[336]
CHAPTER III.
FROM THE FOUNDATION OF NAUVOO TO THE DEATH
OF THE PROPHET. 1839-1844.
HOSPITALITY IN ILLINOIS TO THE FUGITIVES. -- JOURNEY OF THE
PROPHET TO WASHINGTON. -- FOUNDATION OF NAUVOO. --
WONDERFUL PROSPERITY. -- JUDICIAL PROCEEDINGS AGAINST THE
PROPHET. -- THE PROPHET APPOINTED GENERAL OF MILITIA. -- HE IS
A CANDIDATE FOR THE PRESIDENCY OF THE UNITED STATES. -- HIS
ELECTORAL ADDRESS. -- PROSPERITY INTOXICATES HIM. -- LETTER
OF THE PROPHET TO HENRY CLAY. -- DESTRUCTION OF THE PRESSES
OF A NEWSPAPER. -- THE STORM WHICH FOLLOWS. -- JOSEPH AND
HIS BROTHER ASSASSINATED IN THE PRISON OF CARTHAGE. --
MOURNING AT NAUVOO. -- FUNERAL OF THE MARTYRS. --
CHARACTER OF JOSEPH SMITH.
The Mormons were exceedingly well received, on their arrival in Illinois,
by the inhabitants of Quincy, a small town situate on the banks of the
Mississippi. They were offered land a few miles to the north on that river,
on a site which had been fixed upon for a town to be called Commerce. The
situation was delightful, the temperature mild, the soil fertile, and adapted
to all kinds of produce.
[337]
Prairies stretched far away until lost in the distance. The new town, then
consisting of a few huts only, was built on undulating ground, which
skirted the left bank of the Father of Waters. Smith accepted the offer* made
him, and fixed the seat of the new Church at Commerce, hoping to be able
to find a resting-place for his wandering and persecuted divinities --
"Errantesque deos agitataque numina Trojae."
But, resolute in asserting his right as in enduring persecution, Smith
would not own himself vanquished, and, like all great characters, he was
indefatigable in demanding justice, so long as a chance of obtaining it
remained. On the 5th of May, at a conference, Rigdon was, at his suggestion,
commissioned to go to Washington, to lay before the President a statement
of their grievances. On the 14th of the same month, he wrote to the public
journals, which: had tried to give a false colouring to the events in
Missouri, by falsely declaring that he had attributed the persecutions
complained of to a particular political party: he entered his protest against
this insinuation, emphatically asserting that politics had nothing to do with
them, and that the responsibility rested on an infatuated populace, who
were in
_____________________
* On the 1st of May, 1839, Joseph, in the name of a committee of Mormons,
bought of Dr. Isaac Galland and of Hugh White, new land for a sum of
14,000 dollars. Dr. Galland, one of the principal landowners of the country,
exhibited from the beginning much sympathy with the newcomers; he was
baptized, and became an Elder; but his faith was not of very long duration.
[338]
all respects as much divided in political as in religious opinions. Ultimately,
he started himself, towards the close of the summer, for Washington, in
company with Rigdon, Elias Higbee, and P. O. Rockwell.* An anecdote is
related in connection with this journey, which does great honour to the
courage of the Prophet. The coach in which he had taken a place, and in
which were other passengers, members of Congress, was carried off at full
speed down a rapid descent, and a fearful accident was imminent. The
driver having been thrown off, Joseph contrived to get on the box, seized
the reins, and checked the horses. The travellers whom he had saved from
almost certain death, were enthusiastic in their praise of his cool
determination, and even went to the extent of saying that they would make
a motion in Congress for a reward to their intrepid fellow-traveller. It must
be added that, of course, when it was understood that their preserver was
the famous leader of the Mormons, they ceased to talk about a reward: party
spirit overcame all feeling of gratitude.
On his arrival at Washington, Smith and his friends at once immediately
waited on the President, Martin Van Buren, who received the Mormon
representatives with a good deal of stiffness. After listening with visible
impatience to the recital of their complaints, he said to them: --
_____________________
* P. O. Rockwell is the same person who subsequently acquired considerable
notoriety in the affair of an attempted assassination of Governor Boggs, of
which he was strongly suspected of having been one of the principal
instigators.
[339]
"Gentlemen, your cause is just, but I can do nothing for you. Were I to take
your part, I should lose the support of Missouri."
Congress, to which they shortly after appealed, did not prove more just or
more gracious. Like the President, it recognized the justice of their cause,
but declared that Missouri was an independent State, that they must apply
to the tribunals of that State, and that the business was no affair of the
federal government. Despite the ill-success of these efforts, the Mormons
would not give up yet: so powerful is the sense of right in this Anglo-
American race, and so persistent and irresistible the desire of having
recourse to every means of obtaining it! On returning to Nauvoo,* the new
name given to Commerce, Smith and his people drew up their legal
depositions on the Missouri affair for transmission to Washington, an they
preferred a claim to Congress for 1,381,044 dollars, as indemnity for the
losses they had suffered during the persecutions in Missouri. The claim
was not listened to. But as a final protest against the denial of justice, the
Saints officially complained, in one of their conferences, of the members of
Congress who, instructed to examine into their complaints, had reported
against them.
In spite of all this, the period of persecution through which the Mormons
had just passed, was not fruitless.
_____________________
* Nauvoo, in the language of-the Book of Mormon, means beautiful. "The
name of our city is of Hebrew origin, and signifies a beautiful site,
conveying besides an idea of repose." -- Proclamation of Joseph Smith,
the 15th of January, 1841.
[340]
The missionaries whom the Prophet had sent out to preach his doctrine
in England and various parts of America, had met with sympathy and with
proselytes. From all parts, even of the Old World, new-made converts
flocked to Nauvoo. On the 6th of June, 1840, a body of forty English
Mormons embarked at Liverpool to join the Saints in America. Dwellings
rose in the new city as if by enchantment. Commerce consisted of five or six
huts when the Mormons went to settle there in April, 1839. On the 1st of
June, 1840, it already consisted of two hundred and fifty houses. The land
was under cultivation, and the prairies were covered with cattle. Several
small settlements of Saints sprang up in the vicinity; among others,
Augusta and Zarahemla, on the opposite bank of the Mississippi, in the
State of Iowa, facing Nauvoo. This prosperity acted on certain apostates as
striking evidence of the truth of the creed they had forsaken, and brought
them back to better sentiments. Hence it was that W. W. Phelps wrote
Joseph a penitent letter, asking pardon, and returned to the bosom of the
Church, which received him like the prodigal son. Meantime, some
important conversions were made, the most notable of which was that of J.
C. Bennett, Quarter-master-general of the State of Illinois, who had shown
sympathy for the Mormons during the persecutions in Missouri. He was a
person of note, but, as will be seen hereafter, he turned out to be no great
acquisition to the Church which had received him in its fold.
[341]
Peace and harmony reigned in the new city, the prosperity of which the
neighbouring towns regarded without envy. But the constantly increasing
influx of emigrants called for extreme vigilance on the part of the
administration. Bad characters, as was indeed inevitable, had found their
way among the new population. Joseph took advantage of the circumstance
to solicit the legislature of Illinois to pass an act of incorporation for the
rising city. The charter was granted, with numerous privileges, which made
Nauvoo a kind of free city. He also obtained a charter for the establishment
of a university, and the power to form a special militia under the title of the
Legion of Nauvoo.
Joseph Smith's talent for administrative and political action, which is so
conspicuous in his history, did not remain inactive an instant. The charters
we have just mentioned belong to the end of the year 1840. On the 19th of
January, 1841, Joseph received a long revelation from the Lord, relative to
other wants of the city. The revelation commanded the people to erect a
magnificent temple, of which God himself would point out the site, and
would determine the dimensions and shape; also to build an hotel
(Nauvoo House) for the accommodation of strangers, -- to serve, moreover,
as a dwelling-house for Joseph, and his posterity in perpetuity;* it
confirmed Hyrum, the elder
_____________________
* A provisional residence had been hastily constructed for the Prophet,
called Nauvoo House. This he occupied with his family, keeping, at the
same time, an hotel for travellers whom curiosity or business attracted to
Nauvoo.
[342]
brother of the Prophet, in the patriarchate to which he had been nominated
after the death of his father; it nominated Brigham Young president of the
twelve apostles; it instituted the baptism of the dead, which could only be
valid on condition of being administered in the appointed temple.
Benedictions and reprimands were distributed according to merit or
demerit. Joseph was proclaimed President of the whole Church, Translator,
Revelator, Seer, and Prophet. The municipal council was instituted, and
John C. Bennett was elected mayor of Nauvoo. Joseph was made lieutenant-
general of the Legion, and Bennett major-general. Some time after, Joseph
formed an agricultural and industrial society, the statutes of which were
approved by the government of Illinois. He divided the city into four
quarters. He published a decree which proclaimed liberty of worship, and
the toleration of all religions, even Mohammedism, in the city of Nauvoo.
He regulated public meetings, he organized his legion, super-intended the
nomination of municipal officers, made regulations for the sale of
spirituous liquors, etc. etc. No founder of a State ever displayed more
intelligence or activity. Project succeeded project, and every project was at
once carried into execution.
On the 6th April, 1841, Joseph reviewed his legion in the presence of a vast
concourse, which had gathered to witness the imposing ceremony. The
legion consisted of more than fourteen hundred men. The foundation-
stone of
[343]
the temple was laid with great ceremony. Joseph blessed the stone, which
was understood to represent the general presidency of the Church; the
president of the high-priests blessed the second; the president of the great
council the third; the president of the bishops the fourth. These four stones
each occupied one of the angles of the projected church. At the termination
of the April conference, numerous baptisms took place in the waters of the
Mississippi. Finally, some of the Saints, chosen less for their piety than for
their aptitude for the high mission confided to them, were sent forth to
preach the new doctrine.
This bright sky, however, was occasionally chequered with clouds. In
Missouri the storm threatened to gather again, and to extend itself over
Illinois. On the 5th of June, Governor Carlin, in other respects well disposed
towards Joseph, caused him to be arrested on the requisition of the
Governor of Missouri. He was required to meet the charge of murder,
treason, etc., which still hung over him. This caused deep affliction among
all his people. But it was of no great duration; their Prophet was restored to
them in a few days. Arrested on the 6th of June, l841, he entered Nauvoo*
on the 10th, amid the acclamations of the faithful,
_____________________
* It is true, all this had to be done over again the following year. A person,
generally believed to have been Porter O. Rockwell, the friend of the
Prophet, had, on the 6th of May, 1842, fired a pistol at the Governor of
Missouri, Lilburn W. Boggs, the bitterest enemy of the Mormons. Joseph
was accused of the crime, and thought it most advisable to seek
[344]
The resentment of the Missourians, however, still continued; for it is not
in the Old World alone that the poet may exclaim, --
"Tant de fiel entre-t-il dans l'ame des devots!"
Within Nauvoo itself subjects of dissension were ever arising. In a circle
full of such conflicting elements, many bad passions were secretly at work
in the dark, or bursting forth in open day. The mayor, J. C. Bennett, was
foremost among the elements of trouble. Smith had long entertained
suspicions of his hostility, but had as yet no proof against him. While
reviewing, on the 7th of May, 1842, his legion, then two thousand strong, he
got certain evidence that the mayor not only aimed at his authority, but at
his life. However, he took no steps against him; but Bennett, being shortly
after convicted, together with some other residents, of an immoral course of
life, was ejected from office, and so deprived of the power of causing any
more annoyance. But this wars not the only difficulty. The Prophet himself
was the subject of all kinds of accusations. It was alleged that he preached an
immoral doctrine respecting women; and some even went the length of
saying that he countenanced the robberies committed by some of the Saints.
He found it necessary to justify himself against the first charge, which was
easily accomplished,
_____________________
safety in flight from the rancour of his enemies; but by the advice of
Thomas Ford, the Governor of Illinois, he appeared at Springfield before
Judge Pope, and easily proved an alibi.
[345]
no proof being brought against him; and in respect of the second, to declare
that he would proceed against thieves, whoever they might be, with the
utmost rigour. Then again, from time to time appeared disputants and
rivals, who affected to possess, like Joseph, the gift of revelation and
prophecy, and he was compelled to have recourse to censures and
expulsion; extreme measures, which excited animosity, and shook the
Church.
However, on the whole, these incidents, grave though they were, did not
obstruct the prosperity of the new settlement. The excommunications were
amply compensated by the success of the missionaries in the United States
and in England,* and by the return within the fold of old members, such as
Orson Hyde and W. W. Phelps, who, having been cut off from the Church
by exclusion or apostasy, had shown great anxiety at this period to find
favour again with the Prophet. Indeed, the energy and ability he displayed
overcame all obstacles. Public censor, dispenser of rewards and
punishments, high-priest, administrator, and frequently chief-justice, he
proved equal to every part, and successfully faced every difficulty. His
superiority, acknowledged by all, ensured him the confidence and
sympathies of the faithful, on which, indeed, he knew he could count. In a
conference on the 6th of April,
_____________________
* Although Mormonism had not been preached in Great Britain until 1837,
it numbered, in 1845, over 10,000 followers, with a weekly periodical styled
the 'Millennial Star,' which was founded in May 1840, and is still in
existence.
[346]
1843, respecting the construction of Nauvoo House, finding an opportunity
of asking his people if they were satisfied with him and his administration,
or whether they desired another president, they answered him as one man,
that they were perfectly satisfied with him, and entreated him to remain in
the post he so admirably filled. Such was the high value placed upon his
services.
The year 1843 thus commenced under favourable auspices. The tempest in
Missouri still growled at a distance; but they were now accustomed to it, and
it no longer gave them any serious uneasiness. Nauvoo had considerably
increased in the last three years;* it already contained
_____________________
* Among the infidels who made part of the population of Nauvoo, were
speculators who, foreseeing that the city would soon be obliged to extend its
boundaries, had, at a low price, purchased the unoccupied lands, in the
vicinity, in the hope of selling them back to the Mormons at an enormous
profit. Their anticipations were quickly realized, and Joseph had some
difficulty in obtaining the land he required at a reasonable price. It is stated,
-- but the fact, although very possible, is not proved -- that the Prophet
brought these speculators to their senses by means as simple as ingenuous.
Three Mormons were ordered to visit one of these land-speculators, resided
with him, followed him wherever he went like his shadow, never opened
their mouths, remained insensible to every insult, and with the utmost
gravity passed their time whittling. It is stated, that after three days of this
kind of annoyance, the most intractable speculators yielded at discretion.
Whittling consists in chipping up wood with a knife. This pastime is very
much in vogue in the States. It is not unusual to meet on the high-road,
and even indoors, with Yankees busy whittling, while engaged on business
or in conversation. Even in Congress, senators have been seen keeping up
their energy by this whittling. When by any accident they run short of bits of
wood, they apply themselves to furniture or posts We have seen, in St.
Louis, the wood pillars of a public building almost entirely cut through by
this American habit.
[347]
more than two thousand houses. The activity of the people equaled that of
their leader. Commerce was flourishing, products easily exchanged by
means of the numerous steamers which threaded the Mississippi. The
Prophet himself owned a steamer called 'The Maid of Iowa,' which was
employed for him and the Church. The temple was getting on; it was
already of a considerable height; and the building of Nauvoo House was
also proceeding vigorously. Neither was the drill of the legion neglected. On
the 6th of May, 1843, Smith reviewed it with great ceremony, accompanied
by twelve ladies, with Emma his wife at their head, and was exceedingly
satisfied with its proficiency and soldierly appearance.
However, the hatred of Missouri did not subside, and the security in which
they were wrapped turned out, as we have seen, sadly delusive. By the
instigation of J. C. Bennett, who, since his exclusion from the Church, had
constituted himself, as it were, the ex officio adversary of the Mormons and
their Prophet, attempts were made, about the beginning of June, to surprise
Joseph, and bring him up before the Governor of Missouri. He contrived on
that occasion to avoid the snare; but on the 23rd of the month, being on a
visit at Dixon, he was arrested on the requisition of the Governor of
Missouri, by two officers of justice, one of whom belonged to the State of
Illinois. On receiving tidings of this arrest, the Nauvoo legion put itself in
movement to go and deliver their General. This
[348]
mark of affection touched the Prophet, and filled him with pride; but he did
not need the assistance thus offered him. He cleverly contrived to get his
case brought before the court at Nauvoo, which, by a writ of habeas corpus,
for a while secured him from his enemies.
It was about this period that the idea of polygamy, which had been for some
time covertly entertained, and the first premonitory indications of which
we have already noticed, began to emerge from obscurity and to exhibit
itself with considerable openness. On the 12th of July, 1843, Joseph received,
in the presence of Hyrum Smith and of Clayton, if we are to believe him,
his famous revelation respecting polygamy, the starting-point of that
institution. The concubinage of the patriarchs had always struck him, and
he resolved at last to make a clean breast of it. He had therefore appealed to
God, who had answered, "Do the works of Abraham.... If a man espouse ten
virgins, who are given him by the law (the Mormon revealed law), he
cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him; therefore is he justified. Let
my daughter Emma receive all those who have been bestowed upon
my servant Joseph; and who are virtuous in my sight."
Hyrum was charged to read this revelation to Emma, the Prophet's first
wife, who, as will be seen hereafter, was not much edified by it.
A few days afterwards, Joseph preached, but with some reserve, upon this
delicate subject, and intimated that he
[349]
could not yet make known all that concerned it, on account of the ignorance
and incredulity of the people.
This revelation would prove, did we require it, that Joseph at that time
practised polygamy, despite Emma's repugnance to the new dogma. It is
certain that about that period he had several wives; the Mormons make no
secret of it, but they do not know the precise period at which he first began
this practice or the number of his wives.
However this may be, the affairs of the Church continued to prosper.
Joseph estimated that, in the various quarters of the earth where his religion
had been preached, he had over a hundred and fifty thousand followers.
There have been few founders of religions who, at the end of thirteen years
have been able to boast a similar result. How could such success fail to raise
the confidence of the new Prophet? Hence he feared neither discussion
nor comparison, and readily allowed the ministers of various sects to
preach their doctrines in his capital. And remarkably enough, far from this
tolerance doing him harm or alienating his adherents, it would seem as
though it had been expressly done in the interest of the new religion, for the
number of conversions increased daily. Were these conversions, whether
made on the spot or elsewhere, all sincere? There is reason for doubt, and it
is certain that to many they were but a means of fortune or
aggrandizement,. We will merely cite one example in support of this view.
A namesake of the first mayor of Nauvoo (the apostate
[350]
J. C. Bennett), General J. A. Bennett, of New York, had been baptized at Long
Island by Brigham Young in the end of August. Less than two months after,
he wrote to Joseph Smith, asking him to support him as a candidate for the
post of Governor of Illinois, and proposing to become his right hand.
"Joseph," according to him, "was the most extraordinary man of his time, a
new Mohammed, as superior to the old one as he was to Moses." Joseph
was not duped by all this flattery. He sent him a long answer, interlarded,
according to a habit he had recently adopted, with quotations in several
languages, but full of ability and acuteness, wherein, without discouraging
the zeal of his admirer, he gives him to understand that he quite sees into
the secret motives which had brought him over to his new faith.
Meantime, the prosperous state of his spiritual and temporal matters
revived the idea of once again claiming damages, with interest, for the
losses caused to his people by the persecutions in Missouri. To attain his
end with greater certainty, he conceived the idea of securing the support of
the successful candidate for the Presidency. Five candidates were in the
field, John Calhoun, General Lewis Cass, Richard M. Johnson, Henry Clay,
and Martin Van Buren. On the 4th of November, 1843, he wrote to each of
them. He asked them what, in the event of their standing, would be the line
of policy they would follow with respect to the Mormons, considered as a
separate people; and at the same time informed them that he would secure
[351]
the votes of all his followers in favour of the candidate who would
undertake to protect their rights.
He did not stop here. On the 28th of November he addressed a memorial
to the federal government upon the subject of the persecutions in Missouri,
claiming reparation for the losses inflicted on the Mormons in that State, in
defiance of all justice, in 1838 and 1839. Further, he made an appeal 'to the
Children of the Green Mountains' (Vermont, his native place), begging
them to come forward and back the protests of his people against the
barbarous usage they had received from Missouri. This document is rather
curious from the fact of its containing quotations in seventeen languages.
He also advised his brethren in the different States to make similar appeals
to their local legislatures. The only one among these petitions worthy of
notice is that which Sidney Rigdon (who still remained a Mormon at all
hazards, although Joseph had withdrawn his confidence from him)
addressed to the State of Pennsylvania, where he was born. He set forth
with undoubted ability the grievances the Mormons had against Missouri,
and their just grounds of complaint. "The only reason why the people of
Missouri," he said, "have thus persecuted the Mormons, is because the
latter having violated no law, no law could be. enforced against them, and
they were thus reduced to taking it into their own hands."
The municipal council of Nauvoo, completely at Smith's disposal, was not
behindhand. It addressed a petition
[352]
to the federal Congress, claiming the rights, powers, privileges, and
immunities of a Territory, until such time as Missouri should make
reparation. It requested, moreover, that the mayor of Nauvoo should be
empowered to call in the troops of the Union, if need were, to keep the
peace and protect the unoffending.
All this agitation met with but slight success. The answers of the five
candidates for the Presidency were evasive or unsatisfactory. Wounded
probably in his pride as prophet and popular leader, he suddenly conceived
the idea of setting up himself for the Presidency. On the 7th of February,
1844, he accordingly issued an address to the people of the United States
with this title," Views on the powers and policy of the United States
Government." His political programme, modelled on the democratic views
of Jefferson, included among other things, -- free trade, the protection of
person and property, etc.; the diminution by two-thirds of the members of
Congress, and the reduction of their salary; the diminution of public
functionaries, of their pay, and jurisdiction; the liberation of convicts from
the penitentiaries; the reform of the penal code; the substitution of
profitable labour for other penalties; the transformation of prisons into
schools; the abolition of slavery,* with reasonable indemnity to the owners;
the
_____________________
* Although Joseph preached the abolition of slavery, he by no means
intended to raise the Negroes to an equality with the white man. The very
day after the publication of his manifesto, he tried and condemned two
Negroes who had intended to intermarry with two white women.
[353]
abolition of martial law as applicable to deserters (inasmuch as honour
alone should be the guiding principle of all men); the penalty of death to be
confined to murder; the creation of a national bank with branches for each
State or Territory, the annexation, if required, of Oregon, Texas, Canada,
Mexico; and even of all the nations of the earth.
This document appears to us worthy of being given at full length;
independent of its historical value, it is interesting to us as furnishing us
with some idea of the moral worth of Joseph Smith, of the spirit which
inspired his policy and, possibly, contributed to the popularity of his
religious opinions: --
"Nauvoo, Illinois, 7th of February, 1844.
"VIEW OF THE POWERS AND POLICY OP THE GOVERNMENT OF
THE UNITED STATES.
"Born in a land of liberty, and breathing an air uncorrupted with the
sirocco of barbarous climes, I ever feel a double anxiety for the happiness of
all men, both in time and in eternity. My cogitations like Daniel's, have for
a long time troubled me, when I viewed the condition of men throughout
the world, and more especially in this boasted realm, where the Declaration
of Independence "horde these truth" to be self evident; that all men are
created equal: that they are endowed by their Creator, with certain
unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness," but at the same time, some two or three millions of people are
held as slaves for life, because the spirit in them is covered with a darker
skin than ours: and hundreds of our own kindred for an infraction,
[354]
or supposed infraction of some over wise statute, have to be incarcerated in
dungeon glooms, or suffer the more moral penitentiary gravitation of
mercy in a nut-shell, while the duellist, the debauchee, and the defaulter for
millions, and other criminals, take the uppermost rooms at feasts, or, like
the bird of passage find a more congenial clime by flight.
"The wisdom, which ought to characterize the freest, wisest, and most
noble nation of the nineteenth century, should, like the sun in his meridian
of her splendor, warm every object beneath its rays: and the main efforts
officers, who are nothing more or less than the servants of the people,
ought to be directed to ameliorate the condition of all: black or white, bond
or free; for the best of books says, "God hath made of one blood all nations
of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth."
"Our common country presents to all men the same advantages; the same
facilities; the same prospects; the same honors; and the same rewards: and
without hypocrisy, the Constitution when it says, 'We, the people of the
United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice,
ensure tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general
welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do
ordain and establish this Constitution for the United states of America,'
meant just what it said, without reference to color or condition:
ad infinitum.
"The aspirations and expectations of a virtuous people, environed
with so wise so liberal, so deep, so broad and so high a charter of equal
rights, as appears in said constitution, ought to be treated by those to
whom the administration of the laws are intruded, with as much sanctity,
as the prayers of the saints are treated in heaven, that love, confidence and
union, like the sun, moon and stars should bear witness,
[355]
"(For ever singing as they shine,)
'The hand that made us is divine!'
"Unity is power, and when I reflect on the importance of it to the stability
of all governments, I am astounded at the silly moves of persons and parties.
to foment discord in order to ride into power on the current of popular
excitement; nor am I less surprised at the stretches of power, or restrictions
of right, which too often appear as acts of legislators, to pave the, way to
some favorite political schemes, as destitute of intrinsic merit, as a wolfÕs
heart is of the milk of human kindness: a Frenchman would say, 'Presque
tout aimer richesses et pouvoir;' (Almost all men like wealth and power.)
"I must dwell on this subject longer then others, for nearly one hundred
years ego that golden patriot, Benjamin Franklin drew up a plan of union
for the then colonies of Great Britain that now are such an independent
nation, which among many wise provisions for obedient children under
their fathers more rugged hand, -- thus: 'they have power to make laws, and
lay and levy such general duties, imports, or taxes, as to them shall appear
most equal and just, -- (considering the ability and other circumstances of
the inhabitants in the several colonies,) and such as may be collected with
the least inconvenience to the people; rather discouraging luxury, than
loading industry with unnecessary burthens.' Great Britain surely lacked
the laudable humanity and fostering clemency to grant such a just plan of
union -- but the sentiment remains like the land that honored its birth as a
pattern for wise men to study the convenience of the people more than
the comfort of the Cabinet.
"And one of the most noble fathers of our freedom and country's glory:
great in war, great in peace, great in the estimation
[356]
of the world, and great in the hearts of his countrymen, the illustrious
Washington, said in his first inaugural address to Congress: 'I hold the
surest pledges that as, on one side, no local prejudices or attachments, no
separate views or party animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and
equal eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of communities
and interest, so, on another, that the foundations of our national policy will
be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; and the
pre-eminence of free government be exemplifies by all the attributes which
can win the affections of its citizens and command the respect of the world.'
"Verily, here shines the virtue and the wisdom of a statesman in such
lucid rays that had every succeeding Congress followed the rich instruction,
in all their deliberations and enactments, for the benefits and convenience of
the whole community and the communities of which it is composed, no
sound of a rebellion in South Carolina; no rupture in Rhode Island; no mob
in Missouri, expelling her citizens by executive authority; corruption in
the ballot boxes; a border warfare between Ohio and Michigan: hard times
and distress: outbreak upon outbreak in the principal cities: murder, robbery,
and defalcations, scarcity of money, and a thousand other difficulties, would
have torn asunder the bonds of the union; destroyed the confidence of man;
and left the great body of the people to mourn over misfortunes in poverty,
brought on by corrupt legislation in an hour of proud vanity, for self
aggrandizement.
"The great Washington, soon after the foregoing faithful admonition for
the common welfare of his nation, further advised Congress that 'among
the many interesting objects which will engage your attention that of
providing for the common defence
[357]
will merit particular regard. To be prepared for war is one of the most
effectual means of preserving peace.' As the Italian would say: buono aviso,
(good advice.)
"The elder Adams in his inaugural address, gives national pride such a
grand turn of justification, that every honest citizen must look back upon
the infancy of the United States with an approving smile and rejoice, that
patriotism in the rulers, virtue in the people, and prosperity in the union,
once crowned the expectations of hope; unveiled the sophistry of the
hypocrite and silenced the folly of foes: Mr. Adams said 'If national pride is
ever justifiable, or excusable, it is when it springs not from power or riches,
grandeur or glory, but from conviction of national innocence, information
and benevolence.'
"There is no doubt such was actually the case with our young realm at the
close of the last century; peace, prosperity and union, filled the country with
religious toleration, temporal enjoyment and virtuous enterprize; and
gradually, too, when the deadly winter of the 'Stamp Act,' the 'Tea Act,' and
other close communion acts of royalty had choked the growth of freedom of
speech, liberty of the press, and liberty of conscience, did light, liberty and
loyalty flourish like the cedars of God.
"The respected and venerable Thomas Jefferson, in his inaugural address
made more than forty years ago, shows what a beautiful prospect an
innocent, virtuous nation presents to the sageÕs eye, where there is space for
enterprize: hand for industry; heads for heroes, and hears for moral
greatness. He said, 'A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land,
traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their industry, engaged
in commerce with nations who feel power and forget right, advancing
rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye; when
[358]
I contemplate these transcendent objects, and see the honor, the happiness,
and the hopes of this beloved country committed to the issue and the
auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation, and humble myself
before the magnitude of the undertaking.'
"Such a prospect was truly soul stirring to a good man, but 'since the
fathers have fallen asleep,' wicked and designing, men have unrobed the
government of its glory, and the people, if not in dust and ashes, or in sack
cloth, have to lament in poverty, her departed greatness: while demagogues
build fires in the north and south, east and west, to keep up their spirits till
it is better times: but year after year has left the people to hope till the very
name of Congress, or State Legislature, is as horrible to the sensitive friend
of his country, as the house of 'Blue Beard' is to children; or 'Crockford's'
Hell of London, to meek men.
"When the people are secure and their rights properly respected, then the
four main pillars of prosperity, viz: agriculture, manufactures, navigation,
and commerce. need the fostering care of government: and in so goodly a
country as ours, where the soil, the climate, the rivers, the lakes, and the sea
coast; the productions, the timber, the minerals; and the inhabitants are so
diversified, that a pleasing variety accommodates all tastes, trades and
calculations, it certainly is the highest point of supervision to protect the
whole northern and southern, eastern and western, centre and
circumference of the realm, by a judicious tariff. It is an old saying and a
true one, 'If you wish to be respected, respect yourselves.'
"I will adopt in part the language of Mr. Madison's inaugural address, 'To
cherish peace and friendly intercourse with all nations, having
correspondent dispositions; to maintain sincere
[359]
neutrality towards belligerent nations; to prefer in all cases amicable
discussion and reasonable accommodation of differences to a decision of
them by an appeal to arms; to exclude foreign intrigues and foreign
partialities, so degrading to all countries, and so baneful to free ones; to
foster a spirit of independence too just to invade the rights of others, too
proud to surrender their own, too liberal to indulge unworthy prejudices
ourselves, and too elevated not to look down upon them in others; to hold
the union of the States as the basis of their peace and happiness; to support
the constitution, which is the cement of the Union, as well as in its
limitations as in its authorities; to respect the rights and authorities
reserved to the States and to the people, as equally incorporated with, and
essential to the success of the general system; to avoid the slightest
interference with the rights of conscience, or the functions of religion, so
wisely exempted from civil jurisdiction; to preserve in their full energy, the
other salutary provisions in behalf of private and personal rights, and of the
freedom of the press;' as far as intention aids in the fulfilment of duty, are
consummations too big with benefits not to captivate the energies of all
honest men to achieve them, when they can be brought to pass by
reciprocation, friendly alliance, wise legislation, and honorable treaties.
"The Government has once flourished under the guidance of trusty
servants; and the Hon. Mr. Monroe in his day, while speaking of the
Constitution; says -- 'Our commerce has been wisely regulated with foreign
nations, and between the States; new States have been admitted into our
Union: our territory has been enlarged by fair and honorable treaty, and
with great advantage to the original States; the States respectively protected
by the national Government, under a mild paternal system
[360]
against foreign dangers, and enjoying within their separate spheres, by a
wise partition of power, a just proportion of the sovereignty, have
improved their police, extended their settlements, and attained a strength
and maturity which are the beat proofs of whole some law well
administered. And if we look to the condition of individuals, what a proud
spectacle does it exhibit! On whom has oppression fallen in any quarter of
our Union? who has been deprived of any right of person and property?
Who restrained from offering his vows in the mode he prefers, to the
Divine Author of his being? It is well known that all these blessings have
been enjoyed to their fullest extent: and I add, with peculiar satisfaction, that
there has been no example of a capital punishment being inflicted on any
one for the crime of high treason.' What a delightful picture of power,
policy and prosperity! Truly the wise proverb is just, -- 'Sedaukauh
teromain goy, veh-ka-sede le-u-meem khahmaut.' Righteousness exalteth a
nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.
"But this is not all. The same honorable statesman, after having had about
forty years' experience in the government, under the full tide of successful
experiment, gives the following commendatory assurance of the efficiency
of the Magna Charta to answer its great end and aim: to protect the people
in their rights. 'Such, then, is the happy government under which we live;
a Government adequate to every purpose for which the social compact is
formed; a Government elective in all its branches, under which every
citizen may, by his merit, obtain the highest trust recognized by the
Constitution; which contains within it no cause or discord; none to put at
variance one portion of the community with another; a Government
which protects every
[361]
citizen in the full enjoyment of his rights, and is able to protect the nation
against injustice from foreign powers'
"Again, the younger Adams in the silver age of our countryÕs advancement
to fame, in his inaugural address (1825), thus candidly declares the majesty
of the youthful republic, in its in creasing greatness; 'The year of jubilee
since the first formation of our Union has just elapsed; that of the
declaration of Independence is at hand. The consummation of both was
effected by this Constitution.
"'Since that period. a population of four million has multiplied to twelve.
A territory, bounded by the Mississippi, has been extended from sea to sea.
New States he have been admitted to the Union, in numbers nearly equal
to those of the first confederation.
"'Treaties of peace, amity and commerce, have been concluded with the
principal dominions of the earth. The people of other nations, the
inhabitants of regions acquired, not by conquest, but by compact, have been
united with us in the participation of our rights and duties, of our burdens
and blessings.
"'The forest has fallen by the axe of our woodsmen; the soil has been made
to teem by the tillage of our farmers: our commerce has whitened every
ocean.
"'The dominion of man over physical nature has been extended by the
invention of our artists. Liberty and law have marched hand in hand. All
the purposes of human association have been accomplished as effectively as
under any other government on the globe, and at a cost little exceeding, in a
whole generation, the expenditures of other nations in single year.'
"In continuation of such noble sentiments, General Jackson, upon his
ascension to the great chair of the chief magistracy,
[362]
said: -- As long as our government administered for the good of the people,
and as regulated by their will; as long as it secures to us the rights of person
and property, liberty of conscience, and of the press, it will be worth
defending; and so long as it is worth defending, a patriotic militia will cover
it with an impenetrable Aegis.'
"General JacksonÕs administration may be denominated the acme of
American glory, liberty and prosperity, for the National Debt, which in 1815,
on account of the late war, was 125,000,000 dollars, and lessened gradually,
was paid up in his golden day; and preparations were made to distribute the
surplus revenue among the several States: and that august patriot, to use
his own words in his farewell address, retired leaving 'a great people
prosperous and happy, in the full enjoyment of liberty and peace, honored
and respected by every nation of the world.'
"At the age, then, of sixty years, our blooming republic began to decline
under the withering touch of Martin Van Buren! Disappointed ambition,
thirst for power, pride, corruption, party spirit, faction, patronage;
perquisites, fame, tangling alliances; priestcraft and spiritual wickedness in
high places, struck hands, and revelled in midnight splendour.
"Trouble, vexation, perplexity and contention, mingled with hope, fear and
murmuring, rumbled through the Union and agitated the whole nation as
would an earthquake at the centre of the earth the earth, the world heaving
the sea beyond its bounds, and shaking the everlasting hills: so, in hopes of
better times, while jealousy, hypocritical pretensions, and pompous
ambition, were luxuriating on the ill-gotten spoils of the people, they rose
in their majesty like a tornado, and swept through the land, till
[363]
General Harrison appeared, as a star among the storm clouds for better
weather
"The calm came; and the language of that venerable patriot, in his
inaugural address while descanting upon the merits of the Constitution and
its framers, thus expressed himself. -- 'There were in it features which
appeared not to be in harmony with their ideas of a simple representative
democracy or republic. And knowing the tendency of power to increase
itself, particularly when executed by a single individual, predictions were
made that, at no very remote period, the Government would terminate in
virtual monarchy.
"It would not become me to say that the fears of these patriots have been
already realized. But as I sincerely believe that the tendency of measures and
of menÕs opinions, for some years past, has been in that direction, it is, I
conceive, strictly proper that I should take this occasion to repeat the
assurances I have heretofore given, of my determination to arrest the
progress of that tendency if it really exists, and restore the Government to its
pristine health and vigour.'
"This good man died before he had the opportunity of applying one balm
to ease the pain of our groaning country, and I am willing the nation should
be the judge, whether General Harrison, in his exalted station, upon the eve
of his entrance into the world of spirits, told the truth or not: with Acting-
President Tyler's three years of perplexity and pseudo-whig-democrat reign,
to heal the breaches, or show the wounds, secundum artum, (according to
art).
"Subsequent events, all things considered, Van BurenÕs downfall,
HarrisonÕs exit, and TylerÕs self-sufficient turn to the whole, go to show, as a
Chaldean might exclaim, 'Beram etia elauh
[364]
beshmayauh hauhah rauzeen' (Certainly there is a God in heaven to reveal
secrets).
"No honest man can doubt for a moment but the glory of American liberty
is on the wane, and that calamity and confusion will sooner or later destroy
the peace of the people. Speculators will urge a national bank as a saviour of
credit and comfort. A hireling pseudo-priesthood will plausibly push
abolition doctrines and doings, and 'human rights,' into Congress and into
every other place, where conquest smells of fame, or opposition swells to
popularity. -- Democracy, whiggery, and cliquery, will attract their elements
and foment divisions among the people, to accomplish fancied schemes
and accumulate power, while poverty driven to despair, like hunger forcing
its way through a wall, will break through the statutes of men, to save life,
and mend the breach in prison glooms.
"A still higher grade, of what the 'nobility of the nations' call 'great men,'
will dally with all rights in order to smuggle a fortune at 'one fell swoop;'
mortgage Texas, possess Oregon, and claim all the unsettled regions of the
world for hunting and trapping: and should a humble honest man, red,
black, or white, exhibit a better title, these gentry have only to clothe the
judge with richer ermine, and spangle the lawyer's fingers with finer rings,
to have the judgment of his peers, and the honour of his lords, as a pattern
of honesty, virtue and humanity, while the motto hangs on his nation's
escutcheon 'Every man has his price!'
"Now, O people! people! turn unto the Lord, and live; and reform this
nation. Frustrate the designs of wicked men. Reduce Congress at least two-
thirds. Two senators from a state and two members to a million of
population, will do more business than the
[365]
army that now occupies the halls of the national legislature. Pay them two
dollars and their board per diem (except Sundays); that is more than the
farmer gets, and he lives honestly. Curtail the offices of government in pay,
number and power, for the Philistine lords have shorn our nation of its
goodly locks in the lap of Delilah.
"Petition your State legislature to pardon every convict in their several
penitentiaries, blessing them as they go, and saying to them, in the name of
the Lord, Go thy way and sin no more.
"Advise your legislators when they make laws for larceny, burglary or any
felony, to make the penalty applicable to work upon the roads, public works,
or any place where the culprit can be taught more wisdom and more virtue;
and become more enlightened. Rigor and seclusion will never do as much
to reform the propensities of man as reason and friendship. Murder only
can claim confinement or death. Let the penitentiaries be turned into
seminaries of learning, where intelligence, like the angels of heaven, would
banish such fragments of barbarism: imprisonment for debt is a meaner
practice than the savage tolerates with all his ferocity. 'Amor vincit [omnia]
amnia' Love conquers all.
"Petition also, ye goodly inhabitants of the slave States, your legislators to
abolish slavery by the year 1850, or now, and save the abolitionist from
reproach and ruin, infamy and shame.
"Pray Congress to pay every man a reasonable price for his slaves out of the
surplus revenue arising from the sale of public lands, and from the
deduction of pay from the members of Congress.
"Break off the shackles from the poor black man, and hire them to labour
like other human beings, for 'an hour of virtuous liberty on earth, is worth
a whole eternity of bondage!' Abolish
[366]
the practice in the army and navy of trying men by court martial for
desertion; if a soldier or marine runs away, send him his wages, with this
instruction, that his country will never trust him again, he has forfeited
his honour.
"Make Honour the standard with all men: be sure that good is rendered for
evil in all cases: and the whole nation, like a kingdom of kings and priests,
will rise up with righteousness, and be respected as wise and worthy on
earth: and as just and holy for heaven, by Jehovah the author of perfection.
"More economy in the National and State governments, would make less
taxes among the people, more equality through the cities, towns, and
country, would make less distinction among the people, and more honesty
and familiarity in societies, would make less hypocrisy and flattery in all
branches of community; and open, frank, candid, decorum to all men, in
this boasted land of liberty, would beget esteem, confidence, union and love;
and the neighbour from any State or from any country, of whatever colour,
clime or tongue, could rejoice when he put his foot on the sacred soil of
freedom, and exclaim: 'The very name of American is fraught with
friendship!' Oh! then, create confidence, restore freedom, break down
slavery, banish imprisonment for debt, and be in love, fellowship, and
peace with all the world! Remember that honesty is not subject to law; the
law was made for transgressors; wherefore a Dutchman might exclaim. 'Ein
ehrlicher Name ist besser als Reichthum' (a good name is better than
riches).
"For the accommodation of the people in every State and Territory, let
Congress shew their wisdom by granting a national bank, with branches in
each State and Territory, where the capital stock shall be held by the nation
for the mother bank, and
[367]
by the States and Territories, for the branches, and whose officers and
directors shall be elected yearly by the people, with wages at the rate of two
dollars per day for services; which several banks shall never issue any more
bills than the amount of capital stock in her vaults and the interest.
"The net gain of the mother bank shall be applied to the national revenue,
and that the branches to the States' and Territories' revenues. And the bills
shall be par throughout the nation, which will mercifully cure the fatal
disorder known in cities, as brokerage, and leave the peopleÕs money in
their own pockets.
"Give every man his constitutional freedom, and the President full power
to send an army to suppress mobs, and the States authority to repeal and
impun that relic of folly which makes it necessary for the Governor of a
State to make the demand of the President for troops, in cases of invasion or
rebellion.
"The Governor himself may be a mobber, and, instead of being punished as
he should be for murder and treason, he may destroy the very lives, rights,
and property he should protect. Like the good Samaritan, send every lawyer
as soon as he repents and obeys the ordinances of Heaven, to preach the
gospel to the destitute, without purse or scrip, pouring in the oil and the
wine: a learned priesthood is certainly more honourable than 'an hireling
clergy.'
"As to the contiguous territories to the United States, wisdom would direct
no tangling alliance: Oregon belongs to this Government honourably, and
when we have the red-manÕs consent, let the Union spread from the east to
the west sea; and if Texas petitions Congress to be adopted among the sons
of liberty, give her the right-hand of fellowship; and refuse not the
[368]
same friendly grip to Canada and Mexico: and when the right arm of
freemen is stretched out in the character of a navy, for the protection of
rights, commerce and honour, let the iron eyes of power watch from Maine
to Mexico, and from California to Columbia; thus may union be
strengthened, and foreign speculation prevented from opposing broadside
to broadside.
"Seventy years have done much for this goodly land; they have burst the
chains of oppression and monarchy; and multiplied its inhabitants from
two to twenty millions; with a proportionate share of knowledge, keen
enough to circumnavigate the globe, draw the lightning from the clouds,
and cope with all the crowned heads of the world.
"Then why? oh! why, will a once flourishing people not arise, phoenix-
like,over the cinders of Martin Van Buren's power; and over the sinking
fragments and smoking ruins of other catamount politicians; and over the
windfalls of Benton, Calhoun, Clay, Wright, and a caravan of other equally
unfortunate law doctors, and cheerfully help to spread a plaster and bind up
the burnt, bleeding wounds of a sore but blessed country?
"The southern people are hospitable and noble: they will help to rid so
free a country of every vestige of slavery, when ever they are assured
of an equivalent for their property. The country will be full of money and
confidence when a national bank of twenty millions, and a State bank in
every State, with a million or more, gives a tone to monetary matters, and
make a circulating medium as valuable in the purses of a whole
community, as in the coffers of a speculating banker or broker
"Tho people may have faults but they never should be trifled with. I think
Mr. Pitt's quotation in the British Parliament of Mr. PriorÕs couplet, for the
husband and wife, to apply to the
[369]
course which the King and Ministry of England should pursue to the then
colonies of the now United States, might be a genuine rule of action for
some of the breath-made men in high places, to use towards the posterity of
that noble daring people: --
'Be to her faults a little blind;
Be to her virtues very kind.'
"We have had democratic Presidents; whig Presidents; a pseudo-democratic
whig President, and now it is time to have a President of the United States;
and let the people of the whole Union, like the inflexible Romans,
whenever they find a promise made by a candidate that is not practised as
an officer, hurl the miserable sycophant from his exaltation, as God did
Nebuchadnezzar, to crop the grass of the field, with a beastÕs heart, among
the cattle.
"Mr. Van Buren said in his inaugural address, that he went 'into the
presidential chair the inflexible and uncompromising opponent of every
attempt, on the part of Congress, to abolish slavery in the district of
Columbia, against the wishes of the slave-holding States; and also with a
determination equally decided to resist the slightest interference with it in
the States where it exists.'
"Poor little Matty made his rhapsodical sweep with the fact before his eyes,
that the State of New York, his native state, had abolished slavery, without
a struggle or a groan. Great God! how independent! From henceforth,
slavery is tolerated when it exists, constitution or no constitution; people or
no people, right or wrong; vox Matti -- vox Diaboli, 'the voice of Matty -- the
voice of the Devil;' and peradventure his great 'sub-treasury' scheme was a
piece of the same mind: but the man and
[370]
his measures have such a striking resemblance to the anecdote of the
Welchman and his cart-tongue, that, when the constitution was so long
that it allowed slavery at the Capitol of a free people, it would not be cut off;
but when it was short that it needed a sub-treasury, to save the funds of the
nation, it could be spliced! Oh, Granny what a long tail our puss has got! (As
a Greek might say, hysteron proteron, the cart before the horse but his
mighty whisk through the great national fire, for the presidential chestnuts
burnt the locks of his glory with the blaze of his folly.)
"In the United States the people are the government; and their united
voice is the only sovereign that should rule, the only power that should be
obeyed; and the only gentlemen that should be honoured; at home and
abroad, on the land and on the sea. Wherefore, were I the President of the
United States, by the voice of virtuous people, I would honor the old paths
of the venerated father of freedom; I would walk in the tracks of the
illustrious patriots who carried the ark of the government upon their
shoulders with an eye single to the glory of the people; and when that
people petitioned to abolish slavery in the slave States, I would use all
honourable means to have their prayers granted, and give liberty to the
captive; by giving the southern gentleman a reasonable equivalent for his
property, that the whole nation might be free indeed.
"When the people petitioned for a national bank, I would use my best
endeavours to have their prayers answered, and establish one on national
principles, to save taxes, and make them the controllers of its ways and
means; and when the people petitioned to possess the territory of Oregon or
any other contiguous territory, I would lend the influence of a chief
magistrate
[371]
to grant so reasonable a request, that they might extend the mighty efforts
and enterprise of a free people from the east to the west sea, and make the
wilderness blossom as the rose; and when a neighbouring realm petitioned
to join the Union of the sons of liberty, my voice would be, come; yea, come
Texas, come Mexico, come Canada, and come all the world; let us be
brethren, let us be one great family, and let there be universal peace.
Abolish the cruel customs of prisons, (except certain cases), penitentiaries,
court-martials for desertion; and let reason and friendship reign over the
ruins of ignorance and barbarity; yea, I would, as the universal friend of
man, open the prisons, open the eyes, open the ears, and open the hearts of
all people to behold and enjoy freedom, unadulterated freedom; and God,
who once cleansed the violence of the earth with a flood, whose Son laid
down his life for the salvation of all his Father gave him out of the world,
and who has promised that he will come and purify. the world again with
fire in the last days, should be supplicated by me for the good of all people --
With the highest esteem, I am a friend of virtue and of the people,
"JOSEPH SMITH."
This scarcely grammatical manifesto, in which practical and useful ideas
are mixed up with others purely fanciful, was reprinted in a great number of
newspapers, and Joseph Smith met with support, even among others than
his sect. But at the same time it was strongly disapproved, or treated with
contempt, in other quarters. The conduct of the Prophet in this instance, it
must be admitted, was hardly distinguished by his usual prudence. He knew
[372]
himself to be surrounded by powerful and bitter enemies; he knew that the
prosperity of his colony had excited, even in Illinois, formerly so well
disposed towards him, an under-current of discontent; moderation and
silence might perhaps have disarmed them, but a fussy unrestrained
ambition would naturally arouse their hatred, and expose him to fresh
peril. So, in fact, it turned out. The inhabitants of Illinois, full of the worst
feeling towards the Mormons, and urged on, even at this time, by apostates
on the one hand and by Missouri on the other, at length began to devise
means of expelling the Saints from their territory. In the beginning of 1844
they held meetings for this purpose. The people of Carthage especially,
whose hostile disposition was of long standing, had reached such a pitch of
irritation, that Joseph no longer dared present himself in that city. To allay
the storm, or rather to fly from the point it threatened, was the wisest
course; and there is reason to believe that Joseph at first seriously thought of
doing so. With this intention, as much perhaps as for the purpose of
hurrying forward the execution of his designs, which apparently aimed at
nothing less than the establishment of a great temporal power, Joseph, at a
meeting on the 20th of February, spoke of leaving the country, or at least
hinted that he entertained such an idea. He gave instructions to the twelve
apostles relative to an expedition to California and Oregon. The question
under consideration now was, to find a good site to which to retire after the
completion
[373]
of the temple, there to build a great city where, sheltered by the mountains,
they could establish a good government, and "where the devil could not
reach them." This would be to abandon Zion, but that was a difficulty easily
got over. Smith was of the school of Sertorius:
"Rome n'est pas dans Rome; elle est toate on je suis.
And moreover he gave abundant latitude for fixing the site of Zion. " All
America from north to south constitutes Zion. The whole of America is
designated by the prophets, who declare that it is the Zion where is the
mountain of the Lord, and that it is in the centre of the country."*
This idea of a settlement in Oregon, which idea has been realized in our
days by the occupation of Salt Lake, was it perchance suggested to the
Prophet by the recollection of the conversation he had in 1840, at
Washington, with Henry Clay, and of the advice given him, at least
indirectly, by that statesman, to retire into Oregon? It is impossible to say;
but the actual state of things would naturally suggest it. Unfortunately
Smith did not persist in his project of emigrating as resolutely as it was his
interest to do. The fumes of ambition, for a time dissipated, again clouded
his judgment, as the elections drew near, and under their intoxicating
influence he abandoned himself to the most absurd conceits. Before sending
his exploring parties to the west in search of a new territory, he wrote to the
federal
_____________________
* Sermon of Joseph Smith at the conference in April, 1844.
[374]
Congress to ask for authority to levy a hundred thousand volunteers for the
purpose of protecting American citizens emigrating to Texas, Oregon, and
the adjoining parts, where they could not find the protection necessary for
the prosperity of their settlements. In addition to this he requested to have
the rank of General in the United States' army. It is hardly necessary to say
that these requests were very summarily disposed of.
Did his ambition soar still higher? Did he seriously aim at the Presidency
of the Union? Did he really imagine for a moment he could attain the
supreme magistracy of the republic? It would be difficult to reply. But
certainly his language, through its studied and enigmatical obscurity, may
sometimes induce one to suppose it. Thus, in the conference of the 6th of
April, 1844, he said to his followers, there assembled to the number of
twenty thousand: "The great Jehovah has always been with me, and the
wisdom of God will guide me at the seventh hour. I feel that I am in more
immediate communion with God and on a better footing with him than I
have ever been in my life; and I am happy to appear among you under
these circumstances." And what is even more certain is, that subsequent to
the conferences in April, he sent out two hundred and forty-four
missionaries to go into the various States of the Union, to preach up his
candidacy for the Presidency, together with the new gospel.
But however this may be, and whatever were the hopes
[375]
of the Prophet and of the faithful as to the immediate success of the
ambitious projects of the moment. The future appeared to them arrayed in
the most brilliant colours, and gave them the assurance of the most
glorious destinies. Brigham Young, in one of his sermons, during the April
conference, seemed inspired with the like confidence, and said, in that
apocalyptic style so common to the sect, and through the mists of which it is
so difficult for the profane to discern a meaning, "If they strike us, we will
upset the world, and will put the cart before the horse and let it draw them."
Events moreover were of a kind to raise illusions, especially among the
simple and credulous, and the simple and credulous were not wanting
among the Mormons. What wonder if their heads were turned, when they
beheld fresh converts arriving daily from all sides! A single vessel had just
brought eight hundred brethren from England, and announced that
propagandism was making rapid progress in the mother country. And,
moreover, did not a missionary write them, from Great Britain, on the 18th
of April, a letter, filled with miracles accomplished in witness of their faith?
"The Marquis of Downshire;" he stated, "who had persecuted the Saints at
Hillsborough, in Ireland, had the felicity of seeing his son, Lord William,
killed by a fall from his horse while hunting; and Mr. Keilly, his agent, who
had aided him in persecuting the Saints, had suffered a third attack of
paralysis, while his son, who had headed an outbreak against our Church,
[376]
has fallen ill without hope of recovery. So much for them." Surely, after
such prodigies, God could not do less than bestow on them the empire of
America. It is positive that about that time there was entertained such a
hope, if not by the leaders themselves, at all events by their followers. A
single fact will suffice to give an idea of their credulity. When they learned
that Lorenzo Snow had presented the Book of Mormon to the Queen of
England, the joy among them was great; they imagined that if her gracious
Majesty read their sacred writings, it would be enough to convince her of
the truth of their creed, and to induce her to become a convert.
Without sharing all the illusions of his people, Smith, not over-modest
himself, felt proud of the power he had created, of his character of Prophet,
of the progress of his sect, of that kind of celebrity he had acquired, and
which had admitted of his becoming candidate for the highest office in the
republic. So that he believed himself to be in a position to treat on a footing
of equality with his competitors; and as none of them had replied
satisfactorily to his communication of the 4th of November, he took upon
himself to write to Henry Clay a letter full of insolence and irony, but at the
same time very remarkable and frequently eloquent. To present a complete
idea of the mental calibre of the hero whose history we are relating, we
think it necessary to give word for word his letter to Mr. H. Clay.
[377]
"Nauvoo, Illinois, May 18th, 1844.
"Sir, -- Your answer to my inquiry, 'What would be your rule of action
towards the Latter-day Saints, should you be elected President of the United
States,' has been under consideration since last November, in the fond
expectation that you would give (for every honest citizen has a right to
demand it) to the country a manifesto of your views of the best method and
means which would secure to the people, the whole people, the most
freedom, the most happiness, the most union, the most wealth, the most
fame, the most glory at home, and the most honour abroad, at the least
expense; but I have waited in vain. So far as you have made public
declarations, they have been made, like your answer to the above, soft to
flatter, rather than solid to feed the people. You seem to abandon all former
policy which may have actuated you in the discharge of a statesman's duty,
when the vigour of intellect and the force of virtue should have sought out
an everlasting habitation for liberty; when, as a wise man, a true patriot,
and a friend to mankind, you should have resolved to ameliorate the awful
condition of our bleeding country by a mighty plan of wisdom,
righteousness, justice, goodness and mercy, that would have brought back
the golden days of our nation's youth, vigour, and vivacity, when
prosperity crowned the efforts of a youthful Republic, when the gentle
aspirations of the sons of liberty were, 'we are one.'
"In your answer to my questions last fall, that peculiar tact, of modern
politicians declaring, 'if you ever enter into that high office, you must go
into it free and unfettered, with no guarantees but such as are to be drawn
from your whole life, character, and conduct,' so much resembles a
lottery-vendor's sign, with the goddess of good luck sitting on the car of
fortune, a-straddle of the
[378]
horn of plenty, and driving the merry steeds of beatitude, without reins or
bridle, that I cannot help exclaiming, 'O frail man, what have you done that
will exalt you?' Can anything be drawn from your life, character, or conduct
that is worthy of being held up to the gaze of this nation as a model of
virtue, charity, and wisdom? Are you not a lottery picture with more than
two blanks to a prize? Leaving many things prior to your Ghent treaty, let
the world look at that, and see where is the wisdom, honour, and
patriotism which ought to have characterized the plenipotentiary of the
only free nation upon the earth? A quarter of a century's negotiation to
obtain our rights on the north-eastern boundary, and the motley manner in
which Oregon tries to shine as American Territory, coupled with your
presidential race and come-by-chance secretaryship in 1825, all go to
convince the friends of freedom, the golden patriots of Jeffersonian
democracy, free-trade, and sailors' rights, and the protectors of person and
property, that an honourable war is better than a dishonourable peace.
"But had you really wanted to have exhibited the wisdom, clemency,
benevolence, and dignity of a great man in this boasted Republic, when
fifteen thousand free subjects were exiled from own homes, lands, and
property, in the wonderful patriotic State of Missouri, and you then upon
your oath and honour, occupying the exalted station of a senator of
Congress from the noble-hearted State of Kentucky; why did you not show
the world your loyalty to law and order, by using all honourable means to
restore the innocent to their rights and property? Why, Sir, the more we
search into your character and conduct, the more we must exclaim from
Holy Writ, the tree is known by its fruit.'
[379]
"Again, this is not all; rather than show yourself an honest man, by
guaranteeing to the people what you will do in case you should be elected
President, ' you can enter into no engagement, make no promises, and give
no pledges,' as to what you will do. Well, it may be that some hot-headed
partisan would take such nothingarianism upon trust, but sensible men,
and even ladies, would think themselves insulted by such an evasion of
coming events. If a tempest is expected, why not prepare to meet it, and in
the language of the poet, exclaim, --
"'Then let fine trial come; and witness thou,
If terror be upon me; if I shrink
Or falter in my strength to meet the storm
When hardest if besets me.'
True greatness never wavers, but when the Missouri compromise was
entered into by you for the benefit of slavery, there was a shrinkage of
western honour: and from that day, Sir, the sterling Yankee, the struggling
Abolitionist, and the staunch Democrat, with a large number of the liberal-
minded Whigs, have marked you as a blackleg in politics, begging for a
chance to shuffle yourself into the Presidential chair, where you might deal
out the destinies of our beloved country for a game of brag that would end
in 'Hark! from the tombs a doleful sound.' Start, not at this picture; for your
'whole life, character, and conduct,' been spotted with deeds that cause a
blush upon the face of a virtuous patriot. So you must be contented in your
lot, while crime, cowardice, cupidity, or low-cunning, have handed you
down from the high tower of a statesman to the black-hole of a gambler. A
man that accepts a challenge or fights a duel is nothing more nor less than a
murderer; for Holy Writ declares that 'whoso sheds man's blood, by man
shall his blood be shed;' and when
[380]
in the renowned city of Washington the notorious Henry Clay dropped
from the summit of a senator to the sink of a scoundrel to shoot at that
chalk line of a Randolph, he not only disgraced his own fame, family, and
friends, but he polluted the sanctum sanctorum of American glory; and the
kingly blackguards throughout the whole world are pointing the finger of
scorn at the boasted 'asylum of the oppressed,' and hissing at American
statesman as gentleman vagabonds and murderers, holding the olive
branch of peace in one hand and a pistol for death in the other! Well might
the Saviour rebuke the heads off this nation with woe unto you scribes,
Pharisees, hypocrites! for the United States government and Congress, with
a few honourable exceptions, have gone the way of Cain, and must perish
in their gainsayings like Korah and his wicked host. And honest men of
every dime, and the innocent, poor, and oppressed, as well as heathens,
pagans, and Indians, everywhere, who could but hope that the tree of liberty
would yield some precious fruit for the hungry human race, and shed some
balmy leaves for the healing of nations, have long since given up till hopes
of equal rights, of justice and judgment, and of truth and virtue, when such
polluted, vain, heaven-daring, bogus patriots, are forced or flung into the
front rank of government to guide the destinies of millions. Crape the
heavens with weeds of woe, gird the earth with sackcloth, and let hell
mutter one melody in commemoration of fallen splendour! for the glory of
America has departed, and God will set a flaming sword to guard the tree of
liberty, while such mint-tithing Herods as Van Buren, Boggs, Benton,
Calhoun, and Clay, are thrust out of the realms of virtue as fit subjects for
the kingdom of failed greatness; vox reprobi, vox Diaboli!
[381]
"In your late addresses to the people of South Carolina, where rebellion
budded but could not blossom, you 'renounced ultraism, 'high tariff,' and
almost banished your 'banking systems' for the more certain standard of
public opinion.' This is all very well, and marks the intention of a
politician, the calculations of a demagogue, and the allowance for leeings of
a shrewd manager, just as truly as the weathercock does the wind when it
turns upon the spire. Hustings for the south, barbecues for the west,
confidential letters for the north, and 'American system' for the east: --
"'Lullaby baby upon the tree top,
And when the wind blows the cradle will rock.'
"Suppose you should also, taking your 'whole life, character, and conduct,'
into consideration, and, as many hands make light work, stir up the old
'Clay party,' the 'National Republican party,' the 'High Protective Tariff
party,' and the late coonskin party, with all their paraphernalia, ultraism, ne
plus ultraism, -- sine qua non, which have grown with your growth,
strengthened with your strength, and shrunk with your shrinkage, and ask
the people of this enlightened Republic what they think of your powers and
policy as a statesman; for verily it would seem, from all past remains of
parties, politics, projects, and pictures, that you are the Clay and the people
the potter; and as some vessels are marred in the hands of the potter, the
natural conclusion is, that you are a vessel of dishonour.
"You may complain that a close examination of your whole life, character,
and conduct places you, as a Kentuckian would pleasantly term it 'in a bad
fix;' but; Sir, when the nation has sunk deeper and deeper in the mud at
every turn of the great
[382]
wheels of the Union, while you have acted as one of the principal drivers, it
becomes the bounden duty of the whole community, as one man, to
whisper you on every point of government, to uncover every act of your
life, and inquire what mighty acts you have done to benefit the nation, how
much you have tithed the mint to gratify your lust, and why the fragments
of your raiment hang upon the thorns by the path as signals to beware!
"But your shrinkage is truly wonderful! Not only your banking system, and
high tariff project, have vanished from your mind, 'like the baseless fabric
of a vision,' but the 'annexation of Texas' has touched your pathetic
sensibilities of national pride so acutely, that the poor Texans, your own,
brethren, may fall back into the ferocity of Mexico, or be sold at auction to
British stock-jobbers, and all is well, for 'I,' the old senator from Kentucky,
am fearful it would militate against my interest in the north to enlarge the
borders of the Union in the south. Truly 'a poor wise child is better than an
old foolish king who will be no longer admonished.' Who ever heard of a
nation that had too much territory? Was it ever bad policy to make friends?
Has any people ever become too good to do good? No, never; but the
ambition and vanity of some men have flown away with their wisdom and
judgment, and left a creaking skeleton to occupy the place of a noble soul.
"Why, Sir, the condition of the whole earth is lamentable. Texas dreads the
teeth and toenails of Mexico. Oregon has the rheumatism, brought on by a
horrid exposure to the heat and cold of British and American trappers;
Canada has caught a bad cold from extreme fatigue in the patriot war; South
America has the headache, caused by bumps against the beams of
Catholicity and Spanish sovereignty; Spain has the gripes from age
[383]
and Inquisition; France trembles and wastes under the effects of contagious
diseases; England groans with the gout, and wiggles with wine; Italy and the
German States are pale with the consumption; Prussia, Poland, and the
little contiguous dynasties, duchies, and domains, have the mumps so
severely, that 'the whole head is sick, and the whole heart is faint;' Russia
has the cramp by lineage; Turkey has the numb palsy; Africa, from the curse
of God, has lost the use of her limbs; China is ruined by the Queen's evil,
and the rest of Asia fearfully exposed to the small-pox the natural way from
British pedlars ; the islands of the sea are almost dead with the scurvy; the
Indians are blind and lame; and the United States, which ought to be the
good physician with 'balm from Gilead,' and an 'asylum for the oppressed,'
has boosted and is boosting up into the council chamber of the
government, a clique of political gamblers, to play for the old clothes and
old shoes of a sick world, and 'no pledge, no promise to any particular
portion of the people,' that the rightful heirs will ever receive a cent of their
Father's legacy! Away with such self-important, self-aggrandising, and self-
willed demagogues! their friendship is colder than polar ice; and their
professions meaner than the damnation of hell.
"O man! when such a great dilemma of the globe, such a tremendous
convulsion of kingdoms, shakes the earth from centre to circumference;
when castles, prison-houses, and cells, raise a cry to God against the cruelty
of man; when the mourning of the fatherless and the widow causes
anguish in heaven; when the poor among all nations cry day and night for
bread and a shelter from the heat and storm; and when the degraded black
slave holds up his manacled hands to the great statesmen of the United
States, and sings,
[384]
"'O Liberty, where are thy charms,
That sages have told me were sweet!'
"And when fifteen thousand free citizens of the high-blooded Republic of
North America are robbed and driven from one State to another without
redress or redemption, it is not only time for a candidate for the Presidency
to pledge himself to execute judgment and justice though be there laws or
not, but it is his bounden duty as a man, for the honour of a disgraced
country, and for the salvation of a once virtuous people, to call for a union
of all honest men, and appease the wrath of God by acts of wisdom,
holiness, and virtue! 'The fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth
much.'
"Perhaps you may think I go too far with my strictures and innuendoes,
because in your concluding paragraph you say: ?'It is not inconsistent with
your declarations to say, that you have viewed with a lively interest the
progress of the Latter-day Saints; that you have sympathized in their
sufferings under injustice, as it appeared to you, which has been inflicted
upon them; and that you think in common with all other religious
communities, they ought to enjoy the security and protection of the
constitution and the laws.' If words were not wind, and imagination not a
vapour, such views' 'with a lively interest' might coax out a few Mormon
votes; such 'sympathy for their suffering under injustice, might heal some
of the sick yet lingering amongst them, raise some of the dead, and recover
some of their property from Missouri; and finally, if thought was not a
phantom, we might, in common with other religious communities, 'you
think, enjoy the security and protection of the constitution and laws!' But
during ten years, while the Latter-day Saints have bled, been robbed, driven
from their own lands, paid
[385]
oceans of money into the treasury to pay your renowned self and others for
legislating and dealing out equal rights and privileges to those in common
with all other religious communities, they have waited and expected in
vain! If you have possessed any patriotism, it has been veiled by your
popularity for fear the Saints would fall in love with its charms. Blind
charity and dumb justice never do much towards alleviating the wants of
the needy, but straws show which way the wind blows. It is currently
rumoured that your dernier ressort for the Latter-day Saints is to emigrate
to Oregon or California. Such cruel humanity, such noble injustice, such
honourable cowardice, such foolish wisdom, and such vicious virtue, could
only emanate from Clay. After the Saints have been plundered of three or
four millions of land and property by the people and powers of the
sovereign state of Missouri; after they have sought for redress and
redemption from the county court to Congress, and been denied through
religious prejudice and sacerdotal dignity; after they have builded a city and
two temples at an immense expense of labour and treasure; after they have
increased from hundreds to hundreds of thousands; and after they have
sent missionaries to the various nations of the earth to gather Israel
according to the predictions of all the holy prophets since the world began,
that great plenipotentiary the renowned Secretary of State, the ignoble
duellist, the gambling senator, and Whig candidate for the Presidency,
Henry Clay, the wise Kentucky lawyer, advises the Latter-day Saints to go to
Oregon to obtain justice and set up a government of their own.
"O ye crowned heads among all nations, is not Mr. Clay a wise man and
very patriotic? Why, great God! to transport 800,000 people through a vast
prairie, over the Rocky Mountains, to
[386]
Oregon, a distance of nearly two thousand miles, would cost more than
four millions! or should they go by Cape Horn in ships to California, the cost
would be more than twenty millions? and all this to save the United States
from inheriting the disgrace of Missouri for murdering and robbing the
Saints with impunity! Benton and Van Buren, who make no secret to say,
that if they get into power, they will carry out Boggs's exterminating plan to
rid the country of the Latter-day Saints, are
"'Little nipperkins of milk,'
compared to 'Clay's' great aquafortis jars. Why, he is a real giant in
humanity: 'send the Mormons to Oregon, and free Missouri from debt and
disgrace!' Ah! Sir, let this doctrine go to and fro throughout the whole
earth, that we, as Van Buren said, know your cause is just, but the United
States Government can do nothing for you, because it has no power; you
must go to Oregon, and get justice from the Indians !'
"I mourn for the depravity of the world, I despise the hypocrisy of
Christendom, I hate the imbecility of American statesmen, I detest the
shrinkage of candidates for office from pledges and responsibility; I long for
a day of righteousness, when 'He whose right it is to reign shall judge the
poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth,' and I pray God,
who hath given our fathers a promise of a perfect government in the last
days, to purify the hearts of the people and hasten the welcome day.
"With the highest consideration for virtue and unadulterated freedom,
"I have the honour to be,
"Your obedient Servant,
"JOSEPH SMITH."
"Hon. H. Clay, Ashland, Ky."
[387]
The candidacy of Joseph, the noise it made, the personal importance it gave
him, were, as we have stated, and as it is easy to understand, a great occasion
of joy and pride to the Mormons. In their enthusiasm, and in the
anticipation of the political career which was opening to their Prophet, as
well as of the high destiny he was preparing for their cause, they
determined to give him a, striking mark of their gratitude and of their love:
the 17th of May they gave him an ovation, carrying him in triumph
through the streets of Nauvoo.
The Tarpeian rock is not far distant from the Capitol, neither is persecution
from success, especially religious success. While Joseph revelled in his glory
amid his people, his enemies, rendered more inveterate in their hatred by
his very success, and by the noise which he everywhere made, were
devising means of destroying him and of giving him a decisive and final
blow. To the shame of sectarian spirit it must be said, they little cared by
what means; it was deemed imperative at any cost to get rid of the man who
gave them such umbrage. On the 21st of May, at Carthage, a summons was
sent to Joseph Smith, at the instigation of a few apostates and fanatics, to
appear before the court to answer a charge of adultery and, perjury. Joseph at
first thought it advisable to keep out of the way of his enemies and lie in
concealment; ultimately he made up his mind to appear, and, thanks to
those guarantees which even bad passions cannot entirely override in
[388]
free States, his cause was allowed to stand over to another
Time would perhaps have allayed hatred and brought men back to reason.
Unfortunately, Joseph, over-confident and too little under self-control, soon
contrived to furnish arms against himself. Some apostates and personal
enemies of the Prophet, among others* the renegade J. H. Jackson, an ex-
Catholic priest, who having been refused the hand of Hyrum's daughter,
determining to avenge the affront, conceived the idea of starting at Nauvoo
a newspaper called the 'Expositor,' with the avowed object of opposing the
Mormons, and the secret purpose of irritating them to reprisals and
excesses, and furnishing a handle against them. The blow was well directed,
and all that hatred had anticipated was not long in occurring. The first
number of the 'Expositor' appeared the 10th of June; it contained such
violent and terrible attacks** that an explosion immediately ensued. Joseph,
indignant and exasperated
_____________________
* Among the most inveterate enemies of Joseph at this period we may
mention also William Law, Francis M. Higbee, and Dr. Foster. All three had
been expelled the Church for unseemly conduct. Higbee, for the purpose of
revenging himself on the Prophet, commenced a lawsuit against him,
which was long and scandalous, but resulted in nothing. Dr. Foster accused
Joseph of having attempted to seduce his wife by preaching to her the
doctrine of "the spiritual wife." We are not in a position to state whether
the facts justified this serious accusation; there is room for belief that it
arose from Higbee's enmity.
** These charges were made to rest on the depositions, true or false, of
sixteen women, accusing Joseph and the principal dignitaries of the Church
of immoral conduct.
[389]
immediately, in his capacity of mayor, assembled the municipal council,
which, without a moment's hesitation, declared the paper 'a public
nuisance which ought to be suppressed.' An order to destroy the journal,
signed by Joseph, was immediately put into execution by a police officer,
who proceeded the same day to break up the presses.
This was an outrage in a country in which the liberty of the press is
sacred, and considered as the foremost and most vital of all liberties; it was
moreover an imprudence in the position in which the Mormons then
were, and an impolitic act likely to lead to formidable results. No sooner did
the destruction of the presses of the 'Expositor' get wind, than menaces of
death against the Prophet resounded on all sides from the "gentiles." This
time they had a plausible and legitimate excuse for giving vent to their fury,
and they eagerly hastened to make use of it. On the l2th of June, Joseph and
some other Mormons regarded as his accomplices in the fatal day of the
10th, were summoned to appear before the court to answer a charge of
disturbing the public peace. Joseph got off by obtaining, as in similar
circumstances he had done before, a writ of habeas corpus; and the court of
Nauvoo, on the ground that the mayor had simply enforced according to
law a decision of the municipal council, dismissed the charge.
But this judgment could hardly be to the taste of the
[390]
gentiles; it left a flagrant violation of the constitution unpunished. They
protested; they met the 13th of June, at Carthage, to consider the means of
obtaining justice, and resolved to take arms against the Mormons.
The position became alarming. Joseph comprehended the danger all the
more serious inasmuch as he was not now upheld by the goodness of his
cause. He wrote to the Governor of Illinois, and after laying before him the
circumstances which had led to the destruction of the presses of the
'Expositor,' he begged him to come to Nauvoo to suppress the rioters at
Carthage, who were preparing to march against him and his people with
five pieces of artillery.
Before receiving an answer, Joseph on the 17th of June was once more
arrested along with his accomplices, and again brought before the court of
Nauvoo, to answer a counter-charge of riot in the affair of the 'Expositor.'
He was discharged as in the first instance. The same day he convened the
Saints, informed them he was resolved to defend himself if attacked by the
mob from Carthage, and made an energetic appeal to the police, and to the
legion of Nauvoo. The following day, receiving unsatisfactory news from
Carthage and Missouri, and fearing an immediate attack, he was induced to
take extreme measures, and on his own responsibility proclaimed martial
law. He then harangued his troops, exhorting them to fight with him to the
death in defence of their religion and their liberties.
[391]
The ensuing days were employed in making preparations for defence.
However, the Governor of Illinois, Thomas Ford, had arrived in Carthage.
After having investigated the facts, he declared that the municipal council
of Nauvoo had exceeded its powers in decreeing the suppression of the
'Expositor' newspaper, and he wrote to Smith advising him to give himself
up to justice.
It would seem that Joseph had not anticipated any such result: he had
flattered himself that the Governor would have entertained different
views, and would have looked upon the facts in quite another light. He
however lost no time in answering him. His letter, written immediately
upon the receipt of the Governor's, was humble enough: "He was ready,"
he said, "to give way if he had unwittingly violated the constitution; but he
would not go to Carthage for fear of being assassinated by his enemies." He
was discouraged and agitated by sinister presentiments. Knowing of what
his enemies were capable, he seemed thoroughly resolved not to fall into
their hands. He at first thought of going to Washington; ultimately he made
up his mind to seek safety in the West, and at two o'clock one morning he
crossed the Mississippi, intending to retire towards the Rocky Mountains.
This was the wisest course, and it would have been fortunate for Joseph
had he persevered in it to the last. The residence of himself and followers in
Illinois was no longer
[392]
possible. The public mind was excited against him to the highest pitch; the
influence gained by the Mormons in the elections by their acting together,
the singularity and progress of their doctrine, had united against them both
the spirit of party and the spirit of sect, two powers formidable everywhere,
but especially amid a democracy where liberty is unbounded. The affair of
the 'Expositor' had brought matters to a crisis, and given popular animosity
a favourable and almost justifiable occasion to explode. The Governor had
hoped that Joseph, with that clear-headedness which indisputably
characterized him, would have understood his position, and would have
felt the necessity of quitting Illinois as he had quitted Missouri, and of going
to settle in the vast districts which western America, offers to the emigrant
and to human industry. This course was an obvious one; Joseph's flock
would have followed him in mass, and enmity would have departed with
them.
But fate willed it otherwise. The very day of Smith's flight, Emma, alarmed
at the aspect of Nauvoo during his absence, despatched a messenger,
begging him to return and surrender himself to justice. Several intimate
friends added their entreaties to hers. Too easily led by them, Joseph
recrossed the Mississippi. He presently (the 24th of June) received from the
Governor an order to disarm the legion of Nauvoo. He offered no
resistance, and even aided in effecting the disarmament. He had decided
upon placing himself in the hands of justice at Carthage, and he left
[393]
the same day with seventeen others charged with violating the laws.
Although the Governor had assured him of his protection, he was not free
from uneasiness, and he said to his companions during the journey. "I go
like a lamb to the slaughter, but I am calm as a summer's morn." It was
midnight when they arrived at' Carthage. In spite of the advanced hour of
the night, the streets were filled with people. Joseph passed through them
amid shouts and threats which served to confirm his presentiments and
apprehensions.
The 25th of June, Governor Ford, who had promised the militia of
Carthage to show them the Prophet and the Patriarch, passed before them
with the two Smiths at his side. When they had thus been made to gratify the
curiosity of the mob, they were taken before the judge. Remanded upon bail
(7500 dollars), and ordered to appear next term to take their trial at Hancock,
they for a moment possibly thought themselves out of danger. But a
constable shortly after called upon the two brothers to surrender as
prisoners, on a charge of treason against the State, by having called out the
Nauvoo legion on the 18th of June.
The following day (the 26th of June) the two prisoners were brought up
before the court. The proceedings were very brief, and at their conclusion
they were remanded to prison. The final judgment was to have been
pronounced the following day, the 27th of June; but the
[394]
Governor, who had just determined to send troops to Nauvoo to maintain
order, intending to go there himself that very day with a detachment of
them, the decision of the court was deferred until the 29th. This
circumstance was fatal to the prisoners. Was it a preconcerted matter? Was
the Governor in collusion with the rioters? Be that as it may, on the
morning of the 27th, the Governor dismissed the greater portion of the
militia, and went to Nauvoo with a small escort, leaving Hyrum and
Joseph in prison, under the guard of a few militiamen, charged to protect
them against the people, and at the same time to prevent their escape.
The exasperation of the people seemed somewhat to have diminished, and
it must be admitted, in exoneration of the Governor, that there is reason to
believe he did not anticipate any serious danger; but Joseph, whether he
better understood the public feeling, or that he was warned by the instinct of
self-preservation and the consciousness of immediate danger, felt the
keenest alarm. His fears were shared by Hyrum and by the two friends who
had insisted on accompanying them to prison, John Taylor and Dr. W.
Richards: the result will show these fears were but too well founded,
The same day, between five and six in the afternoon, some hundred armed
men, so disguised as not to be recognizable, made an attack on the jail
where the unfortunate prisoners were. They fired a few shots at the guard,
[395]
killing none; the guard returned the fire with as little result. All had been
arranged beforehand, and they only exchanged shots to keep up
appearances. The assailants, as may be imagined, were soon in possession of
the place; they forced an entrance into the prison and rushed towards the
room the prisoners were in. The door had no fastening whatever. They
pushed it ajar and fired upon those within. Joseph, whom a faithful friend
had secretly furnished with a revolver, fired and wounded the assassin by
whose hand his brother Hyrum had just been shot in the face; the
unfortunate Patriarch crying out as he fell, "I am a dead man;" in the act of
falling he received three more bullets which despatched him. John Taylor
at the same moment fell, severely wounded in several places.
The firing was still kept up through the half-opened door. Up to this time
Joseph was untouched. He had defended himself manfully, but now his
revolver having missed fire three times, and being without further means
of resistance, he tried to escape through the window, and had got his legs
across the sill when he was struck by a couple of balls. He fell to the ground,
a height of twenty feet, in the midst of his assassins, exclaiming, "O Lord,
my God!" One of the mob dragged his body along, and propped it up against
the wall of a well. Life was almost extinct, when Colonel Williams ordered
four men to advance within eight paces and fire. The unfortunate victim,
already mutilated by his fall and his wounds, received
[396]
these four shots in his body, which put an end to him. The assassin who
had dragged the body to the well, was about to cut off his head with a
cutlass, when, if the Mormons are to be believed, a sudden flash of
lightning struck him with terror and stayed his arm. The assassins panic-
struck fled in disorder towards Warsaw.
Thus perished the two principal persons among the Mormons. As to the
two Saints who had accompanied them and who were with them in prison,
viz. Dr. W. Richards and John Taylor (to whom, together with another
witness named Daniels, not a Mormon, we are indebted for these facts), they
managed to escape with life from this bloody struggle. Dr. Richards received
only a scratch on the left ear, and assisted his companion, who was
dangerously wounded, to get away after the assassins had departed.
The principal object of the rioters had been attained. But their plot, aiming
at more than the death of the Prophet, extended to his whole people. They
had timed the murder so as to coincide with the Governor's presence in
Nauvoo, in the hope that, the news of the death of the Prophet suddenly
reaching the Mormons while he was still in their city, there would be an
irresistible burst of popular grief and indignation, and that they would seek
to revenge upon him the loss of so important and beloved a victim, a step
which would have given a plausible pretext and a legitimate reason for the
extermination of the abhorred sect. Fortunately this frightful calculation
miscarried.
[397]
The Governor -- who, during the bloody scene enacting at Carthage,
was addressing the Mormons at Nauvoo, reproaching them with the
destruction of the 'Expositor,' exhorting them to avoid the shedding of
blood, and threatening them with terrible vengeance unless they remained
peaceable and submissive to the laws -- first learned the tragic end of the
Prophet during the night, on his return to Carthage from Nauvoo; and it is
by no means certain that, even had he been on the spot when the sad news
arrived, that their first impulse would have been the desire of vengeance.
All hearts were plunged in grief. The lamentation was universal; the city in
a state of stupor.
The bodies of the martyrs were brought from Carthage to Nauvoo the day
after the catastrophe. The whole populace hurried out to meet them.
Nothing but cries of grief and despair was heard during the passing of the
funeral procession. If eye-witnesses can be credited, never was there such an
affecting sight.
They at once proceeded to bury the bodies. But as the assassins had
threatened the Mormons that they would not even leave them the solace of
possessing the ashes of their beloved martyrs, the coffins they lowered into
the grave, instead of containing the precious remains, were filled with bags
of sand, and the funeral pomp, although magnificent, served only to cheat
the eye and to put their enemies on a false scent. At midnight the bodies of
the martyrs were secretly deposited under Nauvoo House, which
[398]
was still in course of construction. The grave was covered in such a manner
as to leave no trace of the place of sepulture. The following autumn the
remains were removed, at Emma's request, and interred near the Mansion
in the spot where the Bee House was subsequently erected. The deceased
children of the Prophet were afterwards buried in the same tomb.
The death of Joseph Smith, from whatever point of view we regard it, is a
blot upon the democracy of the United States, and nothing can justify it. But
unhappily, nothing is more easy of explanation. Starting from a different
principle, and placing himself outside the common ground of the one
revelation admitted by all the various sects, Joseph had necessarily united
them all against him. Opposing to a gospel considered definitive by all,
another gospel represented as new and superior to it, he was regarded as a
kind of monster which must at any cost be cut off and destroyed. Moreover,
as we have already explained, he had excited political jealousy against him.
The unity of the Mormon voters rendered them masters of the local
elections; this disarranged the plans and views of politicians, and of the
ambitious and intriguing of all parties. At variance upon other points, they
agreed in their hatred of the new sectaries, and also in the necessity of
extirpating them, or at the very least, of freeing the country of them. All this
suffices to explain the calumnies of every kind, the accusations of theft and
felony, which were everywhere
[399]
circulated against them. The singularity of their doctrine, and the mystery
in which it was wrapped, were yet a further cause of suspicion and hatred.
The agitation was assiduously kept up for the purpose of being turned to
account. The people, too, on their side, animated with the same feelings as
those of their agitators, were easily led to take part in every movement
against the Mormons, and once let loose, went into every excess. The
authorities were taken by surprise or overawed; if, indeed, they were not, at
times, themselves under the influence of the general excitement.
Occasionally efforts were made to mislead them. Governor Thomas Ford
has officially admitted that the enemies of the Mormons had recourse to
artifice to make him believe that the Saints were engaged in seditious
intrigues, and thus to induce him to be a party to their plans of
extermination.
To these causes of their ruin, the Mormons themselves contributed others.
Their prosperity, which had increased in spite of persecution, the flattering
expectations in which they indulged, the great reputation of their Prophet;
had inflamed their pride, and carried their confidence even to insolence.
Finally, the apostates, the excommunicated and the ejected, covered with
shame in the presence of the gentiles from whom they had first deserted,
exposed to raillery and abuse, vowed implacable hatred against the leaders
whose new doctrine had misled them, who were much too clever to
become their dupes, and who, they
[400]
thought, were making a speculation of their support. Were not these
sufficient causes for popular irritation and excitement? America is
unquestionably a very free country; religious liberty knows no bounds, but
this, it must be observed, is in practice only true with respect to creeds
resting on the common ground of Christianity; for any new religious
system, professedly attacking Christianity, cannot attempt to establish itself
without incurring considerable risk. The time has not yet anywhere arrived,
when man can give his religious ideas the outward form he believes best
calculated to represent and fully express them.
It was feared that Nauvoo would seek vengeance for the death of the man
who had founded and governed it: it was wealthy, powerful, and animated
by that peculiar and lofty courage inspired by religious fanaticism. The
Governor of Illinois at first shared this apprehension: he expected to see the
Mormons burst upon Carthage, and commit all sorts of excesses. He even
lost no time in going to Quincy, to be in a position to watch events. He was
mistaken in his expectation. Every heart in Nauvoo seemed resigned to the
catastrophe, which appeared to be a Divine confirmation of the Prophet's
mission. The leaders, themselves moderate in their views, and rendered
prudent by events, experienced no difficulty in keeping the people calm and
composed; content to wait for justice from man, and, that failing, for
vengeance from the great Elohim.
[401]
The Mormons, independent of the animosity which still threatened them
from without, were also in a very critical position as regarded their internal
affairs. All depended on their leader, and this leader was no more. Those
who were most fitted to replace him were absent on various duties. Of the
twelve apostles, ten were dispersed over different parts of the Union, where
they were engaged in supporting the Prophet's election for the, presidency.
It was impossible, until their return, to proceed to the election of the new
president of the Church. And then, who would be equal to the
requirements of such a post, and competent to fill the void left by such a
man?
It was indeed no easy matter to find an efficient successor to Joseph Smith.
This man, whatever our opinion may be as to his doctrine and the part he
played, was no ordinary man.* This man, born in an obscure condition of
life, without fortune, without education, early conceived
_____________________
* In confirmation of the opinion we here emit, it may be well to give a few
extracts from a severe criticism on Smith's character, which appeared in an
American periodical, 'The Christian Reflector,' written shortly after his
death. "It is but a few weeks," says the 'Reflector,' "since the death of Joe
Smith was announced. His body now sleeps, and his spirit has gone to its
reward, Various are the opinions of men concerning this singular
personage; but whatever may be the views of any in reference to his
principles, objects, or moral character, all agree that he was one of the most
remarkable men of the age ... The Prophet's virtues have been rehearsed
and admired in Europe; the ministers of Nauvoo have even found a
welcome in Asia, and Africa has listened to the grave sayings of the Seer of
Palmyra. The standard of the Latter-day Saints has been reared on the banks
of the Nile, and even the Holy Land has been entered by the emissaries of
this wicked impostor. He founded a city in one of
[402]
and executed a project, difficult in all ages, and which, until his time, had
been considered impossible in ours. We may blame the imposture, the
conception, and performance of the part he played, the profound contempt
for the human mind he evinced, many of the means he employed in order
to succeed, and his persistent use of falsehood. We may assert, if we will,
that success was only possible on the spot where it was sought for, in the
theatre and before the pit where the farce was played; that elsewhere the
actor would have been pitilessly hissed, if indeed, which is not probable, he
had been able elsewhere to find a, stage; that what he indispensably required
was, that medley multitude, made up of such varied and impure elements,
which is either the growth of the New World or an importation from the
Old, in order to obtain an audience and draw down applause. This is all
very true, and we do not dispute it. But it is none the less a fact, that a new
religion has been fashioned by this man, whatever may be the
_____________________
the most beautiful situations in the world, in a beautiful curve of the
'Father of Waters,' of no mean pretensions; and in it he has collected a
population of twenty-five thousand, from every part of the world. He
planned the architecture of a magnificent- temple, and reared its walls
nearly fifty feet high, which, if completed, will be the most beautiful, most
costly, and the most noble building in America." (This, of course, was
written previous to the expulsion from Nauvoo.) ... "Reasoning from effect
to cause, we must conclude that the Mormon Prophet was of no common
genius; few are able to commence and carry out an imposition like this, so
long, and to such an extent and we see in the history of his success, most
striking proofs of the gullibility of a large portion of the human family.
What may not men be induced to believe?" Such was the impression made
by Joseph Smith on the men of his own day and country.
[403]
merits of this religion; that the seeds of a nation have been sown in a virgin
soil, and that up to this moment, at any rate, these seeds are in process of
development and actively germinating. It must not be imagined either, that
men, however humble they may be, that the multitude, base as we may
consider it, can be so easily seduced and persuaded, Many of undoubted
intellect would fail were they to attempt the experiment. In truth, great
influence is never obtained over mankind without real superiority, and if
this be admitted, Smith is undoubtedly a superior man.
And now let us consider whether, independent of the eternal censure
attaching to his imposture, Joseph Smith merits that esteem which is due to
uprightness of life and purity of morals and character. If we believe the
enemies of the Mormons, and apostates, the question will not be difficult to
answer, and the result will be far from favourable; if we place faith in the
report of his friends sad followers, it will be exactly the other way. There is
not a vice* with which the former do not load his name; there is not a
virtue with which the latter do not adorn his memory. It
_____________________
* Among the numerous vices attributed to Smith is drunkenness. It is
related, but we do not vouch for the fact, that he one day said to some
persons who expressed astonishment at a prophet getting intoxicated, "It is
necessary, in order to prevent my disciples from adoring me as a God."
Some years later, he is stated to have made his excuse for the same fault, by
saying, "Several Elders have often got drunk without confessing it; I got in
the same state to show them how disgusting it is, and to set them a good
example by confessing my sin." -- Caswell, 'The City of the Mormons in
1842,' pp. 50, 51.
[404]
is a law, that men who have played a part in the world, who have
powerfully affected the imaginations and minds of their fellow-men,
should be themselves subject to conflicting judgments, and never be either
calumniated or extolled by halves. Perchance the truth lies midway between
these extreme views; and extraordinary men, being compounded, like their
fellows, of good and evil, might say to their friends and to their enemies, in
the words of the poet, --
"Je n'ai point merite
Ni cet exces d'honneur ni cette indignite,"
It would undoubtedly be difficult to rebut the accusations made against his
morality, and to exhibit the promoter of polygamy as a Hippolytus. But if he
had that failing, so common to many great men, and which Mohammed,
one of his predecessors, so candidly acknowledged, he possessed other
dualities which can hardly be ignored, and which are of some weight. He
was gentle, humane, and conciliatory; he readily pardoned wrongs against
himself, either in his public or private capacity. He had a peculiar fondness
for children: he constantly associated with them, mingled in their sports,
and consoled them in their little troubles. Amid his family he overflowed
with kindness and love, both as a father and husband. His mother never
refers to him but as the most affectionate and dutiful of sons, His brothers
were his friends rather than his mere instruments. In his daily relations
with his followers, the man constantly
[405]
effaced the prophet, without thereby compromising his ascendancy. A
lawyer, John S. Reid, whose testimony there appears no reason to suspect,
spoke of him before a State convention, on the 17th of May, 1844, in a
deposition made upon oath, as follows: -- "I have known Joseph Smith
from eighteen years of age; his conduct was irreproachable: he was well
known for his veracity and uprightness; he mixed in the best circles of his
locality, and he, was spoken of as a young man of intelligence and good
moral conduct, endowed with a mind capable of the highest intellectual
acquirements." Doubtless this testimony only applies to the earlier parts of
his career; but there is one fact which is worth all the rest, and which
deserves consideration in the eyes of every impartial judge, which is, that
tried thirty-nine times, by all kinds of courts, on various charges, the greater
part hostile to him, he was never once convicted. May we say in passing,
that this fact, which is such an eloquent answer to all the calumnies against
him, does as much honour to the administration of justice in the United.
States as to him? Perhaps we ought: it is a remarkable thing that in this
country, where we have just seen religious and political fanaticism urging
the populace to so many culpable excesses, that the administration of justice
should have maintained its incorruptibility in the very trials which
fanaticism had instigated.
As to his capacity as administrator and organizer, there is no room for
doubt: it stands out prominently throughout
[406]
his whole life, and this it is perhaps, combined with his power of
influencing mankind, which is the most distinguished feature in the career
of the founder of Mormonism.
As respects his moral qualities, his kindness, his sensitiveness, his
attachment to his friends, without referring to other more manly traits, are
positive and incontestable. True, Smith was an impostor, but when the
mask was raised, he was still a man at heart, and it is not often we can say as
much of all of those who have misled mankind.*
_____________________
* The portrait of Joseph Smith and that of his brother Hyrum, which
illustrate this work, have been copied with scrupulous fidelity from the
original picture, now in the possession of Brigham Young, after having
long been the property of the mother of the Prophet, who died at Nauvoo
in 1856. According to the testimony of the oldest among the Mormons,
these two portraits are most striking likenesses.
|
