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Drawing the Sword of War against War B. H. Roberts, World War I, and the Quest for Peace
B. H. Roberts, photographed in uniform. Roberts served as a chaplain during World War I, representing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Utah State Historical Society, photo no. 38329.
Drawing the Sword of War against War B. H. Roberts, World War I, and the Quest for Peace
BY JOHN SILLITO
On the eve of American entry into World War I, B. H. Roberts was a wellknown general authority of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), Democratic politician, writer, and popular speaker. In the years after the outbreak of war in Europe, he spoke out often on the need for world peace, as well as the policy of American neutrality toward the belligerent nations. His views tended to reflect those of most Americans, as well as the LDS hierarchy at the time. By the spring of 1917, however, Roberts firmly supported the United States’ entry into the conflict, to the extent that he volunteered to serve as a chaplain. The transformation of his views and the arguments he made in support of American involvement were indicative of a similar change in attitude among other Utahns as well, including those of his ecclesiastical colleagues. Indeed, as was always the case, Roberts’s views and actions were intertwined with those of the church in which he served. Fundamentally, as his views evolved, Roberts believed war was necessary only when it reflected God’s will and achieved God’s righteous purposes. As a result, an examination of Roberts’s arguments not only provides one more lens to view the climate that existed in Utah in wartime but also serves as evidence of the immediacy—and importance— of the Great War itself to residents of the Beehive State. 1 Moreover, once the conflict was over, Roberts emerged as an important advocate of postwar reconciliation—again based on his view of God’s will—and reflecting changes in the view of many Americans.
Long before he served as a chaplain in World War I, Roberts voiced his opinions on war, peace, and neutrality many times. As early as May 1899, after his election to Congress, Roberts commented on an international peace conference then being held in The Hague. 2 His remarks came in an address before the Mutual Improvement Associations (MIA) of the Weber Stake, a church auxiliary for young men and women. Roberts decried the “mad race” for armaments throughout the world, noting that young people should be “profoundly informed” on this topic since they would soon inherit leadership. In language anticipating his later views, Roberts proclaimed that when peace finally came to the world it would be on God’s terms, but that he also believed “the time will come when there shall be a federation of the world, and a universal brotherhood of man, and come it will, despite the vaunting ambition of monarchs.” 3 A few years later, in February 1904, Roberts told a congregation at the Salt Lake Tabernacle that war posed a dangerous threat in the modern world. In dramatic language, he noted that war would only “come to an end when it grows so destructive that to engage in it will mean annihilation.” 4 By 1907, again at an MIA conference in Ogden, Roberts said that as he surveyed the state of the world, he believed that “peace would come when . . . nations dealt justly with each other, when laws would all be just and there would be sufficient power behind that law to enforce their enactment.” 5 Clearly, it was a topic of ongoing significance to him, and his views were generally in accord with those of most Latter-day Saint leaders at the time.
Woodrow and Edith Wilson riding in the backseat of a carriage during President Wilson’s second inauguration, March 5, 1917. B. H. Roberts greatly admired Woodrow Wilson and his international policy. Courtesy Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-22737.
Roberts’s position on the subject became more important after war engulfed Europe in 1914. Initially, Roberts called on the United States to maintain its policy of “absolute neutrality,” while asserting that the war “might have been avoided if the people of the different nations had lived according to the commandments of God.” 6 Over the next few years, he expressed similar themes, strongly believing that President Woodrow Wilson’s policy of neutrality was wise because it allowed the United States to be in a position to assist in establishing “permanent peace” once the conflict had ended. Repeating his earlier calls, Roberts told attendees at a session of the LDS general conference in October 1916 that when the war ended, there would “doubtless be constituted a league of nations that will, in a way, establish an empire of humanity, with such instrumentalities created through which to exercise its just powers, that . . . the intensity of national feeling shall not be again permitted to disturb the peace of the world.” 7 By that time, the term “league of nations” was increasingly coming into common usage.
Despite these views, as events in 1917 pushed the United States toward involvement, Roberts shifted into a position of support for Wilson should he decide to call for American entry into the war. This shift again resembled that of the LDS church hierarchy itself. As Brian Q. Cannon has written, church leaders who had initially expressed a contempt for the war, clinging to isolationist views, became convinced once America entered the war that it was “a crusade against evil.” Their sentiments “generally harmonized” with the prevailing sentiment in the nation, Cannon argues, and “church leaders patriotically rallied to the cause.” Indeed, Cannon asserts, the hierarchy’s “reappraisal of the merits of American intervention in light of the altered international situation in 1917 was sensible.” No doubt, despite his initial reservations, Roberts would have agreed with that assessment. 8
As tensions increased, on March 24, 1917, Utah Governor Simon Bamberger issued a call for volunteers, noting that because the United States was “the bearer of the torch of liberty, justice and equality,” it had an obligation to assure similar values would be available to all people. Utahns, he said, must do their duty, and he encouraged “all able bodied men . . . not exempted by law, and of military age,” to demonstrate their “obligation of citizenship” by voluntarily enlisting in the Utah National Guard. In so doing, Bamberger said, they would bring honor to themselves, their nation, and the state of Utah. 9 Roberts agreed with these sentiments as well.
Two days later, Roberts was one of many prominent speakers at a large mass meeting held in the Salt Lake Tabernacle and called by Bamberger. The meeting, with an estimated crowd of 10,000, saw almost every seat filled, with more waiting outside. In addition to Roberts, others in attendance were Utah senators Reed Smoot and William H. King and Salt Lake City Mayor William M. Ferry, who said that at the present time there were only two classes in America—“patriots and traitors.” The Salt Lake Tribune noted that the city “turned out en masse. All classes and creeds were represented. . . . and the thousands of people as united Americans raised their voices in unison for the ‘Stars and Stripes,’ and the nation of which it is the emblem. Patriotism saturated the atmosphere.” 10
The assemblage passed a resolution stating that while “every honorable effort has been made conscientiously to keep this country out of war,” it was time for “all patriotic Americans to take a stand with the republic and the flag and the president.” Such a stand, the resolution asserted, was necessary to defend “our prestige and perpetuity as a nation” and to reassert American “principles of national right and honor.” Roberts joined the others in this statement of support, asserting that “the people are united—they are one behind the president. We are no longer Republicans or Democrats.” 11 Additionally, Roberts indicated that he would offer his services to the National Guard at the meeting, noting that while he was barred “by age limits from the ranks,” that did not preclude him from serving as a chaplain. 12 Several months later, an unidentified columnist in
Goodwin’s Weekly commented on the decision, noting that “No one was in the least surprised that [Roberts] should desire, in spite of his advanced years, to don the khaki and accompany the boys. . . . That was truly typical of the man.” The writer went on to say that “every citizen of the state rejoiced” in Roberts’s decision because it “made it easier” if the boys had to leave, “knowing that Major Roberts was going along to look after them.” 13 Ultimately, his offer was accepted, and he became chaplain of the 145th Field Artillery Regiment.
The next evening, Roberts was the “principal speaker” in a similar rally held at the Ogden Tabernacle. He told the crowd—which included veterans of the Civil War and the Spanish-American War—that while he had faced “many an audience” in that particular hall, none resembled the one he was speaking to at that moment. The Deseret Evening News reported that the tabernacle “was much too small to accommodate the great concourse of people who gathered to give expression to the fact that the citizens of Ogden will stand with the president in this hour of national danger.” The large audience provided “thunderous and prolonged applause,” when “in a brilliant speech,” Roberts reiterated his pledge to serve as a chaplain, assuring “the fathers and mothers of Utah that if their sons go to the trenches I will go with them.” Noting that because he expected that “the large majority of the young men” who will volunteer to serve will be “members of the dominant Church,” Roberts stated he considered it his duty to both his state and his church to offer his services “in this hour of crisis.” 14 According to the Ogden Examiner, Roberts stressed that the time had come when America need to “assert” itself in the face of the repeated violation of its neutrality. These “gross insults,” he said, could no longer be tolerated. Showing his continued support for the policies of President Wilson, Roberts also told the boisterous crowd not to forget that war
Not to be outdone, Ogden’s other newspaper, the Standard, calling Roberts a “silver-tongued orator and revered churchman,” described his speech as “magnificent,” and said that in it he approached the eloquence “of a Clay or Cicero.” The paper went on to say that Roberts, like a “revolutionary preacher . . . threw aside the robe of his sacred calling, and stood revealed as a warrior, as a field leader of God’s people in the battle for human rights. . . . One must see him, must follow closely his sledge-hammer logic, his crushing sarcasm, his soul-stirring appeals, to appreciate the power of his speech.” At the conclusion of the meeting, those in attendance adopted a resolution wherein they pledged “themselves to support President Wilson in whatever course he may take in the present crisis.” 16
As a result of these arguments, Roberts—a man who had emphasized the dangers of war for many years—was motivated to support American involvement in World War I and enlist in the Utah National Guard. It was a crucial step for a man of his age, with far-reaching consequences. Interestingly, his edited autobiography does not discuss this decision. But other sources help us understand his motivations. One of the most revealing statements of Roberts’s views on the war and subsequent peace, and his desire to serve, is contained in a remarkable letter he wrote to Ben Roberts and Harold Roberts, the oldest sons of his first wife, Louisa, and his plural wife Celia. 17 Roberts instructed them to communicate “to the two branches of my family of which you will be the heads respectively,” if the “occasion requires,” and he did “not come out of this war alive.” He assured his sons that he was not concerned that he might be killed, thus “cutting off a very few years of my earthly existence.” Noting that the letter was “finished in my tent at Camp Kearney, this 20th day of December, 1917, near mid night,” Roberts asserted his belief “in the absolute righteousness of this war. . . . I believe it is a necessary as well as a just war.” Additionally, he wrote that the country needed to fight to “maintain our rights,” to “protect the liberties of our people,” and to guarantee the “respect, security and honor of our country.” Roberts indicated that another reason for entering the war was tied to the fact that because “modern democratic principles” had their birth in the United States, “it was only fitting that our nation should enter into the world war on the side of the free nations battling for . . . the freedom of all nations irrespective of whether the nations are small or large, weak or strong.” He then turned to his views on a postwar world, noting “I hope and believe, that the purpose of the war . . . will be that war will cease. . . . So that I regard this present war as a war against war itself.” Saying that he hoped war would be ended “for a thousand years at least,” only with U.S. involvement could the conflict come “to a proper close, and establish peace for the world.” Roberts also notes that while some had criticized him for offering his services at his age, he believed that to not send Latter-day Saint chaplains would be “an everlasting reproach to the Church” since it was clear the 145th would be “largely” made up of Mormon boys—“two thirds at least.” 18
Truman Madsen’s biography of Roberts adds further insight on why Roberts supported the war. 19 In speculating on those motivations, Madsen notes that in April 1915, Roberts had read James M. Beck’s The Evidence in the Case, an extremely important book of the time that placed the majority of the blame for the war on Kaiser Wilhelm and his political and military advisors. 20 Additionally, Madsen suggests that although Roberts had concluded that “the war symbolized a worldwide failure of churches and their leaders,” he held out the hope that a united effort in support of the war might “help break down the unnecessary divisions” within Christianity. Roberts, however, struggled with a “more personal question: Was America responsible for ending the war by force? He was convinced that the answer was yes; the cause of France and England had become the cause of America.” 21 While this was clearly an Anglo-centric viewpoint, it makes sense in light of Roberts’s general attitudes toward the country of his birth—England—and its history, literature, and culture. Madsen also argues that Roberts “wanted to prove his mettle in war. . . . He wanted to act.” More importantly, in Madsen’s view, Roberts felt it necessary to establish that “the Mormon people are not disloyal, but they are true to their country and history will vindicate them.” 22
Indeed, this last point was a crucial factor in Roberts’s decision to support the war. Throughout his career, especially as the LDS church pursued polices of Americanization in anticipation of gaining statehood, Roberts argued that the patriotism and commitment to the U.S. Constitution of Latter-day Saints were overlooked, even while both individual church members and the institution itself were denied the constitutional protections promised all Americans. Moreover, as a candidate for congress and despite his earlier views on peace, Roberts—like most Utah Democrats— championed the Spanish-American War, even criticizing William McKinley for not pursuing it more vigorously. 23 Support for the 1898 war among Utahns, including some of the general authorities, was strong but not universal. 24
A stereopticon view of the wrecked battleship USS Maine, Havana Harbor, Cuba (detail). A mysterious explosion sank the Maine in February 1898, killing some 260 people and stoking the tensions that caused the Spanish-American War. Meadville, PA: Keystone View Company, c. 1898. Courtesy Library of Congress, LOT 13579, no. 5.
Most, including Roberts, saw it as a necessary response to Spanish aggression and oppression of the Cuban people, although some church leaders worried that the conflict might open the floodgates to needless violence. 25 Ultimately, the church would support the war to liberate Cuba from Spanish oppression, calling on Latter-day Saint men in Utah to “respond with alacrity” to Governor Heber M. Wells’s call for military volunteers. 26 As Ronald W. Walker states, when Mormon leaders embraced the Spanish-American War, it allowed the church to demonstrate its “growing conciliation with American society,” when, for the first time, it could “express its patriotism freely.” Moreover, Walker notes, when the church supported the war, “it did so enthusiastically, compensating for past insinuations of disloyalty.” 27
As part of that embrace, Roberts played an important role in seeing to it that the LDS church was officially included in efforts to establish a memorial to the battleship USS Maine; along with Heber J. Grant, Roberts represented the First Presidency in visits to congregations to secure funds for the memorial. 28 In Walker’s view, this policy was part of the effort of church leaders to blend “religious and national symbols,” display “their genuine patriotism for public effect,” and, in so doing, reflect the national mood. In Walker’s words, “They had become part of pluralistic America.” 29 Based on all these factors, Roberts’s support two decades later for American entry into World War I should not be surprising. And, on this question at least, Roberts was in harmony with both his party and his church, something that was not always the case. 30
Interestingly, despite his earlier views, Roberts was conspicuously absent from the large group of individuals who organized a Utah branch of the League to Enforce Peace. The league supported the war effort but pledged to support the creation of an organization after the war had ended to “minimize future disturbances of the international peace by hasty belligerent action on the part of nations.” Beyond that, the group echoed views also held by Roberts outlining Imperial Germany’s “militaristic actions” that had “trampled upon the rights of the United States.” 31 All of this became academic when the United States entered the war on April 6, 1917.
On April 15, 1917, Roberts addressed Utah National Guard troops at religious services held in the Ogden LDS Tabernacle. The troops had gathered first at the armory and then marched in a body to the Sunday afternoon meeting itself where, while the public was invited, most of the seats were reserved for them. Roberts’s remarks were in line with a decision by “the pastors of the Ogden Christian Churches” to preach “patriotic sermons” on that Sunday as a way to support a proclamation made by the city commission earlier in the month. 32 With a number of religious, educational, and governmental officials on the stand behind him, Roberts—using as his text Exodus 15:3, “The Lord is a man of war”—told the congregation that “righteous wars were sanctioned by the Divine Creator” and that “retaliation against German aggression on the high seas was worthy of the same sanction.” 33
In his capacity as chaplain, Roberts, spoke at length of his pride in his new assignment. 34 He said directly to the uniformed men seated in front of him, “In this relationship I bid you hail and welcome. I hope our brotherhood may grow hard and fast together, and I will consecrate my life to your service when we are called into the conflict now at hand.” 35 Roberts proclaimed that the “democratic government” of the United States came into existence “by reason of the inspiration of God, resting upon wise men raised up to establish such a government.” As a result of the sacrifices of these men, he said, “their work was sanctified,” and the American Revolution and Constitution had served as an “inspiration” ever since to all peoples of the world. Roberts gave a detailed vision of what he thought the war would accomplish, reflecting prevailing Wilsonian values.
Roberts concluded by telling the guardsmen, and all those in attendance, that they had “a sacred land and a sacred government” to defend, because it was the government that “safely guards your homes.” 37
Two weeks later, speaking at the conference of the Salt Lake Pioneer Stake, Roberts expressed similar views. He told the congregation that as a blacksmith “he had learned that to make a perfect mold of two pieces of iron each must be equally heated . . . but if one is cold the operation will not be successful.” Such a principle, he said, was true in life as well, and particularly true in terms of support for the war “engulfing Europe.” He assured his listeners that he was confident the “Latter-day Saints will do their duty.” Moreover, he said that had “great hope, great faith, [and] great confidence” that the United States and her allies would prevail, and that he believed that God will save this nation [because] it is worth saving.” 38
Recruiting for the National Guard saw periods of advance and decline. The Utah State Council of Defense oversaw the effort, with Salt Lake City attorney Carl A. Badger, a former assistant to Reed Smoot, leading the recruiting itself. 39 On May 5, state and guard leaders sponsored a massive recruiting rally that brought some 5,000 people to the front of the Salt Lake Tribune building in support of the war effort. Roberts addressed the crowd and called upon Utahns to do their share to defend the nation and oppose enemy forces “arrayed against it.” Roberts made similar appearances elsewhere in mid-1917, energetically boosting the cause of enlistment. 40
By June, Roberts—continuing his efforts to increase enrollments in the National Guard— spoke at a large meeting in the Salt Lake Theater called to prove that Utahns would “show their loyalty and furnish the quota of men needed by the national guard for duty at home and abroad.” Such enlistments would also make men “immune” from the impending draft. Roberts told the gathering that the “most serious business from now on must be the prosecution of the war to a successful conclusion.” He also criticized as a “disgrace” those men who avoided enlistment to wait for their chances in the draft itself, saying that he believed “voluntary service” was preferable to being forced by the government to serve in light of the threat that the war posed to American values. 41 In addition to Roberts, other speakers included former Governor William Spry, Colonel Richard W. Young, Reverend P. A. Simpkin of the Phillips Congregational Church, and Bishop Joseph S. Glass of the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City. Some four dozen men enlisted at the meeting.
On August 26, Roberts made a “stirring address” to a “largely attended” meeting in the Tabernacle. He told the congregation that at times conflicts occur in which “God himself takes part,” and he believed that this war was one of those conflicts. He reminded his audience that the United States had entered the war reluctantly: only after “ingenuity had exhausted itself” did the nation see fit to enter the war. Initially the nation had held “tenaciously to the well-established doctrine that we should have no entangling alliances with other nations, and when the conflict broke out we claimed strict neutrality.” Unfortunately, Roberts commented, the nation “remained in this attitude until many American lives were lost, our ships were sunk, the ports were closed to our commerce, and we became the veritable laughing stock of all the world.” Finally, he said, all of these “outrages” forced the nation to act. 42
Roberts stated that he completely agreed with Woodrow Wilson that this “was a war to make the world safe for democracy.” Moreover, he said that the Allies needed to punish Imperial Germany for causing such a terrible conflict. At the same time, he proclaimed that the “great purpose is that it shall be the end of all war, and as the thunder of cannons is silenced, I hope we shall hear the Angels sing ‘Now shall the Kingdom of this World become the Kingdom of God.’ When the war shall have ended there should be created a league of free nations to guard against the arrogant dominating influences of imperial autocracy.” 43 Despite his advocacy, Roberts did not expand on the exact nature of such a league or what powers it would need to challenge such autocracy. At the same time, Latter-day Saint leaders moved to a similar position. According to Ronald W. Walker, “The Mormon enthusiasm was a microcosm of the nation. World War I united Americans, including the Saints, like no other national war. Moreover, the Mormon’s millennial perceptions made them, like other religious fundamentalists, particularly susceptible to Wilsonian rhetoric.” 44
Predicting that there would be ups and downs over the next months, Roberts said he was convinced that the “sum total of this conflict will be the triumph of right, the accomplishment of Gods purposes. I have absolute faith that so far as the United States is concerned, God is with us.” At the same time, Roberts cautioned that all belligerents sought to have God’s blessing. He concluded by noting that he was “proud of Utah’s part” in supporting the war financially and in every way. Such support, he hoped, would bring a measure of respect for the state. At the same time, he said he realized that “some of ‘Utah’s sons’ might well pay the ultimate sacrifice” but that had been the “price of liberty in all ages.” 45
Because he had strongly attacked the Kaiser, Imperial Germany, and its military and foreign goals, Roberts apparently attracted the attention of some opponents of the war, along with some Utahns of German heritage. 46 The Salt Lake Tribune noted that in response Roberts would speak on “The Duty of the German Citizen in the Present War Crisis” at sacrament service in Salt Lake City’s LDS Cannon Ward on Sunday, September 10. The newspaper called the address an “answer to criticism of many so-called German Americans of this city” that had resulted from Roberts’s recent tabernacle address. 47
According to an account in the Salt Lake Tribune, Roberts spoke directly to “German residents of the ward of which there are many in that section of the city.” He was direct and forceful in his views, noting—in familiar language— that the United States was compelled to go to war because Germany was “running amuck.” Repeating his assertion that “American shipping had been attacked, and American lives had been lost,” Roberts asked rhetorically what the ward members would have suggested the United States do differently “under these circumstances.” At the same time, he cautioned the congregation, “if you offer any sympathy or aid to Wilhelm of Germany, you are not true to your oaths as citizens” and that doing so would place them “upon dangerous ground.” He then spoke in distinctively Mormon terms, reminding the congregation that the church’s “Articles of Faith” taught Latter-day Saints to “be subject to kings and presidents, and to honor, obey and sustain the law.” He went on to tell them: “Our pioneers raised the flag of freedom on Ensign Peak on July 24, 1847, and it was . . . an invitation to the people of all lands to come here and be free, throwing off the tyranny under which they were oppressed in other nations. Unless men are free they cannot be held accountable in the day of judgement.” 48
Additionally, Roberts reminded his audience that the church’s efforts had brought “alien Saints” to Utah. Many of them, while residing in their homelands, he said, had never “dreamed of holding property and owning homes, but here you have that opportunity.” In return for the freedoms America offered, Roberts stated, individuals “must absolutely foreswear allegiance to [their] native country.” Indeed, while he did not say so, this is exactly what Roberts had done many years before when he renounced Great Britain and became an American citizen. Roberts told his listeners that he had “no unkind word or thought against alien citizens,” that he was not singling out Germans, and that his remarks were “applicable to all natives of foreign countries.” As a result, so that there would be no possible misunderstanding, Roberts said he had changed the title of his remarks to “The Duty of Alien Citizens in the War Crisis.” His choice of the term “alien citizen” is interesting, possibly implying that he meant “hyphenated” citizens (rather than non-citizens) who still held to an affinity for their homelands. Perhaps he should have used the term “residents” to clarify what he meant, but he did not. 49
Roberts stated that the United States did not “seek one foot of enemy territory.” Moreover, he contrasted Wilson’s efforts to maintain neutrality with those of Germany who had “flooded” the nation with “spies and tried to embroil the United States with Mexico and Japan.” Finally, he concluded—and warned—that while as a whole German-Americans were “loyal and true American citizens,” those who proved to be disloyal or gave aid to the enemy were traitors and should be dealt with under the “stern regulations of war.” This was not the time, Roberts argued, “to further treasonable spirits and give them the rights of citizenship while they seek to undermine the government and hamper its defense of itself and its citizens.” 50
Obviously, support for the war was complicated for church leaders. Latter-day Saints could be found in the ranks of all the belligerent armies, inevitably pitting Saint against Saint on the field of battle. Moreover, the conflict affected missionaries in various countries. Still, the commitment to the American cause outweighed these concerns. 51 On balance, despite some disagreement, as had been the case previously, church leaders such as Joseph F. Smith became “earnest” advocates for the American cause, urging American Latter-day Saints to enlist with the hope that the success of the Allied cause “might increase world-wide liberty and righteousness.” 52 Their hope was that an Allied victory would mean the triumph of God’s will. 53
Throughout the fall of 1917, Roberts continued to speak in support of the war and the need for unwavering support in a “strong and convincing manner” of the nation’s war effort. At an “overflow” session of that October’s general conference, for example, Roberts delivered an “eloquent address” that lasted some forty-five minutes. He told his congregation that the nation had “drawn the sword of war against war itself that men may be free to live their lives in their own way without oppression.” As a result, he argued that America was engaged in a “Holy War” and pledged that “out of the maelstrom of destruction shall emerge better things than the world had ever known.” Among these accomplishments, he said, would be an expansion of the benefits of the Monroe Doctrine to protect “all peoples of the earth.” 54
Shortly after this address, Roberts’s situation took a dramatic change. Along with the other members of the 145th, Chaplain Roberts left for Camp Kearney, California, for training. By September 1918, the regiment was in France where they saw limited action before the Armistice and returned home. While he had not seen hostile action, Roberts had witnessed the deadly effects of the influenza that hit the ranks of his unit with a vengeance, taking fourteen young lives. As the chaplain, it was his lot to dispose of their personal belongings and to write to their next of kin. It was sobering. As he later remarked, these men had made
When he returned to Utah, Roberts was a different man, very much affected by what he had witnessed. David W. Smith, a nephew, noted that while he still found Roberts to be “a man of reserve,” he was “much warmer than before.” 56 At the same time, Roberts took a measure of pride in the words of an official document from the state praising his “valor, fidelity, and patriotic service” in the Great War. 57 Moreover, he also recognized the irony in his wartime service. As he told an old friend, Bernard Moses, “While the government rejected me as a representative in Congress, they did accept my service as a chaplain in the war and I had the joy of serving overseas. You see I was trying to get even with Uncle Sam for turning me out of Congress.” 58
The published text of an address delivered by President Woodrow Wilson in July 1919, about the treaty ending World War I and the League of Nations. This copy of the address is in the papers of a Layton, Utah, farming family, indicating the reach of the national conversation about the league. Utah State Historical Society, MSS B 1011, box 1, fd. 9.
At the same time, Roberts—like many Americans—was not sure the Armistice would hold, and, in February 1919, he told a joint session of the Utah State Legislature that “We are standing too close to the mountain to see things as they should be seen. The war is not over yet. It may be that our boys may yet have to march down the streets of Berlin to see that the mandates of the peace conference are enforced. . . .
It is impossible at the present time to get a true retrospective of the great war.” 59 Over the next few weeks, however, his concerns were lessened, and he told a church meeting in Richfield that he saw “in the peace conference and the proposed league of nations, the beginning of the millennium when weapons of war will be turned into the implements of the husbandman.” 60
By then, his full-throated advocacy of American involvement in the war had given way to an unwavering commitment to the League of Nations as proposed by President Wilson, whom he called the “first citizen of the world.” 61 Like the president he admired, Roberts believed that by drawing the sword of war against war itself, the future would be made safe for democracy and characterized by a world at peace. This commitment made him the best-known Mormon advocate of the proposed world organization and brought him into conflict with the league’s best-known Mormon opponent, J. Reuben Clark, as the two men debated the issue over the next few years. Ultimately, although there had been great support in Utah for the idea in the years after the war, the issue became politicized in the 1920 presidential election. When Utahns, along with the majority of Americans, supported Republican and league opponent Warren G. Harding that year, it became clear that they had concluded that the nation should not support the League of Nations. Ultimately, the United States never joined the league, and B. H. Roberts—who had dramatically and quickly moved from isolationist to internationalist—must have felt that his dream for peace and postwar reconciliation between nations was lost for his lifetime. 62
Not long after this, the LDS church called Roberts to serve as president of its Eastern States Mission, and he spent most of the decade out of the state. He returned to Utah in 1927 and resumed his activity in church work and political causes—including peace. On January 8, 1928, the church assigned Roberts to be one of the main speakers at a special meeting in the Salt Lake Tabernacle. 63 Sponsored by the Utah Council on the Prevention of War (UCPW), that day had been designated as the second annual “Peace Sunday” by Utah Governor George H. Dern and C. Clarence Neslen, Salt Lake City’s mayor and Roberts’s friend. 64 Several other local churches held similar meetings on that day, where, in Dern’s words, the council and churches would cooperate “to make the services a concrete dedication to the cause of peace.” 65 The UCPW was an affiliate of the National Council for the Prevention of War, a clearinghouse headed by Frederick J. Libby, a peace activist with contacts in Utah. 66 While Roberts does not seem to have been a member, the group brought together a number of local clergy and political leaders.
In his remarks, entitled “A Plea for the Ultimate Abolishment of War,” Roberts reminded his audience that Christ was known by many titles, not the least of which was the “Prince of Peace.” With that as a backdrop, he contrasted peace with war, noting that war brought waste and ruin, destroyed science and the arts, and filled the world with terror, sorrow, and death. Moreover, he asserted:
After outlining his views of the suffering of the Mormon people at the hands of their adversaries and reiterating statements from the Doctrine and Covenants that the church above all stood for the renunciation of war, Roberts said he proclaimed himself as one who “favors with all the emphasis I can put into it peace among men; between states, and among nations.” His version of peace, and the one he believed was commended by God, “must be a peace based upon justice and upon liberty. I can conceive of no peace that would be desirable that does not consider those two great things as rises from them as a result of their existence.” And anyone who advocated peace, Roberts concluded, must accept that it was “equally . . . based upon justice and the liberty of men.” 68
At this point Roberts turned his attention to the horrors of the Great War, its cost in lives and money, and the rightness of the Wilsonian policies, especially of the League of Nations. He renewed his call for the United States to enter the league as “one of the most potent steps that could be taken in the interest of peace in this world today.” Roberts went on to detail specific actions that would, in his view, make the world less martial and more humane: refraining from enlarging the American navy; eliminating submarine warfare; and outlawing the use of chemical and biological weapons. Roberts concluded his address by returning to where he had started, a hope that world leaders would recognize the folly of war by following the Prince of Peace and accepting God’s commandments as “binding on their consciences . . . make them the full measure of their duty . . . then the attainment of universal peace will be comparatively easy . . . for world peace will be in proportion to the establishment of the doctrine of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.” 69
Throughout the rest of 1928, Roberts returned to these themes, especially as he campaigned for Democratic candidates in the elections. 70 Toward the end of the year, he spoke at the fifth annual Woodrow Wilson Memorial Dinner in Boise, Idaho, where he denied that the twenty-eighth president was a “dreamer,” calling him instead a “practical idealist” and a “man of action who had accomplished a great deal during his two terms in office.” Moreover, Roberts reiterated his view on the importance of the League of Nations, saying that it had not failed but the United States had failed it. Referring to the Kellogg-Briand Pact—an international agreement calling for the renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy that had recently been signed in Paris and ratified by the U.S. Senate—Roberts argued that it was a step in the right direction but noted his hope that “we will go further, for this declaration of the outlaw of war must have some kind of force behind it in order that it may be effective. We lost the great opportunity of world leadership. We let it slip through our fingers by not joining that league which is now splendidly functioning today.” 71
By 1930, Roberts was again active in commemorating Armistice Day activities. That year he spoke at the Salt Lake Tabernacle on “The Armistice and What Came of it to the United States.” 72 The Salt Lake Telegram reported that Roberts gave an “eloquent discourse particularly appropriate to the day,” recalling that he had been in Bordeaux with his unit waiting “to go to the front” when he learned of the Armistice from leaflets dropped by airplanes. He warned that if there was another world war it would be worse because the “engines of destruction . . . would be greater.” Roberts reiterated his longheld view of the importance of American involvement in the league. He closed with “a fervent prayer for this nation upon which God had placed a responsibility of leadership; for a continuation of peace, and for God’s blessing upon the United States.” 73 Over the next few years, Roberts’s involvement in public memorials diminished, no doubt due to old age, but he still enjoyed reminiscing about the war and his views on peace. 74
But as it turned out, one more opportunity to advocate peace and international cooperation awaited him. On August 23, 1933, it was announced that Roberts would represent the LDS church at the forthcoming meetings of the World Fellowship of Faiths in Chicago. 75 This gathering, which is little known today, was organized by Charles Weller, a social worker who had created the League of Neighbors in 1918, and Kedar Nath Das Gupta, an organizer of a group called the Union of East and West in America. 76 Weller and Das Gupta merged their organizations and made plans to bring representatives of various religious traditions to the Chicago gathering. The meetings, held at Chicago’s Hotel Morrison, attracted a number of reformers and religious figures, with Margaret Sanger, Philip LaFollette, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman among them. 77 For Roberts, this opportunity to speak to a gathering of noted religious thinkers represented a culmination of his work in this area. Moreover, he must also have seen it as a vindication of the slight he believed he had received forty years earlier when he was prevented from discussing Mormonism at a full session of the World Parliament of Religions held as part of the World’s Fair. 78
Roberts left Salt Lake City by train on the evening of August 24, arriving in Chicago on August 26, where he was met at the railroad station by the president of the local LDS mission, George S. Romney, and others. 79 That day, the Chicago Daily News specifically noted that the Utahn had been “delegated” as the LDS church’s official representative and its contribution to the “impressive program” developed by fellowship leaders. The newspaper referred to the previous parliament and commented that the “sponsors of the 1933 fellowship expect to achieve even greater heights. World brotherhood, universal peace, elimination of poverty and kindred topics will be discussed by men who have made these subjects life time tasks.” 80 The next day Roberts met with local LDS officials and members while attending sacrament meeting. Once the fellowship sessions opened, Romney later reported, the gathering’s officials made reference to Roberts’s treatment at the hands of the organizers forty years before, in the same city, at the parliament. As a result, Romney stated, “President Roberts was honored, it seems to me, more than any other of the distinguished people who spoke.” 81
Roberts delivered his main address, “The Standard of Peace,” at the fellowship meetings on August 29, with a number of local Mormons and some Utahns in attendance. 82 Drawing upon views he had held for some time, Roberts stated that he had chosen his topic because he believed nothing constituted a greater threat to human progress than “the possibility of international war,” which threatened the “very existence of civilization.” Roberts then built upon scriptural references, from both the standard Christian and Mormon canons, to demonstrate God’s injunctions to renounce war and proclaim peace. Such a policy, he declared, had become even more urgent as a result of the “dreadfulness” of the last war. 83 Beyond the renunciation of war and the desire for peace, Roberts asserted there was a need to establish a commitment to justice “upon a firm foundation.” The creation a decade before of the Permanent Court of International Justice of the League of Nations provided the beginnings of such a foundation. Yet, that was only a first step, “because justice is as yet undefined. Who shall give the authoritative definition of it and how? It must be a generalization that will include every scrap and item of law and custom that has in the development into dignity of international law. But, alas, while much is said and written about justice little is said of it in any satisfactory manner.” For Christians generally, and Mormons specifically, to achieve that definition would require an understanding of righteousness, especially as provided in the Ten Commandments, the teachings of Jesus, and the message of the Sermon on the Mount. Roberts argued that from these sources, one might learn more about justice “than in all the musty volumes of law in the libraries of all the nations.” In concluding his address, Roberts called on his colleagues at the World Fellowship to establish a “standard of World Peace upon these foundations of God’s righteousness and Justice.” 84 The Salt Lake Tribune reported that these remarks were “applauded vigorously” particularly by the “large Utah delegation” in attendance. 85
After returning from Chicago, Roberts, although often sick, resumed his regular ecclesiastical duties. About a week later he told his friend Josiah E. Hickman, who had read reports of the talk in the Deseret News, that he had “received very much better treatment at the hands . . . of the World Fellowship of Faiths,” than at the event forty years earlier. 86 It is evident that he was pleased by that fact. By then, however, his faith journey was coming to an end, and he died on September 27, 1933. Roberts’s address at the 1933 World Fellowship of Faiths capped off his decades of thought and experience about war and peace—thought that was not without inconsistencies. Although he always professed a distaste for war, at times he saw it as necessary or even righteous, as with the Spanish-American War in 1898 and with World War I after the American entry in 1917. At other times in his public career, Roberts decried—often in very specific terms—man’s inhumanity to man. Likewise, he looked for concrete solutions to such behavior, finding it in international bodies like the League of Nations and especially in the teachings of Christianity. All told, his responses to war and his hopes for peace seem to have generally hinged on what he viewed as righteous behavior and God’s will. In the years since his death, Roberts has been remembered as a Mormon theologian, historian, and intellectual. At the same time, he should also be remembered as a Utahn who witnessed the horror of war and then became an advocate of peace and international cooperation.
Web Extras
Visit history.utah.gov for newspaper articles describing B. H. Roberts’s oratory, as well as further information about the League of Nations.
Notes
1 For an important overview, see Allan Kent Powell, “Utah and World War I,” Utah Historical Quarterly 86, no. 3 (Summer 2018): 204–33.
2 Roberts was elected in November 1898 but ultimately not seated in Congress because of his polygamous marriages. For a succinct overview of this affair, see Davis Bitton, “The B. H. Roberts Case of 1898–1900,” Utah Historical Quarterly 25, no. 1 (January 1957): 27–46. As we will see, the position he took on the Spanish- American War as a congressional candidate may have influenced his views on peace.
3 “Eloquence of B. H. Roberts,” Ogden Standard, May 22, 1899, 5. Newspaper accounts are extremely important in tracing Roberts’s thought and activities, especially during this period. No diaries—except a small pocket notebook that is cited below—are extant for these years. Moreover, while his official correspondence, which is held by the Church Historical Department, is voluminous, it is currently closed to research.
4 “B. H. Roberts on War and Peace,” Salt Lake Telegram, February 29, 1904, 7.
5 “Conference Sunday,” Ogden Standard, May 18, 1907, 6; “Conference of the MI Workers,” Ogden Standard, May 20, 1907, 2.
6 “B. H. Roberts Heard by Large Audiences on Sunday,” Ogden Standard, August 10, 1914, 5.
7 B. H. Roberts in Eighty-Seventh Semi-Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1916), 143–44.
8 Brian Q. Cannon, “Chastisement of the Nations, 1914– 45,” in Window of Faith: Latter-day Saint Perspectives on World History, ed. Roy A. Prete (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 2005), 427–46.
9 See T. DeWitt Foster, “Governor in Demand for Guard Recruits,” and “Here’s Proclamation,” Salt Lake Telegram, March 25, 1917, 1. This essay draws heavily on Richard C. Roberts, Legacy: The History of the Utah National Guard (Salt Lake City: National Guard Association of Utah, 2003). Also useful is E. W. Crocker, ed., History of the 145th Field Artillery Regiment of World War I (Provo, UT: J. Grant Stevenson, 1968).
10 “Utah Pledges Loyal Defense of Nation’s Honor and Flag,” Salt Lake Tribune, March 27, 1917, 1.
11 “Loyal Utah Speaks,” Deseret Evening News, March 27, 1917, 1.
12 “Loyal Utah Speaks”; see also National Guard 145th Field Artillery Scrapbook, 1917–1918, Series 10339, Utah State Archives and Record Service, Salt Lake City, Utah.
13 “The Spectator,” Goodwin’s Weekly (Salt Lake City, UT), February 23, 1918, 3.
14 “B. H. Roberts Says He Will Go to the Trenches with the Boys,” Deseret Evening News, March 28, 1917, 1. Roberts may have been anticipating the view of Joseph F. Smith, delivered to an LDS audience in June 1917. Smith encouraged soldiers to be “just as pure and true in the army of the United States as you are in the army of the Elders of Israel that are preaching the gospel of love and peace in the world. . . . While death in battle might be instantaneous . . . the death that is caused by the transgression of the laws of God . . . is to be dreaded worse, a thousand times than to die sinless in defending the cause of truth.” Joseph F. Smith, “A Message to the Soldier Boys of ‘Mormondom,’” Improvement Era, July 1917, 821–29.
15 “Prominent Men Offer Services to National Guards,” Ogden Examiner, March 28, 1917, 1. Additionally, Dr. Edward M. Conroy (1857–1926), a prominent Ogden government official and physician, offered his services as a surgeon. Ultimately, he instead served as chairman of the Weber County Council of Defense. See “E. M. Conroy, Ogden Doctor and Ex-Mayor Dies, Aged 68,” Ogden Standard-Examiner, August 13, 1926, 1.
16 “Intense Patriotism in Ogden,” Ogden Standard, March 28, 1917, 1.
17 Gary J. Bergera, ed. The Autobiography of B. H. Roberts (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1990). For more on Roberts’s marriages and families, see Richard C. Roberts, A History of the B. H. Roberts Family (Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2009). Roberts married a third wife, Margaret C. Shipp (1849–1926), but the date of that marriage is in dispute. They had no children together.
18 “My Reason for Enlistment,” box 9, fd. 11, B. H. Roberts Papers, MS 0106, Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah (hereafter Roberts Papers).
19 Truman Madsen, Defender of the Faith: The B. H. Roberts Story (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1980).
20 James M. Beck, The Evidence in the Case: A Discussion of the Moral Responsibility for the War of 1914, as Disclosed by the Diplomatic Records of England, Germany, Russia, France, Austria, Italy, and Belgium (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1915).
21 Madsen, Defender of the Faith, 303.
22 Madsen, 304.
23 Jean B. White, “Utah State Elections, 1895–1899” (PhD diss., University of Utah, 1968), 281–83.
24 D. Michael Quinn, “The Mormon Church and the Spanish-American War: An End to Selective Pacifism,” Pacific Historical Review 43, no. 3 (August 1974): 342–66.
25 Speaking in general conference, Roberts argued that the “present dissensions among the nations” had been foretold in Section 88 of the Doctrine and Covenants. He also indicated his belief that “in this day of great turmoil, war, the crumbling of dynasties, and the anger of the elements,” the situation represented “a splendid time for spreading abroad Mormon faith,” and that the gospel message must “continue to be sounded to all the nations.” See “Conference Meetings,” Deseret Evening News, April 7, 1898, 2; and, “They Talked of War,” Salt Lake Tribune, April 8, 1898, 5.
26 “The War with Spain,” Deseret Evening News, April 28, 1898, 4. Similarly, the editorial columns of the Deseret Evening News during this period tended to argue for support for the war. See “Our Cause Is Just,” Deseret Evening News, April 27, 1898, 4.
27 Ronald W. Walker, “Sheaves, Bucklers and the State: Mormon Leaders Respond to the Dilemmas of War,” Sunstone (July-August 1982): 43–56.
28 “At the Tabernacle,” Salt Lake Herald, May 16, 1898, 7; “The Maine Memorial,” Deseret Evening News, October 4, 1898, 4; see also Heber J. Grant and B. H. Roberts to Wilford W. Clark, July 13, 1898, LR 5735/21, LDS Church History Library, Salt Lake City, Utah (hereafter CHL), digital copy of circular letter and supporting documents, accessed February 27, 2019, catalog.lds.org.
29 Walker, “Sheaves, Bucklers and the State,” 49.
30 For information on the church’s changing view, see “Topics of the Times,” Juvenile Instructor, March 1917, 126–29, April 1917, 186–87, and May 1917, 238.
31 “To Organize Peace League Branch Here,” Deseret Evening News, April 5, 1917, 13.
32 “Guardsmen to Hear Maj. B. H. Roberts,” Salt Lake Telegram, April 15, 1917, 1; “Soldiers March to Tabernacle on Sunday, Ogden Standard, April 14, 1917, 11.
33 “B. H. Roberts to Quit to Serve at Front,” Salt Lake Tribune, July 24, 1917, 4. At the time Roberts was serving as a member of the Utah State Board of Equalization.
34 “Confirmation of Army Appointments, Ogden Standard, September 3, 1917, 8. At that point, Roberts was made a first lieutenant and regimental chaplain of the 145th Field Artillery. Prior to that, while technically a member of the Utah National Guard, he had held the rank of major.
35 “War Sanctioned by the Scriptures Says Major Roberts in Tabernacle,” Ogden Standard, April 16, 1917, 12. For the response of other churches in Ogden to the war, see “Pacifism and the Present War,” Ogden Standard, April 14, 1917, 11; “Guardsmen to Hear Maj. B. H. Roberts.”
36 “War Sanctioned by Scriptures.”
37 “War Sanctioned by Scriptures.”
38 “Nation Must Serve God to Be Saved,” Deseret Evening News, April 30, 1917, 5; “Great World Controversy,” Deseret Evening News, May 26, 1917, III:9.
39 Allan Kent Powell, “Utah’s War Machine: The Utah Council of Defense, 1917–1919,” in Utah and the Great War: The Beehive State and the World War I Experience, ed. Allan Kent Powell (Salt Lake City: Utah State Historical Society and University of Utah, 2016), 91–134.
40 Roberts, Legacy, 104.
41 “To Hold a Mass Meeting in Liberty’s Cause,” Salt Lake Tribune, June 25, 1917, 12; “Appeal to Patriotism is Followed by Enlistments,” Salt Lake Tribune, June 27, 1917, 18.
42 “Says God Takes Part in Certain Great Conflicts,” Deseret Evening News, August 27, 1917, 5.
43 “Says God Takes Part in Certain Great Conflicts.”
44 Walker, “Sheaves, Bucklers and the State,” 50; see also, Joseph F. Smith, “Our Duty to Humanity, To God and To Country,” Improvement Era, May 1917, 645–56.
45 “Says God Take Part in Certain Great Conflicts.”
46 For an overview, see Allan Kent Powell, “‘Our Cradles Were in Germany’: Utah’s German-American Community in World War I,” in Utah and the Great War, 205–25.
47 “Roberts to Answer Pro-German Critics,” Salt Lake Tribune, September 8, 1917, 16.
48 “Roberts Replies to Critics of Address,” Salt Lake Tribune, September 10, 1917, 16; see also, “Work of Churches Told in Sermons,” Salt Lake Telegram, September 10, 1917, 6.
49 “B. H. Roberts is Quite Outspoken,” Ogden Standard, September 10, 1917, 10.
50 “Roberts Replies to Critics of Address.”
51 At the same time, Joseph F. Smith reminded church members that “we have become brothers in the household of faith, and we should treat the people from these nations that are at war with each other, with due kindness and consideration.” Smith, “Our Duty to Humanity,” 61.
52 Walker, “Sheaves, Bucklers and the State,” 49.
53 Joseph F. Smith also feared that servicemen might not remember that they were going in to battle “in the spirit of defending the liberties of mankind rather than for the purpose of destroying the enemy.” Moreover, he urged church members in the military to remember they should “engage in the great and grand and necessary duty of protecting and guarding our Nation from the encroachments of wicked enemies” and do so with “an eye single to the accomplishment of the good that is aimed to be accomplished, and not with the bloodthirsty desire to kill and destroy.” Smith, “Our Duty to Humanity,” 52.
54 Journal History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 7, 1917, 7, CR 100 137, CHL; see also, Powell, “Our Cradles Were in Germany,” 205–225.
55 “Utah Heroes Are Accorded High Praise,” Deseret News, February 13, 1919, 6; see also B. H. Roberts, Chaplain Journal, box 9, fd. 16; and, “The Men Who Died of Spanish Influenza in the Camp of the 145th F. A.,” box 9, fd. 19, Roberts Papers.
56 As quoted in Madsen, Defender of the Faith, 305.
57 Certificate dated March 20, 1919, in Georgiana R. Mowry Scrapbook, MS 30037, #60, CHL.
58 B. H. Roberts to Bernard Moses, June 24, 1925, Bernard Moses Papers, Mss SC904, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah.
59 “B. H. Roberts Says War Is Not Over Yet,” Myton (UT) Free Press, February 13, 1919, 1.
60 “Chaplain Roberts Delivers Discourse,” Richfield (UT) Reaper, March 22, 1919, 1.
61 “Chaplain Roberts Delivers Discourse.”
62 James B. Allen, “Personal Faith and Public Policy: Some Timely Observations on the League of Nations Controversy in Utah,” BYU Studies 14, no. 1 (January 1973): 77–98.
63 In addition to Roberts, Apostle David O. McKay discussed “The Ruthlessness of War.” See “The Ruthlessness of War,” Deseret News, January 14, 1928, III:7; see also “B. H. Roberts to Speak at Tabernacle Sunday,” Salt Lake Telegram, January 7, 1928, 7.
64 The initial observance in Utah was held before Roberts returned to the state. Apparently, the designation had the tacit approval of the First Presidency. See “World Peace, Pulpit Topic,” Salt Lake Telegram, January 3, 1927, 6. After that the observances were moved to coincide with the celebration of the Armistice in November.
65 “Dern Proclaims January 8 as Peace Sunday,” Salt Lake Telegram, December 19, 1927, 3; “Sunday Services in Salt Lake Churches,” Salt Lake Telegram, January 7, 1928, 3.
66 For more on the group’s goals, see “Peace Sunday to be Observed in S. L.,” Salt Lake Telegram, November 21, 1926, 2.
67 B. H. Roberts, “The Abolishment of War,” Deseret News, January 14, 1928, III:9.
68 Roberts, III:9.
69 Roberts, III:9.
70 “Peace Sunday to be Observed in Utah on Nov. 11,” Salt Lake Telegram, October 24, 1928, 2; “B. H. Roberts to Speak at Logan Armistice Day,” Salt Lake Telegram, October 23, 1928, 13; “Youth Education Urged for Peace,” Deseret News, November 12, 1928.
71 “Wilson Termed Man of Action,” (Boise) Idaho Statesman, December 29, 1928, 1.
72 “Salt Lake Will Celebrate 13th Armistice Day,” Salt Lake Telegram, November 9, 1930, 2.
73 “Armistice Day in Paris Gives Sermon Theme,” Deseret News, November 10, 1930, 5.
74 “First Armistice Day is Recalled by Vets,” Salt Lake Telegram, November 10, 1931, 13.
75 “Impressive Meeting to Launch Meeting of World Faiths,” Chicago Daily News, August 26, 1933, 8.
76 “Tagore Address Full of Interest,” (Salt Lake City) Utah Daily Chronicle, October 16, 1916, 2.
77 “Religious Groups Open Parliament,” New York Times, June 19, 1933, 17; “Problems for the Fellowship of Faith at Chicago,” Literary Digest, July 8, 1933, 21; “Church Envoy Sent to Meet,” Deseret News, August 24, 1933, II:1.
78 For a general overview, see Reid L. Neilson, “Mormonism’s Blacksmith Orator: B. H. Roberts at the Chicago World’s Fair Parliament of Religion,” Mormon Historical Studies 12, no. 1 (Spring 2011): 53–84. For more detail, see Neilson’s Exhibiting Mormonism: The Latter-day Saints and the Chicago World’s Fair (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011); and Konden R. Smith “Mormonism and the World’s Fair of 1893: A Study of Religious and Cultural Agency” (PhD diss., Arizona State University, 2012).
79 Northern States Mission Records, Manuscript History, August 24, 1933, LR 6227/63, CHL.
80 “Impressive Meeting to Launch Meeting of World Faiths,” Chicago Daily News, August 26, 1933, 8.
81 George S. Romney in One Hundred and Fourth Semi- Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1933), 40.
82 In a later reminiscence, written after Roberts had died, Emily A. Rich of Ogden described her experiences at the fair and the World Fellowship of Faiths. She said Roberts’s remarks were “wonderful” and that the sessions had been an education. Emily A. Rich, Diary, September 29, 1933, Dr. Edward I. and Emily Almira Cozzen Rich Diaries, MS-74, Special Collections, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah.
83 B. H. Roberts, “The Standard of Peace,” in World Fellowship: Addresses and Messages by Leading Spokesmen of All Faiths, Races and Countries, ed. Charles Frederick Weller (New York: Liveright, 1935), 870–75; see also, B. H. Roberts, Discourses of B. H. Roberts of the First Council of the Seventy (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1948).
84 Weller, World Fellowship, 871, 873, 875.
85 “Church Official Deplores Passive Christian Spirit,” Salt Lake Tribune, September 8, 1933, 6.
86 Roberts to Josiah E. Hickman, September 8, 1933, Josiah E. Hickman, Scrapbook 2, accessed March 5, 2019, hickmans family.homestead.com/files/JEHscrapbook2.pdf.
