Perhaps the most politically influential Mormon in America from 1939-41 made a strident effort to save people like the Frank family. Rafael Medoff, director of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies in Washington, writing for JTA, cited the efforts of
…U.S. Sen. William H. King, D-Utah, to pass legislation that would have admitted 20,000 German Jewish refugee children to the United States who were outside the regular immigration quota system. When that effort failed, Medoff says, King then sponsored a bill to open Alaska to European Jewish refugees.
Although King’s efforts failed, his actions were particularly noteworthy, because there was no Jewish constituency in Utah to serve, and his party was largely against immigration.
King, because of his Mormon faith (membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), was driven to try to do something to help.
Another Mormon U.S. senator from Utah, Democrat Elbert Thomas, would soon pick up where King left off and help lead the campaign to rescue Jews from the Nazis in the 1940s. [1]
Medoff wrote his article in the midst of public controversy in the U.S. over the Latter-day Saint practice of baptism for the dead. While Mormons baptize for the dead in Mormon temples to save the children of God spiritually, Medoff considered it important to show that Mormons have tried to save Jews physically. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is doing everything possible to make sure baptisms for the dead are only performed by Mormons for their own ancestors. A stringent policy attempts to prevent proxy baptism for Holocaust victims. Digital fail-safes are employed to block online submissions that break the rules for proxy baptisms.