The Kirtland Safety Society (KSS) was a quasi-bank organized in 1836 (and reorganized on January 2, 1837) by leaders and followers of the Church of the Latter Day Saints. According to KSS's 1837 "Articles of Agreement", it was intended to serve the banking needs of the growing Mormon community in Kirtland, Ohio. Its preamble stated it was:
- ...for the promotion of our temporal interests, and for the better management of our different occupations, which consist in agriculture, mechanical arts, and merchandising.
However, by November 1837, KSS failed and its business closed. In the aftermath, Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, was fined for running an illegal bank, and many bankrupted Mormons left the church because they believed Smith had established the bank in order to enrich himself and the Mormon leadership.
Read more about Kirtland Safety Society: Economy in Kirtland, KSS Organization, National Bank Crisis, Opposition and Failure, Response in The LDS Community, Kirtland Safety Society Notes
Famous quotes containing the words safety and/or society:
“He had a gentleman-like frankness in his behaviour, and as a great point of honour as a minister can have, especially a minister at the head of the treasury, where numberless sturdy and insatiable beggars of condition apply, who cannot all be gratified, nor all with safety be refused.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“Accept the place the divine providence has found for you, the society of your contemporaries, the connection of events.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)