Book Review

Canada and the United States

Wayne Flynt has produced a well-researched history of Baptists in the deep South. More precisely, it is the story of the Baptist groups that aligned with the Alabama Baptist State Convention. Since 1823, the convention has sent missionaries throughout the state, sustained denominational higher education, administered such benevolent undertakings as orphanages and hospitals, and supported the missionary operations of the Southern Baptist Convention. Black Baptists and Primitive Baptists are not in view in this book.	1
Flynt is industrious. The book's greatest strength is its extensive utilization of the published and manuscript sources by and about Alabama Baptists. The result is a thick description of Alabama Baptists. Flynt writes in a pleasing narrative style that at times runs folksy. He correctly looks beyond the centralized bureaucracy and examines such issues as the religious beliefs of the Baptists, the moral discipline exercised by their churches, their attitudes about race and gender, their political alignments, and their involvement in education and other social issues. The documentary evidence comes from clerical elites primarily, but Flynt notices the beliefs of many educated lay men and women as well as of some poorly educated clergy.	2
Flynt is at his best in his descriptions of Alabama Baptists' political views and activities from Reconstruction to the civil rights movement. His discussion of Baptist involvement in the Prohibition Party, the Farmers' Alliance, and the Populist Party is particularly informative. He shows that Baptists have often introduced politics into their churches and vice versa.	. . .