“_Resolved_, That the efficiency of said pastorates can be best promoted by distinct conference organizations, and that therefore the bishops be, and they are hereby, authorized to organize among our colored ministers, for the benefit of our colored members and population, mission conferences—one or more—where, in their godly judgment, the exigencies of the work may demand it, and, should more than one be organized, to determine their boundaries until the meeting of the next General Conference, said conference or conferences to possess all the powers usual to mission annual conferences: _Provided_, that nothing in this resolution be so construed as to impair the existing constitutional rights of our colored members on the one hand, or to forbid, on the other, the transfer of white ministers to said conference or conferences where it may be practicable and deemed necessary. “3. _Resolved_, That our General Missionary Committee be requested to take into careful consideration the condition of our colored people, and should conferences be organized among them, make to them—consistently with other demands upon its funds—such appropriations as may be essential to success.” Annual or mission conferences being composed of traveling preachers, it was necessary that some colored local preachers be admitted into the traveling connection before they could be formed into a conference, which gave rise to a question upon which the same committee made a report, which was adopted, as follows (Jour. 1864, p. 253): “We, the committee to whom this subject was finally referred, beg leave to report that we are not aware of any legal obstacle to the reception of colored preachers into our annual conferences.” This General Conference at a later day made more specific and direct provision for the Delaware and Washington Conferences in the following resolution (Jour. 1864, p. 263): “The Washington Conference shall embrace Western Maryland, the District of Columbia, Virginia, and the territory south. “The Delaware Conference shall embrace the territory north and east of the Washington Conference. “_Resolved_, That in order to constitute the first conferences of colored members, the rule of Discipline requiring a probation of two years, be so far suspended as to allow the bishops to organize into one or more annual conferences such colored local elders as have traveled two or more years under a presiding elder, and shall be recommended by a quarterly conference, and by at least ten elders who are members of an annual conference.” The Delaware Conference was organized July 28, 1864, and the Washington Conference October 27, 1864. It will be noted that “the constitutional rights of our colored members” were recognized, as well as the difficulties of incorporating the work.