LDS Church involvement in religious liberty issues extends to the earliest days of the history of the church, when Latter-day Saints experienced firsthand the harshness of religious persecution. Church founder Joseph Smith said in 1843 that "if it has been demonstrated that I have been willing to die for a Mormon, I am bold to declare before Heaven that I am just as ready to die in defending the rights of a Presbyterian, a Baptist, or a good man of any other denomination; for the same principle which would trample upon the rights of the Latter-day Saints would trample upon the rights of the Roman Catholics, or of any other denomination, who may be unpopular and too weak to defend themselves."
