Women Under Polygamy/Chapter 29

by Walter Matthew Gallichan

CHAPTER XXIX

MORMON POLYGAMY

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, or Mormons, are a remarkable sect, numbering at the present time about 220,000 adherents. Mormonism was the inspiration of a lad of fifteen, Joseph Smith, of Sharon, Vermont, who, at that critical period of adolescence, began to dream and to receive revelations. One day Smith was visited by "the angel Moroni," who told him that a new Bible was hidden near the town of Manchester. Some years after this alleged revelation, the young mystic went in search of the buried scriptures, and again an angel appeared and gave to him a number of their gold plates, enclosed in a stone case.

These plates were said to be inscribed with the tenets of the new gospel, written in a form of the Egyptian language, and decipherable by means of a pair of magic spectacles. Joseph Smith, who was almost illiterate, was assisted by two men, named Cowdery and Harris, in the interpretation of the celebrated "Book of Mormon." The trio of discoverers swore to the reality of the plates; but they were never shown to the converts, and in a short time the documents vanished and were never traced.

The credulity of the disciples of Joseph Smith may appear amazing. But the average human mind is curiously susceptible to the hypnotism of a positive personality, and there is no doubt that Smith possessed a compelling force, a supreme self-confidence, and the diplomacy of a born leader. He was, however, an insignificant light compared with his successor, Brigham Young, who raised Mormonism to the dignity of a vital faith swaying many thousands of minds.

Joseph Smith had several important revelations. He was instructed to start a bank, and he issued a number of bogus notes. This fraud enraged the "Gentiles," and led to an assault upon the prophet. Smith's influence was still further weakened by his licentious practices, which estranged some of his converts. The original "Book of Mormon" had not counselled plural marriage; but Joseph Smith had a new inspiration, and he began to teach polygamy as part of the creed of Mormonism. Setting an example to his followers, Smith lived with several women besides his legal wife.

The open teaching of polygamous marriage was an illegal offence. Joseph Smith was called to justice, but his community defended him against the officers of the law, and a serious conflict was prevented by his surrender to stand for trial. While Smith and a coreligionist were awaiting trial, a mob broke into the gaol and shot the two men. The new leader was the notorious Brigham Young, a mechanic, who was already a prominent figure in the sect. Young was a great organiser, a fluent and persuasive speaker, and extremely tactful and astute. He died worth several hundred thousand pounds. He had seventeen wives and over fifty children. To Amelia, his favourite wife, he left property and a handsome legacy, and all his wives were well provided for on his decease. Under the autocratic and, in some respects, wise rule of Brigham Young, the Latterday Saints grew into one of the finest communities of agriculturists and artisans that the modern world has seen. The early Mormons sent out missionaries into all parts of the globe. In Great Britain they secured many converts. There are now eighty-two Mormon churches in the United Kingdom. Settlers came from Germany, France, and other European countries, and a flourishing settlement was established in Utah. Young elected himself governor of the state, in spite of the Federal Government. A force was sent against the Mormons, led by an official governor appointed by the United States legislation. But the Mormons stoutly resisted the intervention.

A stronger force was sent to Utah. Fighting and bloodshed lasted for about two years, until the Mormons were constrained to acknowledge the Federal authority. Peace reigned for a time. But the Government were determined to suppress Mormon polygamy. Young was seized and indicted with the teaching and illegal practice of plural marriage. Various enactments were directed from time to time against polygamy, and it was stated that the custom was waning. But this form of marriage survived the attacks of the central government. It is now said to have fallen into disrepute among the Mormons themselves, but it is not entirely unknown in the society.

As the Mormon community affords the only instance of polygamy, sanctioned by religion, among Western civilised peoples, it is useful to inquire into the effects of this sex relationship. Soon after the institution of the creed of Mormonism, the "saints" claimed that they had banished the evils of seduction, infanticide, and prostitution, so common among their "Gentile" neighbours. They had also solved the problem of compulsory celibacy for women.

I am informed by a friend who has lately spent some time in Salt Lake City that prostitution is not quite unknown. This may be a result of the decay of polygamy.

A seceder, General J. C. Bennett, wrote a very strong indictment of the charlatanry of Joe Smith. Bennett appears to have joined the sect with the intention of learning their secrets and exposing them.^[1] He declared that men and women lived in sexual promiscuity in Utah. Another hostile critic was John D. Lee, who firmly believed that polygamy was an admirable institution, although he left the sect. In "Mormonism Unveiled," Lee states that the prophet Smith preached plural marriage privately after a revelation in 1843. Lee confesses that he had several wives, nineteen in all, who bore him sixty-four children.

Brigham Young was more explicit than Joseph Smith in the teaching of polygamy. In the publication "Times and Seasons," he made this declaration: "And I would say, as no man can be perfect without the woman, so no woman can be perfect without a man to lead her. I tell you the truth as it is in the bosom of eternity; and I say to every man upon the face of the earth, if he wishes to be saved, he cannot be saved without a woman by his side. This is spiritual wifeism, that is the doctrine of spiritual wives."

Biblical sanction, even in the teaching of Jesus Christ, was discovered by the promulgaters of polygamous unions.^[2] W. A. Linn says that most of the Mormon leaders had more wives than one, and that the wives had separate apartments allotted to them, as in Oriental countries. Horace Greeley, in his "Overland Journey," states: "The degradation (or, if you please, the restriction) of woman to the single office of child-bearing and its accessories is an inevitable consequence of the system here paramount. I have not observed a sign in the streets, an advertisement in the journals, of this Mormon metropolis, whereby a woman proposes to do anything whatever. No Mormon has ever cited to me his wife's or any woman's opinion on any subject; no Mormon woman has been introduced or spoken to me; and though I have been asked to visit Mormons in their houses, no one has spoken of his wife (or wives) desiring to see me, or his desiring me to make her (or their) acquaintance, or voluntarily indicated the existence of such a being or beings."

Mr. Roger Pocock, the well-known author and traveller, who has twice visited Salt Lake City, tells me that the inhabitants seem to prosper greatly, and that the prohibition of the sale of alcoholic drinks may account in a measure for the general social well-being. There is, however, a lack of joyousness in the community. The people are sober, dour, and persistently industrious. Mr. Pocock found a more genial atmosphere among the "Gentile" settlers on the outskirts of Utah, where there is less commercial and industrial activity, but more zest of life. The Mormons are temperamentally akin to the Boers; they resemble them in their manner of life. A sombre form of religiosity pervades the society.

Mormon women, in the view of my informant, are very imperfectly educated. Their level of intelligence is low; they seem like overgrown children, and have no conversational aptitude. This deficiency in education may be due in part to the inferior status that polygamy often imposes upon women. But Mormonism is scarcely an intellectual creed, and its tenets do not appeal to women of strong intellect.

Women have, however, proved ardent converts to the Mormon faith, and enthusiastic upholders of the system of polygamous marriage. They have supported the creed with their money, and given themselves willingly as "spiritual wives." It has been said that Mormon polygamy finds its most zealous advocates among women, and that the practice of plural wedlock has survived through their influence.

The early missionaries, who scoured Europe for proselytes, inspired a large number of women with ardour for the new gospel. Wealthy women left home and kindred to join the settlers in their wilderness, facing privation, and engaging in severe labour, with astonishing eagerness. Young and old women, married and single, threw in their lot with the followers of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young.

Although Western women are usually opposed to polygamy, it is a remarkable fact that many women are attracted to those sects, such as the Mormons, the Princeites, and the Free Lovers, that teach heterodox sexual relationships as a salient part of their doctrine. Repugnance towards plural marriage is, no doubt, deep-rooted in the mass of women in Europe and the United States; but such repugnance is by no means universal.

A lady correspondent, who wrote to me lately on polygamy from the English woman's point of view, stated that there was something to be said for the practice. In her opinion, plural wedlock solved the great problem of the enforced celibacy for a large number of women, and mitigated to a very considerable extent the evils of prostitution, seduction and desertion, and infanticide.

Judged as a pastoral and industrial community, the Mormons are a remarkably flourishing people. They have wrested a vast tract of infertile land, and cultivated it with painstaking and constant industry. Their system of irrigation is one of the best in the world, and an object lesson for agriculturists.

There is but little crime in the community. Intemperance in drink is quite unknown. There is work for everyone, and adequate food and shelter for all. Many of the flagrant inequalities of city life are entirely absent. These benefits have been won in spite of persecution and repeated efforts at legislative suppression.

The Mormon society is a curious survival of patriarchal rule. The system has its manifest disadvantages for women, though some of the ills that accompany monogamous marriage are unknown. There is no doubt, however, that the bulk of women converted to Mormonism heartily approved of polygamy and subordination to men. Had it been otherwise, the State of Utah could not have prospered as it has since the founding of the colony. Mr. Linn says that the Mormon women of to-day are "the most earnest advocates of polygamous marriage."

"Said one competent observer in Salt Lake City to me, 'As the women of the South, during the war, were the rankest rebels, so the women of Mormondom are to-day the most zealous advocates of polygamy.'"^[3]

Undoubtedly, cases of jealousy on the part of older wives, neglected for young and new brides, have frequently arisen. On the other hand, the great majority of the female adherents of the Mormon religion assert that they have eliminated all trace of jealousy.

A friend, Mr. E. Rouse, who knows Utah, tells me that during a visit in 1901 he was hospitably entertained by an elder, who spoke frankly and intelligently upon the Mormon faith and practice.

"Polygamy," said the elder, "is not practical amongst us more than in the proportion of one in fifty. It originated with Brigham Young's great desire to keep up and to increase the population of Utah. This was very necessary for resisting the Indian tribes that constantly threatened the community."

When asked whether plural wives quarrelled among one another, the preacher replied: "Not often. We have almost subdued jealousy. Our system of a separate house for each wife is an excellent one. We do not coop all our women together in one dwelling. Of course, the separate establishment plan is very expensive. Only the rich are able to indulge in spiritual wives. Such marriages are far too costly for the mass of our men."

Mr. Rouse was impressed by the wealth of Salt Lake City, due chiefly to the immense store of mineral treasure in the surrounding mountains. Many of the houses in the richest thoroughfares of the city were built of rare and beautiful stone. The tabernacle is a vast building, with an oval dome, perfect in its acoustic quality, and the organ is a magnificent instrument. Mineral treasure, rather than agriculture, is the source of the prosperity of Utah.

Benjamin G. Ferris, who visited Utah in 1854, said that polygamy was then practised by about one-fourth of the adult male population, and that the number of wives to each husband ranged from two to fifty.^[4] The preachers had "the largest harems." This writer found much illness and mortality among the young children of Salt Lake City. The children were unclean and seemed to be neglected. This was, however, denied by Sir Richard Burton.

Ferris, who was an extremely hostile critic of Mormonism, stated that the elders of the Church often changed their wives for younger women. Elder Wilford Woodruff frequently practised this system of reconstructing the household.

"In Utah the effect of the plurality system is most severely felt by the first or real wife," writes B. G. Ferris. He declares that polygamy was introduced originally to gratify the sensuality of Joseph Smith. The Mormon upholders of plural marriage declare that this is untrue. They assert that polygamy was taught as a part of Biblical morality, as a remedy for the celibacy of redundant women, and in order that every woman should exercise the right of maternity. The relations of the sexes were strictly regulated in Salt Lake City under the rule of Brigham Young. Unchastity in the unmarried was punishable by a term of ten years in full, or six months at the least. Keepers of immoral houses were subject to a year's imprisonment, and sometimes to a heavy fine also. Publishers of improper literature could be fined four hundred dollars. Three years in gaol was the minimum term for adultery, and twenty years the maximum.

Sir Richard Burton^[5] closely investigated Mormon morals during his stay in Utah. He states that the attacks of Mr. Ferris and others upon the community are mainly unmerited and usually false. The "perpetual storm," in which "plurality-families" are said to live, is denied by Burton, who says, "I believe that many a 'happy English home' is far stormier, despite the holy presence of monogamy."

The children of Salt Lake City struck Sir Richard Burton as clean, healthy, well-cared-for and intelligent. Girls marry usually at about the age of sixteen, fifteen years earlier than the average marrying age in England.

Divorce is permitted to women for cruelty, desertion, or neglect on the part of the husband. Men in Utah rarely sue for divorce.

"The Mormons point triumphantly to the austere morals of their community, their superior freedom from maladive influences, and the absence of that uncleanness and licentiousness which distinguish the cities of the civilised world. They boast that if it be an evil they have at least chosen the lesser evil, that they practise openly as a virtue what others do secretly as a sin . . . . ."^[6]

Sir Richard Burton refers to the continence of the Mormon men, and compares it to the asceticism of some African tribes.^[7] The tie of romantic sentiment seemed less strong than in marriage in England; but Burton was impressed by the "household comfort, affection, circumspect friendship, and domestic discipline" of the Mormon polygamists.

 

The Mormon woman's point of view regarding plural unions is especially instructive. Mrs. Belinda M. Pratt, writing to a sister, gives her opinions frankly. She refers to the Old Testament sanctions for polygamy and the concubinate, and to the illustrious patriarchs who followed the practice, and "did build the house of Israel." Quite truthfully, this apologist asserts that "polygamy is authorised and approved by the word of God." She commends the custom as an act of obedience to the divine injunction to increase and multiply and replenish the earth.

"I have a good and virtuous husband, whom I love," writes Mrs. Pratt. "We have four little children, which are mutually and inexpressibly dear to us. And besides this my husband has seven other living wives, and one who has departed to a better world. He has in all upwards of twenty-five children. All these mothers and children are endeared to me by kindred ties, by mutual affection, by acquaintance and association; and the mothers in particular by mutual and long-continued exercises of toil, patience, long-suffering, and sisterly kindness.

"We all have our imperfections in this life, but I know that these are good and worthy women, and that my husband is a good and worthy man; one who keeps the commandments of Jesus Christ, and presides in his family like an Abraham. He seeks to provide for them in all diligence; he loves them all, and seeks to comfort them and make them happy."

1. "Story of the Mormons," Linn.
2. Op. cit. Linn.
3. A. W. Linn. Op. cit.
4. "Utah and the Mormons."
5. "The City of the Saints."
6. Burton. Op. cit.
7. "In point of mere morality," says Burton, "the Mormon community is perhaps purer than any other of equal numbers."