Moroni’s supporters were the Nephites who answered Captain Moroni’s call to defend their freedom against the dissension led by Amalickiah. After Amalickiah sought power and the support of dissenters, Moroni, chief commander of the Nephite armies, tore his coat, wrote on a piece of it “In memory of our God, our religion, and freedom, and our peace, our wives, and our children,” fastened it to a pole, and called it the title of liberty (Alma 46:12-13).
Those who rallied to Moroni’s standard were already “true believers in Christ,” who had gladly taken upon them the name of Christ, or Christians, because of their belief in him who should come (Alma 46:15). When Moroni proclaimed his words, the people came running together with their armor girded about their loins, rending their garments as a token or covenant that they would not forsake the Lord. They declared that if they should transgress and be ashamed to take upon them the name of Christ, the Lord should rend them as they had rent their garments (Alma 46:21).
They then cast their garments at Moroni’s feet, covenanting that they would be destroyed, as their brethren in the land northward had been, if they fell into transgression, and that the Lord might cast them at the feet of their enemies just as they had cast their garments at Moroni’s feet to be trodden under foot (Alma 46:22).