[Genreal]
Smith defined as "a conspiracy against the peace of my household" three separate conflicts that converged today. First, the Sidney Rigdon family was outraged to learn of his polygamous proposal to his first counselor's daughter. Second, the charges and counter-charges involved in that crisis led to the discovery that Smith's special counselor John C. Bennett had been claiming the prophet's authorization for seducing several women. In his own defense Bennett apparently told others about his knowledge of Smith's recent polygamous marriages and unsuccessful proposals. These interrelated scandals threw Smith's wife Emma into a fury, as one woman after another began disclosing Nauvoo's sexual underground. This controversy caused Smith to delay his plans to give the "grand key words of the Holy Melchizedek Priesthood" to his wife and other women, "as well as to the Elders" .
[Quinn, D. Michael, The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power, Signature Books, 1994, Appendex: Meetings and Initiations of the Anointed Quorum, 1842-45, http://amzn.to/origins-power]
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