| 378 The following is a copy of the petition presented to Congress:-
"To the Honorable the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled:-
"Your petitioners, Joseph Smith, Sidney Rigdon, and Elias Higbee, would most respectfully represent, that they have been delegated, by their brethren and fellow citizens, known as 'Latter Day Saints' (commonly called Mormons), to prepare and present to you a statement of their wrongs, and a prayer for their relief, which they now have the honor to submit to the consideration of your honorable body.
"In the summer of 1831 a portion of the society above-named commenced a settlement in the county of Jackson, in the State of Missouri. The individuals making that settlement had emigrated from almost every State in the Union to that lovely spot in the far West, with the hope of improving their condition, of building houses for themselves and posterity, and of erecting temples, where they and theirs might worship their Creator according to the dictates of their conscience. Though they had wandered far from the homes of their childhood, still they had been taught to believe that a citizen born in any one State in this great republic might remove to another and enjoy all the rights and immunities of citizens of the State of his adoption-that wherever waved the American flag, beneath its stars and stripes an American citizen might look for protection and justice, for liberty in person and in conscience.
"They bought farms, built houses, and erected churches. Some tilled the earth, others bought and sold merchandise, and others again toiled as mechanics. They were industrious and moral, and they prospered; and though often persecuted and vilified for their difference in religious opinion from their fellow citizens, they were happy; they saw their society increasing in numbers, their farms teemed with plenty, and they fondly looked forward to a future big with hope. That there was prejudice against them, they knew; that slanders were propagated against them, they deplored; yet they felt that these were unjust; and hoped that time and an uprightness of life, would enable them to outlive
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