Phoenix 101: The Mormons

The Arizona Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Mesa.

Growing up in Arizona, I found the Mormons neither strange nor mysterious, much less threatening. They were part of the wonderful mosaic of a state still tasting of the frontier, before it had been overrun by immigrants from the Midwest and miles of lookalike crapola subdivisions.

We had a Book of Mormon in our library, more a testament to my mother's insatiable curiosity than any desire to convert. My great-grandparents were among the first non-LDS farmers to settle near Mesa, and Grandmother reveled in telling the story about how the Saints pestered them to convert and "seal" their marriage in the temple, much to the horror of these former Presbyterian missionaries. But it was a story told gently and with affection for all.

The Mormons were revered among the great Arizona pioneers. They were known for their generosity, including to "gentiles," something our family experienced. Mormons were hard-working, reliable, self-reliant, patrons of education and the arts. Mesa in those days was a beautiful small city, a monument to the energy and far-sightedness of its LDS founders. We would regularly drive down neat and prosperous Main Street to see the beautiful Arizona Temple. The Mormon kids with whom I went to high school were among the most talented in one of the country's top high-school fine arts program.

The Mormons were also powerful. That was clear even at an early age.

My mother worked for Ray Killian, who served as executive secretary of the powerful Interstate Stream Commission. She admired Killian as a mentor and friend. It was also clear that Killian was a political force, as well as a substantial grower, farmer and landowner.

Then there were the Udalls. Stewart was JFK's Secretary of the Interior; Mo was the long-serving Democratic congressman from Tucson, beloved for his wit, independence and accomplishments on behalf of the state. (Yes, back then Mormons were generally Democrats). The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints itself was formidable, with land holdings and the mutual aid that members gave each other, including in business. Again, none of this was sinister. It was just part of the landscape.

In high school -- back when history was taught -- I learned more about Mormons, including the persecution of the early days and the flight led by Brigham Young to Zion, or Utah. We were also taught about the Mountain Meadows Massacre, where church members killed 120 immigrant pioneers passing through Utah, and the unanswered question about whether Young authorized the attack (I suspect not). Yet Young and the Mormons were also essential to the completion of the Union Pacific Railroad, and after the LDS renounced polygamy, Utah became a state. It was from the base of Zion that Mormon pioneers were sent to rough Arizona territory.

Then I lived away from Arizona for some 22 years before returning for a seven-year tour of duty. My view of the Saints became, well, more nuanced.

Mormons market themselves as Protestants, but they're not. LDS theology, which is intriguing, is based on continuing revelation. Thus, the president of the church could have it revealed to him in 1978 that people with black skin could indeed enter the priesthood (which is essentially the role of all adult males; bishops are the rough equivalent of ministers). Protestants, like Catholics, Orthodox Christians and Jews, believe the period of revelation generally ended with the canonical Bible. The LDS faith is different in many other ways, and compelling to millions. It's an American-born creed that is growing fast around the world. But it is generally opposed to equality of the sexes in the sense many modern Americans would understand it, and some lapsed Mormon women ("Jack Mormons") tell horror stories. Well, every denomination has its problems and critics.

The mainsteam LDS doesn't cover itself with glory on the issue of polygamy. While it condemns the practice and excommunicates members who practice it, the church seems to have a "don't ask, don't tell" policy. At times, it appears more interested in protecting its image than addressing the problem. Some mainstream Mormons have relatives in the polygamous groups, and the tendency to close ranks can be strong. Arizona Gov. Howard Pyle was defeated for re-election, largely because of mainstream Mormon unhappiness with the state's 1953 raid on the Short Creek polygamy community. The hamlet changed its name to Colorado City. We now know that polygamy isn't like Big Love. It involves child rape, welfare fraud, the banishment of young men who would compete with the powerful old bulls. It may never be stamped out. But there's always the sense that the main LDS wants us to look away.

In Arizona, the Mormons seem to have changed, and of course some of this is seeing things through the eyes of an adult who had been out in the big world, and whose job involves looking under rocks. Still... Sweet, neat, industrious Mesa has been abandoned to blight, while Mormons with means made an exodus to the sprawl of Gilbert and Chandler and all the "master planned communities." That's sad. What's more portentous is the melding of the Mormons with the agenda of the far right. Given general voter apathy and the dependability of the Saints, this has given the LDS control over the Legislature, which has given them control over the state. Not for nothing was a trip to Salt Lake City and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles among the first things on Michael Crow's agenda on taking over as president of ASU.

The Saints becoming the base of the Arizona Republican Party has resulted in odd outcomes, in some ways different from even Utah and in dissonance with many LDS tenets. For example, the right in metro Phoenix was apoplectic against light rail, while the church in Utah insisted it be built there. The Mormons were always community builders and strong supporters of education. Not in central Arizona, where the right's politics are division and nihilism, if not outright calls for violence. Somehow the natural bent of any persecuted religion to tribalism -- uncorrected by pluralism, education and self-interest -- is enhanced by all the walls and gates of the suburbs. The virulent anti-immigrant stance of prominent Mormon politicians in the East Valley is starkly at odds with the church's missionary zeal in developing nations and among all people. I have heard through decent sources that the Salt Lake bigs aren't happy with all that the East Valley bigs stand for. Still...

The economic power of the church is one of the great un-done stories by the Information Center (although the Arizona Republic may have examined this years ago, it deserves an update and ongoing scrutiny). Its vast land-holdings gave, and give, it a major say in the regional economy. The Mormon farmers of the East Valley got rich selling off the land for subdivisions -- destroying the cooling miles of citrus and fields -- and ensuring the freeway system was built there early and thoroughly. Yet the chuch has not used its power to build a diversified economy as it has in Utah.

On a level that seems smaller, but looms large, are the tribal business ties between LDS businessmen and their patrons or proteges in the state Legislature. This surfaced momentarily in the infamous "alt-fuels" scandal, where LDS legislators and businessmen appeared to disproportionately profit from the tax-subsidized conversion of vehicles (which did nothing to help the environment). This was quickly swept under assorted rugs, carpets, runners and mats, unhindered by an incurious press. It is a serious question in the Legislature's ongoing effort to defund the public schools and steer money to favored businessmen in the charter schools racket.

The LDS was always a big part of Arizona history. Today its power seems even greater. It's too bad that it appears to have veered off track, into an unbreakable veto elite that can stop progress but offer nothing to really address the metro area's monumental challenges, into a too-reliable partner and enabler of extremists, into something that plays into the cabal paranoia of those who fear and hate the Mormons.

I write this and then am reminded of Ira Fulton. Although he did his share of sprawl, he is among metro Phoenix's greatest philanthropists -- and at a time when fewer and fewer existed. He's given away hundreds of millions of dollars. A few years ago, I asked him why more of Arizona's most powerful people didn't do the same, how much of a difference it would make. Standing strong despite his cane, he said in a folksy voice, "Well, we're going to make that happen." Maybe so. The company he started ended up in bankruptcy court, another casualty of the crash. The good he built in the community, such as at ASU, endures. And it reminds us that the Saints shouldn't be pigeon-holed. It makes me long for more of their old independence.

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My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.

Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.

 

Comments

[soleri]

The 1978 revelation that removed the curse of Cain from blacks, much like the revelation about polygamy in the 19th century makes it clear that Mormons are, first and last, pragmatists. They did what they had to do to reconcile to established power while maintaining their own vernacular customs and mores. It it seems, at times, to be arbitrary and a bit incoherent, so what? That's life itself, cutting corners and rationalizing where it has to.

The swing to the hard right is not particularly unique. Catholics, Southern Baptists and Pentecostalists also swung hard in that direction. As much as anything, it's a reaction to modernity and the role of government in reproductive freedom, civil rights, and social democracy. The LDS social-welfare apparatus is directly competitive with the government's so it has some reason for its hostility.

With government(s) overburdened by debt and an increasingly ungovernable nation, Mormons may enjoy a growth surge as people look for a safety net that includes millions of instant friends and allies. There's nothing like social necessity when it comes to elevating nutty beliefs and liturgies systems to Inerrant Truth. Humans can and will believe anything. Especially when it also comes with ample food, sex, and positive tribal identity.

[eclecticdog]

I have met many kind and hard-working Mormons, but there is a dark and scary underpinning:

- They may be great pioneers, but they did try to set up their own country, murdered non-Mormons that were passing thru, and stole vast tracts from the Natives.

- They are insular and place high value on "conformity". Hence Smiley Ford became Smiley-Berge Ford when Smiley figured out the Mormons in Mesa wouldn't buy from a non-Mormon from Indiana.

- I don't think their faith is big enough to truely include non-whites. The effort seems contrived and politically and economically motivated. (As an aside I met an African Phd student in physics at ASU in the late 70s. His fiancee, also African, studying at BYU was encouraged by a dean to date the only other black student, a highly popular athlete, at BYU.) Mesa has been abandoned to Catholic Mexicans, but the Mormon superstructure (government and business) remains in control).

You're right when you state the business side of the Church needs more scrutiny. AZ has become just a colony to milk for profit and converts.

[Matt Self]

Suburban sprawl and the shift in politics had everything to do with the radical change in the Mormon community in Arizona. Even though they attempt to maintain their wards as the center of their community, they are not as insulated as they like, and their children are as impacted by social ills of sprawl as anyone else. It's not at all surprising they would adopt a political paradigm that is intolerant of change.

[Zelph]

Actually Steve Benson's Grandpa, Ezra Taft Benson, played a major role in the Arizona LDS shift to the extreme right. He held John Birch Society political views and he was the head of the church. Many East Valley Mormons still hold such kooky views, while Mormons in SLC seem to have moved on. Ask Steve about this sometime. He has some great stories to tell.

[Rogue Columnist]

To add a little context to Zelph's post:

Ezra Taft Benson was not an Arizonan. He was born in Idaho, and spent much of his life in Salt Lake City and Washington, D.C.

Benson was sympathetic to the John Birch Society. And the Birch/LDS axis -- forged during the Cold War -- may well be where we can trace the current LDS enablement of the Kookocracy, even though communism has been left in the dustbin of history.

Benson's grandson Steve left the church. He's a great and talented guy. Interestingly he lives...in Gilbert.

[terry dudas]

Jon, this is probably one of your best threads.

Terry Dudas

[Donna]

Thank you for this post, Jon. As a fairly recent East Coast (by way of an intinerant decade in the Navy - still in coastal cities) transplant I never understood how LDS folks in AZ reconciled the Mormon tradition of community with the harsh and selfish nihilism of the kookocracy. Now I sorta get it.

[Emil Pulsifer]

Mormons were big recruits to the FBI, at least back in the days of J. Edgar Hoover. Part of this was their clean-cut morals/image, part was their conservative, virulently anti-Communist politics.

I'm not sure to what extent they changed the leadership structure of that organization (e.g., helping and promoting their own, especially into management positions) -- but that would be an interesting if difficult to research study topic for someone, somewhere.

Mormons have some arcane religious traditions that they don't share with outsiders and which few Mormons know until they reach leadership positions in the church hierarchy, or at least the equivalent of made men (specially sanctified members of the church).

I came across a tract (at a garage sale, selling for 25 cents) written by a highly influential church elder back in the 1920s, and it mentioned that some specially devout members, when they die, will become the God of their own planet, and populating it with their own race of men created by them. No kidding.

[Donna]

They also get to practice polygamy in heaven, though (supposedly) not on earth. This seems counter-intuitive to me since polygamy in the here and now increases the number of possible converts to the faith, which I thought was part of the path to heaven for Mormons. Populating heaven would seem to be a lesser priority.

[Patrick Nielsen Hayden]

"We now know that polygamy isn't like Big Love. It involves child rape, welfare fraud, the banishment of young men who would compete with the powerful old bulls."

Jon, have you actually watched Big Love? Because in it, polygamy involves child rape, welfare fraud, and the banishment of young men who would compete with the powerful old bulls.

[Steve]

Another aspect of the Dark Underbelly of the East Valley LDS involves their purchase of favors from Maricopa County Superior Court judicial officers, notably regarding Family Court issues/cases.

[shaun]

The LDS church in Arizona is alive and well along with all kinds of different churches spread all across the state. The Mormons are growing they now number over 400,000 members in some 90 stakes 5 temples and alot of wealth. the future of the church here in Arizona is bright and stable, the view that the LDS church controls the Legislature is a long held view,but it is simply not true. The church seems to wield alot of clout for it's size but that is simply because the members of the church are counseled to be active in politics and so they are. The church is admired and respected after some 132 years of hard work and effort, it did not happen overnight.

[MP]

As someone who grew up Mormon in Utah but is no longer a member, I'd like to thank the author for one of the most fair minded assessments of Mormonism I have ever seen. Often people tend to fall into the trap of generating pro or contra propaganda. It makes finding reliable information on Mormonism a painfully difficult task.

That said, I wanted to address the polygamy issue. I agree that in most of the polygamist communities that there are high levels of sexual, physical, and emotional abuse. However, I'm not sure that extends to non associated polygamists: the ones that don't belong to any church, they just kind of live in the suburbs and try to fit in as much as possible while staying out of trouble.

We had some neighbors like that in all the neighborhoods I grew up in, there was always one or two families. Everyone knew they were polygamists, but since their marriages were religious and they were legally just cohabitating and all of their kids seemed normal and fine, no one really wanted to do anything about it. I was never sure if they were members or not, because they never went to church. In the church, you can believe or do whatever you want (within reason) as long as you stay out of sight and keep your mouth shut. They don't bother to hod inquisitions and excommunicate people who aren't attending unless they are convicted of a serious crime.

You can be a total athiest and still practice as long as you don't out yourself (as the New Order Mormons are.) Part of the reason no one asked if the polygamists in my neighborhoods were still members was because if the answer was yes, you had to go through the very painful and humiliating process of excommunication. Nobody wanted to do that to their neighbors so as long as they only came to church for major holidays Christmas and Easter) and kept their mouths shut, people tried to return the respect by not prying into their personal lives and ostracizing them from the community. Its not as simple as taking their name off a list, excommunication has really big implications for people's eternities and immediate social reality. Although the high ups would like the polygamy policy to be executed 100% of the time, its much harder when you're the bishop and you have to do al of the dirty work of prying into their personal life and throwing them out of their community (while they are still living inside of ward boundaries.)

I don't really know what it was like in Arizona though, I imagine the dynamics are totally different. Anyway, these nonaffiliated polygamists (those without a church membership in any church) make up 50,000 of the "Mormon" polygamists compared to the 40,000 who are affiliated with a church and a community rather than just free floating around in society. I'm not certain that the social and behavioral dynamics are the same in these two groups and I would hesitate to lump the behavior of the FLDS onto the non-affiliated. Its possible that its the same or similar, and its possible that it is not. They aren't as well studied or observed and based on personal experience I can't jump to that conclusion.

Something else you wrote about that I might be able to provide insight on is the Church's lag on mainstream values. The church will always be 10-30 years or so behind mainstream America because of the nature of the leadership. It is age based with the oldest members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles having more authority. Essentially the oldest guy in the group is the one on top, the "trustee in trust," president or prophet, who owns the whole show and calls all of the shots. With the average age of the Quorum of the Twelve at eighty right now, LDS policy is going to reflect the thinking of a senior citizen. That's just the nature of the beast unfortunately.

As far as the swing to the far right, thats hard on a lot of young Mormons too. Its probably a significant factor to the church's high levels of inactivity (some estimates place inactive millennials at 50-80% of the members of their age group.) that might force change on the church. Some of us both i and out of the church hope that Brother Uchtdorf the current second councilor will swing it more to the left: community building, tolerance, understanding, big-tent mormonism, being nice, etc. just as Benson was responsible for initial swing to the right and Brigham Young may have been responsible for the priesthood ban on blacks (which didn't exist under Joseph Smith.) He's already been censored by the Church for being to liberal with "apostates" and the content of his sermons seems to center on food security, love, humanitarianism, he even slips into ridiculing members for being too judgemental, cliquish and "un-christlike" something I never thought I would see in my life. If he does swing the church a little more to the left, he might save the church from a millennial die off, and make it a more pleasant group of people less concerned with legislating a definition of marriage and more concerned with building Zion. Less proud of building temples and more proud of building Bishop's Storehouses. At least, thats the direction some of us hope it will go.

But mind you, these are just my opinions.

[NOT A MORMON, !]

Mormons need to be run out of Arizona, they succeded in Ny Missouri, Ohio, now move on. I for one have been the victim of the sinister ways of mormons. And their allies as you put it.
They are the most evil corrupt money grubbing no goods on the face of the planet.
Shame on all of them !!

[Steve Lowen]

Celebrate the Mormons? 'Nice People,' This gaggle discriminates against the Rights of Women, LGBTQ Individuals and. Groups, minorities and, immigrants (unless LDS). They also outrageously Baptized dead Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust. (Disclosure: I identify as Jewish).