"It incarnates every unclean beast of lust, guile, falsehood,
murder, despotism and spiritual wickedness." So wrote a prominent
Southern Baptist official in 1899 of Mormonism. Rather than the
"quintessential American religion," as it has been dubbed by
contemporary scholars, in the late nineteenth century Mormonism was
America's most vilified homegrown faith. A vast national campaign
featuring politicians, church leaders, social reformers, the press,
women's organizations, businessmen, and ordinary citizens sought to
end the distinctive Latter-day Saint practice of plural marriage,
and to extinguish the entire religion if need be.
Placing the movement against polygamy in the context of American
and southern history, Mason demonstrates that anti-Mormonism was
one of the earliest vehicles for reconciliation between North and
South after the Civil War and Reconstruction. Southerners joined
with northern reformers and Republicans to endorse the use of newly
expanded federal power to vanquish the perceived threat to
Christian marriage and the American republic.
Anti-Mormonism was a significant intellectual, legal, religious,
and cultural phenomenon, but in the South it was also violent.
While southerners were concerned about distinctive Mormon beliefs
and political practices, they were most alarmed at the "invasion"
of Mormon missionaries in their communities and the prospect of
their wives and daughters falling prey to polygamy. Moving to
defend their homes and their honor against this threat, southerners
turned to legislation, to religion, and, most dramatically, to
vigilante violence.
The Mormon Menace provides new insights into some of the most
important discussions of the late nineteenth century and of our own
age, including debates over the nature and limits of religious
freedom; the contest between the will of the people and the rule of
law; and the role of citizens, churches, and the state in
regulating and defining marriage.
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