D&C Official Declaration 1

Back to the concept of polygamy. It’s interesting to me that the idea surrounding polygamy is so widely opposed by men, and this is just the man-hating cynic in me, but I’m pretty confident that their antagonistic view of plural marriage is not held because of their love and devotion to the women in their lives. I think that I’ve said it before but I’ve always found it interesting that in our society and most others, having many girlfriends makes a man respected, but as soon as he tries to commit to and care for all these women, he’s a felon. It makes no sense. When I was younger, I was under the impression that polygamy was ended by the Church in order to become a state in the union. I remember giving a presentation on Mormon pioneers and someone asked me about polygamy and I said “yes, the Church practiced polygamy but then wanted to become a state so they stopped it.” Which is “kind” of true, but not really. That argument never really sat right with me because if the Lord willed that polygamy continue, then it should have been continued regardless of the consequences. I saw that explanation as a cop out. This section and the accompanied explanation by the IM gives me a completely different perspective. Let’s begin this section with a quote from President Wilford Woodruff himself to give us some perspective, and this is really what put my uneasiness about that explanation to rest. He says, “But I want to say this: I should have let all the temples go out of our hands; I should have gone to prison myself, and let every other man go there, had not the God of heaven commanded me to do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me to write. I laid it before my brethren… I might as well undertake to turn an army with banners out of its course as to turn them out of a course that they considered to be right. These men agreed with me, and ten thousand Latter-day Saints also agreed with me… Why? Because they were moved upon by the Spirit of God and by the revelations of Jesus Christ to do it.”

Let’s get a time line started because there is a lot of back and forth in sequence that I think is important.

1831 – Joseph Smith is first introduced to the concept of polygamy.

1842 – Polygamy first begins.

1847 – The saints leave the formed United States and move west into Mexican territory and into Utah.

1852 – First “anti-polygamy” legislation is introduced by “non-Mormon governor of the Territory of Utah,” through “Justin R. Morrill of Vermont.”

1862 – The Anti-Polygamy Act of 1862 is signed in to law by President Abraham Lincoln. Seems to me that he probably had bigger problems to worry about during that time than what the Mormons were doing a world away.

1874 – The Church sponsors a case “to test the validity of the law of 1862… The leaders of the Church believed that the Supreme Court would rule the law unconstitutional.” The test subject is George Reynolds, who was asked by the First Presidency and “furnished the evidence necessary to convict himself.” The Anti-Polygamy law was upheld by the Supreme Court.

1882 – Congress passes the Edmunds Bill which “took away the right to vote from those who practiced polygamy and made it illegal for them to hold any office.”

1887 – Congress passes the Edmunds-Tucker Act which “disincorporated the Church, dissolved the Perpetual Emigration Fund, gave the property of the Church to the government for the benefit of the common schools of Utah, and took away the right of Utah women to vote.” Here’s an interesting point, in 1887 apparently the women of Utah had the right to vote because they have to have it in order for it to be taken away. But women of the United States didn’t have the right to vote until 1920, so the Mormons were way ahead of their time when it came to women’s rights. And why would the US government take away the right of women to vote? If the men were the perpetrators then surely that would make the women the victims. They weren’t interested in women’s well-being, but in being able to control them.

1889 – “For at least a year prior to the Manifesto in 1890, President Wilford Woodruff had forbidden plural marriage to be performed in the Endowment House. This ban, however, was not publicized.” What I find interesting in this statement is that the President of the Church began making changes to the policy at least a year before the official declaration was made, showing to me that this was not something that was done to appease the masses or other forces. If it was that type of response this was then the Church would have made it public and been loud about it, because that’s how people when they change to fit for others. The IM quotes President George Q. Cannon as describing the response of the people when they found out that plural marriages had stopped being approved the people have said, “Inasmuch as we have ceased to give permission for plural marriages to be solemnized, why cannot we have the benefit of that? Why cannot we tell the world it so as to have the benefit of it? Our enemies are alleging constantly that we still practice this in secret, and that we are dishonest and guilty of evasion. Now, if we have really put a stop to granting permission to men to take more wives than one, why should not the world know it and we have the advantage of it?” So why didn’t they make it known? President Cannon says, “These remarks have been made to us repeatedly. But at no time has the Spirit seemed to indicate that this should be done. We have waited for the Lord to move in the matter.”

1890 – Manifesto is issued in which the Church declares “We are not teaching polygamy or plural marriage, nor permitting any person to enter into its practice, and I deny that either forty or any other number of plural marriages have during that period been solemnized in our Temples or in any other place in the Territory.” We see that the Lord took his time, He made a point to show that he was not bending to popular culture or opinion. We know through the scriptures that the Lord commands marriage between one man and one woman unless he otherwise directs for his purposes. He knows the hardships and difficulties that arise when polygamy is practiced and cannot command it once his purposes are accomplished, otherwise that would be cruelty and the Lord is not cruel. One of the reasons cited for discontinuing the practice is explained by President Woodruff, “Inasmuch as laws have been enacted by Congress forbidding plural marriages, which laws have been pronounced constitutional by the court of last resort, I hereby declare my intention to submit to those laws.”

Interestingly, President Woodruff says that “the Lord showed me by vision and revelation exactly what would take place if we did not stop this practice.” Some of the consequences are:

1. Temples would be closed. The government seized the Church’s property for their non-compliance of the law, which again is interesting because Utah didn’t become a state until 1896. No ordinances could be done for the living or the dead without any temples. Priesthood ordinances would again be taken from the earth.
2. Men would be imprisoned for breaking the law and “confusion would reign throughout Israel, and many men would be made prisoners.”

I guess that’s it. The Lord made it clear that the practice would be made to stop, either the saints stop it by the Lord’s command, or they would be compelled to stop through violence and litigation.

Do I think the fact that polygamy was stopped indicate that it wasn’t actually commanded by the Lord in the first place? Not at all, in fact, I think it shows the opposite. A man who desires power, especially in the dominance of women, doesn’t give that up under any circumstances. He would have made them kill him before they would give it up. Overall, I think that the timing of everything and the doctrines and the reasoning only further solidifies that polygamy was commanded of God for that time and for those purposes.