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Riley was best known in the 1920s for defending the Bible and attacking Darwinians.
Riley was best known in the 1920s for defending the Bible and attacking Darwinians.
When Riley started preaching anti-Semitism, his fellow Fundamentalist preachers rejected and denounced his position.<ref> Trollinger, ''God's Empire'' (1991) [http://books.google.com/books?id=DE-HQpppDd8C&pg=PA78&dq=fundamentalism+anti-semitism&lr=&as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=&num=30&as_brr=0&as_pt=ALLTYPES online pages 77-79] </ref>
Although the fundamentalist drive of the 1920s to take control of the major Protestant denominations failed at the national level, the network of churches and missions developed and controlled by William Bell Riley indicates that fundamentalism was very strong regionally. Riley's "empire" was organized around the Northwestern Bible and Missionary Training School in Minneapolis, which expanded to include a seminary, annual bible conference, a monthly magazine, and eventually to control the Minnesota Baptist Convention. Both rural and urban in character, the flourishing movement acted as a denominational surrogate and aimed at a militant orthodoxy of evangelical Christianity. Centralized in the person of Riley, however, it was unable to survive his death in 1947.<ref> William Vance Trollinger, Jr. "Riley's Empire: Northwestern Bible School and Fundamentalism in the Upper Midwest". ''Church History'' 1988 57(2): 197-212. 0009-6407 </ref>
In the 1920s Riley was involved in the anti-evolution movement and became a leader in the World Christian Fundamental Association which retained [[William Jennings Bryan]] in the [[Scopes Trial]] of 1925.
Riley led the opposition to the teaching of evolution in Minnesota schools. He sponsored speeches by William Jennings Bryan in the Twin Cities in 1922. His anti-evolution bill was decisively defeated in the Minnesota state legislature in 1927. Riley's chief target was the University of Minnesota, of which the students and president, Lotus Delta Coffman (1875-1938), provided the most effective opposition to Riley’s proposed anti-evolution law. Their resistance, based on the issue of academic freedom, together with lack of support for Riley's campaign from denominations other than the Baptists and from the general public, doomed the anti-evolution measure. Nevertheless, Minnesota came closer than any other northern State to passing such a law.<ref> Ferenc M. Szasz, "William B. Riley and the Fight against Teaching of Evolution in Minnesota." ''Minnesota History'' 1969 41(5): 201-216. 0026-5497 </ref>
Riley influenced [[Billy Graham]], to whom he turned over his schools in 1947.
Riley wrote 60 books and numerous articles arguing that the Bible was verbally infallible and was an explicit revelation of God to man. Riley's lasting contribution has been in his influence on Graham, the World Christian Fundamental Association, and the conservative nature of Minnesota Baptists.
When Riley started preaching anti-Semitism in the 1930s, his fellow Fundamentalist preachers rejected and denounced his position.<ref> Trollinger, ''God's Empire'' (1991) [http://books.google.com/books?id=DE-HQpppDd8C&pg=PA78&dq=fundamentalism+anti-semitism&lr=&as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=&num=30&as_brr=0&as_pt=ALLTYPES online pages 77-79] </ref>
==References==
==Further reading==
* William V. Trollinger, ''God's Empire: William Bell Riley and Midwestern Fundamentalism'' (1991) [http://books.google.com/books?id=DE-HQpppDd8C&pg=PA78&dq=fundamentalism+anti-semitism&lr=&as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=&num=30&as_brr=0&as_pt=ALLTYPES excerpts and text search]
* William V. Trollinger, ''God's Empire: William Bell Riley and Midwestern Fundamentalism'' (1991) [http://books.google.com/books?id=DE-HQpppDd8C&pg=PA78&dq=fundamentalism+anti-semitism&lr=&as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=&num=30&as_brr=0&as_pt=ALLTYPES excerpts and text search]
===Primary sources===
* Trollinger, William Vance, Jr., ed. ''The Antievolution Pamphlets of William Bell Riley.'' (Creationism in Twentieth-Century America: A Ten-Volume Anthology of Documents, 1903-1961. Vol. 4.) New York: Garland, 1995. 221 pp.
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==See also==
==See also==