| 335 was commenced and a tragedy the most dreadful was enacted, by a large portion of the inhabitants of one of those free and independent States which comprise this vast republic; and a deadly blow was struck at the institutions for which our fathers had fought many a hard battle, and for which many a patriot had shed his blood; and suddenly was heard amidst the voice of joy and gratitude for our national liberty, the voice of mourning, lamentation, and woe. Yes! in this land, a mob, regardless of those laws for which so much blood has been spilled, dead to every feeling of virtue and patriotism which animated the bosom of freemen, fell upon a people whose religious faith was different from their own, and not only destroyed their homes, drove them away, and carried off their property, but murdered many a freeborn son of America-a tragedy which has no parallel in modern and hardly in ancient times; even the face of the Red Man would be ready to turn pale at the recital of it. It would have been some consolation if the authorities of the State had been innocent in this affair; but they are involved in the guilt thereof, and the blood of innocence, even of children, cries for vengeance upon them.
"I ask the citizens of this vast republic whether such a state of things is to be suffered to pass unnoticed, and the hearts of widows, orphans, and patriots to be broken and their wrongs left without redress No! I invoke the genius of our Constitution. I appeal to the patriotism of Americans to stop this unlawful and unholy procedure; and pray that God may defend this nation from the dreadful effects of such outrages.
"Is there not virtue in the body politic? Will not the people rise up in their majesty and with that promptitude and zeal which is so characteristic of them discountenance such proceedings by bringing the offenders to that punishment which they so richly deserve, and save the nation from that disgrace and ultimate ruin which otherwise must inevitably fall upon it?
"Joseph Smith, Jr."
-Millennial Star, vol. 17, pp. 148-151.
(page 335) |
