Legal marijuana

[annewandering]

This proves that the Church is not merely duplicitous in trying to hide stuff, it's incompetent.

lol I am sure you are right.

[Truth12]

I. It is true that the degree to which the proscription on alcohol has been enforced, varied up until the 1920s or so. And yes, the Church produced wine in southern Utah into the 1890s or later--for use in sacrament meetings

.

Wine, Beer, and Whisky was produced in Utah heavily until prohibition. Beer was produced at more than 500 gallons a day. You can see some of the remains of the industry in Salt Lake City; the area of I-80 and 215 right before Parley's canyon produced some of the church's best alcohol.

"Valley Tan" was the premier Whisky made in Utah. It was considered one of the better brands in the West and earned praise from many, including British adventurer Captain Richard F. Burton and Mark Twain. The Lion House served alcohol regularly, beer could be found at most church activities. By 1870 3/4 of the state's revenue came from alcohol sales. B. Young and many church leaders were known to be heavily involved in producing and drinking alcohol. For more info you can read "Beer in the Beehive: A History of Brewing in Utah". The info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

With prohibition, these alcohol producers stopped. Utah was the deciding vote on ending prohibition. Mormons have a rich history in alcohol production & consumption. WOW was not a commandment, if it were I'd think JS wouldn't have put a bar in his house nor be known as a heavy drinker outside of the church. I've heard many church historians and lawyers debate this question, the common consensus is the WOW is not a commandment.

And I would ask you how you know "the only reason alcohol and drugs became a bigger part of the WOW".

Perhaps not the "only reason" but a very compelling coincidence.

[Vort]

"Valley Tan" was the premier Whisky made in Utah. It was considered one of the better brands in the West and earned praise from many, including British adventurer Captain Richard F. Burton and Mark Twain. The Lion House served alcohol regularly, beer could be found at most church activities. By 1870 3/4 of the state's revenue came from alcohol sales. B. Young and many church leaders were known to be heavily involved in producing and drinking alcohol. For more info you can read "Beer in the Beehive: A History of Brewing in Utah". The info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

Utah was also an early and enthusiastic producer of poppy and semirefined cocaine. Church leaders commonly did a few lines of coke before General Conference addresses, resulting in the Church's early major shareholder status in the Coca-Cola Corporation. Each meetinghouse had a dedicated "herbal room" where the brethren and sisters would, as they put it, "cut the grass". The huge number of girls born in Utah between 1860 and 1895 named "Mary Jane" is not mere coincidence. Not until Reefer Madness exposed the sordid underbelly of drug usage did the Church leaders see fit to stifle, quietly but effectively, the prevalent usage of drugs, hastily designating the existing herbal rooms as so-called "nurseries". So really, we have drug usage to thank for our wonderful children's programs. This may sound incredible to the ignorant and uninformed, but the info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

[Vort]

"Valley Tan" was the premier Whisky made in Utah. It was considered one of the better brands in the West and earned praise from many, including British adventurer Captain Richard F. Burton and Mark Twain. The Lion House served alcohol regularly, beer could be found at most church activities. By 1870 3/4 of the state's revenue came from alcohol sales. B. Young and many church leaders were known to be heavily involved in producing and drinking alcohol. For more info you can read "Beer in the Beehive: A History of Brewing in Utah". The info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

Utah was also an early and enthusiastic producer of poppy and semirefined cocaine. Church leaders commonly did a few lines of coke before General Conference addresses, resulting in the Church's early major shareholder status in the Coca-Cola Corporation. Each meetinghouse had a dedicated "herbal room" where the brethren and sisters would, as they put it, "cut the grass". The huge number of girls born in Utah between 1860 and 1895 named "Mary Jane" is not mere coincidence. Not until Reefer Madness exposed the sordid underbelly of drug usage did the Church leaders see fit to stifle, quietly but effectively, the prevalent usage of drugs, hastily designating the existing herbal rooms as so-called "nurseries". So really, we have drug usage to thank for our wonderful children's programs. This may sound incredible to the ignorant and uninformed, but the info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

[Windseeker]

"cut the grass"

LOL

[Vort]

"cut the grass"

LOL

Some Saints don't realize that Brigham Young himself coined the phrase, "Things go better with coke." But the info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

[Windseeker]

Some Saints don't realize that Brigham Young himself coined the phrase, "Things go better with coke." But the info is easily available for anyone who looks into Utah history.

I'll make sure to run that by a GA next time we're stokin a blunt.

[Just_A_Guy]

I don't think that interpretation was as widely accepted as you might think.

I respectfully submit that interpretation and application are two different issues.

"Valley Tan" was the premier Whisky made in Utah.

And also the name of an anti-Mormon newspaper published out of Salt Lake City beginning in 1858.

The Lion House served alcohol regularly, . . .

Uh . . . the Lion House was a private residence, not the reception center it is now.

. . . beer could be found at most church activities.

Do you have a source for this, other than a modern-day Utah brewer whose historical credentials--and partiality--are open to question?

By 1870 3/4 of the state's revenue came from alcohol sales.

Naturally. There was no income tax back then; and Salt Lake City was rapidly becoming a hub of the intermountain west--not to mention the presence of a healthy (and predominately non-Mormon) mining community in the northern and western parts of the territory.

B. Young and many church leaders were known to be heavily involved in producing and drinking alcohol.

Young had a distillery, yes, which he himself admitted to and the purposes of which he freely explained--see here (search on "whiskey").

But look through the Journal of Discourses and see what he and his contemporaries had to say about the Word of Wisdom. For example:

I will begin by asking the older portion of the assembly, if you do not recollect that when you were two, three, or four years of age, many of your mothers, as soon as you were able to drink out of a glass, and they happened to have a little wine, would compel you to partake of it, contrary to your feeble remonstrances? Do you not recollect when your mother made a little sling to revive her when she was fatigued with labor or exertion of any kind, saying to you, "Drink, my child?" Now, I wish to say to you girls, never be guilty of such practices when you become mothers. Never, when you sit down at the table to drink strong tea, perhaps as a stimulant when you are fatigued, give it to your child. I see this practice almost daily, or occasionally, at least, in this as well as other communities. Keep the tea, the coffee, and the spirits from the mouths of your children.

. . . .

Young men, my young brethren, will you accept a little counsel from me? When you go from this Tabernacle make a covenant with yourselves that you will taste no more ardent spirits, unless it is absolutely necessary, and you know it is; also make a covenant with yourselves that no more of that filthy, nasty, and obnoxious weed called tobacco shall enter your mouths; it is a disgrace to this and every other community. I am well aware of the reflections of many upon this subject. You may say to yourselves, "If I can do as well as my parents, I think I shall do well, and be as good as I want to be; and I should not strive to excel them." But if you do your duty you will far excel them in everything that is good—in holiness, in physical and intellectual strength, for this is your privilege, and it becomes your duty. Young men, take this advice from me, and practice it in your future life, and it will be more valuable to you than the riches of this world. "Why," say you, "I see the older brethren chew tobacco, why should I not do it likewise?" Thus the boys have taken license from the pernicious habits of others, until they have formed an appetite, a false appetite; and they love a little liquor, and a little tobacco, and many other things that are injurious to their constitutions, and certainly hurtful to their moral character. Take a course that you can know more than your parents. We have had all the traditions of the age in which we were born to contend with; but these young men and women, or the greater part of them, have been born in the Church, and brought up Latter-day Saints, and have received the teachings that are necessary to advance them in the kingdom of God on earth. If you are in any way suspicious that the acts of your parents are not right, if there is a conviction in your minds that they feed appetites that are injurious to them, then it is for you to abstain from that which you see is not good in your parents.

And on, and on it goes, through twenty-six volumes of the Journal of Discourses. Mention after mention of the Word of Wisdom and its proscribed substances, more or less as interpreted today. Condemnation after condemnation of alcohol. Leniency for those who are set in their ways, yes; but no ambiguity about what the Lord expects.

With prohibition, these alcohol producers stopped.

Are you really trying to imply that the Mormon proscription of alcohol is merely an outgrowth of Prohibition?

WOW was not a commandment, if it were I'd think JS wouldn't have put a bar in his house . . .

For which he was reprimanded by the local high council. Why didn't you tell us that? You seem to be quite well-versed in the subject.

. . . nor be known as a heavy drinker outside of the church.

You're confusing your Joseph Smiths there. Joseph Smith Sr. was a heavy drinker--indeed, may have been an alcoholic at some stages of his life. Joseph Smith Jr.? Drank, yes. Heavily? I think you'll have a hard time demonstrating that from the historical sources.

I've heard many church historians and lawyers debate this question, the common consensus is the WOW is not a commandment.

It was not given by way of commandment, no. Was it thereafter adopted as such by those whose prerogative it was to do so?

No official member in this Church is worthy to hold an office after having the word of wisdom properly taught him; and he, the official member, neglecting to comply with and obey it.

This isn't information that's been secreted away in some First Presidency vault, Truth12--it's on Wikipedia, for heaven's sake.

Edited February 21, 2013 by Just_A_Guy

[Vort]

In case anyone is wondering, my information above is exactly as accurate and truthful as Truth12's.

[john doe]

This trip down Ridiculous Road is now over. Thread closed.