Church Archives: Spencer W Kimball Describes the Native Americans as Lamanites

Segment from a 1950 General Conference address demonstrates how the church leaders saw the Native Americans as the descendants of the Lamanites *and* Nephites.

07:45 - Indian Placement Program

[ThisEveinEvening]

I'm half Native. I can't change colors. I'm no Lamanite. I don't carry anyone's curse. And I have no responsibility or accountability for anyone else's actions.
Thank you so much for sharing this.

[randylamb]

He left out the part about Brigham and the first presidency approval of Special Order no 2. To exterminate the Timpanogos people In Utah.

[bonegrubber]

This is what I was taught growing up... And I believed and accepted it... It's what I taught as a missionary in south america...

[jy]

Just terrible. In 2012, I was with my daughter in Primary and the teacher pointed out a First Nations boy calling him a Lamanite. Even as a believer I was so uncomfortable with that 🤦‍♂️

[kayjohnson]

Little did JS know that the forces to prevail against him would be his own! Leadership that is...🤣😂🤣

[VIRGINIABRNANDBRED]

There's a Mormon Stories episode that covers Indian Placement Program. Members were sharing stories of how they could see the Indian children's skin getting whiter as they began to live the gospel.

[TreasureMapsGenealogy]

The 4:45 mark. “Become a white and delightsome people.” I’ve never seen SWK younger like this. I think he believed what he was saying.

[MaryH-olsd]

This man does such great, unbelievable work on his videos! Such good Clarity, amazing information, actual factual information/data .. and backs it ALL up too!

[joetaylor]

Native Americans have historically ALWAYS been described as "Lamanites" by the "leaders" of the Church. They also described all the Polynesians, etc., as "Lamanites, " implying that they too somehow are descendants of Book of Mormon characters who landed in the Americas from Israel. No need to start talking about actual realistic possibilities and logic as long as you subscribe to the current theology and philosophy of "the Brethren, " even if those ideas are ever-changing . . . right?

[stelladavis]

Soon the narrative will be that the BOM is meant not as a history but as a way to teach people valuable lessons. Meant to be taken spiritually and not literally. And the members will rationalize this change as equating it to how Jesus taught parables that were not meant to be taken as real or actual events, but as teaching guides.

[ThomasJDavis]

In anticipation of an apologetic response, the issue here is not merely that earlier church leaders were speaking like this, it's as much, or more so, to do with the fact that this way of speaking and thinking about BoM historicity was the _primal messaging_ to the membership of the church in a time when the church had a _very very tight grip_ on the information about itself as well as a very tight grip on the minds of the members. The leaders of the church throughout the 20 century could direct the beliefs and attitudes of the membership in nearly any way they wanted _without_ having to make official statements on various positions as an organization.

And now that they have lost control of the information and are continuing to lose control of the minds of the membership, they can utilize this lack of explicit, official endorsement to present what appear to be justifiable apologetic arguments and damage control messaging to the membership regarding those words of prophets and apostles and at the same time direct their beliefs and attitudes away from those now debunked teachings.

[whenpigsfly]

Nice thumbnail. Spencer looking a bit like Al Capone.

[kennethd.]

Great video! I had no idea that past leadership featured Nephite and Lamanite so prominently in their talks.

I emphasize strongly with the guy on the right. Why am I sitting here?

[gregreeder]

SO there you have it. Sounds like doctrine to me. So many problems with the Church's treatment of native peoples. Taking children from their families and putting them into LDS families was a horrible idea among many others.

[TheShodan]

The trusty old Mormon flip flop..
Retracting what Mormon prophets of old have said. The good old : "That was then and this is now, and he was speaking as a man".

Remember Adam/God?

Since they're constantly updating and changing what a prophet of yesteryear has said into what the new prophet now says, it must needs be that they must also get a brand new Christ each time also, for Him to be in step with contemporary doctrine and policy.

[galengalbreath]

This doctrine made me ashamed of the color of my skin and my Native ancestry. I literally hid myself from the sun in hopes of losing the cursed shade of brown and becoming white and delightsome. I was so foolish.

[hbendzulla]

I think that Spencer really believed what he was talking about. If not he’s or was a d... good actor. The emotion and Fiber he was delivering it, just marvelous. I never accepted this as a fact. 😱

[kentthalman]

Spencer does a really good job channeling the bigotry predominant when the BoM was published.

[wildhorses]

it's pretty undeniable with video evidence that they viewed native americans and apparently just anyone brown under the sun as canonically Lamanite or Nephite. that shit was 100% real to this man.

[jasona.palmer]

I was raised a Mormon for 18 years.And I can testify that the church keeps changing what they believe with politics.Which is why I quit among many other reasons.