After Mitt Romney dropped out of the presidential race, many people gave a sigh of relief that we would not have to possibly endure years of Mormon jokes delivered on late night television. But a century earlier, Reed Smoot—an LDS Apostle who was elected to the U.S. Senate—caused an even greater media controversy.
Congress refused to let Smoot take his seat—because, as everyone knew, Mormons were weird. Soon after, Congress did what they do best: held hearings to determine how weird they really were.The Mormon Church On Trial: Transcripts Of The Reed Smoot Hearings is the first-rate presentation of this moment in American history. Testimonies by LDS leaders were brought before Congress, ultimately uncovering skeletons in the LDS Church and Utah politics.The major skeleton exposed was the continued practice of polygamy, 14 years after it “officially” ended in 1890. So Congress did what they do even better: investigate people’s “sexual relations,” because, as everyone knew, a man having sex with more than one woman was weird. These revelations resulted in the church’s stronger policy against polygamists, including two apostles who “resigned” and were later disciplined.
Michael Harold Paulos’ edited transcripts explore a watershed moment in national politics when the LDS Church finally gave up part of its 19th-century identity and was brought kicking and screaming into the modern age.
The Mormon Church on Trial: Transcripts of the Reed Smoot Hearings, edited by Michael Harold Paulos, forward by Harvard Heath, Signature Books, 709 pages, $49.95.
Originally published in the Salt Lake City Weekly, 04.02.2008
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