The Mormon Story
The Mormons. By :Thomas F. O'Dea. (C.U.P., 37s. 6d.)
MR. WEST'S history of the Mormons gives a full account of the rise of this remarkable religion
from the position of a persecuted sect in the American East and Middle West to that of a prosperous and respectable group, particularly strong in Utah and the Far West. Mormonism started in 1830, when the founder, a Vermonter named Joseph Smith, claimed to have been the witness of a series of miraculous revelations from the angel Moroni. Smith also claimed that he had been told by the angel where to find a book of gold plates, engraved in 'reformed Egyptian,' which he translated into the Book of Mormon (named from the angel's father) and which provided the whole doctrinal and social basis of the new church.
The first settlement of the Mormons was in Ohio, and from there they moved first to Missouri, then to Illinois. By the very nature of their funda- mentalism they antagonised all other non-Mor- mons ('gentiles' to Mormons), and after a series of incidents involving violence and loss of life Joseph Smith was murdered in Nauvoo, Illinois, in 1844. He was succeeded as leader by Brigham Young, who took the decision to move west to the Rockies. This was the great event in Mormon his- tory; they became an important part of the move- ment west of the American frontier, with the first pioneers establishing themselves in Utah in 1847. Apart from this, Mormon missionaries had been sent to Europe—as early as 1841 Brigham Young had organised mass meetings in England, includ- ing one attended by 6,000 people in Manchester.
At first, life in Salt Lake City was difficult, but the settlers were saved by the California gold rush, for all the 'forty-niners' who came to the Mormon city sold their equipment at low prices, so great was their hurry to get on to the West Coast.
After the Utah settlement the central conflict in Mormon history was with the Federal Govern- ment over the practice of polygamy. Mr. West gives a lucid account" of the whole complicated issue and points out that the Mormons started to adopt polygamy as early as 1842-43 in the Illin- ois days. But it was not until the middle 1850s that it-became a national issue. President Buchanan sent units of the United States Army to Utah in the winter of 1857-58, but after protracted negotia- tions with Brigham Young no decisive action was taken and the troops were pulled back to the East at the beginning of the Civil War. It was not until Congress took a strong line in the 1880s that the Mormon leaders realised that they would lose the issue to the Government, and when the Supreme Court confirmed anti-polygamy legislation in 1890 Wilford Woodruff, the Mormon leader, issued a document advising submission to the law. But as Mr. West states : 'Officially, the Mormon Church continues to affirm the principle of polygamy, but its leaders explain that the persecution of the 1880s indicated that the world is not yet ready for so enlightened a practice—that polygamy is another example that God's law is too heavy a burden for man in his present state of imperfec- tion.'
Since the end of the polygamy issue the social and political development of Utah has come to resemble more and more the rest of the United States. Mr. O'Dea's rather laborious book con- tains some interesting facts on the modern econo- mic development of Utah and a detailed account of the development of Mormon theology. The present-day Mormon Church of over a million adherents, he decides, is a 'vital institution.'
DAVID REES
Previous page
