 William Smith was elected bishop of the Maryland diocese, but the Bishop of London refused to consecrate Smith.Unable to obtain consecration of their clergy from the Church of England, representatives from nine dioceses already organized met in Philadelphia in 1789 to form an independent Anglican church in America and to ratify a constitution for its governance.In 1789 the Anglican congregations in nine states adopted the name of the "Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America" as their name and formally separated themselves from the Church of England.