ities from all outside legal
processes. No writ for the arrest of any Mormon inhabitants of any
Mormon city could be executed until it had received the mayor's
approval. By way of a mild and adequate penalty, anyone violating this
ordinance was to be imprisoned for life with no power of pardon in the
governor without the mayor's consent.

Of course this was a welcome opportunity for the lawless and desperate
characters of the surrounding country. They became Mormon to a man.
Under the shield of Mormon protection they could steal and raid to their
heart's content. Land speculators also came into the Church, and bought
land in the expectation that New Zion property would largely rise.
Banking grew somewhat frantic. Complaints became so bitter that even the
higher church authorities were forced to take cognizance of the
practices. In 1840 Smith himself said: "We are no longer at war, and you
must stop stealing. When the right time comes, we will go in force and
take the whole State of Missouri. It belongs to us as our inheritance,
but I want no more petty stealing. A man that will steal petty articles
from his enemies will, when occasion offers, steal from his brethren
too. Now I command you that have stolen must steal no more."

At Nauvoo, on the eastern bank of the Mississippi, they built a really
pretentious and beautiful city, and all but completed a temple that was,
from every account, creditable. However, their arrogant relations with
their neighbors and the extreme isolation in which they held themselves
soon earned them the dislike and distrust of those about them. The
practice of polygamy had begun, although even to the rank and file of
the Mormons themselves the revelation commanding it was as yet unknown.
Still, rumors had leaked forth. The community, already severely shocked
in its economic sense, was only too ready to be shocked in its moral
sense, as is the usual course of human nature. The rather wild vagaries
of the converts, too, aroused distrust and disgust in the sober minds of
the western pioneers. At religious meetings converts would often arise
to talk in gibberish--utterly nonsensical gibberish. This was called a
"speaking with tongues," and could be translated by the speaker or a
bystander in any way he saw fit, without responsibility for the saying.
This was an easy way of calling a man names without standing behind it,
so to speak. The congregation saw visions, read messages on stones
picked up i