Item Detail
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27968
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0
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0
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English
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The Murder of Joseph Smith
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Mormonism and American Culture
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New York, NY
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Harper & Row
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74-86
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If, as David Brion Davis suggests, Mormon persecution of the 1830s was an example of the paranoid style of politics, Keith Huntress views the murder of Joseph Smith in 1844 as resulting from similar tendencies. The Mormons were viewed as interlopers in Hancock County, Illinois, and Huntress examines the sources of the paranoia that led to the Carthage tragedy. Against the background of misunderstanding and violence Huntress considers the dilemma imposed upon Governor Thomas Ford in trying to prevent civil war and still preserve the lives of Joseph and Hyrum Smith for whose protection he assumed responsibility. In viewing the murders at Carthage in this context, Huntress creates a new understanding of the complexity of political problems facing a western democratic society in an age of limited government. [Editors's summary]