Gibbons, James Cardinal (1834–1921)

As the archbishop of Baltimore, James Cardinal Gibbons was the nominal leader of the Catholic Church in the United States from 1877 to 1921. In this capacity, he was a bridge between Roman Catholicism and American Catholic values. Gibbons also led the reform of American Catholic education from a defensive reaction to the Protestant-oriented common schools of the 19th century into a value-based response to the secular public education system of the 20th century.

Born in Baltimore in July of 1834, Gibbons was taken by his parents to Ireland in 1837. He returned to the United States 10 years later and spent the next 8 years as a grocer in New Orleans. In 1855, he entered a seminary in Baltimore and became a priest in 1861. He rose through the ranks of the Church quickly and by 1868 he was the youngest bishop in the United States. After short stays in North Carolina and Virginia, Gibbons was elevated to be archbishop of Baltimore in 1877.

Gibbons assumed a leadership role in the reform of parochial education as the presiding prelate at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1884. The Council decrees clearly advocated the need for parish schools, but stopped short of condemning Catholic parents who sent their children to public schools.

Gibbons's most prominent role in the history of the Catholic education reform movement came in 1891 when he defended collaborative educational experiments in Faribault and Stillwater, Minnesota. Much to the dismay of conservative bishops, Gibbons refused to condemn public education and encouraged efforts to find a common ground between the two systems.

In fact, Gibbons defended Archbishop John Ireland's efforts to develop specific plans for cooperative schools in those two Minnesota communities and obtained official approval for Ireland's plans from the Vatican. On education, as on other social issues, Gibbons sought ways of harmonizing the tenets of the Catholic faith with the principles of American democracy.

After more than a year of consideration, the pope acknowledged the fundamental righteousness of the school legislation of the plenary [Page 406]councils of Baltimore, but noted that the Faribault Plan could be “tolerated.” The statement was careful not to offend either liberals or conservatives, with the intention of ending the conflict. Unfortunately, the conflict had gone too far and both sides claimed victory after the statement was made public.

The conservatives claimed that Gibbons had misinformed the pope about the condition of the Church in the United States. The pope responded with a plea for unity and a call for the bishops to work together for public funding for denominational institutions.

Gibbons was in total agreement with the pope in calling for an end to the controversy. The cardinal was a realist, however. He knew that neither faction would accept such a neutral statement. Matters continued to deteriorate during the summer of 1892, and it was clear to Gibbons that school reform would again be the main topic of discussion at the upcoming November 1892 conference of the American archbishops.

But the conservatives were in no mood to find common ground and resisted proposals made by the Vatican. The pope's personal representative, Archbishop Francis Satolli, proposed that the American hierarchy “tolerate” the enrollment of Catholic children in public schools. The proposal was met with stony silence.

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