32. New and Everlasting Covenant used to mean Polygamy only
September 4, 202430. Church Encouraged getting as many wives as possible
September 6, 2024
Apostles and other high leaders continued to marry polygamous wives after the manifesto.
Table of contents
- Apostles and other high leaders continued to marry polygamous wives after the manifesto.
- A1) Wilford Woodruff issued the Manifesto 24 September 1890.
- A2) Despite the Manifesto, church leaders continued to perform Plural Marriages.
- A3) While performing post-Manifesto plural marriages, church leadership published 24 denials that any new plural marriages were being performed.
- Issues these Facts Raise
- Questions these Facts Raise
A1) Wilford Woodruff issued the Manifesto 24 September 1890.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
LDS Scriptures, Doctrine & Covenants, Official Declaration 1
Excerpts from Official Declaration 1:
“Press dispatches having been sent for political purposes, from Salt Lake City, which have been widely published, to the effect that the Utah Commission, in their recent report to the Secretary of the Interior, allege that plural marriages are still being solemnized and that forty or more such marriages have been contracted in Utah since last June or during the past year, also that in public discourses the leaders of the Church have taught, encouraged and urged the continuance of the practice of polygamy—
I, therefore, as President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, do hereby, in the most solemn manner, declare that these charges are false. We are not teaching polygamy or plural marriage, nor permitting any person to enter into its practice, and I deny that either forty or any other number of plural marriages have during that period been solemnized in our Temples or in any other place in the Territory.”
Later:
“There is nothing in my teachings to the Church or in those of my associates, during the time specified, which can be reasonably construed to inculcate or encourage polygamy; and when any Elder of the Church has used language which appeared to convey any such teaching, he has been promptly reproved. And I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land.”
Late:
“The Lord will never permit me or any other man who stands as President of this Church to lead you astray. It is not in the programme. It is not in the mind of God. If I were to attempt that, the Lord would remove me out of my place, and so He will any other man who attempts to lead the children of men astray from the oracles of God and from their duty. (Sixty-first Semiannual General Conference of the Church, Monday, October 6, 1890, Salt Lake City, Utah. Reported in Deseret Evening News, October 11, 1890, p. 2.)
Later:
“The Lord showed me by vision and revelation exactly what would take place if we did not stop this practice. If we had not stopped it, you would have had no use for … any of the men in this temple at Logan; for all ordinances would be stopped throughout the land of Zion. Confusion would reign throughout Israel, and many men would be made prisoners.” (Cache Stake Conference, Logan, Utah, Sunday, November 1, 1891. Reported in Deseret Weekly, November 14, 1891.)
A2) Despite the Manifesto, church leaders continued to perform Plural Marriages.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
“A small number of plural marriages continued to be performed in Mexico and Canada under the sanction of some Church leaders.”
- LDS Website, “Plural Marriage after the Manifesto”
“Ever since the opening of colonies in Mexico and Canada, Church leaders had performed plural marriages in those countries, and after October 1890, plural marriages continued to be quietly performed there.”
Footnote 34 with this article: “Polygamy was illegal in Mexico and, after 1890, in Canada as well…”
- LDS Website, “The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage”
One example:
Apostle John W. Taylor married Janet Maria Wooley as his third wife only four days after the Manifesto banning plural marriage was presented and accepted in general conference. They married in a carriage in Liberty Park at night in Salt Lake City. The family intentionally backdated the marriage date to 10 October 1889. Apostle John W. Taylor married Rhoda and Roxie Welling on 29 August 1901 (11 years after the Manifesto). The ceremony was performed at the Taylor home in Farmington, Utah. Joseph F. Smith, who was acting as a counselor in the First Presidency, gave permission. The subterfuge was regarded as virtuous and necessary by church leaders. (Solemn Covenant pp. 206-207)
Or another:
Apostle Marriner W. Merrill took a plural wife in the Logan Temple in 1901, well after the Manifesto was accepted as binding upon the church. He denied under oath in front of the Senate committee investigating Reed Smoot that he had married Hilda after 1890. Though the committee possessed solid evidence that he was lying he continued to insist that he was telling the truth.
Or this one:
The son of Wilford Woodruff, Abraham Owen Woodruff, married 18 year-old Eliza Avery Clark as a plural wife in 1901 (11 years after his father presented the Manifesto). She was previously engaged to a young man living in Wyoming where she resided with her family. After Apostle Matthias F. Cowley persuaded her to marry Woodruff, she broke her engagement and consented to marry Woodruff. Cowley performed the ceremony in Preston, Idaho. (Solemn Covenant, pp. 208-209)
A3) While performing post-Manifesto plural marriages, church leadership published 24 denials that any new plural marriages were being performed.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
On 24 September 1890, President Wilford Woodruff issued his famous Manifesto which stated in part, " . . . and I deny that either forty or any other number of plural marriages have during the period [since June 1889] been solemnized in our temples or in any other place in the Territory," and concluded, "And I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land." The Church-owned Deseret Evening News editorialized on 30 September: "Anyone who calls the language of President Woodruff's declaration 'indefinite' must be either exceedingly dense or determined to find fault. It is so definite that its meaning cannot be mistaken by any one who understands simple English." On 3 October it added, "Nothing could be more direct and unambiguous than the language of President Woodruff, nor could anything be more authoritative." 2 A few days after this last editorial, the Church authorities presented this "unambiguous" document for a sustaining vote of the general conference. Yet during the next thirteen and a half years, members of the First Presidency individually or as a unit published twenty-four denials that any new plural marriages were being performed.”
- D. Michael Quinn, “LDS Church Authority and New Plural Marriages, 1890-1904”, Dialogue Journal
Issues these Facts Raise
Why does God’s revelation mean so little to apostles? Why should we consider them worthy followers of God when they directly contradict the manifesto?
Questions these Facts Raise
Wilford Woodruff declared that he had a revelation of what would happen if Plural Marriage were to continue. Plural Marriages did continue for another 13 years, albeit quietly and secretly. Despite this, none of what he declared would happen came to pass. Is this a false prophecy?
