Roger D. Launius

Methods and Motives: Joseph Smith III’s Opposition to Polygamy, 1860-90

Dialogue 20.4 (Winter 1987): 77–85
When Joseph Smith III preached his first sermon as a leader of the Reoganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints at Amboy, Illinois, on 6 April 1860, he expressed his unqualifed aversion to the Mormon doctrine of plural marriage. 

A Prophet’s Progress | Dean C. Jessee, ed., The Personal Writings of Joseph Smith, and Scott R. Faulring, An American Prophet’s Record: The Diaries and Journals of Joseph Smith

No one today knows more about the handwriting, letters, and other documents produced by Joseph Smith, Jr., than Dean C. Jessee. Long a careful student of these primary resources, his comprehensive editing of the Prophet’s writings…

An Ambivalent Rejection: Baptism for the Dead and the Reorganized Church Experience

Dialogue 23.2 (1990): 61–83

Launius shares how the Reorganized Church has changed their stance on baptisms for the dead.

The Papers of the Prophet | Dean C. Jessee, ed., The Papers of Joseph Smith: Volume I, Autobiographical and Historical Writings

It takes a meticulous person to edit historical documents. No amount of effort should be too much to obtain the stray fact, to check the transcription, the con text, and the details of an edited…

Affidavits Revisited | Roger I. Anderson, Joseph Smith’s New York Reputation Reexamined

In Another Part of the Twenties (1977), Paul A. Carter upended all of the stereo types advanced by historians about the 1920s. The jazz age was really more of a waltz than most people thought;…

Is There a New Mormon History? | D. Michael Quinn, ed., The New Mormon History: Revisionist Essays on the Past

D. Michael Quinn, one of the foremost practitioners of the type of work distinguished as the “New Mormon History,” certainly thinks so. He has assembled in this volume a set of fifteen previously published essays…

The “New Social History” and the “New Mormon History”: Reflections on Recent Trends

Dialogue 27.1 (Spring 1994): 109–123
My own analysis of the state of Mormon history suggests that the field, while other factors have also been at work, suffers from some of the exclusiveness and intellectual imperialism that were nurtured during the glory days of the “New Mormon History ” in the 1970s.

Coming of Age? The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in the 1960s

Dialogue 28.4 (Winter 1995): 31–55
In many respects the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints of the 1960s mirrored the general tumult, if not the details, of the larger American society.

Pretender to the Throne? R.C. Evans and the Problem of Presidential Succession in the Reorganization

Dialogue 30.2 (Summer 1997): 47–65
Born into a Canadian family living in St. Andrews, Ontario Province, on 20 October 1861 , Richard C. Evans rose to fame and power experienced by few other members of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The Reorganized Church, the Decade of Decision, and the Abilene Paradox

Dialogue 31.1 (Spring 1998): 47–65
In this essay I intend to build on my earlier work on the Reorganized Church and the decade of decision it faces in the 1990s.

Is Joseph Smith Relevant to the Community of Christ?

Dialogue 39.4 (Winter 2006): 58–67
I spoke as a member of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints/Community of Christ. As a result, I had a decidedly different perspective on Joseph Smith than my co-panelists.