From Smithwick, and relevant to this discussion.... http://www.lsjunction.com/olbooks/smithwic/otd26.htmI found a number of my old Mormon friends in California, and without an exception found them secessionists, not from any partiality for the Southern people, who were even more intolerant of Mormonism than the Northern people, nor yet because of any sympathy with the peculiar institutions of the South. They wanted to see the South succeed in its purpose to withdraw from the Union, thereby establishing a precedent - which Brigham Young would have made haste to follow.
Had there been no other reason for opposing secession, that dangerous precedent, which would have been a constant menace to the South as well as to the North, would have been sufficient ground.
"...if the gentlemen of Virginia shall send us a dozen of their sons, we would take great care in their education, instruct them in all we know, and make men of them." Canasatego 1744
| 
