In Nauvoo Mormons established a well-planned city and began building a temple, the University of Nauvoo, and a number of mills and shops. But once more the Mormons had difficulties with their neighbors, and in 1844 a mob, including members of the state militia, stormed the jail where Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum were being held on the charge of inciting a riot and murdered them.
Within a few weeks, Brigham Young, leader of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, was "sustained" as the new prophet. Under his leadership preparations were made for removal of the church to the Great Basin in western America. Nauvoo was abandoned in 1846. A pioneer company of 148 persons reached the Salt Lake Valley in July 1847, where they made preparations for those to follow. About 2,000 wintered in the Salt Lake Valley in 1847-1848, and the remainder of some 16,000 exiles migrated to the Great Basin at a rate of about 3,000 per year. Meanwhile, the 30,000 or more converts in the eastern United States, Great Britain, and Scandinavia were arriving at a similar rate. By 1860 there were 40,000 Latter-day Saints in Utah; by 1900, more than 200,000.
Some believers who chose not to follow Brigham Young founded the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in 1860 in Amboy, Illinois, with Joseph Smith III as their president. Headquarters were later removed to Iowa and still later to Missouri, where a large auditorium and other facilities were built. There were approximately 220,000 members of the Reorganized Church in 1990.
The Utah Mormons colonized 350 settlements in Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Wyoming, and Idaho and established industries required for their relatively self-sufficient agricultural economy. Community growth and welfare were supported by a system of voluntary "consecrations" and tithing.
Although the Mormons had hoped to establish a state government, Congress instead set up Utah Territory (which included present-day Nevada). This meant that Mormon settlers had to deal with officers appointed by the president. Although Brigham Young was the first governor, most of the federal appointees were hostile to the Mormons, and few, from any point of view, were competent.
Because the Mormons failed to cooperate with the "outsiders," President James Buchanan, accusing them of being in "a state of substantial rebellion" in 1857, sent the U.S. Army to occupy the territory. The troops remained until the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861.
Federal appointees and visiting journalists complained of three problems: the attempt of the Mormons to control the political life of the territory at the expense of the non-Mormon minorities; exclusivist economic practices, which inhibited the activities of "outside" businessmen; and the practice of plural marriage, even if by only a small minority. Federal legislation was directed at each of these practices during the 1860s and into the 1880s, culminating in the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1887. This act disincorporated the Mormon church, placed regulation of elections in the territory in the hands of a commission appointed by the U.S. president, disfranchised Mormon women (who had been given the vote in 1870), and required the seizure by the territorial marshal of all assets of the church, except chapels and burial grounds. After Mormon leaders agreed in 1890 to refrain from performing plural marriages, to disband the church's political party, and to disengage from church-supported business enterprises, Utah was granted statehood in 1896.
Quick notes:
Kirtland:
- At Kirtland the Mormon movement got stronger.
- The Mormons out numbered the non Mormons.
- They owned a mill, store bank and printing press.
- In 1837 there was an economic disaster (banks closed).
- The Mormons were chased out of Kirtland.
Missouri:
- Smith and his followers fled to the colonies which the Mormons set up.
- By 1831 there were 1000 members in the Mormon movement.
- In the winter of 1838 the Mormons let Missouri.
- Attempts were made to stop Mormons from voting
Nauvoo:
- Nauvoo was created for the Mormons.
Joseph smith and the start of the Mormon movement:
- Most of the emigrants who went west were afraid of god.
- The most important religious group to go west was the ‘church of Jesus Christ of the letter day saints’ – the Mormons.
- In 1920 Smith was visited by an angel after he had dug up some strange plate that told quite a different story to the bible.
- Smith started with 5 followers but by 1830 it turned into several hundred.