Posted on 07/02/2011 6:05:43 PM PDT by Colofornian
(To see Cal Grondahl’s cartoon that goes with this post, click here) I spent some time re-reading the late Richard S. Van Wagoner’s excellent book, “Mormon Polygamy: A History.” The 19th century tales of harems and never-ending teenage-girl hunting were, of course, lies to excite Eastern U.S. readers. Polygamy was a contradictory doctrine, and extremely dysfunctional. Brigham Young once said that he wished it wasn’t a doctrine, but later also raged that those who disbelieved in polygamy — and even monogomous LDS men — were in danger of damnation. And polygamy led to divorce among LDS elite leaders in numbers that would shock today. According to Van Wagoner, more than 50 marriages of LDS leaders ended in divorce in the mid 19th century.
Indeed, two early wives of LDS apostle brothers, Orson and Parley Pratt, gave their husbands the heave-ho for their enthusiastic embrace of polygamy, and penchant for young, teenage brides. And not every faithful LDS elder with a feisty wife was brave enough to try polygamy. Van Wagoner recounts the tale of one husband who abandoned plans to take a plural wife after his wife informed him that she had received a revelation from God directing her to shoot any spare wife who darkened the family doorstep.
As Van Wagoner writes, though, there was a somber paradox to polygamy, particularly for faithful LDS women who reluctantly embraced the doctrine as a commandment of God yet suffered personal heartache and financial pain due to their husband’s extracurricular wives. Emmeline B. Wells, early Mormon women’s leader and feminist, wrote publicly that polygamy “gives women the highest opportunities for self-development, exercise of judgment, and arouses latent faculties, making them truly cultivated in the actual realities of life, more independent in thought and mind, noble and unselfish.” In her private journal, though, Wells despaired of how polygamy had robbed her of the love of her husband, Daniel H. Wells, member of the church’s first presidency.
Emmeline wrote, “O, if my husband could only love me even a little and not seem to be perfectly indifferent to any sensation of that kind. He cannot know the cravings of my nature; he is surrounded with love on every side, and I am cast out.”
“He is surrounded with love on every side, and I am cast out,” is an appropriate indictment of polygamy, and no doubt a reason that it has long been discarded by the LDS Church.
As Van Wagoner recalls, another LDS women leader, physician Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon, the first female state senator in the U.S., yearned in her personal letters for one husband who would be hers only to cherish. Despite these yearnings, she clung to her LDS faith in “the Principle.” Martha wrote her husband, Angus, that only her divine knowledge of the sacred principle of plural marriage made it bearable to endure. Nevertheless, Martha also wrote this scolding to Angus: “How do you think I feel when I meet you driving another plural wife about in a glittering carriage in broad day light? (I) am entirely out of money …”
For Emmeline Wells, there was a sort of happy ending that was denied many others. As Van Wagoner recounts, in his final years, her frail and aging husband, Daniel, seeking tender care and companionship, returned to Emmeline’s home and side, after mostly ignoring her for 40 years. In her eyes, that probably counted as a blessing due after decades of suffering.
Despite lurid tales and even the teenage bride races, sex was a distant reason for polygamy. It was the result of an odd doctrine, now mostly forgotten in the LDS Church, that taught that the more wives and children one accumulated on earth would increase one’s post-life eternal influence and kingdoms. Yet, one will rarely hear that explanation today.
However, historically this served a different purpose.
I'm not going to dissect this piece for piece, but the idea you pose of this being self imposed is amusing!
So what you're saying is that the Bataan Death March was really the fault of the “poor planning and greed” of the US forces, not the Japanese forcing them along? lol
Do you know what they did with Smith, after they murdered him? ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Joseph_Smith,_Jr. ) The Mormon community was persecuted not once, twice or a few occasions, not even over simply a short time span, but literally decades. If one is serious and actually does a little bit of investigating and reading on this topic, but this is not the intent of those that cherry pick their facts or arguments. They were shot, hung and burned alive, their leaders murdered and mutilated, and they fled to a “no mans land” not because of all the great conveniences that were there waiting for them. May it be the actual persecution, the conditions they were exposed to that led to hardship, their journey's or building their new existence in a wilderness that wasn't the most forgiving, they lost many people.
Even today it is completely acceptable to make jokes or use ad hominem attacks on candidates etc. The same people of course would think twice if it were a black, native American, Jew or gay person they were attacking, but when it comes to Mormons, it's all good. The Mormons get the opportunity to have the left and the right dump on them, for differing reasons of course. The news media and Hollywood will join in on the fray since this community is opposed to many of the more socially progressive views. On the right there are stereo types, fictional make belief boogieman arguments or an exclusive view of Christianity that brands them as some sort of deviant.
Fact is, with the discussion of Romney as a candidate, the release of such articles is probably not coincidental. They don't even need to be outright negative and in fact if they were their true intent would be easily seen and their effectiveness lost. The purpose of these articles is to simply play on pre existing notions about Mormons and negatively impact Romney. You don't have to engage in name calling, just rekindle the cliche arguments by talking about issues that will surely draw a certain candidate into the cross-hairs.
Viva el Cid!
BTW, I didn’t care one way or another about Mormon beliefs even when the mishies tried to convert me to the holy underwear while I was in flight school enroute to Vietnam (garmies are fireproof just like our flightsuits haha).
It was only when I learned how the Mormon `scriptures’ teach hatred of the Catholic Church (and all other Christian denominations) that I decided to jump ugly on their weird beliefs and thought control.
Only I gotta really dumb question: why this pursuit of teenaged girls by middleaged Mormon men? Weren’t there lots of beautiful women out there in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s who would make equally desirable and devoted wives?
Not that it matters in my case, I’m 62 and my beautiful wife is ageless. Wouldn’t trade her for the world.
Utah is one of the most pro gun states there is. CHL is common.
It is also one of the more socially conservative states in the Union.
They vote red: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_4u9lzZ9sqJk/TSJ4q79O_ZI/AAAAAAAADVw/LQbrUHuPZ-Y/s1600/electoral.college.map.final.gif
It’s one of the few states left that has their affairs in order and isn’t tanking because of gross mismanagement and corruption.
What’s your point? Do you want them to be more like California? Delaware? Maryland? New York? Illinois?
***Weren’t there lots of beautiful women out there in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s who would make equally desirable and devoted wives?****
I immagine the hard, hard work made them age very quick. But even then, the mormon banks were also financing houses of ill repute so the castoffs had a place to go. There was a thread on FR not long ago about mormon banking practices back then.
Interesting fiction you must be reading red. I'm sure you have unimpeachable sources for those hung and burned alive.
But their woes tended to be of their own cause. If you do serious research you will find that mormon Rierdon in his 'salt sermon' declared war on the missourians weeks before the state was forced to respond.
May it be the actual persecution, the conditions they were exposed to that led to hardship, their journey's or building their new existence in a wilderness that wasn't the most forgiving, they lost many people.
They were persecuted because their leadership was in open defiance of the laws of this country - so much for that article of faith. And yes, actual research will show that Young and the inspired mormon leadership royally screwed up with their hand cart migration - with self inflicted deaths.
On the right there are stereo types, fictional make belief boogieman arguments or an exclusive view of Christianity that brands them as some sort of deviant
Fictional - lol, well documented by their own history red, nor is it an "exclusive" view - IF you bother to read the threads here in the RELIGION FORUM (hint hint), you would see that their doctrines - from their sources - are posted and contrasted to traditional Christianity. No need for boogiemen red.
Finally - your analysis/excuse for polygamy in the 1800s is flawed - studies show that there was not an overpopulation of women in the country as a whole, nor in Utah Territory.
Consequently your question is meaningless, and needlessly insulting.
Save the rage for the Leftwingtards and Mitbots!
What I would like to know is, who do the children of such unions end up marrying? One polygamous man siring so many children creates a population of half-siblings. Are they going to inbreed with each other or migrate to other communities for mates?
references to self or other blogs/posts......
You stated: “because their leadership was in open defiance of the laws of this country “
You mean like having the US government pass laws that are unconstitutional by ANY litmus test and jail people (1,300), strip them of the voting rights, tell them that they are forbidden to run for public office.......... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmunds_Act
Or how about the Edmond's Tucker Act: where the US government essentially nationalized all property of the Mormon church! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmunds%E2%80%93Tucker_Act Which required an oath of office that made essentially ALL Mormons unqualified to hold public office, even if they never practiced polygamy! Dictating what textbooks kids use in schools, installing intentionally anti-Mormon federal judges.
This is getting comical, keep it coming!
You know, I'm Southern Baptist but grew up in Germany. Over there I had people looking at me like I was weird, they saw us as radical, in fact dangerous, sort of like a Muslim extremist.............
“If someone passed laws that were flagrantly unconstitutional and stepped all over you, would you follow them, or would you at some point simply ignore them?”
Lay of the koolaid, man!
Comparing the trek west to the Batann death march is ludicrous. Mormons were not driven out of the country, they left. Their OWN ACTIONS (such as stealing from the gentiles and an unprovoked attack on Gov. Boggs of Missori, as well as their claims to take over the government and the destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor) are what led to them leaving. Polygamy was part of it, and part of the founding of the Republican party.
Secondly, try reading the actual sources (journals and such) as well as books likeDevil’s Gate: Brigham Young and the Great Mormon Handcart Tragedy which detail the poor planning of the trek west. The deaths amounted to less than 2% of those traveling but immigrants were lured stateside with promises of being cared for and land, much of which never materialized.
I guarantee I know much more about Mormonism and Mormon history than you do, I know more than most Mormons.
CENSUS RECORDS PROVE there was no shortage of women.
You seem to have bought the propaganda the LDS church puts out.
Mormonism is proven deviant theologically on these threads every day. If you are LDS, the drinking the koolaid is expected, but if you claim to be a Christian then Mormonism is heretical and deviant in the highest order. That isn’t exclisivity, it is the facts proven here every single day.
In short, we are making nothing up and even using LDS SOURCES to prove that Mormon hand cart trek was badly planned (and had a lot to do with Brigham Young’s greed), that they are NOT Christians in any way shape or form and that there was NO need for polygamy, other than lust.
I’ve been there, you haven’t. I have devoted the last 20 years to studying Mormonism, have you? Tell me what specifically you would like cited and I will provide sources for you.
Just let me ask this before I disengage.
- - - - - -
Translation: before I run away
Are you aware that until the 1930’s, Mormons took oaths in the temples against the US Government and to kill the descendants of those who killed Smith?
How ‘American’ /sarc
And that is how you deal with it.
Never understood the, "ok husband" attitude.
There are times in a society when polygamy or polyandry are necessary for survival however once those forces are abated if you will find that people prefer to go back to the one man, one woman norm.
Oh I can give you plenty of references far more reliable that wiki red. google Kathryn Daynes and population statistics for Utah from 1850 to 1950 to see that on the contrary, men outnumbered women in Utah.
You mean like having the US government pass laws that are unconstitutional by ANY litmus test and jail people (1,300), strip them of the voting rights, tell them that they are forbidden to run for public office.......... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmunds_Act
LOL, oh right. BTW red - had you researched this subject more closely (or even read the wiki article), you would have found that the Supreme Court ruled the law constitutional because polygamy was not a protected religious practice.
Mormons were in violation of federal and state laws in regards to polygamy long before 1887 red. Perhaps you should do some deeper research eh? Federal laws were enacted between 1862 to 1879 merely served to force the Mormons to comply with existing common laws. Young in his illegal theocracy in Utah continued to ignore the laws.
Which required an oath of office that made essentially ALL Mormons unqualified to hold public office, even if they never practiced polygamy! Dictating what textbooks kids use in schools, installing intentionally anti-Mormon federal judges.
Considering that Utah was operating outside the law as a theocracy, this is not surprising now is it. But you misrepresent the facts - non polygamous mormons were not affected by this red - only the ones practicing polygamy. the mormon church was disenfranchised because it continued to endorse polygamy and used its resources to continue the practice. Specifying textbooks - wow, how hideous red - particularly since the 'text books' were those promoting polygamy and teaching mormonism. Judges were replaced because they were personally sworn to Young and the prophets of the mormon church (like a Shira court) - and were replaced by real federal judges.
This is getting comical, keep it coming!
Yep, your exposition is a laugh a minute.
You know, I'm Southern Baptist but grew up in Germany. Over there I had people looking at me like I was weird, they saw us as radical, in fact dangerous, sort of like a Muslim extremist.............
What were you doing to stand out so much red. I lived in Germany for a fair amount of time and never did the locals look at me as something 'weird'.
Keep researching red.
For starters, polygamy was illegal from the moment of smith's initiation of the practice. That should be a no brainer for most people. Since it was illegal and those laws stood constitutional muster- then tell me - what was unconstitutional about laws directed at the originator and sustainer of the practice?
Secondly, Young attempted to operate separately from the country - establishing his on little kingdom and a theocracy. They installed their own judges, chased away federal officials sent to perform their legal duties of oversight of the territory, ruthlessly attacked and harassed wagon trains of settlers enroute to Oregon or California.
In short, they had set up a renegade empire operating illegally and in open rebellion against the US Gov't. Given the facts you ignored in your previous, the laws were deemed constitutional and the government of Utah had to be forcibly severed from the mormon church's theocratic rule.
Don't forget - Under Young's dictatorial rule non-mormons were killed or chased away, apostates were hunted down and killed, and indian tribes killed and chased off as well. Things were not peachy keen under his rule.
For a church that claimed as one of its articles of faith "We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law." They did all they could do to not be subject to the President, magistrates and honoring and sustaining the law.
Your question is invalid in this case.
Brigham Young stated, “Furthermore, every one who had passed through their endowment, in the Temple, were placed under the most sacred obligation to avenge the blood of the Prophet, whenever an opportunity offered, and to teach their children to do the same, thus making the entire Mormon people sworn and avowed enemies of the American nation.” (Confessions of John D. Lee, p. 160)
It was a commitment of the individual.
I would venture to guess that the United States from the 1830's to 1897 was not one of those period of survival.
I know that following the Civil War there were a lot more females around then males. It was not uncommon for a guy to have a wife and a couple of more ladies around the place who were known as "cousins".
It was better then working in a brothal and less uncertain then becoming a mail order bride.
Out West where the problem was not enough women you had the situation the other way around.
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