Polygamy, the practice of men having multiple wives, was allowed throughout all denominations of Mormonism; even Joseph Smith practiced polygamy for some time. But in 1890, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (also called the LDS Church, the main denomination of Mormonism) outlawed polygamy in an edict from the president of the community at the time. Those who continued to practice it were (and are still) excommunicated from the LDS Church. (To learn more about the LDS Church and Joseph Smith, click here.)

Then in 1920, a man named Lorin C. Woolley began proclaiming that men who were not members of the LDS Church had the authority to justify polygamist marriages. In 1935, the Fundamentalist LDS Church formed, uniting those polygamists who had been excommunicated from the LDS Church and who followed Woolley’s thinking. Estimates from ReligiousTolerance.org and MormonFundamentalism.com place the numbers of FLDS polygamists at anywhere from 1/6 to 1/3 of Mormons in the United States today. The FLDS Church is currently under the leadership of Warren Jeffs, the third leader since the co-founding of the denomination (his father was the second). Most of the members of Jeffs’ church can be found in Utah and in Colorado City, AZ.

It’s important to note that just because polygamy is permissible by the FLDS Church, it is not legal by U.S. law. Jeffs himself (pictured above) is currently serving two consecutive prison term for being an accomplice to the rape of a 14-year-old girl (who he apparently forced to marry an older man, who just happened to be her cousin).

This gives us some context for this week’s events. A 16-year-old girl from a ranch in Eldorado, TX, recently called the police claiming she was a member of an FLDS sect and had been forced to marry a man three times her age. She claimed that man sexually abused her and assaulted her, and that she had been forced to have sex with many other men on the ranch. Police began to investigate and eventually raided the compound. They took 416 children into custody, and arrested several of the adults. Some women have left voluntarily while others are standing by their husbands – and by Warren Jeffs.

Now a slew of negative imagery is coming out through the media – Warren Jeffs banning television, dancing, and fishing; Jeffs allowing the use of iPods but only to listen to his sermons; the FLDS Church excommunicating men and reassigning their wives and children to other men.

What do you think? Was Woolley correct that men have the authority to allow polygamist marriages? Did Jeffs go too far in his restrictions? Are estimates correct or is polygamy extreme and unique to just this sect? Do these actions reflect on the entire FLDS Church? What about the LDS Church?

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