The American clergy, originally reluctant to request…
September 1789 CE
The election of Samuel Seabury (1729–1796) in 1783 as the first Anglican bishop in the United States had shown that Americans had accepted the appointment of a Protestant bishop.
The American clergy had received the assurances of the Continental Congress that it would not object to election of a bishop whose allegiance was to Rome.
On November 26, 1784, the Holy See established the Apostolic Prefecture of the United States.
John Carroll, as Prefect Apostolic in February 1785, had urged Cardinal Antonelli to create a method of appointing church authorities that would not make it appear as if they were receiving their appointment from a foreign power.
A report of the status of Catholics in Maryland is appended to his letter, where he states that despite there being only nineteen priests in Maryland, some of the more prominent families are still Catholic in faith.
He does say that they may be prone to dancing and novel-reading.
The pope is so pleased with Carroll's report that he grants his request "that the priests in Maryland be allowed to suggest two or three names from which the Pope would choose their bishop".
The priests of Maryland petition Rome for a bishop for the United States.
Cardinal Antonelli replies, allowing the priests to select the city for a cathedral and, for this case only, to name the candidate for presentation to the pope.
Carroll had been selected Bishop of Baltimore by the clergy of the United States in April 1789 by a vote of twenty-four out of twenty-six.
On November 6, 1789, Pope Pius VI in Rome approves the election, naming Carroll the first Catholic bishop in the newly independent United States.
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