of course, do not forget that one of these prelates [ Dupanloup] was roused up by excesses on the other side, nor do I forget who roused him." ⁷⁶ The reference is to the epistolary controversy between the Bishop of Orleans and Manning, which had begun in November, 1869. 77 Moreover, the first to bring the infallibility question to the formal notice of the council had been Bishop Anton Pluym of Nicopoli, who presented a petition for the definition on December 18. ⁷⁸

The Belgian Minister to the Holy See informed his government of the activities of the "third party" in a letter dated February 5. He reported that the leading figures in the effort to organize those who were not "fettered by prejudice or preoccupation with self-love" were Archbishop Spalding and Cardinal Henri de Bonnechose of Rouen. The diplomat was not, however, optimistic about the success of the project. 79 Isaac Hecker reflected the malaise which had settled over the fathers when he wrote to Orestes Brownson: "The council is in the via purgativa or discussiva, and from appearances it will be some time before it will enter upon the via illuminitiva." He expressed his

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76 Ullathorne to Newman, Rome, February 4, 1870, in Butler, I, 214-7.
77 Ibid. , pp. 149-50.
78 Mansi, LI, 639-40.
79 Aubert, "Documents," p. 243.

confidence, however, that God's will would in the end prevail, and he concluded: "Light will come and action follow in due season." ⁸⁰

Spalding's fruitless efforts continued throughout February. On February 13, Cardinal Mathieu of Besançon asked Father Icard's opinion of a communication which he had received from the Archbishop of Baltimore. In his letter Spalding identified himself as the author of the four-point schema and asked Mathieu to use his influence for its adoption by the French minority bishops. If the four points were unacceptable, Spalding had said, then he would like to know what modifications might make it acceptable, or what alternative program could be substituted for it to secure agreement. Icard told the cardinal that he considered the first and fourth points superfluous. Number one was already in the schema on the Church which had been distributed to the fathers, and number four belonged to the section on the infallibility of the Church, rather than to that on the infallibility of the pope. He thought that paragraphs two and three might be allowed to stand if they were modified. In particular he objected to the term "perverse quibbling" as applied to those who held that only external assent need be given to papal pronouncements and he also felt that the third paragraph should be revised so as to skirt controversies which might be aroused by its wording. 81 Cardinal Mathieu brought the Spalding schema to the attention of the French minority at their meeting on February 15, but Dupanloup indicated in his diary that there was no great enthusiasm for its provisions. Archbishop Darboy of Paris, he said, opposed it, while the Archbishop of Rheims, JeanBaptiste Landriot, dismissed it as "more than a definition." 82

Archbishop Spalding made one final attempt to persuade the French bishops. On the morning of February 17 he went to Cardinal Mathieu and asked if he might not be permitted to

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80 UND, Brownson Papers, Hecker to Brownson, Rome, February 4, 1870.
81 ASS, Icard Journal, February 13, 1870.
82 ASS, Dupanloup Journal, February 15, 1870.

address the minority prelates in person and explain his schema to them. The cardinal answered that he could make no promises, and that same evening the bishops voted to reject all compromise and to stand by their own original counterpetition. 83 Spalding was no more successful with the German-Austrian group. On February 16, Cardinal Rauscher wrote to Cardinal Schwarzenberg: "I heard yesterday from reliable sources that attempts will be made to enlist the support of the Austrian and German bishops for the Spalding proposition, which has been put out from the American College. I hope without result." 84 The obituary notice to these efforts to gather minority support was written by the Norbertine canon Franz Mayer, a confidant and theological advisor of the Cardinal Archbishop of Prague: "The compromise proposed by Spalding is evidently no compromise at all, and embraces in its indistinct generality much more than an explicit definition of ex cathedra statements." 85

After the failure of Archbishop Spalding's proposal, Cardinal Henri de Bonnechose of Rouen and a group of French bishops continued to work for a compromise solution, but their endeavors had no more success than the American attempt. The Bonnechose party differed from Spalding in that they were all inopportanists, while he was considered a moderate infallibilist. At first there were hopes that a settlement acceptable to all factions might be achieved, but the new regulations of February 22 and the pressures for a strong definition exerted by the majority disappointed those of the minority who were tempted to compromise, and in the end nothing was accomplished."

Reaction to Spalding's plan from anti-infallibilist sources outside the council was unfavorable. This, added to the lack of

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83 Friedrich, Tagebuch, pp. 189-190. Friedrich had his information from Archbishop Haynald, who had just visited Mathieu. This and the two following citations are also found in Aubert, "Documents," p. 257.
84 Rauscher to Schwarzenberg, Rome, February 16, 1870, in Wolfsgruber, III, 245.
85 The quotation is from Mayer's diary, cited ibid.
86 Aubert, "Documents," pp. 244-55, tells the story of the Bonnechose group.

any perceptible ground swell in support of it from the infallibilist side, spelled its doom. Döllinger was an outspoken critic. On February 8 he instructed Acton to see to it that an answer was made to the archbishop's use of the episcopal address of July 1, 1867 as an argument in support of his proposals. The German professor suggested that Dupanloup might undertake this task. 87 Three days earlier he had summarized the schema as demanding "that everybody must assent to every doctrinal decision of the Pope on pain of everlasting damnation," and this, he commented, beyond even the desires of Manning and Dechamps, who would at least restrict infallibility to decrees addressed to the whole Church. He concluded confidently:

Every theologian must declare this invention of the Archbishop of Baltimore's to be the most monstrous demand ever made on the conscience and understanding of the Catholic world. It is as if a courtier at Teheran were to say, 'I will not indeed affirm that our Shah is almighty, but I do assert confidently that he can create out of nothing what he will and that his will is always accomplished.' The reverend fathers who torment themselves with inventing such devices would perhaps do best if they were to make a collection among themselves, and offer a prize of 100 ducats for that form of circumlocution or involution most securely adapted for entrapping the innocent souls of Bishops. Then the most ingenious heads from all Europe would compete in sending in their suggestions, and the right bait might be discovered among them. ⁸⁸

Three weeks later, Döllinger was still disturbed at the Spalding petition, and he returned to the attack in the twenty-sixth letter of the Quirinus series:

Archbishop Spalding of Baltimore has not receded from his ludicrous notion that his infallibilist formula is milder and more tolerable than that of the 400 . . . . Its essence consists, as was mentioned before, in asserting that everybody must receive with unconditional inward assent every Papal decision on every question of faith or morals or Church life. On all theological principles such faith can only be accorded in cases where all possibility of error is excluded, or, in other words,

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87 Conzemius Transcripts, Döllinger to Acton, Munich, February 8, 1870.
88 Quirinus, pp. 213-4.

where a revealed truth is concerned; and therefore to accept this formula would be to set aside the limitation of Papal Infallibility, hitherto recognized even in Rome, to decisions pronounced ex cathedira. And thus, in the crush and confusion of the innumerable and often contradictory decisions of Popes, theology would degenerate into a lamentable caricature of a system--"science" it could not longer be termed--involved in hopeless contradictions. If the good Spalding had the slightest acquaintance with Church history, he would know that he was bound, in virtue of his inward assent paid to all Papal decrees, first of all to reject his own orders as invalid. ⁸⁹

The German theologian's attack, for all its polemical sarcasm, did single out the major defect in Spalding's proposal. The archbishop had deliberately made his schema more comprehensive than an explicit definition. This was not the way to conciliate the opposing parties and it betrayed a lack of understanding of the minority's mentality. Their objection was not primarily to the word "infallibility," as Spalding seemed to imply. They were not mere nominalists. The principal labor of the council was destined to be a gradual refinement of the definition formula until it expressed accurately and precisely the limits, conditions, and objects of infallible papal pronouncements. This was the process which Spalding attempted to avoid with his vague general statements. It was an approach which pleased neither side.

Back home in the United States, the press was still bedeviled by lack of exact information on the proceedings in Rome. On January 29, the New York Tribune tried to line up the contending forces. Its correspondent listed three parties: those who believed with Archbishop Manning that the pope was infallible in both spiritual and temporal matters, those at the opposite extreme who held with Archbishop Darboy and Bishop Maret that infallibility rested with the hierarchy, and, finally, a middle

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89 Quirinus, pp. 313-4. The reference to invalid orders had been explained in Döllinger's earlier work, published under the pseudonym of "Janus." He claimed that there was so much confusion on the point in Italy during the eight and ninth centuries that many ordinations conferred by popes were annulled by subsequent popes and synods. See Janus, The Pope and the Council ( Boston. 1870), pp. 42-4.

group of inopportunists headed by Dupanloup and Schwarzenberg. These last were said to hold the infallibility of the pope only when he spoke ex cathedra. The Tribune stated that an "important" part of the French and Belgian bishops and the majority of the Americans belonged to the inopportuaist party ⁹⁰ The inaccuracies in the report are obvious, but they demonstrate the fallacy of a policy that had refused the world press adequate opportunity to cover the council. In mid-February, a full month after the minority addresses had been signed by twenty-one American prelates, the World carried an item to the effect that some bishops from the United States had refused to sign the majority petition ⁹¹ The Herald was better informed when it reported on February 28 that a "third party" had grown up among the fathers, and it gave a reasonably accurate summary of the Spalding proposals. ⁹²

Some Catholic sources had access to more direct information. On January 23, Paulist Father Augustine F. Hewit, the acting editor of the Catholic World in the absence of Isaac Hecker, wrote to Orestes Brownson:

I hear the bishops are all deeply studying the question of papal infallibility and it is supposed about one fourth are against the opportuneness of the definition. If they are obliged first to vote on the question is it definable as a dogma, the opposition will be in straits, & I feel sure we shall have a definition. The memorial against the Papal Bull regulating the council got only fourteen signatures, & on Xmas Day the Pope gave them a beautiful sermon on despising human respect & listening with humility to his teaching as the Vicar of Christ. ⁹³

Two weeks later, Hewit wrote again to Brownson: "I am very glad to see you writing on papal infallibility and I hope you will keep up the fire, as I am somewhat restricted in these things." ⁹⁴

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90 New York Tribune, January 29, 1870, in Beiser, pp. 82-3.
91 The World ( New York), February 14, 1870, ibid. , p. 86.
92 New York Herald, February 28, 1870, ibid. , pp. 90-91.
93 UND, Brownson Papers, Hewit to Brownson, New York, January 23, 1870.
94 Ibid. , Hewit to Brownson, New York, February 9, 1870.

James A. McMaster of the Freeman's Journal was kept supplied with news by two correspondents. One of them, William Faulkner Browne, M.D., reported on February 3 that he had arranged a subscription to Civlità Cattolica for McMaster. He added that the other Italian papers-- Giornale, Osservatore Romano, and Unità Cattolica --were all very good "to light your cigar with--or for some other purpose--but as newspapers Oh!" Browne warned McMaster to beware of using too much imagination in his comments on the situation in Rome, and said that there was actually very little news available. He had tried without success to get hold of a copy of the petition against the definition, but had learned that many of the United States bishops were among the signers. He concluded: "I think that the opposition to the definition of dogma is good because it will insure its definition." 95 McMaster's second informant was Father Eugene M. O'Callaghan of the Diocese of Cleveland. O'Callaghan was in Rome on behalf of another of the crusades sponsored by the Freeman's Journal, a campaign for the establishment of canonical parishes in the United States. He wrote on February 26:

The question of the infallibility of the Pope is convulsing the assembled prelates considerably. It has strong opposition and will give rise to a great deal of bad will. It will almost without doubt be introduced. The question De Ecclesia is now up for deliberation and afterwards comes the Question De Summo Pontifice, when it will be introduced. There are many grave reasons offered contra, and many objections, but I understand each party gives the opposite party credit for conscientious and sincere motives. Notwithstanding this, there is a great deal of excitement. There have been also objections--and it would seem from the statement of the Bishop who informed me-not unreasonable ones to the manner in which some of the "Committees" have been formed. But I trust and pray that the issue may be peaceful and the end productive of harmony. 96

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95 UND, McMaster Papers, Browne to McMaster, Rome, February 3, 1870.
96 UND, McMaster Papers, O'Callaghan to McMaster, Rome, February 26, 1870.

The editor of the Freeman's Journal was not disposed to the same degree of magnanimity as the correspondent. On February 5, he reported that a petition had been submitted for the definition and went on to say that there were rumors that a second and contrary memorial was being prepared. His only comment was to add in brackets: "Feebly signed by a very few. Ed. F. J." 97 A month later the news had been confirmed, and McMaster had heard that "a very respectable minority" had signed the inopportunists' petition. He remarked of this minority, "a small one either as to number or character." 98 By March 19, the facts were clear and the New York editor could not contain his hurt astonishment. He refused to believe that Archbishops Purcell and Kenrick were involved in the affair and that they had the support of a considerable number of the American bishops. It must be "idle Roman gossip," he thought, although it was obvious to McMaster that there was a "spirit of heresy and schism rampant." 99

Other Catholic newspapers were not so outspoken. The Catholic Telegraph of Cincinnati had been a strong supporter of the definition until March. On the third of that month, it printed a letter which had been received from its Roman correspondent, "Viator." The letter was dated February 5, and said in part: "The question of infallibility has assumed a new character; many prelates are in favor of a compromise, if there can be any such thing. . . . I have known since I came to Rome ( Nov. 10, 1869) that the majority of the working Bishops were opposed to it." 100 Two more Viator letters appeared in the Telegraph's March 10 edition. On February 12 he had written that "few of the American, Canadian, English or Irish Bishops are in favor of the dogma," and that many were annoyed over the "petition business," which had originated with Archbishop Manning. In a letter sent on February 14, Viator declared that Archbishops

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100 Catholic Telegraph, March 3, 1870.
97 Frooman's Journal, February 5, 1870.
98 Ibid. , March 5, 1870.
99 Ibid. , March 19, 1870.

McCloskey, Purcell, and Kenrick had lost their chances for a cardinal's hat because of opposition to the "new dogma." 101 The Telegraph later apologized for this "unbecoming and untrue reference . . . concerning the relations of the Holy See and some of the American episcopacy," and its subsequent treatment of the whole question of infallibility was marked by a more detached approach than had been used in the earlier months of the council; it was no longer a strong advocate of the definition. 102

The Pittsburgh Catholic also modified its stand as a result of dispatches from Rome. On February 19, its columns contained a defense of the temporal power of the pope and also some remarks on the fallacious reasoning of the inopportunists. On the temporal power, the editor remarked that its opponents reminded him of the parishioner who "saves a few dollars by practicing his creed of spiritualizing the clergy." Only "weakkneed persons," he went on, feared the definition of papal infallibility. "It is not by toning down the truth, by covering up its; stern outlines, that the Church is to be spread, as some romantic lackadaisical Christians seem to think." 103 It was not until May 7 that the Catholic obtained a copy of the minority petition, which was then printed without comment, although it included the name of the Bishop of Pittsburgh among the signers. 104 Two weeks later, the editor remarked that the petition proved that there was freedom of discussion in the council, and he placed the best possible interpretation on the intentions of those who had presented it. 105 Neither the Catholic nor the Telegraph turned into anti-infallibilist journals, although the latter did lean towards inopportunism. The American Catholic press in general continued to favor the definition, although none was quite so violent in their partisanship as the Freeman's Journal. All through the council they labored under the double handicap

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101 Ibid. , March 10, 1870.
102 The apology is in the March 19 issue of the Telegraph.
103 The Catholic, February 19, 1870.
104 Ibid. , May 7, 1870.
105 Ibid. , May 21, 1870.

of inadequate and delayed information. By the time the issues before the council were discussed in the United States, the fathers had already moved on to a new phase of their work. The result was that comments in American journals were most often nothing more than out-of-date reprints, culled principally from the pro-infallibility newspapers of Europe.

The three-week adjournment which began on February 22 marked, as we have seen, a turning point in the council. There is only one more incident which must be mentioned before summing up the situation of the American bishops at that time. This was the visit of Pope Pius IX to the American College on January 29. The occasion was the promulgation of a formal decree declaring that the apostle of sixteenth-century Corsica, Giovanni Giovenale Ancina, was to be considered venerable. The pope, attended by Cardinals Patrizi, Capalti, and Barnabò, presided at a Mass in the college church at which all the American bishops assisted. Afterwards he delivered a short sermon in Italian on the virtues proper to the episcopate. When the ceremonies were over, a reception was held in the great hall of the college and Archbishop Spalding spoke on behalf of the Americans. He traced briefly the history of the Church in the United States and ended his discourse, as Bishop Gibbons remembered, with "a few touches of true American wit." The pope entered into the spirit of Spalding's talk and seemed to enjoy these lighter touches, although his attendants were taken aback by the unexpected informality. 106

James Gibbons interpreted the pope's visit as "a very signal and very agreeable mark of his good will" towards the American bishops. Others were inclined to a more cynical interpretation. The sixteenth Quirinus letter reported:

The North American Bishops too are being gradually educated to ecclesiastical maturity in the school of Rome and the Council, and have already grown out of that naïve belief in the disinterested generosity and superhuman wisdom of the Curia which most of them brought here. To-day the Pope paid them a visit at the American

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106 Gibbons, 1, 57-63.

College, conversed in a friendly way with the Bishops individually, said obliging things, and, in a word, displayed those well-known powers of fascination he has such a command of. "A month ago this would have taken effect," said an American priest who was present, "but now it comes too late."107

The source of Döllinger's information was Lord Acton, who had written on February 2: "[The pope] made a visit three days ago to the American College and spoke very cleverly with each of the bishops. Hecker was there and said to [ Archbishop Xavier de) Mérode: 'It is too late. A month ago he would have been able to accomplish something." 108 Johann Friedrich's account was even more at variance with that of Gibbons and he also succeeded in transforming the festival of the sixteenth-century Italian bishop into an American national holiday. His diary entry for February 4 read:

In the last few days, the pope gave a talk at the American College on the occasion of a national holiday, in which he complained quite openly and frankly about the opposition of a segment of the American bishops, so that a bishop said to my informant, Count . . . , "This is too much. Now the pope goes from house to house and exerts pressure on the bishops." ¹⁰⁹

It is not difficult to see the wishful thinking that crept into the reports of both Acton and Friedrich. While it is true that a personal visit from the pope was calculated to impress the American bishops, there is no evidence, apart from the accounts of two scarcely impartial observers, neither of whom was present, that any overt attempt was made to win votes for the definition.

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107 Quirinus, p. 208.

108 Conzemius Transcripts, Acton to Döllinger, Rome, February 1/2, 1870. Mérode, a member of a noble Belgian family, had been Pius IX's Minister of War and was the chief architect of the many civic improvements made in Rome during his reign. But he remained until the final balloting an opponent of the definition. 109 Friedrich, Tagebuch, p. 155. The informant was probably Count Louis Arco-Valley of the Bavarian Legation, Acton's brother-in-law, who provided Friedrich with information on other occasions. See Johann Friedrich , "Römische Briefe über das Konzil (1869-1870)," Revue Internatiotide de Théologie XI ( 1903), 621-8.

Whatever subtle purposes the celebration might have had in the minds of some, the bishops of the United States preferred to see in it a gracious gesture to themselves and to their country on the part of the pope. ¹¹⁰

Bishops McFarland and McQuaid were quick to take advantage of the recess which was announced on February 22, and they left Rome for a holiday in Naples. ¹¹¹ Among the fathers who remained in the city, the battle over the competing petitions temporarily gave way to equally heated controversy over the new regulations for the council. The adjournment also permitted the various parties to take stock of their situation and to evaluate their relative strengths and weaknesses. The prospects of the majority were encouraging. Approximately 500 bishops and abbots had signed the several petitions for the definition. The minority could count only 136 signatures, or some twenty per cent of the fathers, but it represented an imposing segment of the non-Latin countries. ¹¹²

The American bishops had been practically unknown when the council opened in December. By the end of February they had become an important factor in the calculations of both majority and minority. In two letters to Father John Henry Newman, Bishop Moriarty of Kerry reported that all, or nearly all, of them would support the opposition. 113 Gaspard Mermillod, the Auxiliary Bishop of Geneva, partially confirmed this when he wrote to his vicar-general, Monsignor Dunoyer: "The Gallican group, joined to the bishops of Hungary and to some American bishops, creates many difficulties for us." ¹¹⁴ The

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110 Gibbons, I, 57-63.
111 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, February 25, 1870.
112 Aubert, Pontificat de Pie IX, p. 332.
113 Moriarty to Newman, Rome February 3 and February 20, 1870, in Butler, II, 28-9, 30.
114 Mermillod to Dunoyer, Rome, January 21, 1870, in Charles Comte, Le Cardinal Mermillod d'après sa Correspondance ( Geneva: 1924), p. 103. Although technically an auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Lausanne and Geneva, Mermillod ruled the Geneva section of the diocese as if he had been its ordinary. The anomalous situation was caused by the Swiss constitutional prohibition against the erection of new dioceses. ( Ibid., pp. 84-8.)

opinions of both Moriarty and Mermillod were based on general impressions or on the activity of individuals like Archbishop Kenrick. The records show that less than half of the United States bishops present in Rome had taken a stand against the definition, and we now know that at least three of those who did sign the petition of the inopportunists were not firmly committed to opposition.

Ten American prelates, including two archbishops and one abbot, had signed the petition put out by the Villa Caserta majority committee. Another six, headed by Archbishop Spalding, asked for an indirect and implicit definition of papal infallibility without mentioning the term. Twenty archbishops and bishops signed the English-speakers' minority petition of January 15, and one other put his name to the German-Austrian version. These signatures accounted for thirty-seven of the forty-eight American fathers who were at the council in the winter of 1869-70. Another affirmative vote had been sent in by Celestin de la Hailandière, the retired Bishop of Vincennes, Indiana, who asked Archbishop Godefroid Saint-Marc of Rennes to have his name added to the majority petition. 115 Eleven bishops refused to sign any petition.

As a tentative conclusion, it can be said that as of February 22 there was a barely discernible tendency toward following the lead of the respective metropolitans. This was particularly true in the case of Archbishop Kenrick and, to a lesser degree, of Archbishop McCloskey. The least united province was that of Baltimore. The small size of the representation from Cincinnati, Oregon City, and San Francisco renders any attempt to categorize them fatuous. New Orleans was the strongest center of proinfallibility sentiment, with only Bishop Fitzgerald in open opposition.

February also saw the first rash of American departures from Rome. Apparently Archbishop Odin of New Orleans was one of the first to leave. At the suggestion of the pope he retired to France, where he died at Ambierle (Loire) on May 25. 116 Bishop

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115 Saint-Marc to Fessler, February 27, 1870, in Mansi, LI, 677. 116 Baudier, pp. 434-5.

David Bacon obtained leave of absence on January 31, and Bayley reported his departure in a letter to Michael Corrigan dated February 8. 117 Five more bishops were excused on February 14, but the exact time when they left Rome is not known. These were Patrick Feehan, John J. Hogan, John Baptist Lamy, Joseph Melcher, and James O'Gorman 118 To the observer who judged solely on the basis of the petitions, the minority seemed to have suffered the greater losses. Five of the departing bishops had been signatories of the opposition memorial of January 15, one had not committed himself, and another had signed the majority request. We have, however, already seen that Bishops Hogan and O'Gorman later retracted their signatures. Nevertheless, the minority could ill afford to lose any votes, and so the early departures represented a net gain for the majority.

A writer in Conservatore of Naples summed up the various nationalities at the council in an article which eventually found its way, via the Vatican of London, into the pages of the Pittsburgh Catholic. The bishops subject to Propaganda, he said, were "one body with the Holy See." This was a reference to the numerous vicars apostolic who generally supported the definition. The Spaniards were noteworthy for their strict and edifying lives, and, said the commentator, "they are all, to a man, red hot supporters of Papal Infallibility." He found the Italians fully the equal of the Spaniards in erudition, but more knowledgeable about "the duties of the ecclesiastical state." The French he reported as having attempted to take Rome by storm with an active social life, while the "cold, speculative" Germans and English kept to themselves. The "honors of notoriety" fell to the Hungarians, who were used to riding about with hussars as a military escort. They were excellent Latinists who wanted the whole Christian world to look through Magyar spectacles. As for the North and South Americans, the Italian writer said: "They are a little more uncouth, and if I may speak in so delicate a

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117 Mansi, L, 571; AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, February 8, 1870. 118 Mansi, L, 725.

matter, more careless of external forms. They pay less regard to ecclesiastical costume, they talk more loudly and gesticulate more freely and do everything in a more offhand way than their European prototypes." ¹¹⁹ These views are interesting as indicative of the impression created by the foreign bishops, and they are also illustrative of the proprietary mentality toward the Church on the part of some Italians which was responsible at times for the insufficient attention paid to the needs of Catholics whose situation differed from that existing in Italy.

Comments by three bishops from the United States will sum up the state of affairs which obtained as the council went into recess. James Roosevelt Bayley wrote to Michael Corrigan on February 25 that progress had been slow and the weather miserable. He cautioned Corrigan that many of the stories circulating about the deliberations were false, although some were true. Unfortunately, he did not go into further detail. ¹²⁰ Bishop McQuaid had been more explicit when he wrote to Corrigan on February 6:

The great question of the infallibility has not come before us as yet, although it is the great question outside the Council. Should it come before us then the war begins in earnest. The present skirmishing is only child's play to what will be. The ablest Bishops by far that have spoken in the Council are Bishops whose views are known to be adverse to any definition. Another difficulty will be to define what is meant by "ex cathedra" etc. Should this question come up the discussion will be endless. I am afraid that there is a determination to pass abstract questions as decrees, that may be true enough in themselves, but will be highly injurious to us in America from the handle they will give to our enemies. If I had not confidence in God's protecting hand, I would run from the Council in despair, so strangely ignorant are many men of what is going on in the world. We need the earnest prayers of all good Catholics. ¹²¹

Bishop Augustus Martin of Natchitoches agreed with Bayley and McQuaid in only one particular. He informed the newly

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119 The Catholic, April 23, 1870.
120 AANY, C-2, Bayley to Corrigan, Rome, February 25, 1870.
121 AANY, C-3, McQuaid to Corrigan, Rome, February 6, 1870.

appointed Coadjutor Bishop of New Orleans Napoleon J. Perché that the cold and humidity of Rome had kept him from writing many letters, since the climate was very bad for his rheumatism. But his description of the council had nothing in common with that supplied by the prelates from the north. It was instead a strong manifesto of infallibilist faith and as such will bear extensive quotation. Martin wrote as follows:

The council is a real arena, in which 650 bishops devoted to the [illegible] faith, which is the life of the Church, and to the supreme pontifical authority which is its strength, have been battling for three months against the old Gallicanism, modern rationalism and a wicked spirit of independence. The chiefs of this triple school have rallied a hundred men of different types, without fixed principles, such as are found even in the ranks of the episcopate. The evident purpose of the council was to remedy the actually existing evils of society by exposing and striking at the numerous errors which have overrun it since the council of Trent, to tighten again the bonds of discipline and to strengthen the unity of the Church by affirming more distinctly and more solemnly than ever the supreme authority of its head. The last purpose was particularly hateful to the opposition, which is in reality nothing more than the revolutionary element introduced into the Church. According to the order of matters to be discussed, the question of pontifical authority was not to have been presented until towards the end of the council The password, today perfectly well known, has been to drag out the discussion, opposing everything, multiplying speeches without end, wearying the patience of the majority, which had counted on a council of only three or four months, putting half of the fathers to the necessity of returning to their dioceses, coercing the Holy Father, whose exhausted treasury cannot for long pay all the expenses of the more than 300 bishops who are his responsibility, to prorogue the council--a prorogation which would be the equivalent of a miscarriage. This plan has been followed, and after three months, not a question has been settled, not a Decree formulated.

That is not all. The very pronounced stream of aspirations of the immense majority of the clergy and faithful has been calling for a Definition of the Dogma of infallibility. To lead opinion astray, the academician Gratry, Oratorian of the drawing-rooms, has let loose to counteract this stream, and has already published and distributed gratis by the hundred thousand, 4 pamphlets in which the historical lies, the most brazen falsifications, the blasphemies, the insults to the Roman Curia are prodigious.

The impious writings of this madman, worthy of Luther, have been judicially condemned and censured by 13 Archbishops and Bishops of France, but they are rightly honored by the applause of the liberal and atheist press, by the encouragement of the [two words illegible] purveyors of insults, Montalembert and de Falloux, and by the unfortunate letters of congratulations of the Croat Strossmayer and the Bishop of St.-Brieuc, which the press has printed in full, &tc., the reading of which has drawn tears from the Holy Father. Yielding to our repeated requests, the Most Holy Father, who had declared that he did not wish to take the initiative in the matter of a Decree for the definition of infallibility, has had it drawn up and distributed to the residence of each of the fathers, subject to study and written observations within ten days, which expire on the 18th, the vigil of St. Joseph. However, the calendar of business adopted would demand that ten other [ schemata ] take precedence over it. We are now pressing to have it declared urgent and that it have precedence, so that it may be voted before Easter. We await the result.

There is a great deal of talk that the French government would intervene to prevent a definition of the doctrinal infallibility of the Holy See. The fact is, that pressure of this type has been asked for by some Gallican prelates. For myself, I don't believe it. Whether the pope is or is not subject to error in matters of doctrine concerning faith and morals is indeed the last concern of the present ministry. It is much more concerned about decrees which would affirm the imprescriptable rights of the Church over the education of its children and their matrimonial unions. It is likewise probable that in a few days the doors of the council will open to a representative of the cabinet of the Tuileries. They speak of M. De Broglie, whose liberal opinions are known to you. Look at where we stand. You see that we move slowly. Many complain at this slowness, but I bless God for it. It cannot have for its effect but to bring into focus the wounds from which the Church suffers, and to throw a great light on serious questions. Rome does not move quickly, because He of the all-powerful word to whom it owes its past of eighteen centuries has also given it the future.

After a recess of two weeks at Easter, the council will resume its work, to finish by the feast of St. Peter. We can say that the most difficult part is done, each one of us having worked on the decrees and formulas, of which the last on the list have as their object modern dances, loss of souls and the shameless theatres which make (illegible) the corruptions of paganism.

Martin concluded his letter by telling Perché that he would unfortunately have to leave Rome within the week, since he had to think of the needs of his diocese. However, he concluded, "to the edifice which is rising, I have brought my humble stone." ¹²²

Bishop Martin was obviously strongly partisan, and his letter is a good example of the attitude of the extreme infallibilists, but it also summarizes the facts of the situation. The long debates had been barren of tangible results, however much they had contributed to a deeper understanding of the manifold problems of the Church and of the opinions of others within the Church. The broad gap between opposing sides which Spalding had sought to bridge had grown wider, and any sort of compromise seemed out of reach. Discussion of infallibility was inevitable. The only question that remained was whether the definition could be made without causing a schism in the Church. It was with thoughts such as these that the fathers began their threeweek vacation on February 22.

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122 UND, Perché Papers, Martin to Perché, Rome, March 12, 1870. On Gratry, see Granderath, II, 2, 191-217; Ollivier, II, 49-64; Aubert, Pontificat de Pie IX, pp. 344-5.
Auguste-Alphonse Gratry had left the Congregation of the Oratory ten years previous to the council.
Dupanloup, Strossmayer and Bishop Augustin David of St.-Brieuc encouraged him in his polemical exchange with Archbishop Dechamps and Abbot Prosper Guéranger of Solesmes. Of the others mentioned by Martin, Count Charles de Montalembert and Count Frédéric de Falloux had both encouraged the ex-Oratorian, while Duke Jacques-Albert-Victor de Broglie was an associate of Montalembert. For the French government's attitude, see Ollivier, II, 87-242.

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THE FIRST COUNCIL OF THE VATICAN: THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

THE FIRST COUNCIL OF THE VATICAN:
THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE