View source for Methodist Church, South

===African Americans===
After the [[American Civil War]] many African American Methodists in the south left the Methodist Episcopal Church, South and joined either the [[African Methodist Episcopal Church]], the [[African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church]], or the [[Methodist Episcopal Church]].  Out of 200,000 African American members in 1860 there in 1866 remained only 49,000, and most of them split off on friendly terms in 1870 to form the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church, now the [[Christian Methodist Episcopal Church]], taking with them $1.5 million in buildings and properties. The new denomination avoided the [[Radical Republican]] [[politics]] of the AME and AMEZ churches. It had over 3000 churches, over 1200 traveling preachers, 2500 local preachers, about 140,000 members, and 22 Annual Conferences, presided over by four bishops.