some of these leading elders were never acted upon. The church never incorporated them into her polity. Indeed, it would have been a violation of divine instruction given in the New Dispensation had the church attempted to establish such procedure. As early as 1831 the law of the Lord was given to the church as follows: "And now, behold, I speak unto the church: Thou shalt not kill; and he that kills shall not have forgiveness in this world, nor in the world to come.” Accusation by R. C. Evans In 1920, R. C. Evans, a former member of the First Presidency of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints who had left the church, wrote a book titled Forty Years in the Mormon Church: Why I Left It!. Evans accused both the RLDS Church and the Utah-based LDS Church of advocating “blood atonement” and he also associated the alleged practice with the “Danites.” In response to denials that the practice had ever been implemented by both churches, Evans wrote: Thus we have the President of the Reorganized Church and son of Joseph Smith admitting, as well as apologizing for the rash statements of his father and other leaders in the old church, and then we have Joseph F. Smith of the Utah church using about the same argument to excuse the language and murderous conduct of the Danites in Utah. All we care to say is reply to both of these descendants of the original prophet and organizer of the Danite Band is, that when the leading members and officers of the church for many years teach and practice, by threats and murders, ascribed to the Danite Band, then we believe the public is justified in denouncing such language and conduct, and affirming it to be the doctrine of the church. Response by Joseph Fielding Smith Responding to Evans’s accusations regarding the alleged implementation of the practice of “blood atonement”, Joseph Fielding Smith restated the doctrine, but denied that it had ever been practiced by the church, claiming that any such accusation was a “damnable falsehood.” Smith wrote, Through the atonement of Christ all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel...Man may commit certain grievous sins - according to his light and knowledge -that will place him beyond the reach of the atoning blood of Christ. If then he