The Garfield Assassination, 1 of 4: Joy, Prophecy, and Conspiracy

In his inaugural address as President of the United States, James A Garfield included about 180 words proposing action against Mormonism (1881 Mar 04). [1] Four months later (Jul 02), Charles J Guiteau shot Garfield. Guiteau was apprehended at the scene and Garfield died several weeks later (Sep 19). In the next few posts I will look at some ways Garfield?s shooting and rhetoric about Mormonism intersected. (Image [2])

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Mormon Women Leaders and Meeting American Presidents

President Barack Obama met with LDS Church leaders on April 2, 2015, for a little under half an hour during a brief scheduled visit to Utah. In attendance were President Henry B. Eyring, Elder D. Todd Christofferson, President Dieter F. Uchtdorf and Elder L. Tom Perry here. President Thomas S. Monson was unable to attend the gathering due to health reasons, but online feedback also quickly picked up on the noticeable absence of any high-profile female leaders of the Church.  Mormon women have not always been left out of presidential visits; in fact, various meetings between Relief Society leaders and American chief executives in the last 150 years are worth the retelling, and serve as a reminder of the stature and influence that elite Mormon women held in representing the Church to the nation.

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When Did Joseph Smith Know What He Knew?

Okay, kind of a goofy way of putting the question, but in my last post, I said that I argued in my dissertation that I believed that JS often knew about things much earlier than when he first clearly taught them. I base this claim on a few point, most notably my assertion that I think JS was influenced early on by texts that had a lot of what we would consider “Mormon ideas.” As I’ve tried to stress a lot around here, I don’t see this claim as an attack, but as a larger claim that JS was gathering “Truth” together from the sources that had it. Nor do I see such claims as antithetical to revelatory claims since we’re supposed to seek wisdom “by study and faith” and then ask God “if it be right.”  

So with that in mind, here’s part of my introduction to my chapter 6 “The Plan of Salvation” where I treat JS’s teachings about God’s plan of sending preexistent beings to earth to progress, get bodies, with the chance of becoming deified.  It’s an overview of my claim that JS knew about a lot of the Nauvoo doctrine much earlier. It’s pages 386-87 of my dissertation.

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Two Quibbles with the Church’s Essay on Joseph Smith’s Polygamy: When It Was Revealed and Eternity Only Marriages

I add my praise for the church’s essays on gospel topics, including the essays on polygamy. However, I disagree with two points that the essay on Joseph Smith’s polygamy made: that polygamy was revealed to Joseph Smith during his translation of the Old Testament and that Smith engaged in eternity only sealings. Such points have been asserted by a number of scholars so my critique isn’t so much one of the essay but of these two commonly asserted claims.

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MHA Updates: Conference Program & New Website

In case you missed it last week, the Mormon History Association unveiled two important and noteworthy things:

1. They have a new website. It looks quite spiffy, so make sure to explore it a bit. It is still obviously a work in progress, as several pages and uploads don’t seem to work, but I’m sure they will be fixed in due time.

2. There is now a lot more information about this year’s annual conference, taking place in early June in Provo. This includes a conference program which looks absolutely spectacular–perhaps the most stacked program I’ve seen. The weekend includes great plenary sessions (one by Colleen McDaniel and a presidential address by Laurel Ulrich), a number of “50th Anniversary Sessions” (including one, chaired by yours truly, on the legacy of John Brooke’s Refiner’s Fire, and another on the legacy of Leonard Arrington, to name only two), and even a Gold and Green Ball. And since there are not as many pricey meals as usual, you can take your money and register for some of the fantastic pre- and post-conference tours, including a women’s history tour hosted by our own Andrea Radke-Moss and Jenny Reeder. So if you haven’t already, renew your MHA membership, register for the conference, and book your hotel room.

There are, of course, too many great panels at the conference to attend them all, but if there are any that excite you, please share them in the comments.

Mormonism and Western History: Jared Farmer, ?Crossroads of the West,? JMH 50th Roundtable

Characteristic of his other sterling contributions to the field of Mormon History, Jared Farmer?s historiographical essay entitled ?Crossroads of the West,? provides us with an illuminating evaluation of the relationship between the history of Mormonism and that of the American West. As a native of Utah and a fixture in the field of Western history, Farmer is uniquely qualified to assess the ways that the writing of Western history has shaped and influenced the historiography of Utah Mormonism.

Surprisingly, Farmer is fairly critical of the close relationship between the historiographies of Mormonism and the American West, suggesting that this closeness has often limited and inhibited our narratives of Utah Mormonism. Farmer argues, ?From a long-range point of view, the conflation of Mormons and the American West has not been good for historiography. It has distorted Utah history, making it less diverse than it rightfully should be. It has reinforced parochialism inside the Beehive State and reinforced prejudices outside? (Farmer, ?Crossroads of the West,? 157). Farmer?s critique is, of course, primarily aimed at those whose brand of Western history is still dominated by heroic stories of pioneering, settlement, and struggles between cowboys and Indians, what has been termed the Old Western History. It is a reminder to such historians that this brand of history generally lacks both sophistication and nuance, reinforcing racial stereotypes than denigrate Utah?s Native groups. Such efforts, Farmer warns, become little more than ?faith-promoting history with footnotes? (Farmer, ?Crossroads of the West,? 162).  However well researched and written, such contributions are summarily disregarded by outsiders as historical fluff that adds little to the broader discussions of American History and the West.

Farmer?s critique of the parochialism of Mormon history is well founded. Despite the fact that European immigrants made up a significant percentage of those who participated in Mormonism?s westward migration, there are surprisingly few evaluations of the impact that this diversity had upon the development of Utah.  Such a gap leaves a whole in the historiography that begs to be filled.  Given the traditional challenges that immigrants have faced in the United States, the existence so many international communities in Utah offers intriguing opportunities for historical research.  Similarly, Farmer justly criticizes the rather woeful disregard for Native Americans within the historiographies of both Utah and Mormonism. Drawing upon Patricia Limerick’s call for continuity in the study of the American West, Farmer pleads for a fuller study of Mormon interactions with Native Americans that includes both the nineteenth and twentieth-century interactions.  Such historiographical shortcomings are hallmarks of the Old Western History, and demonstrate the significant problems created by plugging Utah Mormonism into Western History tropes.

Even the inclusion of Mormonism in the New Western History has been problematic in Farmer?s view. Whereas Farmer hoped that Patricia Limerick?s The Legacy of Conquest might have critiqued the Mormon historiography for its ?excessively Turnerian? tone, Limerick?s focus cast Mormonism as a social and religious minority that evidenced the complexities of the West (Farmer, ?Crossroads of the West,? 163). In other words, Farmer suggests that Limerick missed an opportunity to offer needed critiques to Mormon history because Mormonism suited her thesis better being cast as a minority than as an example of the kind of Old Western History that needed revision. Accordingly he offers a number of suggestions where Mormon history could be dramatically improved.

First, drawing upon his critique that Western history had made Mormon history less ?less diverse than it rightfully should be? (Farmer, ?Crossroads of the West,? 157), Farmer hopes that the future will yield more nuanced treatments of Native Americans, including what he hopes will be the definitive volume on the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Secondly, he hopes for a brighter future for the history of Mormon women; one that will move beyond the mere publication of biographies and documents and demonstrate the interactions between Mormon and non-Mormon women in Utah. Third, he hopes that future historians will make greater efforts to integrate environmental history into the history of Mormonism, addressing topics such as the MX Missile issue. Finally, he suggests that historians need to come to terms with the questions of violence in Utah, uncovering whether the territory was ?more or less or simply differently violent than other western settlement zones and periods? (Farmer, ?Crossroads of the West, 169). In Farmer?s eyes, such developments will not fully materialize unless and until a greater number of non-Mormon historians follow the example of John Turner and take up the task of researching and writing Mormon history.

On the whole, Farmer?s suggestions are invaluable to both Mormon and Western historians alike. His suggestions for future areas of research and writing provide historians with a number of potential topics that would allow Mormon history to transcend its parochial nature and take on a greater national and historiographical significance. Among the ideas he suggests are: 1) A detailed analysis that places Mormon history within the framework of a ?Greater Reconstruction? laid out in Elliott West?s The Last Indian War, and 2) A study that examines the practice of Mormonism from the useful perspective of the differences that naturally arise between a center and its peripheries. Such studies would have the potential to make Mormon history a more enticing field to unaffiliated historians, who might then take advantage of Mormonism?s rich?if at times, daunting?archival holdings. By thus expanding the breadth of Mormon history, perhaps there are opportunities to make it more than a mere subtopic of Western history in the future.

Mormon Thugs, Part 2 of 2

In my last post I looked at comparisons between Mormons and Thugs in the late nineteenth century. Today I look at Mormon reactions and the broader imperial context.

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Feminism and Religion From a Distance: Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, ?Heritage and History,? JMH 50th Roundtable

In this personal essay, MHA president Laurel Thatcher Ulrich compares her own path into Mormon history (from Mormon Idaho native to historian of early-American women) to that of Jan Shipps (from ?Gentile? to historian of Mormonism). Shipps had called herself an ?inside-outsider? in Zion; here, Ulrich calls herself an ?outside-insider.? She is referring to the fact that she never intended to write Mormon history; rather, she had come to see herself professionally as a scholar of 17^th– and 18^th-century New England women. Of her recent research into her religious roots, Ulrich concludes that her training as a colonial historian has enabled her to see connections between Mormon history and American history that she otherwise would not see. She tantalizes us with allusions to her forthcoming book on the relationship between early-Mormon polygamous families and American women?s activism. Of particular interest to me in this narrative of her personal and professional development, though, is the way that distance has worked to her advantage in the writing of Mormon history.

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JI’s March Madness Bracket

As if the announcement of MHA’s 50th anniversary issue roundtable wasn’t exciting enough, we are also happy to bring back JI’s March Madness bracket tournament. You can find our group at this link. You will need to create your own (free) ESPN account and fill out your bracket by Thursday’s first game. Each participant is allowed up to two brackets. The winner gets bragging rights, as well as a digital trophy that we may or may not create by the Final Four.

Also, creative bracket names are encouraged.

Roundtable on the Journal of Mormon History’s 50th Anniversary Issue

The first issue of the Journal of Mormon History this year is a special volume in honor of the Mormon History Association’s 50th anniversary. It is guest-edited by Spencer Fluhman and Douglas Alder, and includes reflections on the past half-decade, a number of smart and provocative essays demonstrating the vibrancy of the field, and predictions concerning where Mormon history may go from here.

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