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Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843

Source Note

Revised Minutes, and JS, Discourses, , Hancock Co., IL, [23 Apr.–ca. 8 May 1843]. Featured version published [ca. 8 May 1843] in “Special Conference,” Times and Seasons, 1 May 1843, vol. 4, no. 12, 180–185. For more complete source information, see the source note for Letter to Isaac Galland, 22 Mar. 1839.

Historical Introduction

The 1 May 1843 issue of the Times and Seasons published a revised version of the minutes from the 6 April 1843 sessions of the ’s special , including discourses delivered by JS during the midday and afternoon sessions. In the first session, JS had announced his desire that “the conference minutes go forth, to inform all of the order of doing business.” In particular, JS hoped to inform church members that the had been “appointd to this spicial mission of collecting funds for the ” and that no others were authorized to receive donations. The minutes also recounted deliberations over other significant items of business and decisions made by the conference.
was appointed clerk of the and in that capacity sought to record the proceedings and the accounts of discourses as he heard them. He struggled in this endeavor, at times capturing only fragmentary sentences and failing to note contextual information such as openings and closings of meetings, the names of those offering prayers, and sometimes the identities of speakers. Simultaneously, another JS scribe, , kept notes of the proceedings, which he later copied into JS’s journal. Richards more successfully captured complete sentences and contextual information. After reviewing Clayton’s minutes, JS determined they were insufficient and directed that they be revised. Over the following weeks, several of JS’s scribes as well as editors working in the church’s prepared multiple drafts—ultimately amalgamating Clayton’s minutes with Richards’s notes—before eventually publishing the minutes.
The process began on 23 April 1843, when JS “heard read” the “minutes of special conference”—most likely ’s minutes and accounts of discourses—which JS determined “were not explicit enough.” He indicated that he would “dictate them over again.” Clayton, presumably taking dictation from JS, then produced a new set of minutes. The resulting text was just over two pages long and provided an abbreviated outline that tracked the structure of the 6 April 1843 midday and afternoon sessions and the 7 April morning session. On the second and third pages of the draft of the revised minutes, Clayton used the numerals 1 through 4 to mark specific places where JS delivered “further remarks” during the conference, as the actual remarks were not included in the outline. Clayton then inserted corresponding numerals on his original minutes to help place these additional comments.
Soon after, another JS scribe, , expanded ’s revised minutes beyond the brief outline and copied the “further remarks” marked with numerals in Clayton’s original minutes. Times and Seasons editor then revised Sloan’s expanded draft, canceling short passages. On the final leaf of the draft, Taylor inscribed replacement language for the canceled passages and numbered his revisions to correspond with the deleted portions. He then typeset and printed a draft of Sloan’s expanded minutes and made additional editorial changes to the printed proof. Subsequently, Taylor made a second printed draft that incorporated his emendations.
On 3 May 1843, JS “rev[i]ewed the m[i]nutes,” presumably in typeset form. JS apparently still found the revised minutes and discourses wanting. noted in his personal journal on 3 May that he spent part of the day working on the “conference minut[e]s.” Richards clipped portions of the first and second printed drafts and attached the clippings to blank pages with adhesive wafers. Around the clippings, Richards added handwritten expansions drawn largely from his notes, thereby amalgamating his account of the conference with ’s original minutes and subsequent drafts. Based on Richards’s amalgamated draft, typeset a third draft and made a new proof sheet, to which he added more emendations. Through each step of this revision process, JS’s words—as captured by Clayton and Richards—were changed, polished, and refined by his scribes, apparently without his direct involvement. Nevertheless, the scribes retained some of his distinctive phrases, such as the admonition that church members not “make a bridge of [his] nose.”
The final form of the 6 April 1843 revised conference minutes and accounts of discourses was published in the 1 May 1843 issue of the Times and Seasons. Evidence within the issue indicates that the paper was delayed and did not appear until 8 May or later. Although exact subscription numbers for the Times and Seasons are unknown for 1843, at least a few thousand copies of the issue were printed and circulated among church members, including Latter-day Saints living in branches outside of . Information in the published minutes that departs substantially from either Clayton’s minutes or Richards’s notes is identified in the annotation.
The survival of both the original minutes and multiple prepublication drafts makes the publication record of the April 1843 conference unique. For previous conferences held in , only the final, published versions of the minutes are extant. JS’s involvement in the publication process for the April 1843 minutes also seems to have been distinctive in comparison to earlier conference minutes.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 Apr. 1843.

  2. [2]

    See Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 Apr. 1843.

  3. [3]

    See JS, Journal, 6 Apr. 1843; and Discourse, 6 April 1843–A, as Reported by Willard Richards.

  4. [4]

    JS, Journal, 23 Apr. 1843.

  5. [5]

    Textual evidence does not conclusively reveal what sources Clayton and JS used to produce the revised minutes, but they probably drew on Clayton’s original minutes and their memories. It is unlikely that they utilized Willard Richards’s notes of the conference, given that the revised minutes differ from Richards’s version when recording the meetings’ openings and closings.

  6. [6]

    Revised Minutes Draft, ca. 23 Apr. 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6 Apr. 1843.

  7. [7]

    See Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6–7 Apr. 1843.

  8. [8]

    Revised Minutes and Discourses Draft, 23 Apr.–ca. 3 May 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6 Apr. 1843. Sloan’s expanded draft covered the midday session and part of the afternoon session of 6 April, concluding with JS’s comments on Jacob Remick.

  9. [9]

    See Revised Minutes and Discourses Printed Draft, 23 Apr.–ca. 3 May 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6–7 Apr. 1843. Two fragments of the first printed draft are extant. The first includes the 6 April 1843 midday session, and the second includes comments made during the afternoon session by Hyrum Smith and JS on stealing in Nauvoo.

  10. [10]

    See Revised Minutes and Discourses Printed Draft, ca. 3 May 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6–7 Apr. 1843. Three fragments of the second printed draft are extant and include comments made during the afternoon session on 6 April 1843 by Hyrum Smith and JS on stealing in Nauvoo and JS’s comments on Jacob Remick and land in Iowa Territory. The first of these fragments is glued to the first fragment of the first printed draft. Portions of this printed draft were cut out. The second and third fragments of the second printed draft were used in the 1850s in compiling JS’s History; Thomas Bullock made emendations for the history to the text on these fragments.

  11. [11]

    JS, Journal, 3 May 1843.

  12. [12]

    Willard Richards, Journal, 3 May 1843.

    Richards, Willard. Journals, 1836–1853. Willard Richards, Papers, 1821–1854. CHL. MS 1490, boxes 1–2.

  13. [13]

    Revised Minutes and Discourses Draft, 3 May–ca. 8 May 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6 Apr. 1843. Some of the clippings attached to Richards's draft match holes in the first and second printed drafts. Richards made his draft on printed sheets that included Book of Abraham facsimiles. (See Revised Minutes and Discourses Printed Draft, ca. 3 May 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6–7 Apr. 1843.)

  14. [14]

    The extant portion of the third printed draft includes only the 6 April 1843 midday session. (See Revised Minutes and Discourses Printed Draft, 3 May–ca. 8 May 1843, in Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6–7 Apr. 1843.)

  15. [15]

    See Notice, 8 May 1843, in Times and Seasons, 1 May 1843, 4:185.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  16. [16]

    Tanner, “Mormon Press in Nauvoo,” 102.

    Tanner, Terrence A. “The Mormon Press in Nauvoo, 1839–46.” In Kingdom on the Mississippi Revisited: Nauvoo in Mormon History, edited by Roger D. Launius and John E. Hallwas, 94–118. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1996.

  17. [17]

    For full annotation of Clayton’s minutes and Richards's notes, see Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 Apr. 1843; and JS, Journal, 6 Apr. 1843.

  18. [18]

    See, for example, Minutes and Discourses, 5–7 Oct. 1839; Minutes, 7–11 Apr. 1841; and Minutes and Discourses, 6–8 Apr. 1842.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. *Discourse, 6 April 1843–B, as Reported by William Clayton Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 April 1843, as Reported by William Clayton *Discourse, 6 April 1843–B, as Reported by Willard Richards Journal, December 1842–June 1844; Book 2, 10 March 1843–14 July 1843 Discourse, 6 April 1843–B, as Reported by Franklin D. Richards *Discourse, 6 April 1843–B, as Reported by James Burgess Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, James Sloan and John Taylor Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, First Printed Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April-circa 8 May 1843, Willard Richards Draft *Discourse, 6 April 1843–B, as Published in Times and Seasons Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843 History Draft [1 March–31 December 1843] History, 1838–1856, volume D-1 [1 August 1842–1 July 1843] *Discourse, 6 April 1843–A, as Reported by William Clayton Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 April 1843, as Reported by William Clayton *Discourse, 6 April 1843–A, as Reported by Willard Richards Journal, December 1842–June 1844; Book 2, 10 March 1843–14 July 1843 Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, James Sloan and John Taylor Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April-circa 8 May 1843, Willard Richards Draft *Discourse, 6 April 1843–A, as Published in Times and Seasons
Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843
History, 1838–1856, volume D-1 [1 August 1842–1 July 1843] *Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 April 1843, as Reported by William Clayton Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 April 1843, as Reported by Willard Richards Journal, December 1842–June 1844; Book 2, 10 March 1843–14 July 1843 Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, William Clayton Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, James Sloan and John Taylor Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, First Printed Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April-circa 8 May 1843, Second Printed Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April-circa 8 May 1843, Willard Richards Draft Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843, Third Printed Draft *Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843 History Draft [1 March–31 December 1843] History, 1838–1856, volume D-1 [1 August 1842–1 July 1843] “History of Joseph Smith” “History of Joseph Smith” “History of Joseph Smith”

Page 181

but would be present soon. He called upon the choir to sing an Hymn. opened by prayer, and another Hymn was sung. Elder then read the 3d chapter of the 2d epistle of Peter, and spoke upon the subject of the resurrection. At ten minutes before 12 o’clock President Joseph Smith, Elder , and Elder arrived.
At 12 o’clock gave way for the business of the .
President Joseph Smith commenced by saying, We all ought to be thankful for the privilege we enjoy this day, of meeting so many of the Saints, and for the warmth and brightness of the heavens over our heads,— and it truly makes the countenances of this great multitude to look cheerly, and gladdens the hearts of all present.
He next stated the object of the meeting, which was,
First, to ascertain the standing of the , which he should do by presenting himself before the conference for trial.
Second, to take into consideration the expediency of sending out the , or some of them, or somebody else, amongst the of the , to obtain stock to build the , for the time has come to build it.
Third, the elders will have the privilege of appeals from the different conferences, to this, if any such cases exist. These, said the president, are the principle items of business which I have at present to lay before you. This is not a general, but an annual conference.
It is necessary that this conference give importance to the . A prejudice exists against building the , in favor of the , and the conference are required to give stress to the building of the . This is the most important matter for the time being, for there is no place in this , where men of wealth, and character, and influence, from abroad, can go to repose themselves, and it is necessary we should have such a place. The church must build it or abide the result of not fulfilling the commandment.
President Joseph then asked the conference if they were satisfied with the First Presidency, so far as he was concerned, as an individual, to preside over the whole church; or would they have another? If, said he, I have done any thing that ought to injure my character, reputation, or standing; or have dishonored our religion by any means in the sight of men, or , or in the sight of men and women, I am sorry for it, and if you will forgive me, I will endeavor to do so no more. I do not know that I have done any thing of the kind; but if I have, come forward and tell me of it. If any one else has any objection to me, I want you to come boldly and frankly, and tell of it; and if not, ever after hold your peace.
Motion was made and seconded that President Joseph Smith continue president of the whole church. After a few minutes silence, the motion was put by , when one vast sea of hands was presented, and the motion was carried unanimously.
President Joseph returned his thanks to the assembly for the manifestation of their confidence, and said he would serve them according to the best ability God should give him.
The first presidency being disposed of, President Joseph said he did not know any thing against the Twelve if he did he would present them for trial. It is not right that all the burden of the , should rest on a few individuals; and we will now consider the propriety of sending the Twelve to collect means for the . There has been too great a solicitude, in individuals, for the building of the , to the exclusion of the . The have had too great latitude to practice fraud, by receiving donations and never making report. The church has suffered loss, and I am opposed to that system of collecting funds when any elder may receive moneys.
I am opposed to any man’s handling the public funds of the church who is not duly authorzed.
I advise that some means be devised for transacting business on a sure foundation. The Twelve are the most suitable persons to perform this business; and I want the conference to devise some means to bind them as firm as the pillars of heaven, if possible. The Twelve were always honest, and it will do them no hurt to bind them.
It has been reported that they receive wages at two dollars per day for their services. I have never heard this till recently, and I do not believe it. I know the Twelve have never had any wages at all. They have fulfilled their duty— they have always gone where they were sent, and have labored with their hands for their support, when at home. If we send them into the world to collect funds, we want them to return those funds to this place, that they may be appropriated to the very purpose for which they were designed. I go in for binding up the Twelve, solid, putting them under bonds; and let this conference institute an order to this end, and that the travelling expenses of the agents shall not be borne out of the funds collected for building these houses, and let no man pay money or stock into the hands of the Twelve, except he transmit [p. 181]
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Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Revised Minutes and Discourses, 23 April–circa 8 May 1843
ID #
1033
Total Pages
6
Print Volume Location
JSP, D12:282–293
Handwriting on This Page
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Footnotes

  1. [1]

    By the 1840s the church was holding conferences twice a year, in April and October. In October 1841, JS announced that the church would “not hold another general conference” until the temple was completed. Church members apparently used the word annual to refer to the April conference and semiannual to refer to the October conference. In the manuscript minutes of the April 1843 conference, Clayton recorded that JS referred to it as a “special conference.” (Minutes and Discourse, 1–5 Oct. 1841; see also Minutes, 4–5 May 1839; Minutes, Times and Seasons, Dec. 1839, 1:30–31; “Conference Notice,” Times and Seasons, 15 Sept. 1841, 2:543; and Historian’s Office, General Church Minutes, 6 Apr. 1843.)

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  2. [2]

    Both William Clayton’s minutes and Willard Richards’s notes indicate that the other counselors in the First Presidency, Sidney Rigdon and William Law, as well as church patriarch Hyrum Smith, were also presented “for trial” to the conference. On 27 March 1843, JS wrote to inform Rigdon that at the upcoming conference, he would seek to withdraw fellowship from him due to persistent suspicions that Rigdon was conspiring with John C. Bennett against JS. Rigdon responded the same day, denying any association with Bennett and insisting on his loyalty to JS. Following the conference’s 6 April 1843 vote in JS’s favor, Rigdon was permitted to speak about his relationship with Bennett and his ongoing support for JS and the church, leading to his “almost unanimous” sustaining by the conference. The portion of the minutes devoted to the other sustaining votes, including Rigdon’s “trial” and its resolution, was omitted from the published account. (JS, Journal, 6 Apr. 1843; Letter to Sidney Rigdon, 27 Mar. 1843; Letter from Sidney Rigdon, 27 Mar. 1843; Minutes and Discourses, 6–7 Apr. 1843.)

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