Protestors at Montgomery Bell

At least 67 Cumberland Presbyterian pastors were among over 300 Tennessee faith leaders who denounced both the ideology of the New Century Foundation and the location of its annual meeting, Montgomery Bell State Park near Burns, Tennessee. For Cumberland Presbyterians the park is particularly significant as it surrounds the approximate 5.25 acre historic site where the denomination was founded in 1810.

The New Century Foundation has been described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as “a self-styled think tank that promotes pseudo-scientific studies and research that purport to show the inferiority of Blacks to whites—although in hifalutin language that avoids open racial slurs and attempts to portray itself as serious scholarship.”

Approximately 20 anti-white supremacy protestors marched at the park on the Saturday morning, November 19, 2022. An estimated 150 officers, both Tennessee Park Rangers and State Police secured the area of the park’s lodge, where the New Century Foundation meeting took place. Protestors were not allowed access to the lodge and New Century Foundation members did not leave the lodge. At no time did the New Century Foundation attempt to use or even visit the Cumberland Presbyterian Birthplace Shrine.

Police presence was reportedly slip in the area where the protesters were allowed. In fact, they allegedly allowed members of the Proud Boys into the protest area, where one of the alleged Proud Boys subsequently took a baton and bloodied one of the protestors’ heads. It took some time before the police arrived at the protest area from the checkpoint to address the matter.

©Tennessean