Welcome to the Standard of Truth podcast, hosted by historian Dr. Garrett Dirkmont,

where we explore the early days of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

and gain rare historical insights into how a young farm boy was able to establish a new church

and grow it by way of visions,

manifestations, and miracles.

Hi, welcome to another episode of the Standard of Truth podcast.

I'm your host, Dr. Garrett Dirkmont, and I'm joined by my friend, Professor Richard Ladook. Hi, Garrett. In the last podcast, we left you with quite the cliffhanger,

talking about the 1856 Republican knowledge. As much as 19th century history could ever be

considered a cliffhanger. So whatever happened with, John C. Freedon?

So what do you?

So did Lincoln ever become president?

Or I don't even know.

I mean, we talked, we talked a bit about kind of setting the table for a little bit about what the Republican Party, what their platform was, especially as related to Latter-day Saints,

and some of the problems that that would cause to help to provide some context now

to have a discussion about President Lincoln.

Yeah, and again, Lincoln's from Illinois.

So he actually would have dealt with, he would have dealt with issues surrounding Latter-day Saints back in the 1840s

when Latter-day Saints are being persecuted and driven from Illinois.

Now, it's important to note that Lincoln is a Whig back then.

And Whig politicians generally were antagonistic towards Latter-day Saints in Illinois, because

the Latter-day Saints voted as a block for the Democrats.

And so that's the reason why when Joseph declares his candidacy for the presidency, that

...