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This is a blog post that I prepared in October of last year, in the wake of the following comments made by Quentin L. Cook in General Conference:

Quentin L. Cook wrote:A second example of how religious faith benefits society and contributes light to the world is the role of religion in treating all of God’s children as brothers and sisters.

Many faith-based institutions in the last two centuries have been at the forefront in reaching out and rescuing those subjected to cruel circumstances because their members believe that all men are made in the image and likeness of God. William Wilberforce, the great British statesman who was instrumental in outlawing the slave trade in Great Britain, is an excellent example. “Amazing Grace,” the touching hymn, and the inspiring movie of the same name capture the feeling of the early 1800s and describe the account of his heroic effort. Wilberforce’s untiring efforts were among the first steps in eliminating this terrible, oppressive, cruel, and venal practice. As part of that effort he, together with other leaders, set out to reform public morality. He believed that education and government had to be morally based. “His … vision of moral and spiritual enrichment was what he lived for, whether in defending the institution of marriage, attacking the practices of the slave trade or emphatically defending the Sabbath day.” With great energy he helped mobilize the country’s moral and social leaders in a nationwide struggle against vice.

In our early Church history, the vast majority of our members were opposed to slavery. This was a significant reason, along with their religious beliefs, for the hostility and mob violence they experienced, culminating in the extermination order issued by Governor Boggs in Missouri. In 1833 Joseph Smith received a revelation stating, “It is not right that any man should be in bondage one to another.” Our commitment to freedom of religion and treating all people as sons and daughters of God is central to our doctrine.

Source: Let There Be Light!

At the time I prepared it, the text of the talks hadn't even been posted yet.

I sent it to a friend for feedback. My friend decided that by "feedback" I meant that I wanted a point-by-point refutation of the post. Long story short, my friend's response was so depressingly hostile that I wound up scrapping the post altogether. I felt like, if someone as reasonable and even-handed as my friend hated it, then the reaction from my LDS readers was going to be a nightmare. Shortly afterward, J. Nelson Seawright did an excellent post at By Common Consent where he made some of the same points, so I decided that the post would be redundant and wound up never running it.

I'm posting it here now because Lizard Jew's recent comment reminded me that there are still Mormons trying to claim that the LDS church was opposed to slavery in its early days. The fact of the matter is that it wasn't. The church's treatment of slavery can best be described as ambivalent.

As I point out in the post, a lot of good men and women spilled their blood to end slavery in America. Very few of them were Mormon. I think it's an injustice to the memory of those men and women when Latter-day Saints try to take credit for opposing slavery. They didn't earn it.

So, here is the post. I've made a few minor modifications and added a link, but for the most part it is unchanged from the draft form that I sent to my friend.

I was somewhat dismayed to hear Elder Quentin L. Cook's remarks concerning Mormons and slavery at the Saturday afternoon General Conference. Elder Cook said:

Quentin L. Cook wrote:In our early Church history, the vast majority of our members were opposed to slavery. This was a significant reason, along with their religious beliefs, for the hostility and mob violence they experienced, culminating in the extermination order issued by Governor Boggs in Missouri. In 1833 Joseph Smith received a revelation stating, “It is not right that any man should be in bondage one to another.” Our commitment to freedom of religion and treating all people as sons and daughters of God is central to our doctrine.

There are several problems with Elder Cook's claims.

Were the "vast majority" of early church members opposed to slavery?

Many of them were on a personal level. However, this stemmed more from the fact that the majority of Mormon converts hailed from the Northeastern region of the United States, where anti-slavery sentiments were prevalent and slavery was not a significant economic factor in their way of life. Had the church drawn more converts from the South, early Mormonism almost certainly would have had a larger pro-slavery faction.

Even if members on an individual level were personally opposed to slavery, they were seldom active in the abolitionist movement. As Thomas M. Spencer notes, "Few among the Mormons were committed abolitionists and the Book of Mormon suggested that those with darker skins were considered inferior in the eyes of God." [1] Furthermore, the position of Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and the institutional church was usually much more ambivalent. At certain times, both Joseph Smith and Brigham Young made statements supportive of slavery and critical of the abolitionist movement while echoing Protestant sentiments that slavery was the natural result of the curse of Cain. A small number of members owned slaves as the church had no policy against it. Joseph Smith did become more critical of the institution of slavery towards the end of his life and developed a moderate abolitionist position, but this was several years after the flight from Missouri.

When Utah was organized as a territory, it was designated as neither free nor slave-holding; that choice was left up to its residents. Though it had some of the kindest slavery laws in the nation, slavery was not abolished in Utah until 1862.

Was Mormon abolitionist sentiment a significant factor leading to the Extermination Order?

Cook is the first person I've ever heard to make this claim. None of my general Mormon history books say anything about Mormon abolitionism being a "significant factor" in the Mormon expulsion from Missouri. In 1833, W. W. Phelps published a rather anti-slavery editorial in The Evening and Morning Star which ignited some bad blood with Missouri locals. Phelps quickly published an "extra" clarifying that the LDS stance on slavery was neutral, and the church issued other statements to the effect of "we're neutral" in the years between 1833 an 1838.

More responsibly, Spencer agrees that "a defense of slavery" was part of the reason for the actions of the Missourians; however, "some religious bigotry," "land hunger," "a tragically misguided sense of paternity" and "a desire for political control" were all factors as well. [2] Since Mormons were not actively opposed to slavery, I would say that Missourian sentiments in this regard were at least partially based on a misunderstanding of the Mormon position. To portray actual Mormon abolitionist sentiments as a "significant factor" in Missourian hostility is to overstate the case.

D&C 101:79

It is true that D&C 101:79 ("it is not right that any man should be in bondage one to another") was written by Joseph Smith in December 1833. It was published as section 97 in the 1835 edition of the Doctrine & Covenants and I could not locate an earlier publication date. However, as already noted, I see little evidence that this revelation ever translated into infusing Mormons with a yearning for racial justice. What anti-slavery sentiment existed was probably a product of the cultural upbringing of its Northeastern converts, not a religious desire to treat all people as sons and daughters of God. The official Mormon stance on slavery was ambivalent to the end, and of course, the LDS church had one of the worst records on institutionalized racism and remains unapologetic about its racist history.

Slavery in Protestant Church History

The struggle over slavery made for one of the most painful chapters in the history of evangelicalism in America. Secular critics often point to the religious convictions of Southern Protestant slaveholders as evidence of the evils of religion, while evangelicals uphold people like William Wilberforce [3] and Sojourner Truth---people whose belief in God passionately moved them to opposition of slavery---as proof of the fruits of faith, but the truth is, neither side is correct. Religious passion did motivate people into opposition of slavery in ways that we might not have otherwise seen. At the same time, many Southern slaveholders were deeply pious Christians, often reaching for biblical and theological justifications in their quest to maintain the institution of slavery. [4] Some of the greatest evangelical leaders in our nation's history, such as Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield, were slaveholders.

The slavery question deeply divided the Protestant world. Questions that Protestants wrestled with included: Was it acceptable to evangelize slaves, particularly if their masters were not Christians themselves? Should slave-holding converts be required to emancipate their slaves? If slavery is a sin, how can slave-holding converts truly be considered regenerate? Is it better to gain converts in areas that will not tolerate abolition at the expense of propagating the slave trade, or should these souls be abandoned in favor of a "zero tolerance" policy? How can we be intolerant of Christian slaveholders when Paul was apparently tolerant of them in the Bible?

In the permanent denominational divisions that took place over the matter, and in the bloodshed as American took up arms against American in the Civil War, slavery left a scar on the face of both evangelical and American history that remains to this day. In the end, while evangelical Christians may have been part of the problem, they were also undeniably part of the solution. [5] Mormons were none-of-the-above.

Conclusion

My dismay at Elder Cook's remarks should be apparent by now. Many critics of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints try to portray Mormons as having been historically pro-slavery, and this is certainly unfair and inaccurate. However, it is just as inaccurate to depict Mormons as abolitionist martyrs driven by religious conviction to a progressive view of blacks when their attitude toward slavery during the first thirty years of their church's history was largely one of "live and let live." Furthermore, few Mormons participated in the Civil War, staying nearly as aloof of that issue as they did of taking a stance on slavery. We can debate whether LDS reasons for avoiding the Civil War were just, but the take-home message is this: Mormons have very little historical claim in the victory over slavery. They did not earn it.

I personally see it as disrespectful to the memory of the men and women who did fight, suffer and die to end slavery to suggest that Mormons were a part of that. Elder Cook's comments are unfortunate in that regard.

See Also:

"Race and the LDS Church (Part I)" by Kaimi Wenger at Times & Seasons

"An Introduction to Mormon Participation in the Civil War" by Brant E at Juvenile Instructor

Notes:

[1] Thomas M. Spencer, "Persecution in the Most Odious Sense of the Word," The Missouri Mormon Experience, ed. Thomas M. Spencer (Columbia, Mo.: University of Missouri Press, 2010): 6.

[2] Ibid, 17.

[3] Cook himself mentioned Wilberforce just prior to these remarks in his talk.

[4] One of the books I read last year that covers this topic is The Mind of the Master Class: History and Faith in the Southern Slaveholders' Worldview by Elizabeth Fox-Genovese and Eugene D. Genovese (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005).

[5] For a summary of the religious nature of evangelism among blacks and slaves in America, I recommend Douglas A. Sweeney, The American Evangelical Story: A History of the Movement (Grand Rapids, Mich.: BakerAcademic, 2005), Chapter 5, "Crossing the Color Line without Working to Erase It: Evangelical History in Black and White," 107-31. The central argument of Sweeney's summary (p. 108-9):

"It is important not to forget the utter enormity of this evil or the extent to which evangelicals condoned it. But it is also important not to forget that evangelicals played a greater role than any other group in taking the gospel to the slaves and treating them as their spiritual equals. Paradoxically, while many leading white evangelical ministers owned slaves (Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield), defended slavery (Charles Hodge and James Henley Thornwell), and preached to segregated crowds (Charles Finney, D. L. Moody, and Billy Graham), some of these people also pioneered black evangelization, education, and even economic uplift. Many other, more progressive evangelical reformers played a major role in the rise of antislavery agitation. Further, evangelicals have contributed more than most white groups to the development of African American worship, doctrine and practice. Conversely, African Americans have exerted extensive influence on the worship, doctrine, and practice of white evangelicals."

Excellent!

Very informative. Thank you for sharing.

If the claim is part of LDS legend making, then at least it is a positive legend. Being against slavery puts us on the right side of history and if we were able to do that with slavery, then maybe we can be on the right side of history on future social issues. It would be a refreshing change of pace.