Scott Woodward:
In the broader American culture in which Joseph Smith lived and led the growing church of Jesus Christ, white attitudes and beliefs about the inferiority of Black Africans dominated the scene. In this pre-Civil-War context, exactly half of the states in the union had legalized slavery and built their economies on it, while the other half opposed slavery. Yet fears were shared on both sides about what might happen to the country and to the “purity of the white race” if all slaves were set free and allowed to be social equals with whites, chief of which being the fear of interracial marriage. In today’s episode of Church History Matters, we take a close look at how Joseph Smith led the church while navigating within this racially fraught culture and what specific factors were at play as he did so. For instance, how did the expulsion of the saints from Jackson County, Missouri in 1833 influence the church’s approach to missionary work going forward? How did Joseph respond to church members in the northern United States who were calling for the excommunication of all slave-holding church members in this southern states? And how did Joseph’s public teachings on slavery change once church headquarters moved to Nauvoo, Illinois and church members were no longer in Missouri. And, importantly, did Joseph Smith ever implement or endorse any practices or policies which specifically prevented church members with black African ancestry from fully participating in priesthood offices or temple worship? I’m Scott Woodward, and my co-host is Casey Griffiths, and today we dive into our second episode of this series dealing with race and priesthood. Now, let’s get into it.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Welcome, everybody, and we’re continuing our discussion today on race and the priesthood. I’m Casey Griffiths, and with me is Scott Woodward. Say, hi, Scott.

Scott Woodward:
Hello, everybody.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This is something that—there’s an inexhaustible amount of material, but we’re trying to hit the main points. Last time we tried to just set the table for what the racial situation was like in early 19th century America, in the environment where the church was founded. So before we move into our next phase of discussing this, let’s do a quick recap. Scott, do you want to give us a rundown on the main points?

Scott Woodward:
Yeah, you bet. So in our last episode we started by saying this topic is difficult to discuss because of its racially charged nature, right? Just by the nature of this.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
But also how it’s increasingly important to discuss both number one, to accurately understand the history of the church on this topic, as well as number two, to just confront our own assumptions about the nature of prophets, the nature of God, which we might find need some recalibrating as we go through this history.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
What else did we talk about, Casey?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Talked a little bit about the early American Republic and how racism against Black Americans wasn’t just there. It was baked into the pie, basically. The environment they lived in, there were just assumptions supported by the most powerful cultural institutions that people of African ancestry were inferior. And that’s not something that some wild racist over here was saying. It was something that mainstream people believed and taught, and that in some ways the whole economy of the United States was based around.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. We used the line from the gospel topics essay on this that racial prejudice against black Africans was not just present, but it was—I think the phrase was “customary,” right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
It was the normal way of life for most whites in America, right? I think that’s very safe to say and historically defensible.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
And we talked about the recipe, right? There was a—we call it the recipe for widespread racial prejudice in America, which consisted of three ingredients that really combined to get us to that state where racism or black inferiority was just customary in America. The first one was the African slavery issue. We discussed at length the spectrum of feelings on that issue in America during that era.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
The second one was the prevailing scientific thought of the day, which disturbingly concluded that black Africans were biologically inferior to whites, and importantly that intermarriage between the races would likely lead to the destruction of both races. We can’t emphasize this point enough, that intermarriage was a major concern and fear of the whites, perhaps the major cultural concern and key issue behind the resistance regarding emancipating slaves and ultimately integrating the races, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
If the slaves are all made free and made socially equal with the whites, what’s going to keep them from intermarrying? That was such a roadblock.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And then the third ingredient in this recipe of customary racial prejudice against black Africans was biblical interpretation. That is, there’s certain stories in the Bible that were interpreted in such a way as to bolster the narrative of black inferiority. Right? Specifically the story of Cain, the first murderer, and the mark that God put on him, and second, the story of Ham, whose son was cursed because Ham uncovered his father Noah’s nakedness when he was drunk in his tent. It’s the weirdest story ever.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Both of these stories had been used for over a century on the American continent before the church was organized in 1830 to give biblical basis to the cursed and therefore inferior status of blacks. And even though, as we talked about last time, applying these stories to black Africans represents a horribly irresponsible reading of the text, they nevertheless actually worked with great effectiveness, both to explain and to maintain black inferiority in the minds of white Christians.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And this isn’t an attack on the Bible in any sense. The Bible—this was read into the Bible. It’s not actually in the text itself. It’s surprising, when you go back and read these texts, how many assumptions they were making about what the mark placed on Cain was, what the punishment was, or even who were descendants of Cain or Ham, however you want to define it.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
But all these things come together and create this environment that exists when the church is organized. And so it shouldn’t surprise us that, even if most members of the church don’t own slaves, most of them come from the north, where slavery doesn’t play as large an economic role as it does in the south, but they still carry these racial attitudes with them. It’s where they live at, and it’s the environment that they grow up in.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
We always use that quote by L. P. Hartley, that “The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.”

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
We’re not saying these ideas were correct. We are not endorsing them. But it’s necessary, in order to understand what happened in the church, to understand the environment that the church lived in.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So we’re not endorsing these ideas.

Scott Woodward:
No.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
We’re saying they were wrong, but at the same time, too, they were so embedded in the society that the church members lived in it was impossible for them to be untouched by them.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. We should not be surprised at all to find that those who join the church at this time bring with them into the church some degree or another of many of these racial assumptions.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
We used that quote from Paul Reeve last time, where he said, “It’s impossible to divorce the racial history of the church from its American context,” and that’s a foundational premise for where we want to go in this series.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
We have to keep that in mind always, that even the most respectable whites of the time, if we can say it like that, are going to struggle in some degree with black equality. Those who join the church, almost without exception, you’re going to have some taint, if you will.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Some a small taint and some maybe wholly swimming in these waters. But now, as we study this history, we’re not here to condemn any in the past. “The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.” But what we are trying to do is understand, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
I, like, I can’t remember who it was. Someone at Joseph Smith Papers was being interviewed, and they said, after quoting that quote, they said we need to be good tourists when we go into the past.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Understanding that they see the world differently than we do. We want to know why that is. Why do they see it differently? We want to try to understand them within their own time and culture, but all while trying to view them with the most charitable lens we can muster, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
It is totally inappropriate to judge 19th century Americans by 21st century racial standards.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
That would be an unfair thing. We hope that people 200 years from now don’t judge us by whatever standards they’re going to have, right? We want people to look back at us charitably, try to understand our culture or context. That’s all we’re trying to do here, right? Is just get them in their context. So as we talk about what we’re talking about today and in this series, Just keep that in mind. Try to suspend your present understanding about race and culture here, and let’s just humbly get into that world and try to understand what was going on. That doesn’t mean people get a free pass. It’s not like, “Yeah, they didn’t even—they didn’t even know what prejudice was back then.” Of course they had prejudice, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And we’re not, none of us are going to try to, like, let that slide, but again, we want to see it in its context, in its time.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. Let’s sum these points up, and then we’ll get to our burning question. The environment the church was created in, the cultural, scientific, almost all of the prominent authorities were saying blacks were inferior.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
A major fear was intermarriage. And number three was that the scriptures, in their mind, supported this. That it wasn’t just a scientific truth, that was a theological truth that blacks were inferior, and that’s the environment the saints exist in. Now, with that in mind, our burning question of the day, and our big theme for this episode, is what was Joseph Smith’s teachings and positions regarding black Africans, and what policies existed during Joseph Smith’s tenure as president of the church? Let’s take a look at some key documents that just explain what Joseph Smith felt about each one of these issues and what the church’s policy was about each one of these issues.

Scott Woodward:
Let’s do it. Let’s begin with the earliest document produced under Joseph Smith’s direction that contains a clear statement regarding blacks. That document would be The Book of Mormon.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
The statement is found in 2 Nephi, and so it was written at the very latest by June of 1829. That’s really early. Joseph Smith is 23 years old at that time, and this comes in the words of Nephi, who wrote, let me quote it here: “Behold, hath the Lord commanded any that they should not partake of his goodness? Behold I say unto you, Nay; … he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; … and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile.” That’s the very first statement that we have any mention of blacks in any church documentation. That’s early.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And it’s very inclusive.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And the Book of Mormon itself presents a kind of anti-racial narrative, right?

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
The ideal society comes into existence when they eliminate racial and class distinctions.

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
You go back and forth as to who the righteous people are in the book, with no discerning nature as to color, and that informs the early members of the church. It’s an anti-racial narrative.

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And we can see little snippets there. The church obviously starts in upstate New York, where racial tensions aren’t as on the surface as they are in places like the deep South, but as the church starts to expand and move into different areas, specifically into Missouri, where the Lord designates the city of Zion to be built in Section 57 of the Doctrine and Covenants, they can’t avoid being brought into these questions about the nature of race.

Scott Woodward:
Right.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And how it works and everything like that. There’s this reference in Joseph Smith’s history. Joseph Smith is commanded to travel to Missouri and identify the site for the city of Zion. And in his history, he writes something that I think suggests that—at least gently—the vision of the city of Zion was that it would be multiracial. This is from Joseph Smith History, volume A1, page 129. He says, “The first sabbath after our arrival in Jackson County, Brother W. W. Phelps preached to a western audience over the boundary of the United States, where present were men of all families of the earth. For there were several of the Indians, quite a respectable number of Negroes, and the balance was made up of citizens of the surrounding county and fully represented themselves as pioneers of the West.” So he was actually thrilled that in the first meeting he attended in Jackson County, the site of the future city of Zion, there was this interracial mixture that he saw as representing all the families of the Earth, and that’s a great thing.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. Our next statement chronologically comes in 1833 from the editor of the church newspaper in Jackson County, Missouri named William W. Phelps, and it is the first published statement about church members‘ views and stance toward black African members of the church.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
The question Phelps was responding to in his paper was whether or not church members who were—he calls them “free people of color,” should gather with the saints in Missouri, which was a slave state at the time.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
So Phelps advised in the church’s newspaper, “So long as we have no special rule in the church as to people of color, let prudence guide.” So Phelps is saying in 1833 there is no church policy about people of color. And so if you’re a free black who wants to come to Missouri, just remember this is a slave state, so let prudence guide. That’s all he’s saying there.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
But give us a little more context there about how that was received by the Missourians and the aftermath of what happens.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
As you mentioned, it is not well-received by the local settlers.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Now, let’s contextualize a little bit here. This is shortly after Nat Turner’s slave rebellion in South Carolina.

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
A bunch of people get killed when this slave revolts, and I think it was around 36 white people—

Scott Woodward:
Boy.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—were killed during this slave revolt. So any slave owner is on edge, and in the summer of 1833, right after W. W. Phelps publishes that editorial in the church newspaper, all heck breaks loose. Then the mob is transparent about what is bugging them about the members of the church. They issue a manifesto that in and of itself explains the source of these tensions. Here’s some of the highlights. The Mob Manifesto says, “It’s been more than a year since it was ascertained they were tampering with our slaves and were endeavoring to sow dissensions and raise seditions among them.” So they’re accusing church members of tampering with the system of slavery.

Scott Woodward:
So they’re probably concerned about another Nat Turner revolt.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Kind of a thing, right? That the Mormons are going to stir up our blacks to try to get them to revolt.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. Yeah. And it’s just by the Mormons treating them like humans, you know?

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
They go on to cite specifically the editorial, they say in the “late number of the Star,” that’s the church newspaper, “Published in Independence by the leaders of the sect, there is an article inviting free negroes and mulattoes from other States to become mormons and remove and settle among us.”

Scott Woodward:
Ooh.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Again, this idea that, hey, they’re trying to bring free black people, and people whose race is intermixed, among us, and then they go on to say, basically, we “see that the introduction of such a cast among us would corrupt our blacks and instigate them to bloodshed.” Again, they’re being totally transparent. They think this’ll lead to a slave rebellion.

Scott Woodward:
So they’re taking Phelps’s words way too far, right? They’re saying that he’s inviting free negroes to come and settle among us, which is going to cause our blacks to rise up and revolt, but actually, his actual words were, “So long as we have no special rule in the church as to people of color, let prudence guide.” Like, that doesn’t sound like he’s recruiting, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
That sounds like he’s saying, “Be cautious. We don’t have a church policy about blacks gathering here, but just realize what you’re coming into.”

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
I mean, they’re totally twisting his words.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It’s a—Phelps’s statement is very mild, but the overwhelming response from the local settlers shows the deep insecurity that slave holders felt—

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—after the Nat Turner rebellion.

Scott Woodward:
Totally.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And anybody even suggesting that they mess with the system mildly, like Phelps does, throws them totally into a fervor to where they wreck the press that the Star is printed on. And again, third thing they say, this is directly from the Mob Manifesto. “We believe it a duty we owe ourselves, to our wives and children, to the cause of public morals, to remove them,” that’s the saints, “from among us, as we are not prepared to give up our pleasant places, and goodly possessions to them, or to receive into the bosoms of our families, as fit companions for our wives and daughters, the degraded … free negroes and mulattoes, that are now invited to settle among us.”

Scott Woodward:
Dang.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That makes it clear that, you know, they don’t like the church, they think that the church members are strange, but it’s really the threat to the racial hierarchy that is throwing them off. And you’ve got to imagine if you’re a slave owner in Jackson County, Missouri’s a slave state, you have these religious zealots, that’s how you see them, coming from the north, who teach that the Native Americans are a branch of the House of Israel. Remember, we’re only about six miles away from Indian territory.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And have a book that says, “All are alike unto God, black and white, bond and free.”

Scott Woodward:
Ooh.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It’s going to set off some alarm bells in their head.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And that, frankly, is one of the just flat-out stated reasons why they decide to persecute the church and evict them from Jackson County.

Scott Woodward:
Most of our listeners will be familiar with the fact that in 1833, the saints were evicted from Jackson County or violently evicted from Jackson County, Missouri.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
But years and years went by in my life where I just thought it was based on religious prejudice.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
But not until reading the Mob Manifesto did I come to realize at the heart of their major concern, as you’ve done so well pointing out, was racial integration.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Like, that was the number one fear of the Mormons settling among them because “free blacks are going to come here, going to stir up our blacks, probably have a slave rebellion. And then next thing we know, the blacks are going to be marrying our wives and daughters.” That’s actually at the beating heart of why Phelps’s printing press is destroyed—

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
—of why Edward Partridge and others are tarred and feathered, of why the Saints homes are burned and they’re violently cast out of Jackson County. That might be a revelation to our listeners. If you’ve never read the Mob Manifesto, there you go. This is at the heart of what’s irking them about these religious fanatics. It’s this slavery issue and the black issue.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, and this isn’t a statement made by an apologist for the church.

Scott Woodward:
No.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This is a statement made by the mob themselves—

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—as to why they’re doing it. And you can see right in it the bald racism that’s just right there. They just don’t like anybody suggesting that any kind of integration between whites and blacks take place, and so this is unacceptable. “You guys got to get out of here. We’ll use any means we have to remove you from our fair city.”

Scott Woodward:
And I find it so fascinating that the problem with the Saints here in terms of our black policy, is that we were too racially inclusive as a church. Isn’t that ironic?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Compared to what’s going to happen into the future, right? Where we are going to be accused of being so behind the times racially, compared to the rest of society. So what’s ironic here is how ahead of the times, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Just including blacks, inviting blacks, if they dare, right, come to Missouri, then let prudence guide. Come on over. But what this experience teaches us is we’ve got to be careful with our rhetoric of inclusion.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And this lesson was painfully seared onto the collective memory of church members and leaders. We’re not going to forget Missouri, 1833 anytime soon.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, and it’s difficult for a 21st-century person sometimes to just comprehend how much of a big deal this was in this particular time period.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That every decision church leaders make after this is colored by the experience in Missouri where they were persecuted because of their racial views, largely. Yeah. At the same time, too, this crisis in Missouri leads to a series of revelations advising Joseph Smith as to what to do and how to assist them, and one of them, section 101, is really a key text when it comes to understanding the church’s position on racism and slavery. In fact, it was cited by Dallin H. Oaks in a devotional he gave at BYU in the fall of 2020. It’s Section 101 of the Doctrine and Covenants, and it’s a really simple line. Verse 79, there’s a verse that—I got to admit, I’ve read through Section 101 I don’t know how many times, and I had always skimmed over this until President Oaks pointed it out in his devotional. It just reads, really simply, “It is not right that any man should be in bondage one to another.” That’s Section 101, verse 79. And that, in and of itself, outlines the church’s position at least on slavery right there.

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm. Casey Paul Griffiths:
And President Oaks took this particular passage to disavow anybody that used the scriptures to justify slavery.

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Here’s the Lord himself saying, “No. It’s not right for any man to be in bondage to another.”

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. So that’s December 1833.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
In the aftermath of the expulsion of the saints from Jackson County.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Which was highly charged with the slavery issue. Wow. So that context matters.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And that statement can stand on its own, actually, very well, but in context it’s even more poignant.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Then, a little over a year later, so this would be February of 1833, W. W. Phelps, he’s back at it.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Now there’s a printing press in Kirtland, Ohio, and he writes another line in the church newspaper there. The church newspaper there was called Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate. And in that newspaper, he expresses the church belief that “All the families of the Earth” “should get redemption … in Christ Jesus,” regardless of “whether they are descendants of Shem, Ham, or Japheth.” Now, these are the three sons of Noah, and there was a common belief at the time that the nations of the Earth come from these sons, not just the nations of the earth, but the races of the earth. From Shem comes the Semites, Middle Eastern folk, from Ham comes Africans, and from Japheth comes, like, Europeans.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
In other words, what’s the church policy in 1835 about blacks? It’s totally inclusive, right? Everybody can come and get redemption in Christ. So far we detect no policy in any way singling out blacks or any sort of restrictions by ‘35.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Now, a few months later—let’s just add one more on this—Phelps writes another article where he says that the church views all people as “one in Christ Jesus … whether it was in Africa, Asia, or Europe.” So, again, this is Phelps at the press, just talking about where the church is at on racial issues, and it’s very inclusive.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm. One document we need to put into the conversation, too, is section 134 of the Doctrine and Covenants.

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This is published in August of 1835. It’s after the church has been evicted from Jackson County, and it’s not a revelation, it’s a declaration by the church on governments. And in this, they’re trying to walk this difficult line between “We believe all people are sons and daughters of God and have access to the atonement,” but they’re also keenly aware that their difficulties in Missouri are linked to views that they’re abolitionists, that they’re advocating an end to slavery. So Section 134 has this verse right on the end: “We believe,” this is verse 12, “We believe it just to preach the gospel to nations of the earth and warn the righteous to save themselves from the corruption of the world, but we do not believe it right to interfere with bond servants.”

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
“Neither to preach the gospel to nor baptize them contrary to the will and wish of their masters, nor to meddle with or to influence them to the least cause to be dissatisfied with their situation and its life, thereby jeopardizing the lives of men.”

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Such interference we believe to be unlawful and unjust and dangerous to the peace of every government that allows human beings to be held in servitude.” Now, that needs to be looked at carefully because it’s not an endorsement of racism—

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—but it’s them basically trying to assuage people’s fears that they’re trying to create a slave uprising.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah, in this context of a people, of a nation, of a government that acknowledges slavery—

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
—that makes slavery legal—in such a context, we don’t believe that we should meddle and try to get slaves to rise up against their masters and jeopardize the lives of men. We are not trying to do that kind of a thing with our proselyting.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
That’s the message, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, and it lines up with—I mean, Joseph Smith has this practical but idealistic approach towards blacks, which is—on the practical level he gives a sermon to elders of the church where he says, “Don’t teach them unless you have permission from their masters,” because it seems like that may have caused some of the problems in Jackson County.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
At the same time, too, the position of the church is that they are our brothers and sisters. They have access to the atonement of Jesus Christ. They deserve to hear the gospel, but they’re trying to negotiate with the political reality of this extreme fear of slave uprisings. If people take too free an attitude towards people that are in servitude or try to subvert the will of their masters. So they’re in a really difficult spot right here, and I think the leaders of the church are trying to be practical about how they approach this.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. In January of 1836, we get our very first mixed-race man of African descent. His name is Elijah Ables.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
What’s amazing is he’s ordained an elder in the priesthood, and some people are not aware of Elijah Ables or aware that in Joseph Smith’s time there were blacks ordained to the priesthood. Yet up to this point in the history, it’s clear that there is no such thing as any policy that would in any way bar anyone of black African descent from church participation, and we see that very clearly in Elijah Ables. Again, I say he’s a mixed-race man. I think he was one-eighth black, right? He’s a “octoroon,” some would call him.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
He’s ordained to the priesthood. Joseph Smith lauds Elijah for his, he says, “His good moral character and his zeal for the cause of righteousness.” And that’s on Elijah Ables’s priesthood certificate in March 1836. Then fast forward to December of that year, and Elijah Ables is washed and anointed in the Kirtland Temple, and then later in Nauvoo he’s going to be ordained into the Seventies quorum. And this is going to happen under the hands of Zebedee Coltrin.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Now, recalling that event some 43 years later, Zebedee Coltrin said, “that he had never experienced such unpleasant feelings in his life as when he ordained this black man,” he said. “He recalled resisting Joseph Smith’s directive to ordain him, and he said that he complied only because he had been, ‘commanded by the prophet to do so.’ But he swore to himself that he would, ‘never again anoint another person who had negro blood in him.’” Now. Ooh. This is insightful because we can see both Zebedee’s strong resistance to the idea of black equality in the church, as well as Joseph Smith’s even stronger insistence that Elijah Ables have equal priesthood privileges with white church members.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Elijah Ables is a really interesting character, and I highly recommend Russell Stevenson’s biography on him. Ah, it’s so good. You’ve got to get to know the life of Elijah Ables. But he’s our first documented member of the church with black ancestry who is ordained to the priesthood.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And a key figure and someone we need to know a little bit more about, right?

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
The fact that he’s a Seventy, and a Seventy back then isn’t the same as it is today. He wasn’t considered a general authority. It was more of a missionary position.

Scott Woodward:
Right.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
But he, in a lot of ways, is a great representative of black people in the early church and the role that they played. And sometimes we pretend like they just weren’t there, but they were there. They were prominently there.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
The next stop along the way would be April 1836. And this is probably similar to what we just said about Section 134, but Joseph Smith, in the church’s newspaper, defends slave holding, and again, this is more of an acknowledgement of the realistic situation that they live in to basically try to assure slave holders that they’re not trying to tip over the apple cart, but they do think they have an obligation to share the gospel with all people.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. And the backstory for that one, right, is that from the years of 1834 to 1836, missionaries have been going down to the south, down to Tennessee and Kentucky in particular.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And have brought into the church several members who hold slaves.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Now we have slave holding church members. They’re baptized. They’ve received the gift of the Holy Ghost.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
But meanwhile, Joseph writes in the newspaper, he says, “I am aware that many elders in the north complain against their brethren of the same faith who reside in the south and are ready to withdraw the hand of fellowship because they will not renounce the principle of slavery and raise their voice against everything of the kind.” Ooh. So here we have church members in the north and south who are united in the faith but diametrically opposed to one another on the issue of slavery. So Joseph calls this “a tender point of controversy, which should call for the candid reflection of all men.” So what’s he supposed to do, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
What’s a church leader to say now that you’ve got this internal strife about the issue of slavery?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. And, I mean, it’s them, like we said, negotiating this incredibly explosive, volatile issue. They’ve dealt with losing what they see as the space for the literal city of Zion because of racial attitudes. They also are worried about what’s going to happen in these areas where missionaries are being really successful in the South, where they’re garnering a number of converts.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
They’re also aware that there’s still a fair number of church members in Missouri who are refugees from Jackson County and trying to resettle in Caldwell County, a little bit north of Jackson County, but that are still basically right in the crosshairs of these groups that think the Saints have radical attitudes when it comes to race.

Scott Woodward:
Right.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
In addition to that, there’s a general perception, too, that Latter-day Saints are abolitionists, that they want to end slavery. And the Saints themselves don’t support slavery, but we talked about in our first episode how “abolitionists” meant something different back then. It was someone who radically advocated for the end of slavery, even sometimes with violence is the way that they would do it.

Scott Woodward:
And it would totally, like, upset the social order, right? It didn’t seem like the way, it seemed too radical, too fanatical to just end slavery, right? And then free all these blacks and make them socially equal. Like, “Then what are going to do? Then what’s going to happen?”

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
So if such rumors are true, that Latter-day Saints are abolitionists, think about how dangerous that would be for the Saints who are still living in Missouri, and think about how significantly that would hinder missionary work that’s currently succeeding down in the South.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. And the last factor is there’s a guy named John W. Alvord, who’s not a member of the church, but he lectures on abolitionism, and he sets up an abolitionist society in Kirtland, where, functionally, the headquarters of the church is located at this time. So everybody is looking at Joseph Smith to announce what the church’s position is when it comes to slavery and abolitionism, and that’s the context where he makes this April 1836 statement.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah, he writes in the church newspaper what he calls his “views and sentiments” on the situation. These are Joseph Smith’s views and sentiments. And in that article he actually defends southern church members who want to continue practicing slavery to the members in the north by quoting the all-too-often-quoted Ham story in the Bible, the one we talked about last time, where his son Canaan, Ham’s son Canaan, was cursed to be the first slave.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
It was Joseph’s view and sentiment at that time, he says, and nowhere does he suggest that this is based on any revelation. He just says, “it’s my view and sentiment that Northern Church members should not condemn Southern Church members for slave holding, since it appears that slavery is justified in the Bible, ever since Noah cursed Ham’s son Canaan to be a servant of servants.” After referencing the curse of Ham story and seeming to tacitly accept the unexamined cultural narrative of his day, that this story somehow justified black African slavery, Joseph then cautions northern church members from “crying out against the south,” he says, “in consequence of their holding the sons of Ham in servitude.” This is interesting.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
So does Joseph actually believe the Ham story? Does he believe that Ham’s son Canaan was cursed to be a servant of servants and that black Africans come from Canaan? I think the answer is we don’t know. We don’t know if Joseph actually believed that.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Maybe he did, and maybe he didn’t, but what we do know is that Joseph knew that most of Protestant America in his day believed that Ham connection, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And so Joseph’s going to use that fact in this instance to try to help the saints in the north from condemning saints in the south as evil or as deserving of disfellowshipment, but be the truth of Joseph’s internal beliefs as they may, what we can say for sure is that his tacit acceptance of the Ham justification for slavery here never actually influences Joseph’s policy of black inclusion in the church at all.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Joseph will never exclude participation in the priesthood or in temple worship based on black African ancestry. He just never will.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And so this is super interesting that he’s using a biblical belief of many in his day to try to defend southern church members from northern calls for disfellowshipment, but that never affects church policy whatsoever.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. There is a shift that happens shortly after this, and it might have to do with the fact that in 1838 a second round of persecutions breaks out in Missouri. This is where Hawn’s Mill, Far West, Liberty Jail, all those things happen.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And once and for all, an extermination order is issued, and church members leave Missouri.

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And it feels like, after that point in time, I think it’s fair to say that they are less right in the middle of things.

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And Joseph Smith in Nauvoo is able to more freely express his views without worry that the members of the church in Missouri are going to be in danger.

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Because starting in October of 1840, the First Presidency publishes about the Nauvoo temple that’s going to be built there.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And they write how the saints expected to receive in Nauvoo, this is the quote from it, “persons of all languages and of every tongue and of every color, who shall with us worship the Lord of hosts in his holy temple.” That seems to indicate that at least the view in 1840 was that there would be no temple restriction.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That everybody would be allowed to come to the temple regardless of their race or nationality—

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—and worship alongside people of other races and nationalities.

Scott Woodward:
Right. Yeah. And that’s an interesting connection, that after the Saints are completely, totally, fully expelled from Missouri, Joseph’s not going to try to be as careful. He’s not going to try to please both sides. He’s not going to try to find a middle road as much, right? He’s tried that for several years. That hasn’t worked in reducing persecution against the church.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And so, yeah, Nauvoo Joseph’s going to be a little more free, or at least he’s going to perceive himself as more free to express himself and his views on slavery, at least his public declarations on slavery, are going to change significantly. And now we have this temple. As the Nauvoo temple is going to start to rise, we have this statement of full inclusion. Every color can come and worship in God’s holy temple.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
That’s awesome.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. And it does show, I think, in general, that now that they’re out of the fire in Missouri, they’re worrying less about pleasing the locals—that they’re expressing what they really feel.

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And there’s another key figure that comes into play here. Alongside Elijah Abel, another black elder of the church, Q. Walker Lewis, who comes onto the scene during the Nauvoo period, and again demonstrates that during this time there doesn’t seem to be any kind of priesthood restriction when it comes to black people.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Q. Walker Lewis is actually ordained by William Smith, Joseph Smith’s brother, and there’s no controversy about it whatsoever.

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So this further reiterates that there’s really no priesthood policy when it comes to priesthood or the temple during Joseph Smith’s time as president of the church.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. And that’s 1842, isn’t it, when Walker Lewis is ordained?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
So now we’re marching through. We’re in Nauvoo now. We’ve been in Nauvoo now for about two years. And we get another black elder, our second for sure, well-documented black elder. Then in December of that year, 1842, I think this is really interesting, a very telling conversation occurs between Joseph Smith and Elder Orson Hyde of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Hyde, I’d say he was rather typical of the age in terms of his views of black inferiority.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
And he’s also attuned to the very real challenges that might occur in a church where some members in the south own slaves and other members up north find the practice deplorable. And so he asked Joseph, and this is in Joseph Smith’s history, he recorded this conversation. Elder Hyde asked Joseph, “What advice would you give to a man who came into the church having a hundred slaves?” Someone joins the church, they own a hundred slaves. What would you say, Joseph? And Joseph answers, “I have always advised such to bring their slaves into a free country and set them free, educate them, and give them equal rights.” That’s awesome.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
So Joseph’s instant response is, “Welcome to the church. Why don’t you come up to a place where you can set your slaves free, educate them, give them equal rights?”

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Right.

Scott Woodward:
So Joseph speaking a little more freely here.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And there’s a second conversation, also recorded with Orson Hyde, this is a few days later—

Scott Woodward:
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—that just gets to the heart of what does Joseph Smith think about racial superiority or inferiority. Orson Hyde brings the subject again with Joseph as to the situation of black people in America, and Joseph Smith says, “Change their situation with the whites, and they would be like them. They have souls and are subjects of salvation.” And then he adds, “Had I anything to do with the negro, I would confine them by strict law to their own species or kind and put them on national equalization.” So he’s saying he thinks that they’re the same and that they should have equal rights, but he’s also a creature of his time, where he’s not necessarily in favor of strict integration, but I don’t think anybody was during this time.

Scott Woodward:
Nobody was, yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
During this time, just an acknowledgement that they’re the same as a white person is radical thought when it comes to race relations.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. It seems like here Joseph is giving his view on the great conundrum of the day, right? Which was, “If the slaves are all freed, and they’re granted equal social status with the whites, what’s to stop them from intermarrying with the whites?”

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Joseph knew that advocating for racial intermarriage in his day would be going a stretch too far for most people.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
So his suggestion is to make them equal with the whites but then to create strict laws forbidding racial intermarriage.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
And so that’s his views in the beginning of 1843 on that one.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And we get one more stop in kind of our documentary review of Joseph Smith’s views on race. And that is his platform when he runs for president. He runs for president in 1844. There’s a number of remarkable firsts. I recommend Spencer McBride’s book on Joseph Smith’s presidential campaign.

Scott Woodward:
So when you say president, you mean President of the United States, correct?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
President of the United States. And—

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It appears the reason he’s running is because he doesn’t find satisfaction with the candidates in either party, which is a totally radical feeling for us. But his platform, and again, this is as public as you can get, it’s a statement to the entire country, Joseph Smith is the first candidate for president to really advocate ending slavery.

Scott Woodward:
Wow.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
He publishes a pamphlet called “General Smith’s Views of the Power and Policy of Government,” in which—this is a quote directly from it: “The Declaration of Independence ‘holds these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal: … 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.”

Scott Woodward:
He’s saying that’s ironic, right? That—

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Two or three million people are slaves in our country in a place that has a Declaration of Independence that says all men are created equal. What’s up with that?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. Yeah. Just like he says, just because they have darker skin.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Then he presents a plan to end slavery. He said, “Pray Congress to pay every [slave holding] man a reasonable price for his slaves out of the surplus revenue arising from the sale of public lands, and from … deduction of pay from the members of Congress.” So his plan is to purchase the slaves by selling public lands, which the United States has in abundance. But also, and I don’t know how well this would’ve gone over with the ruling class, but take away pay from members of Congress and use that to basically end this sin that has been affecting America.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. He’s not scoring any political points with that one, right? With—

Casey Paul Griffiths:
No.

Scott Woodward:
I think at that time, if I remember right, Congress members were paid $8 a day, and he said “Let’s reduce it to $2 a day.” That’s a significant deduction.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Let’s buy all the slaves so we can free them.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. Yeah. And, I mean, a question some people would raise, “Is this a realistic plan?”

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It’s difficult to say. I mean, this is all Monday morning quarterbacking, right? Where we’re after the fact and the Civil War happened, but he was at least suggesting a peaceful solution to the slave issue. And there were places like the West Indies where they did peacefully end slavery. They didn’t resolve all the issues with civil rights and equality of the races, but they ended the practice of slavery without bloodshed, and I think it’s noteworthy that Joseph Smith is at least proposing, “Let’s do something about this before it turns into a civil war. And see if we can end the problem without actual bloodshed.”

Scott Woodward:
Mm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It goes on to say, “Break off the shackles of the poor black man … hire him to labor, like other human beings.”

Scott Woodward:
Love that.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And “Then, create confidence! Restore freedom! Break down slavery! … and be in love, fellowship and peace with all the world.” And so this platform is published just a couple months before Joseph Smith’s death. It’s probably the best document to represent his thinking on slavery, on racial equality, his fully developed thoughts where he ends his life at. He’s advocating the end of slavery and saying that black people need to be treated like they’re human beings, like they’re of equal status.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. And I love that in this statement, we actually—we’re seeing a significant public shift from Joseph’s 1836 article to the church.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
Right? In ‘36 he defended southern church members’ slave holding rights, rebuffing northern members’ call for their disfellowshipment.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm.

Scott Woodward:
But here in 1844, boy, he is all in on emancipation, right? He is unequivocally calling for a total end of slavery in America.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
But like you said, not by war and bloodshed—this is a genius plan—by purchasing the freedom of every slave in the nation.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
With fair compensation to all slaveholders. Like, who can argue with that? This is so good. This is visionary stuff. I love this.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. And he’s basically foreseeing down the road what we’re going to have to deal with, which is Civil War. Bloodshed.

Scott Woodward:
How many lives could have been spared if Joseph Smith’s views would’ve been adopted and implemented? No Civil War. Isn’t it still the most bloody? Most people died in the Civil War than have ever died in any other of the wars that America’s been involved in, right? Every death was an American.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. If you add together all the [American] deaths in every one of America’s wars, it still doesn’t equal the total from the Civil War itself.

Scott Woodward:
Oh my goodness.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And so Joseph Smith is advocating a plan that would’ve avoided that bloodshed. And some would argue the real tragedy of the Civil War wasn’t just the war, it was what happened after the war, where the seething resentment between the north and the south causes whites in the south, when they regained political control, to basically end any promise of equality. I mean, we’re still dealing with this today.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Joseph Smith’s system could have created, if it had worked, a system where those resentments that the war generated, that the bloodshed caused, wouldn’t have happened because nobody would’ve died, either.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So I don’t know if it would’ve worked or not, but at least he was trying to fix the problem that he saw would eventually result in the “bloodshed and death of many souls,” to quote his own prophecy.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. Wow. Let’s summarize these key points that we’ve talked about here as we try to land the plane today.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
What were Joseph Smith’s views relative to black Africans? He believed blacks were equal with whites in the eyes of God.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
He never endorsed interracial marriage between blacks and whites, but he believed that we were equal.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
Joseph’s public views on blacks and slavery were not static, we can say.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
In 1836, he defends slave holding rights of Southern Church members, but then eight years later, in 1844, his presidential campaign, he advocates for the emancipation of all slaves in this country and to grant them all civil rights.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:
What about policies, Casey? What policies, if any, did the church have regarding blacks during Joseph Smith’s tenure as church president?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. As far as we can tell, there was no policy regarding blacks. You’ve got, first of all, examples of people like Elijah Abel and Q. Walker Lewis, who were ordained to the priesthood.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
You have open statements where they’re going to include people regardless of race in temple worship, and it doesn’t seem like during Joseph Smith’s tenure as president of the church, there was any policy that excluded or limited black participation in any way in the church.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah. There’s no shred of any historical evidence of that happening.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. And so that leads us to our next major question. Unfortunately, this is where we’ve got to end the episode.

Scott Woodward:
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So how do we go from where Joseph Smith is to a priesthood and temple ban by the 1850s that remains around until the 1970s? What’s the change that happens there?

Scott Woodward:
Yeah, that’s a great question. What happened, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:
If Joseph never instituted any sort of priesthood or temple ban, how did that ban get put in place? Join us next time as we explore that question. Thank you for listening to this episode of Church History Matters. In our next episode we continue this series by exploring what we can learn from the historical record about the origins of the priesthood and temple ban on church members with black African ancestry. While we know it began under the presidency of Brigham Young and was first publicly articulated by him in 1852, there are a lot of complexities going on in the background that we’ll need to carefully consider. Today’s episode was produced by Scott Woodward and edited by Nick Galieti and Scott Woodward with show notes and transcript by Gabe Davis. Church History Matters is a podcast of Scripture Central, a nonprofit which exists to help build enduring faith in Jesus Christ by making Latter-day Saint scripture and church history accessible, comprehensible, and defensible to people everywhere. For more resources to enhance your gospel study, go to scripturecentral.org, where everything is available for free because of the generous donations of people like you. Thank you so much for being a part of this with us.