An Epistle of the First Presidency: To the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in General Conference Assembled. Read April 6, 1886, at the fifty-sixth general annual conference, held at Provo, Utah

Salt Lake City: [Deseret News Company, 1886. First Edition. 19pp. Octavo [21 cm] About very good. Lacks wrappers. An open letter by the First Presidency that was sent out to be read at a General Conferences in Provo, instead of in person at the Tabernacle due to the Polygamy raids, than be conducted by federal marshals throughout the Territory, to locate and arrest known bigamists. In this short work Taylor writes of the challenges the Church was facing due to anti-polygamy legislation and the importance of continuing the practice of plural marriage.

"The cry of polygamy has made a good battle cry: this has called the fanatical element into line; but underneath and above this question of polygamy, and completely enveloping it, has been the design to destroy our rights as citizens, to take away from us our liberties under the Constitution and the laws, and to obtain the political control of our country, so that, being as voiceless in the affairs of government as the Indians or Chinese, we could be taxed and plundered with impunity, and be lorded over by a set of political harpies who would revel and fatten at our expense."

John Taylor (1808 - 1887) was third president of the LDS Church from 1880 to 1887. He is the first and so far only president of the LDS Church to have been born outside the United States. He was with Joseph Smith when he was murdered at the Carthage Jail and led the Church during the Polygamy raid period. Flake/Draper 1662.