Advocating but not enforcing ideas as creed

“In churches and revolutionary movements, schism has historically begun with a controversy over heretical ideals and reached a climax on matters of organizational discipline as one side tried to impose its beliefs upon the other as a condition of membership.  In the cause of the abolition movement, Garrison insisted on the right to advocate his ideas but no attempt to enforce them as a creed.  His opponents, however found both his principles and his advocacy so threatening that they tried to drive him from the organizations, or failing that, to found new and more restrictive ones for themselves.  The ostensible issues in 1839 -1840 were perfectionism, political action, and the participation of women, and Garrison’s antagonists maneuvered to use each as a weapon against him in the AAS meetings.  Underlying the substantial ideological differences there lay the questions of how much agitation any cause could sustain and whether the movement was in fact subject to any kind of central discipline or control. ”  (Henry Mayer, All on Fire, pg. 261)