DCP’s case for Brigham Young as a moderate abolitionist

[drumdude]

I found this recent transcription of DCP’s FairMormon talk about Brigham Young and slavery. Everyone here will know I’m not a fan of DCP, but the case he makes here is much stronger than the one he has been making on his blog. It’s well worth a read.

https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/con ... nd-slavery

In a sense both sides are talking past one another. Critics rightfully point out that Brigham Young was really nothing special - he clearly lacked any sort of divine guidance which can be lauded as extraordinarily progressive. But Dan rightfully points out that Brigham Young was on the side of a more moderate form of slavery, one that was intended to lower tensions and avoid civil war.

I fear I was wrong about DCP’s stance on this. I think his argument about Brigham is well reasoned and supported. He reaches a bit farther than I would go, but that is only because he is under the delusion that Brigham was a prophet.

I think all of the evidence shows that Brigham did not support chattel slavery, but also that Brigham (if he really was a prophet) missed a golden opportunity to position the Mormon religion as clearly anti slavery. The priesthood ban is still a shining example that Jesus Christ was never at the helm. Brigham could have simply carried over the practice of giving Blacks the priesthood, and kept it entirely out of the political fray. There was no need for moderation in that realm.

[Everybody Wang Chung]

Drumdude,

Thank you, that was insightful.

Brigham Young's decisions, whether they were politically pragmatic or divinely misguided, were a missed opportunity to position the church in an unequivocally righteous and Christ-like manner. Even if Brigham had outlawed slavery in all its forms, his legacy would still be marred by his role in the Mountain Meadows Massacre and his involvement in conflicts with Native American tribes.

[I Have Questions]

His point seems to boil down to this: Brigham Young saw black people as inferior to white people and held the opinion that black people should be servants for white people. Peterson is saying that Young favoured slavery without white people having property rights over their slaves. And so we can call them servants, not slaves. And that exonerates Young from being classed as being in favour of slavery. Servitude rather than Slavery. Have I got that right drumdude?

As a slight aside, Peterson spends most of his presentation talking about other people’s views of slavery, the circumstances in the land at the time etc as a means of placing Young as a “product of his environment”. Which is all well and good for a mere mortal. But Prophets are meant to be different. They are meant to be above their environment, they are Seers of the future etc and so Young should not have been a product of his time, he should have been much much much more than that. He should have seen black people and white people as equal, because of his Prophetic insight and divine guidance. Turns out his actions on slavery/servitude seem to be more political than Prophetic. He took a considered middle position that he felt would place him in a powerful position to appeal to people on both ends of the slavery debate at the time. It was a shrewd and calculated political move.

[Kishkumen]

Yeah, I don't see much to celebrate here. Brigham Young felt like he had a better take on how to make Black people serve him and his buddies?

Young:

"Slavery is definitely bad. The Mormon doctrine for how to deal with the inferior race by making them servants instead of slaves definitely works better. We must solve issues of race by contextualizing them within our Mormon Zion economic and property system. That will fix everything."

Modern ex-Mormons:

"And this is what people call an admirable Brigham Young? Really?"

Let's just see what Brigham Young actually wrought. Read up on "An Act in Relation to Service," which was passed by the Utah legislature in 1852. This act legalized the servitude of Blacks and European immigrants. (I guess it is progressive to increase the number of groups who can be servants?) https://exhibits.lib.utah.edu/s/this-ab ... %20decade.

Look at what "enlightened" Brigham had to say about slavery after the bill was passed:

I am as much opposed to the principle of slavery as any man in the present acceptation or usage of the term. It is abused. I am opposed to abusing that which God decreed, to take a blessing and make a curse of it. It is a great blessing to the seed of Adam to have the seed of Cain as servants, but those they serve should use them with all the heart and feeling, as they would use their own children and their compassion should reach over them and round about them, and treat them as kindly, and with that human feeling necessary to be shown to mortal beings of the human species. Under these circumstances their blessings in life are greater in portion than those that have to provide the bread and dinner for them.

A kinder, gentler slavery as God's blessing for whites. That is the legacy of Young. Tyranny is what it is. We should not mistake it for something admirable. I am unmoved by these attempts to make out Brigham to be the good guy he wasn't. I don't see Brigham Young's servitude as desirable. It is still about one group holding itself up as superior over another in order to exploit them for the benefit of the dominant group.

[Kishkumen]

From Brigham Young's speech before the Utah Territorial Legislature on January 23, 1852:

I have this section in my hand. In reading it over I made a little alteration in it. In the first place, with regard to slavery, inasmuch as I believe in the Bible, inasmuch as I believe in the ordinances of God and in the priesthood order of God, I believe in slavery. Just as far as this act is concerned, we believe in making this African creature amenable to certain laws; in their freedom they have subjected themselves to cursing. In their families, in their classes, and in their various capacities they have brought curses upon themselves and until the curse is removed by Him who has put the curse on this class, I am not authorized to remove it. I am a firm believer in slavery. I think this is reasonable according to the revelations; the Lord has revealed that the children of men are to be agents to themselves, unto the Lord their God.

https://exhibits.lib.utah.edu/s/this-ab ... y/page/3_1

I hate to even have to post this vile, disgusting garbage on this website. But the evidence needs to be set out in public. Repeatedly. Brigham Young is not admirable in his take on slavery. Slavery with kind treatment and good intentions is slavery. It is an offense and threat to the freedom of all. It is a stain on the legacy of Western civilization, the United States of America, and the LDS Church. Brigham should be excoriated for these views, not celebrated in them. Make no mistake: Brigham justified slavery as a divinely ordained curse upon black people and a blessing to white people. It is a grotesque set of views that I repudiate entirely. It was never true, and it is not true today. I condemn Young's teachings on race, slavery, and servitude unequivocally.

[Kishkumen]

I will tell you what the real blessings for all are: the rule of law, freedom, equality, and democracy. No half measures toward any of these things should be celebrated. It is perilous to celebrate less-than freedom, less-than the rule of law, less-than equality, and less-than democracy. Brigham Young's rhetoric is the very danger we face at the moment. Brigham Young says he believes in slavery because the Bible says so. That is the road to the servitude of all under tyrannical leaders that we are currently heading down as a nation. We must reject it absolutely. This is what we have discovered Constitutional originalism and Biblical fundamentalism to be: the vehicles to rob us all of the rule of law, freedom, equality, and democracy. This is what the Christian nationalists are braying in approval of and agitating for. This is Project 2025. Do not be the fool who mistakes any of this for something other than the recipe for the establishment of tyranny in the guise of theocracy that it is.

[Kishkumen]

An Act in Relation to Service

Section 1: Be it enacted by the Governor and Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Utah, that any person or persons coming to this Territory of Utah and bringing with them servants justly bound to them, arising from a special contract or otherwise, said person or persons shall be entitled to such service or labor by the laws of this Territory. Provided, That he shall file in the office of the Probate Court written and satisfactory evidence that such service or labor is due.

I think it is worth considering the problem with how this Act is framed. It may be relatively standard for the time, but we should still be concerned that such is applauded. The fact that you could bring someone you claimed was your servant and owed you labor opens up all kinds of opportunities for abuse.

[Kishkumen]

There is the absurd claim that Young's Utah was somehow superior to free California because California 1,500 slaves whereas Utah had 100. Of course, California also had over ten times the population of Utah at the time, so how is this something to celebrate? Does this tend to make Utah look better than California? We can be disappointed that there were ANY slaves in California, but we should not say that a state with 100 slaves out of a population of 20,000* was better than a state having 1,500 slaves out of 260,000+ residents. That would be absurd!!!

See https://wheatandtares.org/2024/11/18/Washington ... -race-ban/ for the use of these numbers by the authors of This Abominable Slavery.

Now, I would like to know where the estimate of 1,500 slaves in California is coming from.

The University of Wisconsin claims that there were no slaves in California, which, strictly speaking, cannot be true, given the fact that there is evidence of the presence of some slaves there, but 1,500? Where is that number coming from?

https://wisc.pb.unizin.org/ls261/chapte ... 1790-1860/

*The population of Utah was 11,380 in 1850 and 40,272 in 1860. I am being reasonable if not generous in allowing for the possibility of 20,000 residents in late January to early February 1852, the time when An Act in Relation to Service was proposed and passed.

[Kishkumen]

Again, here is "enlightened" Brigham in his end-of-year Governor's message:

When southern Statesmen shall learn that Afric's sons and daughters are not goods and chattels, and will attach unto them, that humanity and moral accountability to which they are entitled; and cease to appropriate an inordinate cupidity, the souls of men; and northern fanaticism learn to know that "Canaan" shall be servant of servants unto his brethren; and that there is but little merit, in subverting the decrees of Providence, or substituting their own kindred spirit and flesh, to perform the offices allotted by superior wisdom to the descendants of Cain. If they (northern fanatics)* wish to do them (black slaves) a kindness, and are actuated by the "higher law principle," let them (northern fanatics) purchase them (black slaves) into FREEDOM, and place them in their own household, where they can partake of their kindness, wisdom, and intelligence, and also participate in the sympathies of their "Soi distant" friends, thereby obviating the necessity of white servants, who should tread the theatre of life and action, in a higher sphere: also obviating that bitter hatred, which the constant agitation of the subject of slavery in Congress, engenders in the bosoms of those, who should (being of a common brotherhood,) dwell together in unity. Happily for Utah, this question has been wisely been left open for the decision of her citizens, and the law of the last session, so far proves a very salutary measure, as it (An Act in Relation to Service) has nearly freed the Territory of the colored population; also enabling the people to control all who see proper to remain, and case their lot among us.

I can hardly think of a more cowardly position to take on the issue of slavery than this one, or a statement more revealing of the disdain in which Young holds abolitionism and abolitionists, or of the clever but abominable racism that Young boasts of, in which he sees An Act in Relation to Service as a great success in chasing out many black people from Utah in mere months, and allowing the Territory's white people to CONTROL those black people who remain.

This is not a man to celebrate and honor in his views and actions regarding race. He is a disgusting bigot and white supremacist. The people whom Young decries as fanatics were those who were trying to end slavery, who believed that black people are human beings and not property. While he at points says things seemingly congenial to the abolitionist viewpoint, he has not the courage to go the whole way. No, he allows the Bible to decide that slavery is the dictate of Providence (God) and sees the main error southerners make is not in the existence of slavery but in treating their slaves like goods and chattels instead of human beings. COWARD.

*I have added the text in parentheses to clarify Young's meaning.

[drumdude]

I completely agree, the quotes are absolutely horrific. But DCP’s one specific point seems to be that Brigham wanted an end to chattel slavery, and a transition into servitude.

The whole country was wrestling with how to end chattel slavery. Would we let them vote? How would they function in society without education? And it course the pervasive racism inherent in the common interpretation of scripture.

If we can allow DCP to score points on that very narrow definition of Brigham’s stance on chattel slavery, it allows us to continue the conversation about the rest of the story.

In other words, DCP would like to keep the conversation limited when there is much, much more to say.