The Expositor: Libelous of the deepest dye?

[Aquilifer]

There are a couple of reasons I bring up Ford:

1- Ford describes the issue the way that we still think of it: Freedom of the Press is a Constitutionally guaranteed right, and that if there is an extreme case when the press is acting in a libelous way or is a public nusance, that needs to be addressed in a proper court where the defendents have the opportunity to defend themselves. That's what makes sense now, and it is what Thomas Ford said then--that proves that we aren't applying XXI legal standards to XIX events.

Good grief. Lachoneus shows very well why this line of reasoning is completely out of step with 1844 jurisprudence, which not only was decades away from incorporating the Bill of Rights at the state level, but predates the XIV amendment itself by 20 years. You're proving precisely the opposite of what you assert about 21st century legal standards.

2- Ford was a very intelligent and thoughtful legal expert of the day who knew the details of the case. He wasn't a party to the case of whether or not the Expositor was a nusance. He was a third-party who was fully qualified to judge the legality of the city council's actions.

Again, he is not a neutral third party to the actions in the case. He is entirely disqualified to judge the legality of the actions, no matter what his credentials or intelligence. Put him on the stand as your star witness, and his credibility (and your case) will be destroyed in 10 minutes. What you're insisting on is the equivalent of asking Bill Clinton, a highly intelligent lawyer, to judge objectively the McDougals in the Whitewater scandal. For heaven's sake, he specifically requested the Joseph and Hyrum journey to Carthage for imprisonment in order to placate the anti-Mormons gathering in Warsaw after Joseph had submitted himself to two judges and been released both times, then he abandoned them to the hands of the Carthage Greys. How on earth do you consider this man impartial and objective?

3- Ford didn't hesitate to blame everybody who was a party to the subsequent events--he blames a lot of stuff on the Mormons, but he also blames a lot of stuff on everybody else. He lambasted everybody, and that is why he had few friends. But he tried to be fair in recognizing who was responsible for what. As an example, he blames Cyrus Walker for giving bad legal counsel regarding how the Mormons could exploit the Nauvoo City Charter, and gives some leeway to the Mormons who took the advice of somebody who should have known better.

That's politics 101, blame everyone associated with an event but yourself. The very man who convinced JS to go to Carthage under his protection and be tried before an "impartial" jury in a county that absolutely hated Joseph's guts.

If the city council acted legally, Ford had no motivation to deny it.

Other than ticking off the Carthage Greys who were mobilizing under the encouragement of the Warsaw Signal to settle the issue through "war and extermination...made with powder and ball!!!"

4- Thomas Ford is considered a good historical source. A little self-serving at times, but he generally detailed, thoughtful analysis from the non-Mormon perspective of what was going on. He gives a detailed explanation of why the destruction of the press was illegal. I'm not merely relying on Ford's credibility as a legal scholar, I'm also relying upon the merits of his published analysis itself.

See response to #1, above. Any historian will use him as a source, but his credibility has to be weighed and measured when he gives his rationale for the circumstances leading to the murders of two citizens of his state by a mob, murders that he himself was accused under affidavits of having direct involvement in. He is not neutra.

Can you point me to anybody who acknowledges Ford's analysis and gives a detailed exaplnation for why Ford was wrong?

Well, for starters everyone should be looking for their nearest copy of Dalin Oaks' Utah Law Review article. It's like Fawn Brodie -- no matter where you come down on the issue, it's the recognized definitive starting point.

But again, you miss my overall point, which is not to get into complex legalities that I am ill-informed to consider. My point in this sub-conversation is to figure out why you think that Governor Ford's statements in the official history of the state should be accepted at face value for their objectivity when he's up to his neck in the whole mess. It should be read with the same caveat that one should apply when reading Bill Clinton's version of the Lewinsky scandal and George W. Bush's [inevitable] version of the run-up to the Iraq War -- big grain of salt.

[Aquilifer]

In destroying the press, did Joseph Smith calculate his actions to raise a great flame of excitment? Interestingly, there is a sociological definition of the term "mob". According to that definition, a mob is, "a group of persons stimulating one another to excitement and losing ordinary rational control over their activity." If the Nauvoo City Council couldn't predict that destroying the press would be much worse for their people than letting it print, they must have been a sociological mob that had lost ordinariy rational control over their activity.

Now we're interjecting sociological definitions into a discussion of legal definitions. The city council by definition is an authoritative body, and cannot be a mob. I view your attempt to do so as muddying the waters and casting the council in the most irrational light possible, which is not helpful to a conducive discussion. Any way you can get your digs in....

[Analytics]

Well, that is certainly your theory of the case. The truth certainly is a defense to a libel claim. However, the problem of your theory is set out with JackNimble's quotation of the language used against Joseph and his character in the Expositor.

Given the kind of rhetoric seen in that quotation, it is, to my mind, not as certain as you suggest that Law would have prevailed.

That rhetoric is far from representative of the paper's overall tone, and absolutely irrelevant to the big picture of what was going on.

Maybe a court would have found Law libelous for calling the leaders of the polygamy conspiracy "blood thirsty and murderous propensities of men, or rather demons in human shape." Maybe he would have had to pay a fine for that. Maybe even publish an apology for calling them demons.

But, he would have proven that Joseph Smith really was secretely practicing polygamy. This would have proven that it was Joseph Smith, not William Law, that was the apostate. The Latter-day Saints would have driven Joseph Smith out of town had the truth been known.

That's the big issue. Had the truth come out about what Joseph Smith was secretely doing and what affect it had on some of the victims, I think the vast majority of Latter-day Saints would have been as angry at Joseph Smith as William Law was. I think Joseph Smith knew this, which is why he chose to destroy the press rather than give William Law his day in court.

[JackNimble]

Now we're interjecting sociological definitions into a discussion of legal definitions. The city council by definition is an authoritative body, and cannot be a mob. I view your attempt to do so as muddying the waters and casting the council in the most irrational light possible, which is not helpful to a conducive discussion. Any way you can get your digs in....

We also might want to consider that the city council was made up of both LDS and non-LDS members.

[Analytics]

But again, you miss my overall point, which is not to get into complex legalities that I am ill-informed to consider. My point in this sub-conversation is to figure out why you think that Governor Ford's statements in the official history of the state should be accepted at face value for their objectivity when he's up to his neck in the whole mess.

This is off-topic for this thread, so I'll keep my answer brief. In general, I find Ford to be a good historical source because of his work's intrinsic merits. According to the University of Illinois Press which publishes it,

Both cynical and self-serving, Illinois's seventh governor Thomas Ford also possessed an unrivaled sensitivity to the dynamics of frontier life. He reveals these and other qualities in his classic A History of Illinois, which covers the state's first thirty years.

Ford writes with candor of the lengthy "Hancock County difficulties" and the ouster of Mormons from the state. His treatment of the Black Hawk War and his writings on the slavery controversy in the state, the murder of Elijah Lovejoy, and the larger issues of violence and vigilantism help show why this volume has been called the outstanding early survey of Illinois history. This reissue of Ford's book includes an introduction by Rodney O. Davis and a publication history by Terence Tanner.

I'd suggest you get a copy of the book, read the introduction by Dr. Davis, and then read the book. I think you'll find that after looking at another perspective, Ford isn't quite the villain you think he is.

[Analytics]

We also might want to consider that the city council was made up of both LDS and non-LDS members.

There was one non-LDS member on the council. If you read the minutes, you'll see that he recommended that they handle the matter civily and impose stiff fines for every libel. Joseph Smith immediately responded by stirring emotions about various persecutions of the past and insisted that destroying the press was the only acceptable course of action.

The council's vote came down along religious lines: all of the Mormons voted to destroy the press just as their Prophet pleaded, and the single non-Mormon voted not to destroy it.

[JackNimble]

D&C 132 was recorded eleven months prior to Joseph's murder. The very reason it was kept quiet is the very reason that happened. Some were not ready for such a revelation and apostatized. It appears that William Law became more impressed with his own position and prominence in the community and less humble with regards to the calling of a true prophet and the revelations he received. Did he actually think that he could tell the prophet he would not allow him to do as God had commanded and not be held as apostate?

William Law was also a large investor in Nauvoo land and he did not like the fact that Joseph wanted the land owned by the church sold first to pay off church debts. The more that comes to light, the more we see that it was a power-hungry William Law that was the actual problem, NOT wanting to slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly.

[Analytics]

Now we're interjecting sociological definitions into a discussion of legal definitions. The city council by definition is an authoritative body, and cannot be a mob. I view your attempt to do so as muddying the waters and casting the council in the most irrational light possible, which is not helpful to a conducive discussion. Any way you can get your digs in....

You misunderstand. Ford said, the council's decision "was well calculated to raise a great flame of excitement". Despite the repeated claims that city councils destroying presses were frequent, perfectly legal, and well-tolerated events, the fact remains that the council's actions did in fact raise a great flame of excitement--much more so than anything the paper actually said.

The person who was directing the city council should have known this would be the case. This raises the question, was this course of action calculated to raise a great flame of excitement, or were they experiencing a sociological phenomenon where members of a group stimulate one another to excitement and lose ordinary rational control over their activity? If you read the city council minutes, the latter is a plausible description of what was going on.

To me, that is the most charitable explanation for their actions.

[Analytics]

D&C 132 was recorded eleven months prior to Joseph's murder. The very reason it was kept quiet is the very reason that happened. Some were not ready for such a revelation and apostatized. It appears that William Law became more impressed with his own position and prominence in the community and less humble with regards to the calling of a true prophet and the revelations he received. Did he actually think that he could tell the prophet he would not allow him to do as God had commanded and not be held as apostate?

William Law was also a large investor in Nauvoo land and he did not like the fact that Joseph wanted the land owned by the church sold first to pay off church debts. The more that comes to light, the more we see that it was a power-hungry William Law that was the actual problem, NOT wanting to slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly.

Is there evidence that Joseph Smith wanted to "slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly?"

Here is a link to an entire book which claims that Joseph Smith wasn't trying to "slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly", but rather fought against what the D&C at the time called "the crime and fornication of polygamy" his entire life. The book is pro-Joseph Smith from an RLDS perspective.

The book is Joseph Smith Fought Polygamy Volume I by Richard and Pamela Price. If you think Joseph Smith was trying to "slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly", I'm wondering how you reconcile that with the evidince they present that Joseph Smith fought polygamy.

[JackNimble]

Is there evidence that Joseph Smith wanted to "slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly?"

Here is a link to an entire book which claims that Joseph Smith wasn't trying to "slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly", but rather fought against what the D&C at the time called "the crime and fornication of polygamy" his entire life. The book is pro-Joseph Smith from an RLDS perspective.

The book is Joseph Smith Fought Polygamy Volume I by Richard and Pamela Price. If you think Joseph Smith was trying to "slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietly", I'm wondering how you reconcile that with the evidince they present that Joseph Smith fought polygamy.

So basicly you are trying to use a "pro-Joseph" piece of literature as an "anti-Joseph" piece of literature knowing full well that the RLDS main reason for the split was due to polygamy. You can't have it both ways. You can't say that Joseph WAS a prophet by RLDS standards to prove he wasn't a prophet by LDS standards.

[Analytics]

So basicly you are trying to use a "pro-Joseph" piece of literature as an "anti-Joseph" piece of literature knowing full well that the RLDS main reason for the split was due to polygamy. You can't have it both ways. You can't say that Joseph WAS a prophet by RLDS standards to prove he wasn't a prophet by LDS standards.

Iâ??m not saying he was a Prophet by RLDS standards and wasnâ??t a prophet by LDS standards.

The question Iâ??m talking about is whether Joseph Smith was trying to â??slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietlyâ? that happened to be in flagrant violation of the canonized, enforced rules of the church. Knowing what I know about what he said and what he did, Iâ??m positive that he was never, ever, going to publicly admit to polygamy. His public words and deeds over the course of years, right up until his death, were so adamantly anti-polygamy that there is just no way he was going to switch directions on that.

Given what William Law was accusing Joseph Smith of doing and Joseph Smithâ??s reaction to it, you need to make the decision about which one was telling the truth and which one was lying. The RLDS position has been satisfyingly consistent for 165 years: the RLDS claim that Joseph Smith was in fact innocent of polygamy just as he always claimed he was until his dying day, and that William Law was an evil liar and a traitor.

In contrast, the LDS position is convoluted. Joseph Smith was trying to somehow â??slowly bring the Saints into a new doctrine quietlyâ? by secretly violating the canonized, enforced laws of the church, and the people who were telling the truth and holding all of the members accountable to the same canonized standards was superlatively evil becauseâ?¦they had really evil motives? To maintain the integrity of the church? It doesnâ??t make sense.

When you become sufficiently aware of the historical context and everything Joseph Smith publicly said and did, there are only two plausible scenarios:

Scenario 1 (in the words of Joseph Smithâ??s grandson, Israel A. Smith) Joseph Smith was the greatest victim of fraud and conspiracy of the last 500 years. Nothing like it in recorded history. He was simply lied about when something had to be done to justify ... Utah Mormon polygamy

Scenario 2 (in the words of RLDS authors Price and Price): If Joseph had been guilty of polygamy and yet published all this evidence claiming that he was not, then he was the greatest liar in history.

I really respect the RLDS because they are clear-headed about the evidence on this point: either Joseph Smith was the victim of a malicious conspiracy, or he was the perpetuator of an incredible lie.

As I view the evidence, I conclude that Joseph Smith was the perpetuator of an incredible lie. Having said that, I like the RLDS, and I like the picture they paint of Joseph Smith as a man of integrity who preached the religion he lived and lived the religion he preached. I would be thrilled to die and find out that the RLDS were right. Iâ??d give Joseph Smith a hug and apologize for disbelieving what he said.

In contrast, the LDS view is that God orchestrated a situation where the Prophet has a secret commandment to secretly â??marryâ? multiple woman in flagrant violation of canonized scriptures of Godâ??s true church? I find that view of God creepy and I find somebody who would obey that kind of God to be a sycophant lacking in integrity.

[JackNimble]

The doctrine had been known to Joseph since 1831. It was secretly practiced and recorded in 1843. How slow do you want? Joseph knew this would cause problems.

[Analytics]

The doctrine had been known to Joseph since 1831. It was secretly practiced and recorded in 1843. How slow do you want? Joseph knew this would cause problems.

I don't want it slow. I want it honest. He said, "The standard of truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done."

If I understand your position, you are saying that he knew that telling the truth would cause problems, so he figured the best course of action would be to deny the truth and use his political influence to silence the people who told the truth, and then eventually sloooowwwwwlllly come clean?

In general, I have a lot of respect people who say what they believe and are willing to die for it. A little less for the people who don't say the truth because the truth will cause problems. A lot less for people who excommunicate people who tell the truth and then use heavy-handed techniques (like destroying their press) to silence them.

[JackNimble]

I wouldn't presume to demand that God conform to MY standards or to be held in judgement for what revelations and when they are brought about, would you?

[Analytics]

I wouldn't presume to demand that God conform to MY standards or to be held in judgement for what revelations and when they are brought about, would you?

Yes. If God commanded me to cheat on my wife,I'd tell Him to stick it.

[spinner]

No. The point being that those who speak so vociferously against the destruction of the Expositor don't speak out with the same vehement passion about the Phelps press, if they even speak about it at all.

It's not about two wrongs, it's about hypocrisy.

I haven't seen anybody defend the destruction of Phelps' press, have you? Should you want to start a thread on whether the mob was justified, I'd be happy to pipe in that in my opinion they absolutely were not. Since I seriously doubt anybody is going to defend the mob, it probably would be a quite short and not very interesting thread.

Your point seems to be that if I don't condemn every obvious wrong ever perpetrated against Mormons before I engage Mormons on controversial issues, I'm a hypocrite. Perhaps Mormons talking about their history should similarly begin every discussion by condemning the Mountain Meadows Massacre, lest they be labeled hypocrites.

Or can we forgo some of that silliness?

[JackNimble]

Yes. If God commanded me to cheat on my wife,I'd tell Him to stick it.

There's your trouble. Lack of understanding of the principle.

This next part is just hypothetical so...

Tell me. How many children did Joseph and Emma have all together. Okay. How many children did Joseph have with all of his other wives combined?

[ed2276]

I haven't seen anybody defend the destruction of Phelps' press, have you?

Nope. I also haven't seen the critics, who protest the destruction of the Expositor, protest the Phelps press destruction; have you?

Do you want to start a thread on whether the mob was justified, I'd be happy to pipe in that they were not.

Nope.

But if you want to call critics hypocrites, it seems that Mormons complaining about the destruction of Phelps' press but defending the trashing of the Expositor might be vulnerable to accusations of double standards.

They might be, if the facts of the cases are the same.

[Darth_Bill]

>Yes. If God commanded me to cheat on my wife,I'd tell Him to stick it.

If God commanded it, it wouldn't be cheating. And I'd love to see someone tell God to "stick it". That would be an interesting light show.

Then again, would God communicate with someone who would tell him to "stick it"?

Thanks for the diversion. Back to the discussion.

[spinner]

Nope. I also haven't seen the critics, who protest the destruction of the Expositor, protest the Phelps press destruction; have you?

Well so far there have been two who have piped in to note their disapproval. A thread on whether the destruction of that press was justified would likely be very short and not very interesting; this is the reason it's not brought up rather than some sort of hypocrisy on the part of critics.

Nope.

OK, but until you do so, you should stop imputing some sort of approval or acquiescence by critics simply because they aren't discussing a topic that interests nobody.

Are critics now hypocrites because they do don't condemn each obvious wrong perpetrated against Mormons every time they engage in conversations on controversial topics? If that is the standard, should not Mormons also be required to apologize for the Mountain Meadows Massacre every time they discuss their history?

Or can we forgo such silliness?

[Analytics]

There's your trouble. Lack of understanding of the principle.

This next part is just hypothetical so...

Tell me. How many children did Joseph and Emma have all together. Okay. How many children did Joseph have with all of his other wives combined?

Given the fact that Joseph adamently denied having more wives then Emma and subsequently didn't record the "marriages" in the civic records, church records, or even in his personal records, why would we expect there to be a record of the resulting births? I don't know how many wives he had, much less how many children he had. In any case, this line of questioning seems to be off topic so I'm not going to go down it.

>Yes. If God commanded me to cheat on my wife,I'd tell Him to stick it.

If God commanded it, it wouldn't be cheating. And I'd love to see someone tell God to "stick it". That would be an interesting light show.

If I have sex with somebody who isn't my wife, it is cheating regardless of whether God commands it.

[ed2276]

If I have sex with somebody who isn't my wife, it is cheating regardless of whether God commands it.

"What God has joined together..."

If God has given another to you as wife by commandment, then it is not cheating.

[Analytics]

"What God has joined together..."

If God has given another to you as wife by commandment, then it is not cheating.

And you think if God commands you to kill somebody it isn't murder, right?

I'm quite familiar with this system of ethics; it is used to rationalize all sorts of immoral behavior. I find it quite disturbing and I reject it.

[Areabird]

From the FAIR site...

Prior to the publication of the Expositor, Hyrum Smith, Almon W. Babbitt, and Sidney Rigdon attempted to reconcile William Law to the Church. He announced he would reconcile only under conditions:

I told him [sidney] that if they wanted peace they could have it on the following conditions, That Joseph Smith would acknowledge publicly that he had taught and practised the doctrine of plurality of wives, that he brought a revelation supporting the doctrine, and that he should own the whole system (revelation and all) to be from Hell.

7 June 1844

the first (and only) edition of the Nauvoo Expositor was published. It detailed Josephâ??s practice of plural marriage, and charged him with various crimes, labeling him a â??blood thirsty and murderousâ?¦demonâ?¦in human shapeâ? and â??a syncophant, whose attempt for power find no parallel in historyâ?¦ one of the blackest and basest scoundrels that has appeared upon the stage of human existence since the days of Nero, and Caligula.â?[/i]

I would say that THAT was libel.

8 June 1844 - The town council held their meeting concerning the Expositor.

10 June 1844 - The Expositor and the press were destroyed. The destruction of the printed paper was deemed legal under the charter. Precedent was set by at least 19 other Illinois papers having been closed by the same type law.

So out of the over 12,000 words in that issue of the Expositor, the only thing you could come up with was what is bolded above? The entire paper is libelous because of that? I'm not sure you have actually read the paper.

[dblagent007]

The very fact that Ford viewed the 1st Amendment's Freedom of the Press clause as a constitutional right applicable to the city of Nauvoo shows how out of step he was with XIX legal precedents. In 1844 the governing opinion on the extent of Freedom of the Press was Barron v. Baltimore, 32 U.S. 243 (1833), in which the Supreme Court held that the Bill of Rights applied only to the federal government, not to the States (and certainly not to individual cities). In other words, state and municipal laws could and did contravene the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights. If Ford believed otherwise, he was wrong under XIX law. Even after the adoption of the 14th Amendment the Barron decision continued to be the law of the land (see, e.g., United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875)). In fact, it was not until the end of the first quarter of the XX, in Gitlow v. New York, 268 U.S. 652 (1925), that the United States Supreme Court first held that the Fourteenth Amendment made freedom of the press applicable to the governments of the individual states and, therefore, to cities within them. You may think of Ford as being ahead of his time. I think he was just out of step.

The City of Nauvoo was arguably bound by the U.S. Constitution because the Nauvoo Charter expressly stated that it would be bound by the U.S. Consitution. Section 13 of the Nauvoo Charter states:

Sec. 13. The City Council shall have exclusive power within the city, by ordinance, to license, regulate, and restrain the keeping of ferries; to regulate the police of the city; to impose fines, forfeitures, and penalties for the breach of any ordinance, and provide for the recovery of such fines and forfeitures, and the enforcement of such penalties; and to pass such ordinances, as may be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the powers specified in this Act; provided such ordinances are not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States or of this State, and in fine to exercise such other legislative powers as are conferred on the City Council of the City of Springfield, by an Act entitled an Act to Incorporate the City of Springfield, approved February 3rd, 1840.

Note also that Article VIII of the Illinois Constitution (ratified in 1818) stated

22. The printing presses shall be free to every person, who undertakes to examine the proceedings of the general assembly or of any branch of government; and no law shall ever be made to restrain the right thereof. The free communication of thoughts and opinions is one of the invaluable rights of man, and every citizen may freely speak, write, and print on any subject, being responsible for the abuse of that liberty.