CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The Quest for Self-Sufficiency

After the Civil War, Church leaders recognized more than ever before the wisdom of being self-sufficient and the strength this would give the Saints both economically and spiritually. This was especially true with the arrival of the transcontinental railroad, which eliminated Utah’s isolation. Several measures were taken at this time to establish the Church’s independence from contaminating worldly influences.

Early Measures

Because he saw it as a great aid in making it easier for immigrants to reach the Great Basin, Brigham Young had encouraged a railroad as early as the 1850s. Leading public officials outside the Church also wanted the “iron horse” running through the Utah Territory, not only because of the wealth that they could accrue from this but also because they were confident that when the transcontinental railway reached Utah, the Church would collapse. Their confidence was based on an erroneous belief that Brigham Young was an evil dictator who held his people in captive subjection. Therefore, they reasoned that when the railroad came it would allow the oppressed Latter-day Saints a convenient means of fleeing to the freedom of the East—even though one of them acknowledged that President Young, upon learning of this idea, remarked that his religion “must, indeed, be a poor religion, if it cannot stand one railroad.”¹

Little did the nation’s leaders know that Brigham Young and his followers waited with anticipation and enthusiasm as workers laid track at a frantic pace. Church members, however, were not unaware, because of their experiences in the East, that potential problems were not just shadows lurking in the rails and ties being laid from both ends of the continent to rendezvous at Promontory Summit, Utah.

Realizing that the railroad would bring more non-Mormons to the territory, Brigham Young reorganized the School of the Prophets, promoted cooperatives, and revitalized the Church’s auxiliaries. To help strengthen the brethren in doctrine and policies of the Church, the School of the Prophets was instituted as early as 1867. President Young wanted the brethren to help him make economic decisions that would promote home industry and cooperative enterprises so that the Saints could maintain a degree of financial independence. The school was also intended to purify Church meetings and minimize the promulgation of false doctrines.²

In addition to Salt Lake City the School of the Prophets was also organized in Logan, Ogden, Brigham City, Provo, Parowan, and other principal settlements. Brigham Young sought a self-sufficient economy and encouraged Church members through this organization to purchase goods from their fellow Saints. Home industry was also stressed, which meant that Church members manufactured their own clothes, produced their own food, and constructed their own iron works. They also produced their own silk, cotton, and flax. They dug their own coal and even manufactured their own paper, some of which was made from rags.

Other activities of the School of the Prophets included raising funds for the Perpetual Emigrating Fund, instituting a mercantile boycott of merchants who opposed the Church, establishing the Provo Woolen Mills, reducing wages for Utah workers to make the prices of Utah manufactured goods more competitive with goods that would now be shipped from the East, and finally promoting the construction of the railroad from Salt Lake City to Ogden.

The School of the Prophets also motivated Church members to clean up their homes, yards, and public thoroughfares. Honesty, personal cleanliness, and neatness were stressed so that Zion’s people would indeed be a light to the world. While the Saints made their economy more secure, their personal property more tidy, and their lives more Christlike, the railroad began to penetrate the mountains that surrounded them.

In 1868 Brigham Young, on behalf of the School of the Prophets, signed a contract with Union Pacific officials to build the railroad from the head of Echo Canyon to Salt Lake City if the route came that way, or from the canyon to Ogden if that was the route chosen. The School of the Prophets considered such a contract advantageous for several reasons. First, it would avoid the troubles that always followed the railroad camps. The morality of the community was threatened by gamblers, prostitutes, and ruffians who followed the railroad to take advantage of the laborers and their earnings. Second, “it would insure that the income earned under the contract would go to the church and its members.” Third, it would “minimize an influx of undesirable ‘outsiders’ by deflating the reports on Utah’s mineral wealth, thus diminishing the prospect of a rush of miners to Utah.” And fourth, it would supply much needed employment for Latter-day Saints.³

Prominent Church members, including Elder Ezra T. Benson, of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Bishop Chauncy West, and Ogden Stake president Lorin Farr, also signed contracts to build two hundred miles of track east from Humboldt Wells, Nevada, to Ogden, Utah. Thus hundreds of the territory’s residents secured jobs. When the Union Pacific reached Ogden on 8 March 1869, the citizens celebrated and greeted the workmen with many banners, one of which read, “HAIL TO THE HIGHWAY OF NATIONS! UTAH BIDS YOU WELCOME!”⁴

It was 10 May 1869 when the two rail lines met at Promontory Summit, fifty-three miles northwest of Ogden, Utah. The last tie laid was made of California laurel wood with an inscription on a silver plate celebrating this great event in the nation’s history. At 12:47 P.M., using sledge hammers, both Leland Stanford, president of the Central Pacific, and Thomas C. Durant, vice-president of the Union Pacific, swung and missed hitting an iron spike. Still, the telegraph wires sent the message to U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant that the last spike had been driven while two construction supervisors completed the task. Guns were fired in San Francisco, and the rest of the nation joined in the rejoicing of this historic event.⁵ Brigham Young was on an extended visit to the Saints in the southern part of the territory and missed the celebration.

In an effort to further improve transportation within the territory and to provide employment for Church members, the First Presidency, with the help of ward bishops and territorial surveyor Jesse W. Fox, began plans for the Utah Central Railroad that would connect Salt Lake City with the transcontinental line at Ogden. On 17 May 1869 the first ground was broken, not with a miner’s pick but with a farmer’s shovel to represent the Saints’ commitment to agriculture. The laying of the track was completed 10 January 1870. Thousands of spectators gathered to watch President Brigham Young drive home the last spike, which was made of Utah iron.

The construction of this line was followed with Church support by the laying of track for the Utah Southern Railroad, which ran through Provo and other southern settlements, and the Utah Northern lines, which were laid as far north as Butte, Montana.

For years the federal government had withheld giving land titles to the people of Utah; therefore, as the railroad approached, the citizens grew concerned about their holdings. Should the “iron horse” significantly increase the number of non-Latter-day Saints in the territory, there was a distinct possibility that without clear property title many residents would be denied both their land and the improvements they had made. That the Saints had lived in peace for so many years without clear title to their land is a tribute to their ability to cooperate with one another. Even the coming of some Gentiles had elicited very few land disputes in contrast to the many conflicts between ranchers and squatters in California, for example.

The Saints’ concern grew to such an extent that in 1869 the School of the Prophets appointed a committee to inform themselves “upon the land question and report to the people what steps were necessary to take to preserve their homesteads being claimed by the railway companies.”⁶ (This would also apply to others who might want to settle in the Great Basin.) “This committee made periodic reports to the school, and sent individuals on missions to assist local settlers throughout the territory with their land title applications.”⁷ Because of their efforts a minimum of injustice was done to the people.

By congressional decree the railroad had been given land along their right-of-way, except where property rights were already vested in private citizens. The committee visited the territory’s communities and assisted residents with their land title applications.

In the October 1865 general conference, Brigham Young announced that the Latter-day Saints had to help one another economically. He declared, “Let every one of the Latter-day Saints, male and female, decree in their hearts that they will buy of nobody else but their own faithful brethren, who will do good with the money they will thus obtain. I know it is the will of God that we should sustain ourselves, for, if we do not, we must perish, so far as receiving aid from any quarter, except God and ourselves. . . . We have to preserve ourselves, for our enemies are determined to destroy us.”⁸

Again in 1868, President Young carefully explained that our policy “must be to let this trade [with outside merchants] alone, and save our means for other purposes than to enrich outsiders. We must use it to spread the Gospel, to gather the poor, build temples, sustain our poor, build houses for ourselves, and convert this means to a better use than to give it to those who will use it against us.”⁹ Church leaders then began to promote locally-owned and Church-supervised cooperatives to avert the threat to the economic stability of the Saints.

The first Latter-day Saint cooperative institution was founded in 1864 in Brigham City under the direction of Elder Lorenzo Snow of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and proved so successful that it served as a model to the Church’s cooperative movement later that decade. Elder Snow had been sent in 1854 by Brigham Young to supervise the Saints in Box Elder, which was renamed Brigham City in 1864. That same fall President Young and Elder Snow had a lengthy conversation about instituting principles of the united order in Brigham City. President Young had long been anxious to apply principles of the law of consecration from the Doctrine and Covenants, and now that self-sufficiency was being stressed, Brigham City appeared to be the ideal place to start.

Elder Snow explained in an 1875 letter to President Young that his main objective for the cooperative was “to unite together the feelings of the people by cooperating their interests with their means and make them self-sustaining according to the spirit of your teachings and to make them independent of Gentile stores.”¹⁰

First, Lorenzo Snow supervised the organization of a cooperative general store. It was his intention to use this mercantile cooperative as the basis for the organization of the entire economic life of the community and the development of the industries needed to make Brigham City self-sufficient. A joint-stock enterprise was formed to which all members of the community were invited to subscribe. As the only store in town, the enterprise soon was producing dividends to the subscribers. But most of the profits were reinvested in home industries. The first was a tannery, which was built with cooperative labor and supervised by an English convert who had much experience in the business. This, in turn, was followed by a shoe manufacturing plant and a leather industry. Over the next several years other industries were added until the entire community became self-sustaining. The fame and success of this cooperative spread throughout the nation, and the famous writer, Edward Bellamy, who was studying cooperative movements in America, came to Brigham City and spent several days with Lorenzo Snow observing how the association worked.¹¹

In 1868 President Young established an economic system known as Zion’s Cooperative Mercantile Institution. The purpose of ZCMI, as it was popularly known, was to bring goods to the territory, sell them as inexpensively as they could possibly be sold, and “let the profits be divided with the people at large.”¹² Furthermore, the directors were empowered to set standard retail prices, and these were to be charged to all cooperating concerns. Such prices were to be “reasonable” and “such as would tend to the satisfaction and benefit of both the merchants and the whole people.”¹³ The purpose of uniform retail prices was not to prevent price competition but to stifle exorbitant prices. The first such list of prices was adopted in the winter of 1869 “with the understanding that the Superintendent of Zion’s Co-operative Mercantile Institution be permitted to vary them according to circumstances.”¹⁴ ZCMI eventually had its own factories for boots, shoes, overalls, coats, vests, overshirts, undershirts, and men’s underwear.¹⁵

Within six weeks of the opening of the parent institution in Salt Lake City, 81 cooperative stores throughout the territory were in operation. The Saints in individual communities were urged to buy one or more shares in the joint-stock endeavor. Eventually over 150 stores were in operation in Utah and Southern Idaho. These stores managed nearly all the business of the Latter-day Saints.

In metropolitan Salt Lake City nearly every ward organized its own co-op, and many established individual manufacturing enterprises. Most of these provided dividends to their subscribers. Stockmen also managed their cattle, horses, and sheep on a cooperative basis and improved the quality of these herds by importing breeding stock.¹⁶ This cooperative system proved imminently successful in fulfilling the self-sufficiency goals of Church leaders until the Saints began feeling the effects of the nationwide panic of 1873. Some of the co-ops even survived into the twentieth century.

Revitalizing the Relief Society

At the same time that the School of the Prophets was reorganized in 1867, President Brigham Young reorganized the Church’s Relief Society. He sought to involve the sisters in promoting home industry and self-sufficiency, and encouraged them to teach each other how to withstand life’s temptations and how to fashion their own clothing and styles so that the community’s capital would remain within the territory and help stimulate economic growth. The importance of the Relief Society was emphasized when Brigham Young called Eliza R. Snow, probably the most respected woman in the Church, as its president. He wanted the sisters “to visit the sick and the helpless and the needy, and learn their wants, and, under their Bishops, collect the means necessary to relieve them.”¹⁷ They were, furthermore, to prevent or diminish female extravagance, inform themselves on political matters, and lobby against anti-Mormon legislation.¹⁸

Strengthening Zion Further

Conscious that the variety of languages converts brought with them to their new mountain homes made communication difficult and reading English periodicals a problem, President Young promoted for a time a new phonetic alphabet. He believed that this new alphabet would stimulate unity among the Saints. The president asked several of his associates to develop a new phonetic alphabet called Deseret. Drawing on Pitman shorthand as a source for the sounds and characters, these brethren soon accomplished their task. President Young then authorized the printing of the Book of Mormon and several school books using the new symbols. Orson Pratt transcribed the Book of Mormon into the new alphabet in 1869, and a small sized edition was produced.

President Young explained the merits of this new alphabet, stating that it would make it easier for children to learn to read and minimize the amount of time they would have to spend in school. In addition, he said it would reduce the time foreign converts would need to learn English. After the primers were printed, classes were held and other attempts were made to convert the Saints to implementing this alphabet. Soon it was discovered that using a new alphabet created more difficulties than it solved, and the experiment was abandoned.

Believing that the Saints could be strengthened spiritually if they had an adequate building where they could be called together and instructed by their leaders, President Young began planning for such a structure. Following several council meetings, a pattern for a great dome-shaped house of worship stamped itself vividly upon the mind of President Young. To make this vision a reality, he called to his office Henry Grow, who was a master mechanic as well as an experienced millwright. Brigham Young had recently watched Elder Grow complete a wooden arch bridge over the Jordan River—a rather unusual structure having no center supports, sustained wholly by fitting together wooden triangles and arches. President Young felt that it was just such a continuous bridge, or set of wooden bridges, that he needed to support the roof of the spacious, dome-shaped edifice that he had in mind.

With the assistance of architect William H. Folsom, President Young and Henry Grow worked out tentative architectural plans for the proposed pioneer Tabernacle, one of the largest buildings of its kind in the world—150 feet wide, 250 feet long, and 80 feet high, on the outside. The most novel part was that the massive ceiling was to be “bridged over,” without supporting pillars. Since some Saints doubted and others questioned the feasibility of such a high dome-shaped roof, President Young supervised the construction of a model tabernacle, which answered the Saints’ questions. Construction of the Tabernacle commenced during the spring of 1863.

By the fall of 1867 the Tabernacle and its famed organ were completed sufficiently to be used at the October conference. The organ and other inside fixtures were not entirely finished until after 1870. The gallery—30 feet wide and 480 feet long, extending entirely around three sides of the structure and resting upon seventy-two columns—was started in 1870, which improved the acoustics and added many seats to the Tabernacle. Finally, John Taylor, President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, dedicated the completed Tabernacle at the October conference of 1875.

Joseph H. Ridges, a convert to the Church from Australia, brought with him to Utah a small pipe organ he had built. President Young, upon learning of Elder Ridges and his organ building capabilities, appointed him to construct the first Tabernacle organ. Finding the proper wood to build an organ was a major problem. Finally the desired timber was located in the Parowan and Pine Valley Mountains of Utah three hundred miles south of Salt Lake City.

The Tabernacle as it looked while under construction and when finished. The unique “eggshell” construction of the Tabernacle was a result of the large bridgelike trusses used to span the 150-foot width of the building, which was 80 feet high and 250 feet long.

Chipping and hauling heavy logs for this project was no small task in the 1800s; roads had to be constructed and canyon creeks bridged. Moreover, almost all the labor had to be done by volunteers. Sometimes as many as twenty teamsters with three yoke of oxen on each wagon journeyed to these distant mountains to chop and haul logs. In less than twenty months Elder Ridges had completed the organ sufficiently for it to be played at the October conference of 1867. Combined choirs from Payson, Springville, and Spanish Fork, Utah, provided music for part of this conference, and the newly organized Tabernacle Choir, under the direction of Robert Sands, provided the music for the Sunday services. The Tabernacle Choir grew in quality from this beginning and has today become world famous.

The Gospel Continues to Spread

Even as President Young and the Saints were busily engaged in establishing Zion in the tops of the mountains, the Church continued to grow in other parts of the world as well, but not without opposition.

In New Zealand, Elder Robert Beauchamp, a missionary from Melbourne, Australia, was peppered with rotten eggs in Wellington. On another occasion he escaped injury through the intervention of his Heavenly Father, who hid Elder Beauchamp from the eyes of the wicked men who were going to tar and feather him. In spite of mobs and a bitter attack by the newspaper, the Wellington Advertiser, a conference was held and the Saints “enjoyed a goodly portion of the Holy Spirit.”¹⁹

In Scandinavia, Elder Knud Peterson reported that during the year 1871, 1,021 souls were baptized into the Church. He continued, “A good many of the native Elders have been appointed to missions during the winter.” Crowded meetings were reported in Sweden, although in that country and Norway, Church elders “are still subjected to fines and imprisonment for administering the ordinances of the Gospel. In Norway exists religious liberty for all Christian denominations, but the supreme court has passed the strange sentence that the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not a Christian religion,” and therefore Church members were denied religious freedom. The Saints in Norway were also very poor, but 630 of them had raised sufficient means to emigrate to Zion that year.²⁰

Missionaries in Switzerland were described by Edward Schoenfeld as being as “united as a clover leaf,” and were sacrificing to publish a pamphlet that would plainly set forth the principles of the gospel to combat the distortions about the Church in the popular press.²¹

Near the end of 1872, one elder in Switzerland reported that the Saints there were striving to live their religion and were doing their best to sustain the missionaries. He added that in just a short time he had baptized twenty-seven persons and blessed ten children.

While laboring in Hawaii, Elder George Nebeker reported that over one hundred converts had been baptized and that the meetinghouse was too small; hence, the Saints were busily engaged in constructing a new one. In the Hawaiian Islands as a whole, during the last six months of 1872 there were more than six hundred souls added to the Church. The spring conference of 1872 reported an attendance of more than seven hundred Saints. There were healings of the sick, and emphasis was placed on obeying the Word of Wisdom.²²

Meanwhile, beginning in 1869, the Church required emigrating Saints to pay in advance for their entire journey to Zion. Previously most had been allowed credit for the portion of the trip covered by the Church trains (ox teams that met the emigrants at Winter Quarters and took them on to Salt Lake City). In order to help their friends and relatives emigrate, the Saints in the Great Basin established a Welsh Fund, a Scottish Fund, and similar area funds, which they then gave to Church officials to help those gathering to Zion from those areas of the British Isles. Ward Primaries contributed to the emigration of children, but perhaps the most popular kind of assistance was that sent by friends and relatives who deposited cash at the Church offices and had a “Church draft” sent to the prospective emigrants along with a notification that the funds were now available for their journey.

Dealing with Apostasy

Unfortunately, not all members of the Church supported the leaders and their philosophy of economic self-sufficiency. Some people fell into apostasy. Just as Brigham Young was promoting the cooperative system, certain Mormon businessmen and intellectuals who called themselves “liberals” publicly questioned his policies. This faction, known as the Godbeites, because they were led by William S. Godbe, called for cooperation with gentile merchants nationwide and argued that Utah should focus upon mining as its natural source of wealth rather than upon agriculture and stock raising. The outlet for their opinions was the Utah Magazine, which they founded in 1868.

Church leaders sought diligently to reclaim these men and tried calling some of them on missions. The calls were rejected, and their public outcries became even more strident. The men were summoned to the School of the Prophets to discuss the issues, but only an unpleasant confrontation took place. After further attempts at reconciliation, the Salt Lake Stake high council brought charges against the leaders of the New Movement, as they were also called, and the men were excommunicated from the Church. In 1870 they started their own church, named the Church of Zion, and made their periodical into a daily anti-Mormon newspaper, the Salt Lake Tribune. Together with leading non-Mormons in Salt Lake City, they formed the Liberal Party to oppose the Church’s political activities.

By 1870 the New Movement had taken into its ranks former Apostle and colonizer Amasa M. Lyman, who had been dropped from the Twelve in 1867 for teaching false doctrine regarding the Atonement and for espousing spiritualist ideas. Lyman joined with others in the Church of Zion in conducting seances. By 1873, the Church of Zion had collapsed from lack of support, while the Liberal Party lived on and was a disruptive force in Utah politics until 1893.

The United Order

With the success of the cooperative movement, Brigham Young and other Church leaders desired a still better economic system. In the October 1872 general conference, Elder George Q. Cannon indicated that the three and one-half years of success of the cooperative institutions pointed to even more valuable results to be expected from the “order of Enoch.” This new order was needed, he insisted, to bring a time “when there shall be no rich and no poor among the Latter-day Saints; when wealth will not be a temptation; when every man will love his neighbor as he does himself; when every man and woman will labor for the good of all as much as for self.” The cooperative system was merely “a stepping stone to something beyond that is more perfect,” and the higher order “which exists in heaven will be practiced and enjoyed by men on the earth.”²³

Brigham Young took up the same theme the next day in his conference address, and for the next several months the General Authorities delivered messages to the Saints preparing them for the establishment of the united order system.

Several factors contributed to the forming of the united order in 1874. Brigham Young and other Brethren who had been closely associated with the Prophet Joseph Smith sought for a reformation among the Saints and the reestablishment of the principles and practices of the law of consecration. When the United States was hit by the depression of 1873, the Saints found that despite their efforts for independence, their economy was clearly affected by the economic rhythms of the nation. Thus, Church leaders began to establish orders of Enoch to soften the effects of future economic cycles upon the Latter-day Saints.²⁴

Also, village life in southern Utah had been disrupted for a few years by the mining industry headquartered in nearby Pioche, Nevada. Building materials and foodstuffs among the Saints had been drawn away by the miners, causing a shortage in the Mormon communities. Several young men had also left their homes for the mining camps to obtain cash wages, where they were subject to influences of the world. This also caused labor shortages at home.²⁵

St. George was particularly in need of an economic boost, and it was there that Brigham Young organized the first united order.²⁶ Its management board was composed primarily of the ecclesiastical officers of the stake and the various ward bishops. One of the order’s earliest acts was to direct the transportation of goods to and from the northern settlements. Soon thereafter they established community-owned flocks of poultry and herds of pigs, and helped construct the St. George Utah Temple. The members agreed to follow a list of fourteen spiritual rules, such as not taking the name of Deity in vain, observing the Word of Wisdom more fully, treating family members with kindness and affection, living the law of chastity, keeping the Sabbath day holy, and wearing non-extravagant clothing. Each member of the order signified his intent to comply with the rules by being rebaptized.

Convinced that conditions were right for establishing united orders throughout Zion, Brigham Young dispatched Church leaders to organize all the southern settlements according to the St. George model. Because of severe weather and bad roads, President Young was unable to arrive in Salt Lake City in time for the scheduled April general conference, where he had planned to introduce the united order to all the Church. Conference was therefore postponed to the first week of May. When the Prophet arrived in Salt Lake City, he immediately went to work to implement the united order in the Salt Lake City wards. During the four-day general conference, more than a dozen sermons were preached explaining all the favorable ramifications of the united order.²⁷

By the end of 1874, over two hundred united orders were established in Latter-day Saint settlements, including settlements in Idaho, Nevada, and Arizona. In the larger communities of Ogden, Provo, and Logan, more than one order was set up, with each one specializing in different production projects. Salt Lake City had a separate order for each of its twenty wards. Brigham City and other communities, following the same model, maintained their cooperative network of industries. Under this pattern each person retained his own private property in addition to the stock he held in the cooperative business.

Another variation of the united order was the type established in small communities of no more than 750 people. In this variation each person shared equally in the community’s production, and everyone lived and ate together as a well-regulated family. The most famous of these was Orderville, Kane County, located in southern Utah, which was founded by twenty-four families in 1875. Within five years the town had grown to 700 people. By cooperative labor the citizens “built apartment house units or ‘shanties’ in a semi-fort arrangement around the town square and constructed a large common dining hall in the center.”²⁸ They also built shops, bakeries, and barns, and established farms, orchards, dairies, livestock projects, and various manufacturing enterprises, such as the building of furniture. The people all wore the same style of clothes, manufactured at Orderville, and no one could improve his or her situation unless all were likewise improved. For ten years this community was a model of cooperation and love, and the system only ended due to the accelerated anti-polygamy persecution of 1885. Those who labored to build Orderville continued to look back with genuine nostalgia for the happy feelings they had living in a well-ordered Christian community.

Generally speaking, most of the orders did not fare as well. Because of some selfishness and some mismanagement, as well as difficult economic pressures from the nation at large, most orders were abandoned by 1877. Some continued until the political problems of the 1880s forced their demise.

Nevertheless, there were several noteworthy accomplishments from the decade-long system of cooperatives and united orders in Zion. The Saints became less dependent upon imports, which consequently decreased drastically. Home production and local investment in manufacturing and retailing all increased considerably. Economic inequality diminished among the Saints. Noble qualities of thrift and industry were developed, which would benefit several generations in the Church. And finally, the economic self-sufficiency programs helped significantly in the building of the Utah temples in St. George, Logan, Manti, and Salt Lake City by providing both labor and material.²⁹

Endnotes

1. In Samuel Bowles, Our New West (Hartford, Conn.: Hartford Publishing Co., 1869), p. 260.

2. See Leonard J. Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latter-day Saints, 1830–1900 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1958), pp. 245–51.

3. Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom, pp. 246–47.

4. Joseph Hall, “Railway Celebration at Ogden,” Deseret Evening News, 9 Mar. 1869, p. 2.

5. See John J. Stewart, The Iron Trail to the Golden Spike (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1969), pp. 225–27; LeRoy R. Hafen, W. Eugene Hollon, and Carl Coke Rester, Western America, 3d ed. (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1970), pp. 405–6.

6. Journal History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 20 Mar. 1869, Historical Department, Salt Lake City.

7. Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom, p. 249.

8. In Journal of Discourses, 11:139; see Leonard J. Arrington, Feramorz Y. Fox, and Dean L. May, Building the City of God (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1976), p. 85.

9. In Journal of Discourses, 12:301; see Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, p. 90.

10. In Thomas C. Romney, The Life of Lorenzo Snow (Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1955), p. 317; see Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, p. 111.

11. This paragraph is derived from Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, pp. 112–13; see also p. 123.

12. Brigham Young, in ZCMI First Record Book, Minute Book A, p. 17, cited in Arden Beal Olsen, “The History of Mormon Mercantile Cooperation in Utah,” Ph.D. diss., University of California, 1935, p. 80.

13. First Record Book, p. 19, in Olsen, “History of Mormon Mercantile Cooperation,” p. 81.

14. Olsen, “History of Mormon Mercantile Cooperation,” p. 93.

15. See Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom, pp. 308–9.

16. See Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, pp. 108–9.

17. “Female Relief Societies,” Deseret Evening News, 6 Dec. 1867, p. 2.

18. Derived from Leonard J. Arrington, Brigham Young: American Moses (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1985), p. 351.

19. “The Church in New Zealand,” Millennial Star, 9 Jan. 1872, p. 25.

20. Millennial Star, 30 Jan. 1872, pp. 75–76.

21. Millennial Star, 20 Feb. 1872, p. 125.

22. See Millennial Star, 5 Nov. 1872, p. 714.

23. In Journal of Discourses, 15:207, 209; derived from Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, p. 135.

24. Derived from James B. Allen and Glen M. Leonard, The Story of the Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1976), p. 359.

25. Derived from Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, p. 137.

26. Derived from Allen and Leonard, Story of the Latter-day Saints, p. 362.

27. Previous two paragraphs derived from Arrington, Fox, and May, Building the City of God, pp. 143, 146, 158–59.

28. Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom, p. 334.

29. Previous four paragraphs derived from Allen and Leonard, Story of the Latter-day Saints, pp. 363–66.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Brigham Young’s Presidency: The Final Decade

Since arriving in the Great Basin in 1847, the Saints had organized sundry, often short-lived, groups for theological, scientific, and literary study. During the last decade of Brigham Young’s life, under the inspiration of God, he established religious auxiliaries that would help meet the needs of Church members for the next century. He also worked to expand Zion and to increase the spirituality of Church members, as exemplified by the colonization of northern Arizona, the reorganization of the priesthood leadership of the Church, the building and dedication of the St. George Utah Temple, and the establishment of the Brigham Young Academy.

Development of the Auxiliaries

As mentioned, the first of the Church auxiliaries to receive renewed impetus and consolidation from general Church leadership was the Relief Society. Since arriving in Deseret, Latter-day Saint sisters had exemplified the ideals of work and compassionate service they had learned from the Prophet Joseph Smith in their Relief Society meetings in Nauvoo. By 1858 there were organizations of the society functioning in ten Salt Lake City wards and in Ogden, Provo, Spanish Fork, and Nephi. But the move south that same year, as a result of the coming of Johnston’s Army, interrupted Relief Society work.

In December 1867, President Brigham Young authorized Eliza R. Snow to reestablish Relief Societies in Salt Lake City. During the next two years the prophet gave official endorsement to the program and directed every bishop to cooperate with Sister Snow and her counselors, Zina Diantha Huntington Young and Elizabeth Ann Whitney, as they travelled throughout the territory setting up branch organizations of the society. Women in each settlement would travel miles—sometimes in carriages and wagons or sometimes on a horse or mule or simply on foot—to attend the semi-monthly Relief Society meetings. One meeting each month was devoted to sewing and caring for the needs of the poor. The second meeting featured discussions on elevating educational and spiritual themes and the bearing of testimonies.

Brigham Young gave the Relief Society several special “missions” during the last years of his life. In 1873 he instructed every Relief Society president to appoint three young women to study hygiene and nursing. In 1875 he called Zina Young to establish sericulture (the cultivation of silkworms and the production of silk) among the women of all the settlements. The “gospel of silk” was a major activity of sisters in the Church for many years as they were striving to produce enough silk for their own clothing and for temples and meetinghouses of the Church. In 1876 the prophet called Emmeline B. Wells to head a grain-saving movement among women. They were to store and save wheat against a time of need. President Young also constantly encouraged that the sisters support and participate in all the home industries spawned by the Church’s cooperative and United Order movements.

A group of sisters closely associated with the Relief Society also promoted a women’s newspaper. The enterprising semi-monthly newspaper, the Woman’s Exponent, started in 1872 with Louisa Lula Greene Richards as its first editor. “The aim of this journal will be to discuss every subject interesting and valuable to women. It will contain a brief and graphic summary of current news local and general, household hints, educational matters, articles on health and dress, correspondence, editorials on leading topics of interest suitable to its columns and miscellaneous reading.”¹ The Woman’s Exponent helped unite the sisters throughout all the settlements in numerous causes.²

As a final organizational development, just one month before his death in July 1877, President Young, accompanied by Eliza R. Snow, traveled to Ogden and organized the first stake Relief Society. He called Jane S. Richards, wife of Elder Franklin D. Richards, to serve as its president. The Saints, both men and women, were pleasantly surprised on this occasion at the unexpected creation of a stake Relief Society organization. The Woman’s Exponent described the day as one of rejoicing.³

The initial Relief Society meetings were often held in private homes, but with the help of the brethren in the settlements, the sisters had Relief Society halls of their own constructed. Relief Society cooperative stores often occupied the ground floor of these halls.

The second auxiliary to take more permanent shape was the Sunday School. The Sunday School concept began with Protestants in the British Isles in 1780 and came to the United States as early as 1790. In 1824 an American Sunday School Union was formed. Sunday Schools generally preceded or accompanied public education and taught reading and Bible subjects to youthful “scholars.” Latter-day Saints had sporadically introduced Sunday Schools, like the Protestant ones that many members of the Church had participated in, at Kirtland, Nauvoo, Winter Quarters, and in Britain before arriving in the Great Basin.

With permission from his bishop, Richard Ballantyne organized the first Sunday School in the Salt Lake Valley during the winter of 1849. Fifty children ranging from eight to fourteen years of age met in an especially built addition to the Ballantyne home. Later they met in the Fourteenth Ward meetinghouse. Sunday Schools were set up in a few other wards, but the approach of Johnston’s Army in 1857 and the move south the following year caused their disbandment.

In 1864, when Elder George Q. Cannon returned from serving in the presidency of the European Mission, he saw the need for teaching the gospel in Zion. He later said, “When I reflected upon the numbers of our children at home, I felt a burning desire to spend all the time I could in trying to teach them the principles of the Gospel.”⁵ He reorganized a Sunday School program in the Fourteenth Ward, and soon his example was followed in other Salt Lake City wards.

In early 1866 Elder Cannon launched the Juvenile Instructor as a personal project. On its pages, children’s conferences, weekly Sunday meetings, scriptural reading, and religious instructions were highlighted. Elder Cannon realized that a journal devoted to the needs of the Sunday Schools would be of great value, particularly since there was so little curriculum available. The Juvenile Instructor “was a means of strengthening the hands of those who had the Sunday School cause at heart.”⁶ This biweekly periodical, though dedicated entirely to the Sunday School cause, remained under the private direction of Elder Cannon until 1900, when it came under direct auspices of the Church.

In November 1867 steps were taken toward establishing a permanent Sunday School organization. President Brigham Young spoke to numerous local leaders concerning his desires for the education of the youth of Zion. Elder George Q. Cannon was selected as president of the fledgling general organization to unite the already existing local Sunday Schools and to promote the establishment of new ones throughout the Church. In 1872, the name Deseret Sunday School Union was formally adopted and “union meetings” of Sunday School workers were held the first Monday in each month. Year by year the union increased in numbers of youthful students. (There were no adult courses at that time.) Uniformity was reached in the methods of teaching and the mode of conducting the schools. Punctuality, memorization of gospel facts, and robust singing of hymns were highly prized in these early years of the Sunday School in the Church.

In the summer of 1874, the Deseret Sunday School Union organized and promoted a great jubilee throughout the territory. In Provo, on 15 June, five thousand persons, three-fourths children, assembled for a day of instruction from President Young and his counselors. There was also singing, recitations, and comic speeches, all by area children. The jubilee held in Salt Lake City netted twelve hundred dollars, which was used to purchase song books and other materials for Sunday Schools.

An organization for the young women of the Church came into being as part of the plans of President Young to protect the Saints against the Gentile world at the coming of the railroad. On 28 November 1869, Brigham Young called his daughters together and addressed them on the responsibilities of the women of Zion and organized them into a “Retrenchment Society.” The girls pledged themselves to avoid all extravagant practices, to retrench (cut back their excesses) in regard to dress, eating, and speech. The society was also to receive instruction in the principles of the gospel like that which the young men were receiving in their priesthood activities.⁷

By the end of 1870 the Retrenchment Association was operating on a firm basis in nearly every ward in Salt Lake City. Eliza R. Snow and Mary Isabella Horne then went from settlement to settlement establishing groups that soon were participating in all kinds of practical economic and cultural activities. After the Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations were organized, President Young expressed the desire that the name of the Retrenchment Association should be the Young Ladies Mutual Improvement Association (or YLMIA), but the name was not permanently changed until 1878.

Although a few literary and debating societies for young men had existed in Utah, Brigham Young expressed a desire in 1875 that a unified organization for young men be established in the Church. The prophet wanted the boys to develop intellectually and spiritually and to have needed recreation under proper supervision. Accordingly he called twenty-one-year-old Junius F. Wells, son of his counselor Daniel H. Wells, to establish Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, first in Salt Lake City and then throughout the territory. The first meeting was held in the Thirteenth Ward meetinghouse, where Henry A. Woolley, son of Bishop Edwin D. Woolley, was chosen as president. He selected B. Morris Young, son of President Young, as first counselor and Heber J. Grant, son of Jedediah M. Grant, as the second counselor. Within the following months more than a hundred young men’s organizations were functioning.⁸

A general board for the YMMIA was formed in 1876 and directed a unified recreational program and course of study. The YMMIA had a powerful impact on the lives of thousands of the Church’s young men. The association began its own periodical, the Contributor, in 1879. As the name suggests, several articles in each issue came from the young men themselves.

In 1877, Bishop John W. Hess of the Farmington Ward called the mothers in his ward together and discussed the responsibility of their children being trained properly. He felt that “the responsibility of guiding their young minds” rested “almost entirely upon the mothers.”⁹

Aurelia Spencer Rogers, a devout, thoughtful Latter-day Saint, took the bishop’s charge seriously. After much prayer, she heard a voice say “that there was an auxiliary organization for all ages except the children, where members learned to do things and use their time wisely.” Bishop Hess, when approached by Sister Rogers, was excited by the idea of an organization for the children. He explained that he would carry Sister Rogers’s thoughts and inspiration to the First Presidency to see what should be done. The First Presidency directed Eliza R. Snow to discuss the matter with Sister Rogers when she attended auxiliary conferences in Farmington.¹⁰

During the summer of 1878, Aurelia spoke with Eliza R. Snow, who had been charged by President Brigham Young with the responsibility of overseeing the Church’s women’s auxiliaries and had come to Farmington for Relief Society and Young Women conferences. Sister Rogers “expressed a desire that something more could be effectuated for the cultivation and improvement of the children morally and spiritually.”¹¹

After returning to Salt Lake City, Eliza R. Snow met with President John Taylor and secured his blessing for a children’s organization to be held one day a week other than Sunday. Sister Snow then wrote to Bishop Hess and indicated President Taylor’s approval for Sister Rogers to organize and preside over a Primary in Farmington, Utah.

Sister Rogers organized the first Primary. On 11 August 1878, she gathered the parents together to explain the importance of the new organization. On Sunday, 25 August, Sister Rogers commenced Primary work in her Farmington Ward. She organized the children into their age groups, with the oldest child in each group serving as a monitor. Sister Rogers then told the children to be obedient to their parents and teachers and to be kind to one another.

As the primary movement spread into the various settlements, Eliza R. Snow attended the organizational meetings and spoke to the young children in the area impressing upon them the vital part that each of them played in the great movement begun by the Prophet Joseph Smith. She displayed the Prophet’s watch and then let each child hold it, subsequently admonishing them never to forget that they had held the Prophet’s watch.¹²

Meeting Educational Needs

The conflict between the Gentiles and the Saints in Utah¹³ contributed to a crisis in education that led to a reevaluation of the Church’s role in educating its youth. In the early days of settlement the Saints had made every effort to establish elementary schools in each ward. These were private schools in which teachers’ salaries were generally paid for by tuition. As the influx of Gentiles increased in the state as a result of the railroad reaching Utah, conflicts developed between Church and government officials over the administration of the “district schools.” The Gentiles objected to the teaching of Mormon values in the schools and demanded that all schools become tax-supported and freed from Church domination.

Another aspect of this debate climaxed in the 1870s. Like schools in many other areas of the country, Utah schools used the Bible as a reader. Federal office holders insisted that neither the Bible nor any other religious subjects be taught in public schools. President Young emphatically stated that the Mormons would not remove the Bible from their schools, even if the rest of the Christian world did so. The Church position received support when other religious leaders in Utah also opposed the elimination of the Bible, which they considered the cornerstone of all character building, in the schools.

Recognizing that secular forces were at work in the nation, Church leaders rejuvenated the University of Deseret and considered establishing branches in other communities. The Dusenberry brothers, Warren and Wilson, operated a school in Provo which they organized in 1869. In 1870 Church and territorial educational officials recommended to them that the Provo school be made a branch of the university. In April the Dusenberry school was established as the Timpanogos Branch of the Deseret University, and students began receiving both secular and religious training.

Because of his devotion to education, Salt Lake Mayor Abraham O. Smoot was assigned by Brigham Young to move to Provo, where he served as stake president, community leader, and supporter of the Provo branch of the university. In spite of President Smoot’s support, the school failed financially. Subsequently, in 1875, President Young appointed President Smoot and five other prominent Utah County men and one woman, Martha Jane Knowlton Coray—an author and teacher—as trustees of the school. A deed was drawn up and put into force. The new school was called the Brigham Young Academy. To ensure that there would be religious instruction at the school, “Brigham Young specifically stipulated that the ‘Old and New Testaments, the Book of Mormon and the Book of Doctrine and Covenants shall be read and their doctrines inculcated in the Academy.’” A few weeks later Warren N. Dusenberry was appointed the school’s first principal.¹⁴

In 1876 skilled German educator Karl G. Maeser took over the principalship of the Brigham Young Academy and began a stellar career in Church education, which later included serving as Superintendent of Church Schools. By the twentieth century this small institution had grown to become Brigham Young University.

In 1877 a second academy, Brigham Young College, was opened in Logan and continued until 1926. The buildings of the college were then turned over to the city of Logan. Plans also went forward to establish a third academy, called Salt Lake Stake Academy, in Salt Lake City. This academy did not begin actual operations until 1886. It went by several names and eventually came to be known as Latter-day Saints’ College. The college officially closed in 1931 during the depression. Faculty members then organized a business college on their own, which was later acquired by the Church and named LDS Business College.

These three academies exemplified Brigham Young’s educational ideals, emphasizing a broad, liberal arts education, high moral principles, and religious training from the scriptures. Teacher training (normal) schools were also established at these institutions. These academies were forerunners of over twenty academies in various communities that would characterize Church education during the rest of the century and the early part of the twentieth.

Looking Outward

During the last decade of his life, Brigham Young continued to extend the borders of the Latter-day Saint commonwealth by colonization and to oversee further expansion in missionary work and immigration. By the end of his life, Mormon colonies had been established in Arizona, and missionary work extended into the Republic of Mexico.

Because missionaries continued to bring in converts who then immigrated to Utah Territory, Church leaders regularly sought new areas to colonize. As early as the 1850s, Church explorers had penetrated Arizona, but the aridity of the deserts, the lack of information on the territory south of the massive Colorado River, and the raiding Indians made it difficult to attempt any colonizing during the 1850s and 1860s. In 1870 the government pacified the Navajos, who had been raiding settlements in southern Utah since 1865. This led the way for a string of settlements to be established from Kanab, Utah, to Lee’s Ferry on the Colorado River in Arizona as a springboard for further colonization.

As the winter of 1872–73 began, Brigham Young invited long-time friend of the Saints Thomas L. Kane and his wife, Elizabeth, to accompany him to St. George. During this trip President Young laid plans for a gathering place for the Saints in Sonora Valley, Mexico. Proposed settlements in Arizona were to form a connecting link between Utah and Mexico.

Establishing colonies in Arizona continued to be exceedingly difficult. In the early spring of 1873, President Young dispatched another set of explorers, the Arizona Exploring Company, which consisted of fourteen men, to visit the Little Colorado River area, the Rio Verde country, and the San Francisco mountain region, all south of the Colorado River. These explorers also became discouraged because the arid, broken countryside was difficult to traverse. Nevertheless, the determination of Brigham Young to colonize Arizona was not to be denied, and in 1874–75 he sent additional scouting parties to study the area.

Early in 1876 the First Presidency called two hundred “missionaries” to be part of four companies under Lot Smith, Jessie O. Ballenger, George Lake, and William C. Allen. By year’s end four struggling colonies were established in the lower valley of the Little Colorado. For many years these citizens in Arizona struggled to harness the water of the river through dams. By 1880 other colonizing parties settled along Silver Creek, a major tributary of the Little Colorado, further upstream, and near Mesa, in central Arizona. One successful village was Snowflake, named after Elder Erastus Snow of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, who encouraged the colony, and their leader, William J. Flake.

Because Arizona settlements were struggling to survive, there was not an immediate push further south into Mexico. Brigham Young, however, desired that missionaries be sent to Mexico. In 1875 the prophet called Daniel Webster Jones, who had served in Mexico during the Mexican-American War, to head a mission and translate the Book of Mormon into Spanish. Elder Jones was soon unexpectedly joined in this project by Meliton G. Trejo, a native of Spain, who had recently joined the Church, stating that he had been inspired to seek out the Lord’s people in the Rocky Mountains. By the end of the year Elders Jones and Trejo and four others departed for Mexico. They crossed the border in January 1876. Although they encountered much opposition from the various clergy, the missionaries held some public meetings and also mailed out five hundred copies of “Selected Passages of the Book of Mormon” to leaders of more than one hundred communities throughout Mexico.

The missionaries also located an area in the state of Chihuahua that they felt would be suitable for a future Church colonization. In the fall of 1876, Elder Trejo and Elder Helaman Pratt proselyted in the state of Sonora. In 1879, Elder Moses Thatcher of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles headed a delegation of missionaries into Mexico City and succeeded in laying a solid foundation for the Church in that land.¹⁵

Throughout the 1870s the greatest number of converts to the Church continued to come from the British Isles and Scandinavia. Each year this long-established pattern was followed: the Perpetual Emigrating Fund Company chartered transportation to gather the European Saints to Zion. In 1869 the Church began using steamships rather than sailing ships to cross the ocean. At about the same time, completion of the transcontinental railroad enabled the Saints to quickly cross the United States to Utah. Instead of approximately five months, the emigrating Saints now took less than three weeks to make the long trip. The cost of passage remained approximately the same.

In 1872–73, George A. Smith, first counselor in the First Presidency, led a delegation of Church leaders to Europe and Palestine to see what opportunities there might be for preaching the gospel and to rededicate the Holy Land preparatory to the return of the Jews. Orson Hyde had conducted a similar mission in 1840–41 but had been forced to go alone. Now the Brethren felt it was time to reassert the great interest the Church had in a regathering of the Jews to Palestine while the Saints were gathering to a new Zion in the West. The party visited several locations in Europe, and on 2 March 1873 both President Smith and Elder Lorenzo Snow of the Twelve offered prayers of dedication on the Mount of Olives.¹⁶

The St. George Utah Temple

Throughout the last years of his life, President Brigham Young persisted in working toward his desire to erect temples in the Saints’ “mountain home.” The Endowment House on Temple Square in Salt Lake City had served as a temporary holy place since 1855, and many Latter-day Saints had received their temple ordinances there, but still there was no permanent structure. Although Brigham Young had identified the site of the Salt Lake Temple in 1847, actual construction did not begin until 1853. The project was seriously delayed by the approach of the United States army and the move south in 1857–58. Progress was gradual on the construction of the Salt Lake Temple in the 1860s and 1870s. On Temple Square, over a hundred stonecutters were cutting blocks from granite, which was being delivered from Little Cottonwood Canyon.

The first temple to be completed in the West, however, was in St. George, which became a second headquarters of the Church as President Young spent most of his last several winters there. He dedicated the location for the sacred structure in November 1871. With the encouragement of the prophet, local Saints, helped by workmen called from the north, hastened the construction. Sandstone quarries were opened, and some timber was hauled from Pine Valley in southern Utah and the Kaibab Forest in northern Arizona, but most of the lumber came from Mount Trumbull in Arizona, eighty miles away. Many Saints donated food and clothing for the workers, and others donated one day in ten as “tithing labor.”

The temple and its interior were constructed almost entirely from native materials, reflecting President Young’s concern for the development of local industry. For example, the Provo Woolen Factory made carpet for the temple, and the fringe for the altars and pulpits was made from silk produced by the Relief Society organizations. The structure was completed in 1877, and individual rooms of the temple were dedicated in January. It was decided to hold the annual general conference in St. George; as part of the proceedings, the whole of the temple was dedicated on 6 April 1877. Daniel H. Wells read the dedicatory prayer.¹⁷

President Young was involved with other important aspects in connection with temple work in 1877. Together with other Church leaders, the prophet supervised the writing down of the endowment of the holy priesthood in correct form so that the work for the dead could be carried out more effectively. In a dramatic address given in the temple, President Young exclaimed, “What do you suppose the fathers would say if they could speak from the dead? Would they not say, ‘We have lain here thousands of years, here in this prison house, waiting for this dispensation to come? Here we are, bound and fettered, in the association of those who are filthy?’ What would they whisper in our ears? Why, if they had the power the very thunders of heaven would be in our ears.”¹⁸

President Young called Wilford Woodruff of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to be the temple president in St. George and directed him to begin in earnest the ordinance work for the dead. It was in this temple that the first endowments for the dead were performed. Furthermore, that same year President Young dedicated sites for two more temples to be built in Utah—Logan and Manti.

Elder Woodruff went immediately to his task. “His whole soul was wrapped up in the temple work for both the living and the dead.”¹⁹ He conducted several people through the ordinances for deceased persons, many of whom were his own relatives. In Salt Lake City, in September 1877, when he reported on his labors, Elder Woodruff said, “For the last eighteen hundred years, the people that have lived and passed away never heard the voice of an inspired man, never heard a Gospel sermon, until they entered the spirit-world. Somebody has got to redeem them, by performing such ordinances for them in the flesh as they cannot attend to themselves in the spirit.” He declared, “The Lord has stirred up our minds, and many things have been revealed to us concerning the dead. . . . The dead will be after you, they will seek after you as they have after us in St. George. They called upon us, knowing that we held the keys and power to redeem them.”

Wilford Woodruff then announced that the signers of the Declaration of Independence had appeared to him for two days and nights, inquiring why no ordinance work had been done for them, even though they had established the United States government and remained true to God. Elder Woodruff immediately was baptized by J. D. T. McAllister for these men and for fifty other prominent individuals, including John Wesley and Christopher Columbus. He then baptized Brother McAllister “for every President of the United States, except three [Martin Van Buren, James Buchanan, and Ulysses S. Grant]; and when their cause is just, somebody will do the work for them.”²⁰ Under the administration of President Heber J. Grant the work for these three men was finally done.

Priesthood Reorganization

Realizing that his advancing age was cutting back on his ability to labor and knowing that he would not live much longer, Brigham Young made a number of important priesthood leadership and organizational changes during his last years. In 1873 he resigned from several Church business posts, including Trustee-in-Trust, and appointed a dozen others under the direction of his first counselor, President George A. Smith, to handle these affairs. He also called five additional counselors—Lorenzo Snow, Brigham Young, Jr., Albert Carrington, John W. Young, and George Q. Cannon—to labor with him in the First Presidency.

Seniority in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles was also corrected by President Young. Wilford Woodruff, who had been sustained for a number of years ahead of John Taylor because he was older, was sustained after John Taylor at the October general conference of 1861. President Young determined that seniority among the Twelve was based on date of ordination; thus, John Taylor who was ordained first was senior to Wilford Woodruff in the Quorum. Further refinement came at the April 1875 general conference when John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff were placed before Orson Hyde and Orson Pratt. Both Orson Hyde and Orson Pratt had been dropped from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles at one time because of disobedience. During the time of their disaffection from the Church, John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, and George Albert Smith (who was serving in the First Presidency in 1875 and thus not sustained as a member of the Twelve at the time) were ordained to the apostleship. When Orson Hyde and Orson Pratt were reinstated they were given their original place in the Quorum. President Young corrected this explaining that continuous service also determined seniority.²¹

In 1876 President Young clarified the interrelationship of the stakes of Zion. He announced that the Salt Lake Stake held no primacy over the others as a “center stake,” that all stakes were equal and autonomous in relation to each other. In 1877, over half of the Apostles had been serving as stake presidents. They were relieved of these responsibilities so they could reassume more general leadership roles.²²

Brigham Young directed a major priesthood reorganization and reform throughout the stakes in 1877. New stake presidencies were called in nearly every stake, and the number of stakes was increased from thirteen to twenty.²³ To clarify leadership responsibilities on the local level, the “Circular of the First Presidency, July 11, 1877” and later messages instructed that all bishoprics were to be composed of three high priests, and that the bishops were to be the presiding high priests in their respective wards in addition to being responsible for taking care of temporal needs. Bishops were to begin handling temple donations, and their responsibility to preside over the Aaronic Priesthood quorums was reemphasized.

More young men were to be called into Aaronic Priesthood quorums and trained. Elders quorums were to be organized with ninety-six elders in each, even if it meant that the men came from several wards to form a quorum. Seventies were to meet only for missionary purposes. High priests were a stake quorum and were not to meet on a ward basis. Stake presidents were to hold quarterly conferences and monthly priesthood meetings. The priesthood leaders were to see that Sabbath meetings, Sunday Schools, YMMIA, and YWMIA were held in each ward.²⁴ The priesthood reorganization movement is a monument to Brigham Young. This action has been viewed as his last major achievement as the Lord’s prophet on this earth.

Lasting Contributions of Brigham Young

Brigham Young kept in close contact²⁵ with Church affairs to the end. As always, he met with a steady stream of visitors. On 23 August 1877, the seventy-seven-year-old prophet instructed a group of bishops gathered in the Council House. Following the meeting, he fell ill with violent cramps and vomiting. Despite the efforts of four physicians and the fasting and prayers of the Saints throughout the Church, he died on 29 August 1877. According to his daughter Zina, his final words were “‘Joseph! Joseph! Joseph!’ and the divine look in his face seemed to indicate that he was communicating with his beloved friend, Joseph Smith, the Prophet.”²⁶

Brigham Young’s body was placed in state in the Tabernacle, where an estimated twenty-five thousand people passed by. Speakers at his funeral included John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, Daniel H. Wells, and George Q. Cannon. These words, offered by President Cannon, aptly summarize the contributions of this mighty prophet of the Lord:

“He has been the brain, the eye, the ear, the mouth and hand for the entire people of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. From the greatest problems connected with the organization of this Church down to the smallest minutiae connected with the work, he has left upon it the impress of his great mind. From the organization of the Church and the construction of Temples, the building of Tabernacles; from the creation of a Provisional State government and a Territorial government, down to the small matter of directing the shape of these seats upon which we sit this day; upon all these things, as well as upon all the settlements of the Territory, the impress of his genius is apparent. Nothing was too small for his mind; nothing was too large.”²⁷

Brigham Young served longer as the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints than has any other President of the Church. His contributions were numerous and many-faceted. So much of what is cherished, revered, or even taken for granted in the Church today has roots in the contributions and leadership of President Young. Brigham Young felt he was only following the lead of his mentor and friend, the Prophet Joseph Smith. He exclaimed, “I feel like shouting hallelujah, all the time, when I think that I ever knew Joseph Smith, the Prophet whom the Lord raised up and ordained, and to whom He gave keys and power to build up the kingdom of God on earth and sustain it.”²⁸ On another occasion he stated, “What I have received from the Lord, I have received by Joseph Smith: he was the instrument made use of. If I drop him, I must drop these principles: they have not been revealed, declared, or explained by any other man since the days of the Apostles.”²⁹

One of Brigham Young’s greatest legacies was his leadership in keeping the Church relatively self-sufficient from the gentile world—in recreation, business, government, and education. Historians recognize the massive kingdom of the Saints built up in the Rocky Mountains as a tribute to this man. This was achieved against great odds—the interference of federal troops and government officers, a desert climate and rough terrain, “outside” businessmen, the fashions of “Babylon,” the coming of the transcontinental railroad, and the discovery of precious metals in Utah.

Brigham Young led his people in one cooperative venture after another. As a leading member of the Twelve in 1838–39, he organized the persecuted Saints in their exodus from Missouri and in their establishment of a refuge in Illinois. Later, Brigham led the Saints from Nauvoo, across the Iowa plains to Winter Quarters, and on to the Great Salt Lake. Between 1848 and 1852, he directed the gathering of thousands from the camps in Iowa to the emerging stronghold in the West. Then, directing his attention to the tens of thousands of new converts in Britain and Europe, he founded the Perpetual Emigrating Fund Company, which established the best system of regulated immigration in American history. He organized colonization parties to lay out agricultural villages in some three hundred and fifty locations in Utah and in parts of Idaho, Wyoming, Nevada, Arizona, and Colorado.

President Young taught the people the importance of cooperation in conquering the difficult frontier. That same spirit continues in abundance in the Church throughout the world today. He directed the disseminating of the gospel to many nations of the earth and the erecting of temples unto the Most High God. He was inspired to set up cooperative economic enterprises and institute the united order among his people. Brigham Young gave the Latter-day Saints all manner of doctrinal and practical instruction. His more than eight hundred recorded sermons ranged widely in diverse subjects. He spoke on the nature of God, the power of evil, the necessity of “working” out one’s salvation, the principles of the priesthood, behavior in the family and marriage, women’s fashions, and keeping one’s earthly possessions clean and orderly. In the twentieth century John A. Widtsoe compiled some of Brigham Young’s teachings into the classic volume, Discourses of Brigham Young. Brigham Young urged the secular and spiritual education of the members of the Church and left an educational legacy that continues to bless the Saints.

Brigham Young left an enduring stamp on all members of the Church since his time. He was both kind-hearted to the meek and humble and fierce with the haughty, bigoted, and proud. He cried when he saw the suffering of helpless people and took many downtrodden people under his wing. He was patient with violators of Church standards, was a good listener, had a sense of humor, and enjoyed theatrical performances and dances. As a political leader, he was astute. He was a person of strong determination, resolute and unwavering. His spirituality was exhibited by his prayers, temple work, and healing of the sick. Throughout his long and colorful career, he exercised all manner of leadership to do what the Lord had sent him to do.

Endnotes

1. “Woman’s Exponent: A Utah Ladies’ Journal,” Woman’s Exponent, 1 June 1872, p. 8.

2. The previous two paragraphs are derived from Ann Vest Lobb and Jill Mulvay Derr, “Women in Early Utah,” in Richard D. Poll, et al., eds., Utah’s History, 2d ed. (Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press, 1989), pp. 343, 347–48.

3. “Home Affairs,” Woman’s Exponent, 1 Aug. 1877, pp. 36–37.

4. In Andrew Jenson, Latter-day Saint Biographical Encyclopedia, 4 vols. (Salt Lake City: Publishers Press, 1901–36), 1:705.

5. In Conference Report, Oct. 1899, p. 88.

6. Jubilee History of Latter-day Saints Sunday Schools, 1849–1899 (Salt Lake City: Deseret Sunday School Union, 1900), p. 14.

7. Derived from James B. Allen and Glen M. Leonard, The Story of the Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1976), p. 336.

8. Derived from Leonard J. Arrington, Brigham Young: American Moses (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1985), p. 370.

9. Aurelia Spencer Rogers, Life Sketches of Orson Spencer and Others, and History of Primary Work (Salt Lake City: George Q. Cannon and Sons Co., 1898), pp. 206–7.

10. Clara Richards, Insights of Early Farmington History (Bountiful, Utah: Horizon Publishers, n.d.), p. 15.

11. Eliza R. Snow, an Immortal (Salt Lake City: Nicholas G. Morgan, Sr., Foundation, 1957), p. 40.

12. See Aurelia S. Rogers, Life Sketches (Salt Lake City: George Q. Cannon and Sons, 1898), pp. 205–17, 221–22; Farmington Ward, Davis Stake, Primary Minute Book, 1878–88, 11 Aug. 1878, pp. 1–4; 25 Aug. 1878, p. 5, LDS Historical Department, Salt Lake City; Eliza R. Snow Smith, “Sketch of My Life,” microfilm of holograph, LDS Historical Department, Salt Lake City, pp. 38–39; Carol Cornwall Madsen and Susan Staker Oman, Sisters and Little Saints (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1979), pp. 1–13.

13. Section derived from Allen and Leonard, Story of the Latter-day Saints, pp. 350–53.

14. Ernest L. Wilkinson and W. Cleon Skousen, Brigham Young University: A School of Destiny (Provo: Brigham Young University Press, 1976), pp. 48–49.

15. Previous six paragraphs derived from Allen and Leonard, Story of the Latter-day Saints, pp. 366–69, 386, 388.

16. See B. H. Roberts, A Comprehensive History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Century One, 6 vols. (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1930), 5:474–75.

17. Previous three paragraphs derived from Allen and Leonard, Story of the Latter-day Saints, pp. 370, 372.

18. In Journal of Discourses, 18:304.

19. Matthias F. Cowley, Wilford Woodruff: History of His Life and Labors (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1964), p. 495.

20. In Journal of Discourses, 19:228–29; see also Conference Report, Apr. 1898, pp. 89–90.

21. John Taylor, Succession in the Priesthood, Priesthood meeting, 7 Oct. 1881, LDS Historical Department, Salt Lake City, pp. 16–17; Deseret News, 14 Apr. 1875, p. 168.

22. See William G. Hartley, “The Priesthood Reorganization of 1877: Brigham Young’s Last Achievement,” Brigham Young University Studies, Fall 1979, p. 5.

23. See Hartley, “Priesthood Reorganization of 1877,” pp. 3, 34–35.

24. See Hartley, “Priesthood Reorganization of 1877,” pp. 20–21.

25. Section derived from Arrington, Brigham Young: American Moses, pp. 398–408.

26. In Susa Young Gates with Leah D. Widtsoe, The Life Story of Brigham Young (New York: Macmillan Co., 1930), p. 362.

27. In Gates and Widtsoe, Life Story of Brigham Young, p. 364; spelling standardized.

28. In Journal of Discourses, 3:51; spelling standardized.

29. In Journal of Discourses, 6:279.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
A Decade of Persecution, 1877–87

The Church faced one of its most difficult, as well as one of its most exciting, decades immediately following the death of Brigham Young. The United States government, with the encouragement and support of many reform groups, passed laws, saw that they were enforced, and launched a media campaign against the practice of plural marriage. In spite of intense persecution, the Church under John Taylor’s able leadership continued to grow in numbers, expand its colonies, and unfold its programs.¹

Events during Apostolic Presidency

Following the death of President Young, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles once more led the Church. In a meeting of this body on 4 September 1877, three important decisions were made. First, that the Twelve should take their place as the presiding quorum of the Church; second, that Elder John Taylor should be appointed as president of that quorum; and third, that Elders John W. Young and Daniel H. Wells were “to stand as counselors to the Twelve as they did to Brigham Young.”²

A month later, on 6 October 1877, following a pattern that dated back to the dedication of the Kirtland Temple but had not been practiced for many years, Elder George Q. Cannon announced to those assembled at the general conference that the afternoon session would be a priesthood solemn assembly. Elder Cannon then gave directions for the seating of the various priesthood quorums. The solemn assembly that afternoon voted unanimously by quorums to accept President John Taylor as the President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and “the Twelve Apostles as the presiding quorum and authority of the Church.”³

Born in England and trained there as a cooper, or barrel maker, John Taylor went to Canada as a young man. There he met and married Leonora Cannon, who was ten years his senior. Although he was a devout Methodist, when he encountered the Church he began an earnest investigation and for a period of three weeks did not miss a single sermon delivered by Elder Parley P. Pratt. He wrote them down, compared them with the scriptures, prayed about the Church, and was converted. Ordained an Apostle in 1839, he served as editor of many of the Church’s periodicals, almost lost his life with the Prophet Joseph in Carthage Jail, and served many Church missions. He was known as a fearless defender of the faith; his personal motto was “The kingdom of God or nothing.” He responded faithfully to all of the calls given him during his almost thirty years in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and was thus prepared in every way to lead the Church through a tumultuous sea of persecution.

After Brigham Young’s funeral, John Taylor and the Twelve turned to the difficult problem of sorting through President Young’s estate to determine how much of it belonged to the Church and how much to his heirs. The Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act of 1862 had made it illegal for the Church to own property valued at more than fifty thousand dollars, other than that which was used exclusively for religious purposes. As a result of the law, properties that were acquired by the Church were placed in the hands of President Brigham Young. President Taylor continued the policy of secretly holding certain Church business properties in the names of individual trustees. President Taylor assigned George Q. Cannon, Albert Carrington, and Brigham Young, Jr. (the latter to represent the family’s interests) as executors of the estate. Their task was made more difficult by the tremendous publicity and speculation that appeared in the nation’s newspapers. Rumors were rampant that the estate was worth millions of dollars, raising the expectations of some of his large family.

After several months of dedicated work, the three executors determined that the estate was worth approximately $1,626,000. Over a million dollars of this actually belonged to the Church, however. When the monetary amount did not meet their high expectations, seven of Brigham’s heirs filed a complaint in the third district court, and the case went into litigation, causing even more national publicity. Siding with the heirs, the clearly anti-Mormon judge, Jacob S. Boreman, ruled that the executors were in contempt of court. Elders Cannon, Young, and Carrington spent three weeks of August 1879 in the Utah Territorial Penitentiary before the Territorial Supreme Court reversed Judge Boreman’s decision. Church leaders then agreed to give the heirs an additional $75,000 to settle the case.⁴

In the April 1880 general conference, the Church celebrated its fiftieth anniversary, and President Taylor, drawing from the Old Testament, declared the year one of jubilee. He announced on behalf of the Church that he was striking $802,000 (half the total deficit) from the amount still owed by certain Saints to the Perpetual Emigrating Fund Company. Then he asked that cattle and sheep be given to the poor and encouraged the Relief Society to lend wheat, which they had stored, without interest to less fortunate farmers. He called on everyone to give a helping hand to the destitute so that poverty in the territory might be eliminated.⁵

During the years of the apostolic presidency, the Twelve continued to expand the kingdom’s perimeters. Over one hundred new settlements were founded in such areas as Star Valley in western Wyoming, Castle Valley in eastern Utah, the rugged San Juan River country in southeastern Utah, the Virgin River territory in southern Nevada, and more in northern Arizona.

In October 1880, over three years after the death of President Young, a new First Presidency was created and sustained by the membership of the Church. Once again priesthood holders were asked to sit in a solemn assembly and vote by quorums. When the names of John Taylor, George Q. Cannon, and Joseph F. Smith were presented to the Saints, there was unanimous approval. Elders Cannon and Smith were men of great capabilities who served as counselors to President Taylor and to two subsequent presidents as well.⁶

The Practice of Plural Marriage

A large part of the persecution experienced by the Latter-day Saints centered around the practice of plural marriage, which was instituted under the direction of the Prophet Joseph Smith. The law of plural marriage was revealed to the Prophet as early as 1831, but he mentioned it only to a few trusted friends. Under strict commandment from God to obey the law, the Prophet began in 1841 to instruct leading priesthood brethren of the Church concerning plural marriage and their responsibility to live the law. The Prophet Joseph Smith dictated the revelation to William Clayton in 1843, when it was first written. Nine years passed, however, before the revelation was read in general conference and published.⁷

On 28–29 August 1852 a special conference was held in the Old Tabernacle on Temple Square in Salt Lake City. On the first day of the conference over one hundred missionaries were called to labor throughout the United States, Australia, India, China, and the islands of the sea. By holding the conference in August the missionaries were able to get an early start in crossing the plains before the cold weather set in.

On the second day of the conference, under the direction of President Brigham Young, Orson Pratt made the public announcement that the Church was practicing plural marriage under commandment of God. Speaking of the United States, he declared that “the constitution gives the privilege to all the inhabitants of this country, of the free exercise of their religious notions, and the freedom of their faith, and the practice of it. Then, if it can be proven to a demonstration, that the Latter-day Saints have actually embraced, as a part and portion of their religion, the doctrine of a plurality of wives, it is constitutional. And should there ever be laws enacted by this government to restrict them from the free exercise of this part of their religion, such laws must be unconstitutional.”⁸

Brother Pratt then delivered a lengthy discourse from a scriptural standpoint concerning plural marriage. He explained that marriage was ordained of God as the channel for spirits to acquire mortal bodies and that through plural marriage worthy priesthood holders could raise up a numerous righteous posterity unto the Lord. Brigham Young then spoke giving a brief history concerning the revelation on celestial marriage. Thomas Bullock, a clerk in the historian’s office, then read the revelation to the congregation for their sustaining vote.⁹

Expecting a great public outcry and a flood of negative publicity, Church leaders promptly sent four of its most faithful and articulate leaders to key population centers to launch newspapers that would both explain and justify “celestial marriage” and other restored gospel principles. Orson Pratt edited the Seer in the nation’s capital; John Taylor, the Mormon in New York City; Erastus Snow, the Saint Louis Luminary in St. Louis; and George Q. Cannon, the Western Standard in San Francisco.¹⁰ In each of these publications the righteous motives of the Saints in entering plural marriage were portrayed, which contrasted sharply with the view put forth in the nation’s newspapers, pulp magazines, and cheap novels. Soon, in spite of the articles published by the Church’s best writers and the talks given by its most articulate speakers, groups formed and began to pressure the government to pass laws that would completely eradicate such a marriage system.

Anti-Polygamy Crusade

In spite of all the attempts by the Latter-day Saints to convince their fellow citizens that the practice of plural marriage was their religious and moral right, the nation united against the Church. Missionaries in England and on the continent of Europe were often mobbed, and some elders in America lost their lives. Many people believed polygamy was immoral, barbaric, and deplorable. A mass of anti-polygamy literature claiming to expose the true story of the degradation of women under polygamy was written, primarily by people who never came to Utah or who were only superficial observers.

In 1862, President Lincoln signed into law the anti-bigamy bill known as the Morrill Law, but because of the Civil War its enforcement was overlooked. This “legislation struck at both polygamy and Church power by prohibiting plural marriage in the territories, disincorporating the . . . Church, and restricting the Church’s ownership of property to fifty thousand dollars.”¹¹ The Saints, believing that the law unconstitutionally deprived them of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion, chose to ignore this law at this time until it was constitutionally defined.

In the ensuing years, several bills aimed at strengthening the anti-bigamy law failed to pass the United States Congress. These included the Wade, Cragin, and Cullom bills which had their origin in the territory of Utah and were initiated by men who were bitterly opposed to the Church. The Wade Bill initiated in 1866 would have destroyed local government if it had passed. Three years later the Cragin Bill was proposed, but within a few days it was substituted by the Cullom Bill, which was more radical than the Wade or Cragin bills. Members of the Church rose en masse to work for the defeat of the bill. Women of the Church held mass meetings throughout the territory in January 1870 in opposition to the bill.

“While they opposed all the features of the anti-‘Mormon’ legislation, their action was principally in protest against the measures, and the remarks of would-be reformers, in which the women of the Church were spoken of as being ‘down-trodden’ and ‘degraded’ by their husband-oppressors.”¹² Opposition by Latter-day Saint women was a great surprise to politicians and suffragettes who saw them as the epitome of suffering and bondage. Newspapers in the East also opposed the bill because of its military features. The president of the United States would have power to send an army to Utah to execute the provisions of the bill. The New York World said: “Its execution will assuredly be followed by war.”¹³ The Cullom Bill was defeated.

In June 1874, however, the Poland Law was passed. This act dismantled Utah’s judicial system by giving the United States district courts (controlled by non-Mormon federal appointees) exclusive civil and criminal jurisdiction. Individuals could now be brought to trial for breaking the Morrill Law. Under the Poland Act, jury lists were to be drawn by the district court clerk (a non-Mormon) and the probate judge (a Mormon) in order to give equal representation of members and nonmembers of the Church on juries. Immediately the United States attorney tried to bring leading Church officials to trial but experienced problems. Many of the Brethren had married before the law was passed in 1862 and could not be tried ex post facto. Furthermore, the wives could not be required to testify against their husbands, and the records for plural marriage that were kept privately in the Endowment House were not public record.

Church leaders became anxious to have a “test case” brought before the Supreme Court to determine the constitutionality of the anti-bigamy law. So when the U.S. attorney, William Carey, promised to stop his attempts to indict General Authorities during the test case, the First Presidency chose thirty-two-year-old George Reynolds, a secretary in the office of the President, who had recently married a second wife, to stand in for the Church in the courts. Reynolds provided the attorney numerous witnesses who could testify of his being married to two wives. When Carey did not keep his promise and arrested President George Q. Cannon, Church leaders decided that they would no longer cooperate with him.¹⁴