Criticism of Mormonism/Books/One Nation Under Gods/Chapter 15

Response to claims made in "Chapter 15: Making the Transition"


Claims made in "Chapter 14: The Politics of Compromise"
A FAIR Analysis of:
One Nation Under Gods
A work by author: Richard Abanes
 Claims made in "Chapter 16: Mormon Racism: Black Is Not Beautiful"
Exactly how many of today's Saints continue to harbor within their hearts this vow to take vengeance on the U.S. remains unclear, since it would be a secret not to be shared with outsiders. At the very least it may mean that when push comes to shove, every Mormon acquainted with the oath and taught to follow it will choose loyalty to the church (whatever form that may take) over loyalty to the United States.
—One Nation Under Gods, p. 335-336
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331, 591n2 (PB)

Claim
  • Did the number of plural marriages jumped "nearly five-fold" immediately after Utah gained statehood?

Author's source(s)
  • Kenneth L. Cannon II, "After the Manifesto: Mormon Polygamy 1890-1906," in D. Michael Quinn, ed., The New Mormon History, 203-204.
Response
  • A "five-fold" increase sounds like a lot. But, the number of marriages was small, so it doesn't take much to increase "five-fold." The author doesn't disclose that this increase was outside Utah. For figures and details, see Approved marriages 1890-1904.
  •  Misrepresentation of source: The author's source should alert him to this, since Cannon mentions "two marriages" being performed per year. These two marriages were not in the United States.

332

Claim
  • Did Reed Smoot take an oath of vengeance against the United States because of their failure to come to the aid of the Saints when they were being persecuted?

Author's source(s)
  • No source provided. This is inferred by the book since Smoot had been through the temple.
Response

334

Claim
  • Did the concept of revenge play a "very prominent role" in early Latter-day Saints' beliefs?
  • Doesn't the Bible condemn revenge?

Author's source(s)
Response

334, 592n10 (PB)

Claim
  • In the 1800s, did Latter-day Saints "glorify vengeance" through the singing of hymns?

Author's source(s)
Response

335

Claim
  • Where Latter-day Saints who served in positions in the U.S. government hindered by having taken an "oath of vengeance?"
  •  Author's quote: "One can only wonder how these persons have reconciled their sacred oath with their pledge of allegiance to America."

Author's source(s)
  • Main text mentions Ezra Taft Benson and Daken K. Broadhead.
Response
  • Temples/Endowment/Oath of vengeance
  • Since many members of the Church have had distinguished service in government and apparently felt no conflict between their Church covenants and government service, this should perhaps alert the author (and his readers) the fact that he has misunderstood or misrepresented LDS doctrine and belief on this point.
  • See and p. 332 and p. 334

335-336

Claim
  • Did the "oath of vengeance" require the Latter-day Saints instruct their descendants to take vengeance upon the U.S. government?
  •  Author's quote: "Exactly how many of today's Saints continue to harbor within their hearts this vow to take vengeance on the U.S. remains unclear, since it would be a secret not to be shared with outsiders. At the very least it may mean that when push comes to shove, every Mormon acquainted with the oath and taught to follow it will choose loyalty to the church (whatever form that may take) over loyalty to the United States."

Author's source(s)
  • No sources provided. This is pure speculation on the part of the author.
Response

336

Claim
  • Do LDS church authorities believe that "non-Mormons are unfit to rule" and that Latter-day Saints are the only ones fit to rule the world?

Author's source(s)
  • No source provided.
Response

336, 593n17

Claim
  • Did Church president Joseph F. Smith defend his "illegal cohabitation with five wives" during Senate testimony.

Author's source(s)
  • Proceedings, vol. 1, 129.
Response
  • President Smith was quite frank that to cohabitate violated the "rule" of the Church and the "law of the land," but refused to say that doing so violated the "law of the Church" (p. 128-129) He then explained:
...I was placed in this position. I had a plural family, if you please; that is, my first wife was married to me over thirty-eight years ago, my last wife was married to me over twenty years ago, and with these wives I had children, and I simply took my chances, preferring to meet the consequences of the law rather than to abandon my children and their mothers; and I have cohabited with my wives—not openly, that is, not in a manner that I thought would be offensive to my neighbors—but I have acknowledged them; I have visited them....I would have been willing to submit to the penalty of the law, whatever it might have been. (p. 129-130)
  • Illegality and civil disobedience (non-wiki)
  •  Internal contradiction: Despite quoting this material, the author then claims (p. 339 that 200 pages later in the testimony that Pres. Smith "finally admits" he has broken the law. Yet, he frankly admitted it right up front.

337, 593n20

Claim
  • Did Joseph F. Smith authorize polygamous marriages in Mexico and request that the records stay there so that they wouldn't be found during a search by U.S. officials?

Author's source(s)
  • Cannon II, 207.
Response
  • U.S. law does not apply to Mexico. Federal marshals have no jurisdiction over events which happened abroad.

339, 593n32

Claim
  • Did Joseph F. Smith admit that he had broken the laws of the land and the laws of God?

Author's source(s)
  • Multiple preceding citations regarding Joseph F. Smith either sanctioning or denying plural marriage.  [needs work]
  • Proceedings, vol. 1, 334-335
Response
  •  Internal contradiction: The author has already cited material (p. 336) more than 200 pages earlier in the testimony that had Pres. Smith admitting that by cohabitation he violated the "law of the land" and the "rule of the Church."

340, 594n42

Claim
  • Were many polygamous marriages back-dated in church records so that it would look like they were performed before the Manifesto was issued?

Author's source(s)
  • Matthias Cowley, testimony before Quorum of the Twelve, 1911. Quoted in Samuel W. Taylor, Rocky Mountain Empire, 131.
Response
  • Note that this claims from the excommunication hearing of former apostle Matthias Cowley.
  • Lying about polygamy? (non-wiki) (entire article)

341, 594n48-50

Claim
  • Did Reed Smoot lie that he had never heard a discussion of plural marriage in his meetings with the apostles and that he had never "advised the promulgation of the practice of polygamy?"

Author's source(s)
  • Proceedings, vol. 3, 204.
  • D. Michael Quinn, "Plural Marriages After The 1890 Manifesto," lecture delivered August 1991 at Bluffdale, Utah.
Response
  • "More than one student has suggested that the [Smoot hearings] constituted the most searching, and perhaps bigoted, congressional investigation of any religious body in American history." [1]

342, 594n53

Claim
  • Did Joseph F. Smith face a "power struggle" within in the church hierarchy as a result of different opinions on polygamy?

Author's source(s)
  • Reed Smoot, letter to E.H. Callister, March 22, 1904. Quoted in Richard S. Van Wagoner, Mormon Polygamy: A History (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1989), 167.
Response

343, 594n54

Claim
  • What was the "Second Manifesto" issued by Joseph F. Smith?

Author's source(s)
  • Joseph F. Smith, Conference Report, April 6, 1904, 74-75.
Response

351, n91

Claim
  • Does the Church teach the the current practice of monogamy is only temporary and that polygamy will be reinstated when Christ returns?

Author's source(s)
  • The author quotes Bruce R. McConkie in Mormon Doctrine: "[T]he holy practice will commence again after the Second Coming of the Son of Man and the ushering in of the millennium." Citation given is McConkie, Mormon Doctrine (Salt Lake City:Bookcraft, 1958; second edition, 1966), 578.
Response
  •  The author's claim is false: The Church has no position on whether polygamy will be reinstated. Some, like Elder McConkie believed that it would. Others believe not. In any case, Mormon Doctrine is not an official publication of the Church.
  • The Church official website responded to the question, "Is polygamy gone forever from the Church?" by saying:
We only know what the Lord has revealed through His prophets, that plural marriage has been stopped in the Church. Anything else is speculative and unwarranted. [2]

353

Claim
  • Do Latter-day Saints have "underlying white supremacist beliefs?"

Author's source(s)
  • No source provided. Author's opinion.
Response
  • The author is claiming that the Church is white supremacist?
  •  Internal contradiction: p. 370 tells us that 'Mormons, by and large, were pleased that God had changed his mind at such a convenient time in history.' So, why were the Mormons happy about the revelation if their faith was composed of "underlying white supremacist beliefs"?
  • Absurd claims
  • Loaded and prejudicial language
  • See Chapter 16 for much more of the same.

Notes


  1. ↑ B. Carmon Hardy, Solemn Covenant: The Mormon Polygamous Passage (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1992), 252–253.
  2. ↑ "Polygamy: Questions and Answers With the Los Angeles Times," (31 May 2006) off-site (last accessed 15 January 2009).
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