Joseph Smith and his Concubines.

[_karl61]

People say that Joseph Smith had thirty 30-plus wives. I don't belive that - I believe a marriage has to be legal to be a marriage, every thing else is something other than a marriage. Does anyone know of any law passed by the city council in Nauvoo that allowed marriage to one or more man or woman? Does anyone know of any law that was passed by the city council of Nauvoo that allowed a married woman to have more that one husband. Is there any law that recognizes any oath dictated to another person and who repeats it back as a marriage ceremony. Were there any legal documents produced besides affidavits in Utah that showed legal marriages in Ohio, Missouri or Illinois to a person who was already married to someone else.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concubinage

[_SatanWasSetUp]

I think even the apologists would admit that Joseph Smith's polygamous marriages back east were illegal in the wordly sense, but they were justified spiritually. As far as calling plural wives concubines, even D&C 132 refers to them as such:

1 Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph, that inasmuch as you have inquired of my hand to know and understand wherein I, the Lord, justified my servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as also Moses, David and Solomon, my servants, as touching the principle and doctrine of their having many wives and concubines—
• • •
37 Abraham received concubines, and they bore him children; and it was accounted unto him for righteousness, because they were given unto him, and he abode in my law; as Isaac also and Jacob did none other things than that which they were commanded; and because they did none other things than that which they were commanded, they have entered into their exaltation, according to the promises, and sit upon thrones, and are not angels but are gods.
38 David also received many wives and concubines, and also Solomon and Moses my servants, as also many others of my servants, from the beginning of creation until this time; and in nothing did they sin save in those things which they received not of me.
39 David’s wives and concubines were given unto him of me, by the hand of Nathan, my servant, and others of the prophets who had the ckeys of this power; and in none of these things did he sin against me save in the case of Uriah and his wife; and, therefore he hath fallen from his exaltation, and received his portion; and he shall not inherit them out of the world, for I gave them unto another, saith the Lord.

So D&C describes these women as concubines. I don't see a problem with calling the Mormon polygamous wives concubines.

[_Scottie]

I've heard apologists argue before that there was no explicit law against polygamy or bigamy, therefore it wasn't illegal.

However, there were no laws that recognized multiple spouses either. So they weren't exactly legal.

But you raise a good point...what do you call them other than "wife" since they weren't legally wives?

[_truth dancer]

Hi Scottie,

Those apologists were wrong. :-)

The following is a brief excerpt from an interesting article on this topic:

http://i4m.com/think/polygamy/polygamy_illegal.htm

"Sec 121. Bigamy consists in the having of two wives or two husbands at one and the same time, knowing that the former husband or wife is still alive. If any person or persons within this State, being married, or who shall hereafter marry, do at any time marry any person or persons, the former husband or wife being alive, the person so offending shall, on conviction thereof, be punished by a fine, not exceeding one thousand dollars, and imprisoned in the penitentiary, not exceeding two years. It shall not be necessary to prove either of the said marriages by the register or certificate thereof, or other record evidence; but the same may be proved by such evidence as is admissible to prove a marriage in other cases, and when such second marriage shall have taken place without this state, cohabitation in this state after such second marriage shall be deemed the commission of the crime of bigamy, and the trial in such case may take place in the county where such cohabitation shall have occurred."
Revised Laws of Illinois, 1833, p.198-99
The fact that polygamy was illegal is the very reason Joseph Smith and his followers practiced it in secret, and steadfastly denied teaching or practicing polygamy when accused of it or when asked about it.

Also...

Since Young himself admitted that his own "plural marriages" were not legal marriages, that means that no other Mormon "plural marriage" at any time was a legal marriage either. No legal marriage licenses were ever applied for nor granted, and every single child born of Mormon "plural marriages" was illegitimate - i.e. not born in a legal marriage.

All of the federal laws enacted against Mormon polygamy from 1862 to 1879 merely served to force the Mormons to comply with existing common laws. But the fact that those additional laws were enacted does not mean that Mormon polygamous marriages were ever legal in the first place.

In 1878, the United States Supreme Court upheld the conviction of a Mormon under the federal statute prohibiting bigamy against a challenge that, among other things, the statute infringed on the first amendment right to freedom of religion.

In so doing, the Court noted that polygamy had "always been odious among the northern and western nations of Europe and, until the establishment of the Mormon Church, was almost exclusively a feature of the life of Asiatic and of African people."

The U.S. Supreme Court described further that:

at common law, the second marriage was always void (2 Kent, Com. 79), and from the earliest history of England polygamy has been treated as an offence against society. After the establishment of the ecclesiastical [98 U.S. 145, 165] courts, and until the time of James I., it was punished through the instrumentality of those tribunals, not merely because ecclesiastical rights had been violated, but because upon the separation of the ecclesiastical courts from the civil the ecclesiastical were supposed to be the most appropriate for the trial of matrimonial causes and offences against the rights of marriage, just as they were for testamentary causes and the settlement of the estates of deceased persons.

By the statute of 1 James I. (c. 11), the offence, if committed in England or Wales, was made punishable in the civil courts, and the penalty was death. As this statute was limited in its operation to England and Wales, it was at a very early period re-enacted, generally with some modifications, in all the colonies. - U.S. v. Reynolds, 98 U.S. 145, 164-65 (1878) (emphasis added).

[_karl61]

I always heard that marriage was a contract. You can have an oral contract and a written one. But the way I understand it you can not enter into a contract if it is illegal as it's void from the beginning. It seems like this was just another con that Joseph Smith played on his followers and something that today's believers refuse to see. The sad fact is that alot of these girls and women found themselves out on the street and Joseph scratching them off his mental list and looking for someone else.

[_harmony]

The early church leaders thought they were living a spiritual law, and did not recognize the laws of the land as binding upon them, if they were living the higher law. It was a convenient way of getting around all those pesky legalities.

Concubines. Bah. Call them sex slaves and be done with it.