My unresolved issues concerning the church - Page 3 - cougarguard.com — unofficial BYU Cougars / LDS sports, football, basketball forum and message board

Archaea · 01-12-2006, 04:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by homeboy

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

Joseph Smith was jailed in Carthage on trumped up charges?

Now your mileage may vary but in my experience during seminary(and any other CES related class that I had) anytime Joseph Smith was jailed for anything it was based on 'trumped up charges by men seeking to frustrate the work of God.' I never heard a thing about any printing press.

Joseph Smith was jailed in Carthage because he smashed the printing press of the Nauvoo Expositor. His main fear was that the newpaper would incite more mob violence. The newpaper had taken to printing dissenting views and Joseph Smith got permission from the town council(who had errantly determined that the charter gave them the authority to shut down the paper) to order the sheriff and his men to break into the newpaper. He was arrested and brought to Carthage. Something about freedom of the press.

Note: I took the following from this website: http://www.lds-mormon.com/06.shtml

The website author claims to have gotten it off the BYU website but I couldn't find it there so I don't know for sure how authentic the below account is.

"The Expositor appeared on Friday afternoon, and the following morning and the Monday thereafter the city council met to consider its threat to the peace and security of the city. With the powers granted by the city charter, they declared the newspaper a nuisance, as they felt its declarations threatened the security of the city. They authorized the mayor (Joseph Smith) to see that the nuisance was abated. The Prophet instructed the city marshal to abate the nuisance which he and his men accomplished by breaking into the printing shop, throwing the press into street where it was smashed with a sledge hammer, dumping the type into the street, and burning the undistributed copies of the newspaper. Such an extralegal method of abating a newspaper was not without precedent in Illinois (though not in keeping with long established practices concerning abatement of a public press), but it was viewed as a violation to the federal Constitution which forbids destruction of property without due process of law. The city council had only the authority to abate the nuisance by suspending further publication of the paper pending a court hearing which would determine whether it was a public nuisance.

The proprietor of the paper went to Carthage and swore out a warrant for the 18 members of the city council, charging that they had violated the federal Constitution by destroying property with the resultant implication of "suppression of the freedom of the press." In response to the charge 15 members of the Nauvoo city council appeared before the justice of the peace in Carthage on Tuesday, June 25, and were bound over to the next term of the circuit court on bail of $500 each. Jointly they posted $7500 in bonds and some of them returned to Nauvoo that afternoon. Joseph and Hyrum, however, remained in Carthage to have an interview with Governor Ford. While awaiting audience with him, they were arrested on charges of treason and rioting for having used some of the Nauvoo Legion to assist the town marshal in the destruction of Expositor equipment. For this charge they were committed to the Carthage jail that afternoon. "

Kind of ironic don't you think? The part about the printing press getting smashed sounds remarkably familiar.

This one bugs me a little bit but probably isn't one of the main ones. Its the secretive nature of CES, when it comes to historical accuracy, that's really starting to get on my nerves.

If the church is trying to hide this, they are doing a very poor job. It has been openly discussed and debated as long as I can remember. I think you have a straw man in this case.

This website is authored by the infamous "Tanners", whose lifelong mission has been to attack the Church. Anything there is of questionable validity.

realtall · 01-12-2006, 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Archaea

Quote:

Originally Posted by homeboy

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

Joseph Smith was jailed in Carthage on trumped up charges?

Now your mileage may vary but in my experience during seminary(and any other CES related class that I had) anytime Joseph Smith was jailed for anything it was based on 'trumped up charges by men seeking to frustrate the work of God.' I never heard a thing about any printing press.

Joseph Smith was jailed in Carthage because he smashed the printing press of the Nauvoo Expositor. His main fear was that the newpaper would incite more mob violence. The newpaper had taken to printing dissenting views and Joseph Smith got permission from the town council(who had errantly determined that the charter gave them the authority to shut down the paper) to order the sheriff and his men to break into the newpaper. He was arrested and brought to Carthage. Something about freedom of the press.

Note: I took the following from this website: http://www.lds-mormon.com/06.shtml

The website author claims to have gotten it off the BYU website but I couldn't find it there so I don't know for sure how authentic the below account is.

"The Expositor appeared on Friday afternoon, and the following morning and the Monday thereafter the city council met to consider its threat to the peace and security of the city. With the powers granted by the city charter, they declared the newspaper a nuisance, as they felt its declarations threatened the security of the city. They authorized the mayor (Joseph Smith) to see that the nuisance was abated. The Prophet instructed the city marshal to abate the nuisance which he and his men accomplished by breaking into the printing shop, throwing the press into street where it was smashed with a sledge hammer, dumping the type into the street, and burning the undistributed copies of the newspaper. Such an extralegal method of abating a newspaper was not without precedent in Illinois (though not in keeping with long established practices concerning abatement of a public press), but it was viewed as a violation to the federal Constitution which forbids destruction of property without due process of law. The city council had only the authority to abate the nuisance by suspending further publication of the paper pending a court hearing which would determine whether it was a public nuisance.

The proprietor of the paper went to Carthage and swore out a warrant for the 18 members of the city council, charging that they had violated the federal Constitution by destroying property with the resultant implication of "suppression of the freedom of the press." In response to the charge 15 members of the Nauvoo city council appeared before the justice of the peace in Carthage on Tuesday, June 25, and were bound over to the next term of the circuit court on bail of $500 each. Jointly they posted $7500 in bonds and some of them returned to Nauvoo that afternoon. Joseph and Hyrum, however, remained in Carthage to have an interview with Governor Ford. While awaiting audience with him, they were arrested on charges of treason and rioting for having used some of the Nauvoo Legion to assist the town marshal in the destruction of Expositor equipment. For this charge they were committed to the Carthage jail that afternoon. "

Kind of ironic don't you think? The part about the printing press getting smashed sounds remarkably familiar.

This one bugs me a little bit but probably isn't one of the main ones. Its the secretive nature of CES, when it comes to historical accuracy, that's really starting to get on my nerves.

If the church is trying to hide this, they are doing a very poor job. It has been openly discussed and debated as long as I can remember. I think you have a straw man in this case.

This website is authored by the infamous "Tanners", whose lifelong mission has been to attack the Church. Anything there is of questionable validity.

I had no idea that it is the Tanners. I feel a little dirty now. I could find no mention of who actually runs the site. I thought that it was a little suspicious that they had the article and said that it was from the BYU site but did not supply the link. I used to spend more time on that site but there was just too much crap that was bothersome & I did not know what to do with.

Still, from my understanding the basics are correct. Joseph Smith was arrested for smashing a printing press and thereby interfering with the freedom of the press. If this is incorrect I would appreciate it if someone would set me straight.

Alkili · 01-12-2006, 04:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

Now that is interesting. I had never heard that the travelers from Arkansas claimed to have killed Joseph Smith.

They don't say the name of the company very often, but they called themselves the Missouri Wildcats, and if you read through the list of names of the men who were killed you will find that many of them were in the carthage grays.

Also in John D. Lees confesion, he talks about the danite leadership being in on the murders, and the danites were an apostate group that was formed to overthrow Joesph Smith as Prophet as well as get revenge for what was happening in missiouri. I really doubt that Brigham Young acted through the danites, since they were a secret combination at the time, that always claimed that they were acting on authority of the Prophet.

fusnik11 · 01-12-2006, 05:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

Still, from my understanding the basics are correct. Joseph Smith was arrested for smashing a printing press and thereby interfering with the freedom of the press. If this is incorrect I would appreciate it if someone would set me straight.

this is my understanding....

joseph had the right to shut down the paper if he felt it was causing discontent with the saints. the paper threatened to continue writing about joseph and his polygamous activities, joseph caught wind and not only did they shut down the press they ransacked the place and smashed it up.

so was he right in impeding certain levels of freedom of speech? yes. was he right in destroying property? no. which is why he ultimately was arrested.

if i am wrong feel free to correct me.

Alkili · 01-12-2006, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by homeboy

If the church is trying to hide this, they are doing a very poor job. It has been openly discussed and debated as long as I can remember. I think you have a straw man in this case.

Here is a talk by Susan Easton Black that hits on this topic.

http://byubwmv.byu.edu/edweek/2005/SBlack05.wmv

What happend was they held a city council meeting about what to do about the press then after many hours of discussion they decided to destroy it. He was tried 3-4 times on the same crime (double jeopardy?). Joseph wasn't present when it happend but may have given the order to do it.

Jeff Lebowski · 01-12-2006, 05:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

There is no straw man. I was speaking from personal experience.

And I doubt still that CES mentions it at all.

I would be very interested if you(or anyone else) heard even a casual mention of this incident in a seminary, institute, or a BYU religion class. I'm not being sarcastic; I'm just trying to gain an accurate picture of things.

I suppose you and I simply have different personal experiences. It just seems to me like I have known for most of my life that JS went to jail for destroying a critical press the day after the first publication. I have read that in so many books, articles, etc. (both friendly and otherwise) that it hardly seems to be any kind of secret.

Dallin Oaks has written on this topic a few times, once in 1979 (wasn't he still president of BYU at that time)?:

Oaks, Dallin H. "The Suppression of the Nauvoo Expositor." Utah Law Review 9 (Winter 1965):862-903.

Oaks, Dallin H., and Marvin S. Hill. Carthage Conspiracy: The Trial of the Accused Assassins of Joseph Smith. Urbana, Ill., 1979.

He argues that when judged by the standards at the time, it wasn't quite so outrageous as it seems now. An apologist approach to be sure, but when you have the president of BYU writing on the topic, it hardly seems to be avoiding the issue.

As for CES, you may be right. It has been so long since I took seminary or institute that I am not a good judge.

realtall · 01-12-2006, 05:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alkili

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

Now that is interesting. I had never heard that the travelers from Arkansas claimed to have killed Joseph Smith.

They don't say the name of the company very often, but they called themselves the Missouri Wildcats, and if you read through the list of names of the men who were killed you will find that many of them were in the carthage grays.

Also in John D. Lees confesion, he talks about the danite leadership being in on the murders, and the danites were an apostate group that was formed to overthrow Joseph Smith as Prophet as well as get revenge for what was happening in missiouri. I really doubt that Brigham Young acted through the danites, since they were a secret combination at the time, that always claimed that they were acting on authority of the Prophet.

Are you saying that the danites were trying to overthow Joseph while claiming Joseph's authority? I don't quite understand. Maybe I'm not reading that last pargaraph quite right.

Thanks for the info. This all quite interesting.

Alkili · 01-12-2006, 05:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

Are you saying that the danites were trying to overthow Joseph while claiming Joseph's authority? I don't quite understand. Maybe I'm not reading that last pargraph quite right.

Thanks for the info. This all quite interesting.

You read that right, the leaders of the group were Sampson Avard, Jared Carter, and George W. Robinson, also one of the men that was supposed to show the support from the church leadership was Thomas B Marsh (sound familiar).

Here is a link about the group http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danite

Dan · 01-12-2006, 06:02 PM

Joseph Smith and his 33 wives

True, polyandry is really the disconcerting issue. But from Joseph's perspective, he was told certain women were his. Some were currently married to others. He went ahead and made them his but allowed them to live with the first husband "for time". Joseph prbably had sexual relations in some or most of these, I would guess. But we don't know. Some of the polyandrous first husbands knew about Joseph, some did not. The overarching theme is that polygamy was secret then. There was a concept back then that a woman could leave her husband to unite with a man of higher priesthood authority. I know that does not gel with current thought on how marriage should be in the church. These women were willing to be married to Joseph even though they had husbands already. AND it was good cover for Joseph at the time. If the women left their husbands and people started realizing they were spending inordinate amounts of time with Joseph with a possible pregnancy here and there, well, you can imagine the gossiping that would take place and the further problems that would erupt if polyandry was put up for public consumption and verified. it had to be kept on the down low, and Joseph was able to marry them and by staying with their first husbands, much suspicion was alleviated. Once the saints started moving west and what they did did not have to be so secretive, polyandry was dumped and polygyny was the only norm. The flip side is that Joseph could have just been a wicked player with the women. Your faith will help you decide which way you believe.

The Salamander Letter

Prophets and presidents of the church are mortal men with weaknesses and all. I think most LDS would admit that if pushed to, but there is a latent idea in the minds of MANY LDS that the prophet is darn near infallible. Think back to how many bad choices Joseph made. The Kirtland bank failure, the many close associates he misread who turned on him. Do not be suprised if leaders of the church are duped here or there. The flip side is that God may have been willing to direct the prophet on the matter but the prophet and/or church is in apostasy themselves. Your faith will help you decide.

Mountain Meadows Massacre

It cannot be pinned on BY. But understanding the circumstances involved sheds light on why it took place. The saints had been driven from place to place for years/decades. Joseph and Hyrum were murdered, as was Parley Pratt. The saints covenanted to avenge the blood of their prophets. The prospect of Johnston's army was looming in Deseret. Everyone was on high alert. The blood atonement concept was in the people's mind. You have a goop of migrants coming through the territory raising a rukus, boasting about the killings of the beloved leaders of the saints, there were fears that the group was poisoning the saints water wells. This was all taking place far from headquarters in southern Utah. The local leaders decided to start avenging some blood. It was an unfortunate event, to say the least. But with all of the pressures and circumstances weighing down at the time, the group of migrants was like a lit match placed under kindling wood.

Polygamy

Polygamy was taught that it would never leave. The nation placed pressure on the church leaders to stop the practice. The church leaders conceded and in turn were given statehood (which had much more autonomy back then compared to now). Still the manifesto was a public statement, nothing more. The leaders of the church kept condoning plural marriages so that the commandments could be complied with. They just had to do it in secret. But then the government found out that the saints were still doing it, so a second manifesto was pronounced which claimed total cessation of the practice. Some marriages were performed thereafter, but the practice was quickly stamped out after the second manifesto, for most anyway. We did boy to government pressures on that one. maybe they shouldn't have. maybe they were meant to go through the crucible of obedience at all cost. Your faith will help you believe if they were guided to make the decisions they did or if they just made poor choices based on their fallible nature. But even back in the Joseph days you had people abandoning their inheritances in Zion because of the threat of violence, etc. Pain and suffering of family and loved ones can be a strong enticing to people to get them to curb their practices. Whether correct or incorrect decisions were made, I certainly could understand how they could have been made either way. I do not think we are punished per se for incorrect decisions they may have made, but such decisions to reach down to the fourth generation, so it says, of which we are in. So maybe the affects are still here and a new day will dawn when any such mistakes made by fallible leaders may be corrected.

myboynoah · 01-12-2006, 07:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by homeboy

Quote:

Originally Posted by realtall

There is no straw man. I was speaking from personal experience.

And I doubt still that CES mentions it at all.

I would be very interested if you(or anyone else) heard even a casual mention of this incident in a seminary, institute, or a BYU religion class. I'm not being sarcastic; I'm just trying to gain an accurate picture of things.

I suppose you and I simply have different personal experiences. It just seems to me like I have known for most of my life that JS went to jail for destroying a critical press the day after the first publication. I have read that in so many books, articles, etc. (both friendly and otherwise) that it hardly seems to be any kind of secret.

Dallin Oaks has written on this topic a few times, once in 1979 (wasn't he still president of BYU at that time)?:

Oaks, Dallin H. "The Suppression of the Nauvoo Expositor." Utah Law Review 9 (Winter 1965):862-903.

Oaks, Dallin H., and Marvin S. Hill. Carthage Conspiracy: The Trial of the Accused Assassins of Joseph Smith. Urbana, Ill., 1979.

He argues that when judged by the standards at the time, it wasn't quite so outrageous as it seems now. An apologist approach to be sure, but when you have the president of BYU writing on the topic, it hardly seems to be avoiding the issue.

As for CES, you may be right. It has been so long since I took seminary or institute that I am not a good judge.

I'm with homeboy on this one. I've heard the smashed press thing discussed many times (Even in Seminary--they just didn't go into detail about what the Expositer was printing--real Jerry Springer type stuff).

01-12-2006, 06:02 PM	#29
Dan Junior Member Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: Elk Grove, California Posts: 211	My .02 Joseph Smith and his 33 wives True, polyandry is really the disconcerting issue. But from Joseph's perspective, he was told certain women were his. Some were currently married to others. He went ahead and made them his but allowed them to live with the first husband "for time". Joseph prbably had sexual relations in some or most of these, I would guess. But we don't know. Some of the polyandrous first husbands knew about Joseph, some did not. The overarching theme is that polygamy was secret then. There was a concept back then that a woman could leave her husband to unite with a man of higher priesthood authority. I know that does not gel with current thought on how marriage should be in the church. These women were willing to be married to Joseph even though they had husbands already. AND it was good cover for Joseph at the time. If the women left their husbands and people started realizing they were spending inordinate amounts of time with Joseph with a possible pregnancy here and there, well, you can imagine the gossiping that would take place and the further problems that would erupt if polyandry was put up for public consumption and verified. it had to be kept on the down low, and Joseph was able to marry them and by staying with their first husbands, much suspicion was alleviated. Once the saints started moving west and what they did did not have to be so secretive, polyandry was dumped and polygyny was the only norm. The flip side is that Joseph could have just been a wicked player with the women. Your faith will help you decide which way you believe. The Salamander Letter Prophets and presidents of the church are mortal men with weaknesses and all. I think most LDS would admit that if pushed to, but there is a latent idea in the minds of MANY LDS that the prophet is darn near infallible. Think back to how many bad choices Joseph made. The Kirtland bank failure, the many close associates he misread who turned on him. Do not be suprised if leaders of the church are duped here or there. The flip side is that God may have been willing to direct the prophet on the matter but the prophet and/or church is in apostasy themselves. Your faith will help you decide. Mountain Meadows Massacre It cannot be pinned on BY. But understanding the circumstances involved sheds light on why it took place. The saints had been driven from place to place for years/decades. Joseph and Hyrum were murdered, as was Parley Pratt. The saints covenanted to avenge the blood of their prophets. The prospect of Johnston's army was looming in Deseret. Everyone was on high alert. The blood atonement concept was in the people's mind. You have a goop of migrants coming through the territory raising a rukus, boasting about the killings of the beloved leaders of the saints, there were fears that the group was poisoning the saints water wells. This was all taking place far from headquarters in southern Utah. The local leaders decided to start avenging some blood. It was an unfortunate event, to say the least. But with all of the pressures and circumstances weighing down at the time, the group of migrants was like a lit match placed under kindling wood. Polygamy Polygamy was taught that it would never leave. The nation placed pressure on the church leaders to stop the practice. The church leaders conceded and in turn were given statehood (which had much more autonomy back then compared to now). Still the manifesto was a public statement, nothing more. The leaders of the church kept condoning plural marriages so that the commandments could be complied with. They just had to do it in secret. But then the government found out that the saints were still doing it, so a second manifesto was pronounced which claimed total cessation of the practice. Some marriages were performed thereafter, but the practice was quickly stamped out after the second manifesto, for most anyway. We did boy to government pressures on that one. maybe they shouldn't have. maybe they were meant to go through the crucible of obedience at all cost. Your faith will help you believe if they were guided to make the decisions they did or if they just made poor choices based on their fallible nature. But even back in the Joseph days you had people abandoning their inheritances in Zion because of the threat of violence, etc. Pain and suffering of family and loved ones can be a strong enticing to people to get them to curb their practices. Whether correct or incorrect decisions were made, I certainly could understand how they could have been made either way. I do not think we are punished per se for incorrect decisions they may have made, but such decisions to reach down to the fourth generation, so it says, of which we are in. So maybe the affects are still here and a new day will dawn when any such mistakes made by fallible leaders may be corrected. __________________ Dan Temet Nosce - \"Know Thyself\"