things I do not understand: beans

I've got the slow cooker going today. I was up early and chopped up onions and carrots and added in a tempting mix of BBQ sauce, ginger ale, brown sugar, and honey over a very nice piece of roast. It is going to be fabulous! In 12 hours.

Right at the end, the recipe calls for adding in beans. I already had some dried cannellini beans in the pantry, so I soaked them in water overnight. They wrinkled up, but by morning, they were still hard. I soaked them some more. Still hard. I put them in a pot on the stove and have kept it on low for several hours now. Still hard. I'm going to boil them now and let them sit. They will BOIL.

The package assures me that if you let them sit overnight, they'd have been good to go. As many times as I have done this, they have *never* been good to go. Why, package, why do you lie to me?!?