Utah: Supports Slavery and Racism

Mormon Series

Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer, 2003, Excerpts

Although Joseph Smith had been opposed to slavery on moral grounds, Brigham Young was an unapologetic racist whose interpretations of scripture institutionalized racism within the LDS Church. Under his leadership, Utah became a slave territory, and the Mormon Church supported the aims of the Confederacy during the Civil War. Through most of the twentieth-century, African-Americans were strictly banned from the priesthood, and black-white marriages were considered an outrage against God.