Discourse, 7 April 1840
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Source Note
JS, Discourse, [, Hancock Co., IL], [7] Apr. 1840. Featured version published in “The Mormons for Harrison,” Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer, 17 Apr. 1840, [2]. Transcription from a digital color image obtained from the Library of Congress in 2016.The 17 April 1840 issue of the Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer consists of four leaves; each leaf contains six columns. The copy used for transcription is bound in a volume with other issues of the newspaper.Samuel H. Davis began publishing the newspaper around 1837. It was published weekly.
Footnotes
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See Masthead, Peoria (IL) Register and North-Western Gazetteer, 18 Nov. 1837, [8].
Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer. Peoria, IL. 1837–1843.
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Historical Introduction
On 7 April 1840, JS delivered a discourse at a general of the held in the , Illinois, area in which he recounted his November 1839 meeting with President in . JS had returned to the Commerce area in late February 1840, about a month before the discourse. He had previously given at least three other discourses recounting his meeting with Van Buren, two of which have extant records. A portion of JS’s 7 April discourse was reported by an unknown correspondent ten days later in the Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer under the title “The Mormons for Harrison.” Although the article states that JS spoke on 6 April—the first day of the general conference—the church’s official minutes indicate that he gave this discourse on 7 April.Some of the details in this account differ from those in earlier accounts of JS’s meeting with . The chief difference is that in this account JS described two meetings with Van Buren in the President’s House on sequential dates; earlier accounts suggest that the parties only met once in the President’s House. JS’s description of Van Buren’s position, however, is consistent in all three accounts: Van Buren would not support the church’s petitioning efforts for fear of losing ’s support in the presidential election of 1840.According to the Peoria Register, two church members who attended the conference— and Benjamin Dobson—vouched for the accuracy of the newspaper’s report of JS’s sermon. However, the author of the article (who was apparently offering his report secondhand) doubted JS’s claim that would openly acknowledge political motives for declining to help the Saints because such a statement was “not in accordance with his [Van Buren’s] non-committal character.” Instead, the author speculated that “this reason instantly struck the mind of Mr. Smith, and that he substituted his own belief for the direct avowel of the president.” Nevertheless, the author indicated that the effect of Van Buren’s alleged statement had been “to turn the Mormons, almost to a man, against Mr. Van Buren, and to make them equally unanimous for General [William Henry] Harrison.” Based on the praise the author then bestowed upon Harrison, it appears that the writer celebrated this shift in party allegiance that many church members experienced.
Footnotes
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1
John Smith, Journal, 1836–1840, 29 Feb. 1840, [58].
Smith, John (1781-1854). Journal, 1833–1841. John Smith, Papers, 1833-1854. CHL. MS 1326, box 1, fd. 1.
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Letter to Hyrum Smith and Nauvoo High Council, 5 Dec. 1839; Discourse, 1 Mar. 1840. JS informed Robert D. Foster that he had delivered another sermon in which he recounted his trip to Washington DC, but records of that discourse are apparently not extant. (Letter to Robert D. Foster, 11 Mar. 1840.)
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For more information on JS’s meeting with Van Buren, see McBride, “When Joseph Smith Met Martin Van Buren,” 150–158.
McBride, Spencer W. Pulpit and Nation: Clergymen and the Politics of Revolutionary America. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2017.
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The newspaper indicated that Thompson and Dobson were members of the church living in Peoria County, Illinois, and Tazewell County, Illinois, respectively. (“The Mormons for Harrison,” Peoria [IL] Register and North-Western Gazetteer, 17 Apr. 1840, [2].)
Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer. Peoria, IL. 1837–1843.
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“The Mormons for Harrison,” Peoria [IL] Register and North-Western Gazetteer, 17 Apr. 1840, [2]. At the time of this discourse, the Whig party had already nominated Harrison as its presidential candidate. Van Buren’s nomination as the Democratic candidate was widely expected but did not become official until that party’s nominating convention the following month. (“The Harrisburg Convention,” Daily National Intelligencer [Washington DC], 10 Dec. 1839, [2]; “National Democratic Convention,” Albany [NY] Argus, 12 May 1840, [2].)
Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer. Peoria, IL. 1837–1843.
Daily National Intelligencer. Washington DC. 1800–1869.
Albany Argus. Albany, NY. 1825–1856.
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“The Mormons for Harrison,” Peoria (IL) Register and North-Western Gazetteer, 17 Apr. 1840, [2]. In the 1840 presidential election, church members in Hancock County, Illinois, appear to have voted overwhelmingly for Harrison. It is unclear, however, the extent to which this represented a lasting shift in church members’ partisan allegiance. In 1843 JS stated that a large number of church members remained Democrats. (Pease, Illinois Election Returns, 1818–1848, 117; [David Nye White], “The Prairies, Nauvoo, Joe Smith, the Temple, the Mormons, &c.,” Pittsburgh Weekly Gazette, 14 Sept. 1843, [3].)
Peoria Register and North-Western Gazetteer. Peoria, IL. 1837–1843.
Pease, Theodore Calvin, ed. Illinois Election Returns, 1818–1848. Springfield, Illinois: Illinois State Historical Library, 1923.
Pittsburgh Weekly Gazette. Pittsburgh, PA, July 1786–.
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