Good pt.
But when it came to the choice of which "prophet" to toss under the bus, well, hey' 'twas easier to agree with the RLDS assessments & Emma Smith's assessment of Brigham Young than to topple the very Joseph Smith foundation of their church.
The church had already silently done that by tossing Brigham's "Adam is God" & "blood atonement" tabernacle teachings under the bus.
And, yeah, it's kind of difficult to make your university namesake a PR sacrificial lamb, but I think they finally realized, "what comes around, goes around" -- and, knowing, that Brigham Young threw John D. Lee under the Mountain Meadows Massacre justice bus stop -- protecting himself & other Mormons by making Lee the sacrificial wolf in that case...they figured, "Well, hey, it's Brigham's turn."
"I am a true believer in the gospel of Jesus Christ, I do not believe everything that is now being taught and practiced by Brigham Young.
I do not care who hears it. It is my last word - it is so.
I believe he is leading the people astray, downward to destruction.
But I believe in the gospel that was taught in its purity by Joseph Smith, in former days.
I have my reasons for it.
"I studied to make this man's [Brigham Young] will my pleasure for thirty years.
See, now, what I have come to this day!
"I have been sacrificed in a cowardly, dastardly manner." (Lee enunciated this sentence with marked emphasis.)
Excerpted from --> http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/mountainmeadows/leeexecution.html