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In my work, there are regulations that I apply that delineate when changes to an entity (such as a corporation or a partnership) are deemed to have continued with all its tax history and attributes in tact and when those changes are so significant, particularly in a short time frame that the changes signify the end of the prior entity and the beginning of a new one, even if it continues with the same name and many of the same constituents. The effect is that the previous entity's tax existence is wrapped up, the new entity begins with somewhat of a clean slate, tax speaking.

This delineation is no more artificial than the notion of the entity having its own existence separate and apart from any one constituent, in the first place.

As I look at what happened to JSJr's church following his death, I think that entity did not continue. Not with the 12's faction that was led by BY and migrated to Utah. Not with what became the RLDS and now Community of Christ. Not with any faction.

The succession crisis is what leads me to this conclusion, including the more than a year hesitancy by BY/12 to assert their preeminent role over a fragment, albeit the largest in count by number of members of JSJr's old church.

From my own experience as BY faction Mormon from birth until my apostasy more than 20 years later, and from what I have witnessed since, it seems the BY faction assumes it is a continuation of JSJr. Not just that they believe that BY was the god-chosen successor of JSJr as prophet, but that it is a continuation of the same organization.

There have been many books written on the succession crisis and the politics played out in that context. I have not, I confess, read anything on the topic since my college days. But as Darth J has frequently implied and on occasion directly pointed out, the SLC-based LDS Church is but one Mormon church. This thread is seeking to start discussion as to whether the SLC-based LDS Church should or should not be considered a mere continuation of JSJr's church, or a different entity that BY/12 essentially created after JSJr's murder, due to the void from June 27, 1844 until August 1845 and the differences in the organization asserted from August 1845.

Might be interesting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtland_Temple_Suit

Edited http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_Lot_Case

lulu wrote:Might be interesting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtland_Temple_Suit

That is interesting. Too bad John Taylor did not learn of the Kirtland OH litigation over the ownership of the temple there, and the SLC-based organization vigorously litigate the matter.

Findings of fact have often been drafted by one attorney or the other, as even requested by the court after deciding preliminarily for which party to rule. This occurs even today, in more rural courts. Judges usually take the submitted draft and make changes, to make it their own before signing them.

I think the significance of this case you point me to would be more a recitation of the point-by-point variances between the SLC-based Mormon church at the time (under John Taylor) and JSJr's church as it was when he was murdered.

lulu wrote:Here's a poorly worded question:

The corporation that the Fed's dissolved with the anti-polygamy laws, when was it incorporated?

That would be a good answer to know.

I have, for one reason or another, had situations where there might be SH A (35%), SH B (28%) and SH C (37%) owners of Entity 1, and they want to set up Entity 2 to be owned, you guessed it, SH A (35%), SH B (28%) and SH C (37%).

For some purposes (see 26 USC sections 414(b), (c), (m), and 1563) they are treated as the same entity, though for other purposes not, because of the similarity of ownership and control.

As the case you pointed to above, lulu, that points to differences between the organization under JSJr to 6/27/1844 and that organization as operated by BY/12 over the largest membership segment beginning in August 1845--and the 13 1/2 month void or gap itself--suggest to me that JSJr's church was not continued after his death. And that for all intents and purposes, the BY/12 organization is one different from JSJr's church.

Well, until any SLC-LDS defender might chime in to make the argument why BY/12 and only them continued JSJr's church, perhaps some of the implications would be worth discussing.

Much of the modern defense of SLC-LDS is that BY was not really inspired, spouting all that stuff that he prefaced as being from god or as revelation, stuff like Adam-God, immediate death for those that interracially marry, the ban on blacks from the priesthood, etc, was just BY talking as a man. By so dismissing statements that BY himself prefaced as from god/revelation, everything BY said is vulnerable to such an assault on its divinity. And that renders meaningless his prophethood. No reliability that what BY uttered came from god.

So, was BY, who shaped much of what is different about SLC-LDS compared to early 1944 Nauvoo Mormonism, led by god or not? When BY said X was commanded or revealed by god, was BY right? And if not and that chain back to JSJr is thus broken, what have you left of claims of modern revelation, that the RCC lost 'authority', etc?