To kill a Mormon just for being a Mormon? Back in the 1830's, then-Gov. Lilburn Boggs of Missouri put out the extermination order that said just that- sort of like Hitler's final solution.
2007-05-31 00:36:57 · 23 answers · asked by mormon_4_jesus 7 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extermination_Order_(Mormonism)#Rescinded_in_1976
http://www.jwha.info/mmff/exorder.htm
http://www.quaqua.org/extermination.htm
To name a few.
2007-05-31 01:09:19 · update #1
Maybe this is what drove them to that Mountain Meadows Massacre in 1857? Where a Mormon militia group killed a group of emigrants, mainly whites and mixed-blood Cherokees. I believe 120 people died.
And that would only be for the state of Missouri. In Ky, you can still be hanged (not just for stealing horses either).
It's a shame that people like this Gov do things like this... but I don't recall seeing too much, in history, where people actually followed thru with it on the level you are suggesting "sort of like Hitler's final solution".
2007-05-31 00:56:37 · answer #1 · answered by River 5 · 3⤊ 5⤋
Something like that, yes. I'm not sure about the date of repeal, but it was in place for an absurdly long time. At the time it was issued, people DID kill Mormons, and the governor all but gave them a medal. The Mormons finally fled, and roughly a century later, the government of Missouri remembered the law and issued a formal apology no Mormon alive needed (though the effort was nice). I'd think that if someone in the later years had killed a Mormon, though, the law would have been repealed much sooner. Nobody in their right mind would stand for that in this day and age.
2016-04-01 06:36:59 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Things weren't pretty on either side. An extermination order was absolutely wrong, and it's unbelievable that a governor wielded that kind of power.
I wish, however, we could take a peak at the real rise of Mormonism. There's more to it than a governor issuing an order. Still...not saying it was right.
2007-05-31 09:03:55 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
I know, and I find it not only sad but filled with hipocracy. This land was founded under the idea that all men (and women) might be free to worship as they pleased. While all of the persecutions were going on not only was this idea being ignored but the exact opposite was being exersized.
2007-06-01 15:40:05 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'm just enjoying some of the answers to this.
Yeah, it's okay to shoot a Mormon on sight...and then you have these people justifying it. Yeah, it's okay...just those damned Mormons....
I really "liked" how that one guy found a child cowering under a table and said "Nits become lice" before he pulled the trigger...of course that was during the Haun's Mill Massacre.
2007-05-31 02:26:24 · answer #5 · answered by Fotomama 5 · 7⤊ 1⤋
Nice to see that you're actually reading some history. The events leading up to that order are varied and complicated and there are 'bad guys' on both sides. The entire Missouri episode was extremely emotional from both sides: The mormon group was convinced that the whole state would become theirs; the early Missouri settlers didn't like that kind of attitude. Missouri was a key political hotbed on the slavery issue, the early settlers 'for', while mormons were generally abolitionists, and a significant voting bloc.
The early settlers also tended to be pretty rough, independent and taken to settling minor differences with a pistol; by contrast the mormons were (usually) sober, mannered, refined, and relied on a totally corrupt state legal system.
Also during this time, the church in Kirtland was in deep financial trouble and the anti-bank-ing venture wasn't any different than the hundred other financial firms in Ohio printing their own money. Unfortunately Smith was not an able financier, nor was his help very honest.
2007-05-31 03:25:09 · answer #6 · answered by Dances with Poultry 5 · 2⤊ 7⤋
You are kidding, right?
Do you remember the Ten Commandments...thou shalt NOT kill.
Obviously the desire to kill someone just because of their religious belief is still wrong. Whether legal or not, it's still committing a sin - wouldn't you agree?
It does sound like another Hitler situation - pity on those who sympathize with this.
2007-05-31 00:52:42 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 4⤊ 1⤋
It would be good to also mention that Missouri's then-governor purged the law and wrote a wonderful letter of apology to the Church.
Some of us are growing and changing, away from the bad things in our history.
BTW, Brigham Young found out about plans to carry out the massacre in Mountain Meadows and sent a messenger to stop it, but he came too late. This sin is not on the heads of the Church leaders, those who did it answered to God directly.
2007-05-31 05:03:00 · answer #8 · answered by Free To Be Me 6 · 9⤊ 2⤋
There are lots of weird laws still on the books. Atheists can't run for public office in 13 states. That has no chance of holding up in a federal court either.
2007-05-31 00:50:33 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 7⤊ 1⤋
I just LOVE some of the bigoted answers on here. Does it matter what anyone believes, that you can order them killed? Whatever happend to religious freedom in this country? It just goes to show you we have a long way to come on tolerance.
2007-05-31 04:20:59 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 8⤊ 1⤋