CHAPTER VI. -- RADICAL DISSENSIONS IN THE CHURCH--ORIGIN OF THE DANITES--TITHING

While the church, in a material sense, might have been as prosperous as Corrill pictured, Smith, on his arrival, found it in the throes of serious internal discord. The month before he reached Far West, W. W. Phelps and John Whitmer, of the Presidency there, had been tried before a general assembly of the church,* and almost unanimously deposed on several charges, the principal one being a claim on their part to $2000 of the church funds which they had bound the Bishop to pay to them. Whitmer was also accused of persisting in the use of tea, coffee, and tobacco. T. B. Marsh, one of the Presidents pro tem. selected in their places, in a letter to the prophet on this subject, said:--

* For the minutes of this General Assembly, and text of Marsh's letter, see Elders' Journal, July, 1838.

"Had we not taken the above measures, we think that nothing could have prevented a rebellion against the whole High Council and Bishop; so great was the disaffection against the Presidents that the people began to be jealous that the whole authorities were inclined to uphold these men in wickedness, and in a little time the church undoubtedly would have gone every man his own way, like sheep without a shepherd."

On April 11, Elder Bronson presented nine charges against Oliver Cowdery to the High Council, which promptly found him guilty of six of them, viz. urging vexatious lawsuits against the brethren, accusing the prophet of adultery, not attending meeting, returning to the practice of law "for the sake of filthy lucre," "disgracing the church by being connected with the bogus [counterfeiting] business, retaining notes after they had been paid," and generally "forsaking the cause of God." On this finding he was expelled from the church. Two days later David Whitmer was found guilty of unchristianlike conduct and defaming the prophet, and was expelled, and Lyman E. Johnson met the same fate.* Smith soon announced a "revelation" (Sec. 114), directing the places of the expelled to be filled by others.

* For minutes of these councils, see Millennial Star, Vol. XVI, pp. 130-134.

It was in the June following that the paper drawn up by Rigdon and signed by eighty-three prominent members of the church was presented to the recalcitrants, ordering them to leave the county, and painting their characters in the blackest hues.* This radical action did not meet the approval of the more conservative element, which included men like Corrill, and he soon announced that he was no longer a Mormon. Not long afterward Thomas B. Marsh, one of the original members of the High Council of Twelve in Missouri, and now President of the Twelve, and Orson Hyde, one of the original Apostles, also seceded, and both gave testimony about the Mormon schemes in Caldwell and Daviess Counties. Cowdery and Whitmer considered their lives in such danger that they fled on horseback at night, leaving their families, and after riding till daylight in a storm, reached the house of a friend, where they found refuge until their families could join them.

* See p. 81 ante. For the full text of Rigdon's paper, see the "Correspondence, Orders, etc., in Relation to the Mormon Disturbances in Missouri," published by order of the Missouri legislature (1841).

The most important event that followed the expulsion of leading members from the church by the High Council was the formation of that organization which has been almost ever since known as the Danites, whose dark deeds in Nauvoo were scarcely more than hinted at,* but which, under Brigham Young's authority in Utah, became a band of murderers, ready to carry out the most radical suggestion which might be made by any higher authority of the church.

* Lee's "Mormonism Unveiled," p. 158.

Corrill, an active member of the church in Missouri, writing in 1839 with the events fresh in his memory, said* that the members of the Danite society entered into solemn covenants to stand by one another when in difficulty, whether right or wrong, and to correct each other's wrongs among themselves, accepting strictly the mandates of the Presidency as standing next to God. He explains that "many were opposed to this society, but such was their determination and also their threatenings, that those opposed dare not speak their minds on the subject.... It began to be taught that the church, instead of God, or, rather, the church in the hands of God, was to bring about these things (judgments on the wicked), and I was told, but I cannot vouch for the truth of it, that some of them went so far as to contrive plans how they might scatter poison, pestilence, and disease among the inhabitants, and make them think it was judgments sent from God. I accused Smith and Rigdon of it, but they both denied it promptly."

* "Brief History of the Church," pp. 31, 32.

Robinson, in his reminiscences in the Return in later years, gave the same date of the organization of the Danites, and said that their first manifesto was the one directed against Cowdery, Whitmer, and others.

We must look for the actual origin of this organization, however, to some of the prophet's instructions while still at Kirtland. In his "revelation" of August 6, 1833 (Sec. 98), he thus defined the treatment that the Saints might bestow upon their enemies: "I have delivered thine enemy into thine hands, and then if thou wilt spare him, thou shalt be rewarded for thy righteousness;... nevertheless thine enemy is in thine hands, and if thou reward him according to his works thou art justified, if he has sought thy life, and thy life is endangered by him, thine enemy is in thine hands and thou art justified."

What such a license would mean to a following like Smith's can easily be understood.

The next step in the same direction was taken during the exercises which accompanied the opening of the Kirtland Temple. Three days after the dedicatory services, all the high officers of the church, and the official members of the stake, to the number of about three hundred, met in the Temple by appointment to perform the washing of feet. While this was going on (following Smith's own account),* "the brethren began to prophesy blessings upon each other's heads, and cursings upon the enemies of Christ who inhabit Jackson County, Missouri, and continued prophesying and blessing and sealing them, with hosannah and amen, until nearly seven o'clock P. M. The bread and wine were then brought in. While waiting, I made the following remarks, 'I want to enter into the following covenant, that if any more of our brethren are slain or driven from their lands in Missouri by the mob, we will give ourselves no rest until we are avenged of our enemies to the uttermost.' This covenant was sealed unanimously, with a hosannah and an amen." **

* Millennial Star, Vol. XV, pp. 727-728.

* "The spirit of that covenant evidently bore fruit in the Fourth of July oration of 1838 and the Mountain Meadow Massacre."--The Return, Vol. II, p. 271.

The original name chosen for the Danites was "Daughters of Zion," suggested by the text Micah iv. 13: "Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion; for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thine hoofs brass; and thou shalt beat in pieces many people; and I will consecrate thy gain unto the Lord, and their substance unto the Lord of the whole earth." "Daughters" of anybody was soon decided to be an inappropriate designation for such a band, and they were next called "Destroying (or Flying) Angels," a title still in use in Utah days; then the "Big Fan," suggested by Jeremiah xv. 7, or Luke iii. 17; then "Brothers of Gideon," and finally "Sons of Dan" (whence the name Danites,) from Genesis xlix. 17: "Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse's heels, so that his rider shall fall backward."*

* Hyde's "Mormonism Exposed," pp. 104-105.

Avard presented the text of the constitution to the court at Richmond, Missouri, during the inquiry before Judge King in November, 1838* It begins with a preamble setting forth the agreement of the members "to regulate ourselves under such laws as in righteousness shall be deemed necessary for the preservation of our holy religion, and of our most sacred rights, and the rights of our wives and children," and declaring that, "not having the privileges of others allowed to us, we have determined, like unto our fathers, to resist tyranny, whether it be in kings or in the people. It is all alike to us. Our rights we must have, and our rights we shall have, in the name of Israel's God." The President of the church and his counsellors were to hold the "executive power," and also, along with the generals and colonels of the society, to hold the "legislative powers"; this legislature to "have power to make all laws regulating the society, and regulating punishments to be administered to the guilty in accordance with the offence." Thus was furnished machinery for carrying out any decr