As previously stated, COGIC although predominately black, had a significant white membership during its first decade of existence, with a number of white ministers holding leadership positions in the church. However, after a meeting in Hot Springs, Arkansas that led to the founding of the Assemblies of God, the white constituency of COGIC continued to decline, until it was almost nonexistent by the 1930s. During World War I, the FBI opened a file on Bishop Mason and conducted surveillance on him because of his pacifism during the war. Bishop Mason taught COGIC members against going to war, but more so he was against African-American men being called to fight a war overseas for freedom and then coming home and being treated as second-class citizens and being lynched, even in their uniforms, because of racism.