Origin 1890 to 1955
The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, known as the FLDS, is a sect that broke from the mainstream Latter-day Saint tradition in order to continue the practice of plural marriage after the larger church abandoned it. Based in communities on the Utah and Arizona border and elsewhere, it lived under a tightly controlled religious hierarchy. The group has been widely described by journalists and former members as a high-control or cultic organisation, and drew national attention over allegations of underage marriage. Its leader Warren Jeffs was convicted in Texas in 2011 of sexual assault of children and sentenced to life in prison.
Facts
Finances
Institutional Wealth or FinancesThe United Effort Plan Trust, the communal land trust holding most of the property and homes in the twin FLDS communities of Hildale, Utah and Colorado City, Arizona, was reported at 110 million dollars in value at the time a Utah 3rd District Court judge signed an order reforming it on 27 October 2006. Utah courts had taken control of the trust the previous year amid allegations that church leader Warren Jeffs and other faith leaders had mismanaged its assets, placing it under a court-appointed special fiduciary. This is a press figure tied to the trust as constituted at the time of that court order, not a cited appraisal or the trust's own audited statement. 2 Basis of the Wealth FigureJournalistic or Scholarly Estimate 2 Financial Disclosure RegimeThe United Effort Plan Trust does not publish its own audited financial statements; it has been under Utah court supervision and a court-appointed special fiduciary since 2005, whose management of the trust has itself been the subject of extensive litigation between the fiduciary, the FLDS church, and the Utah and Arizona attorneys general. Press coverage of court proceedings is how any total value figure for the trust reaches the public, and no source found in this pass names a specific appraisal document behind the 110 million dollar figure recorded here. 2 Wealth Figure As Of Year Origins
Origin Period Origin PeriodThe FLDS as a distinct incorporated body dates from the middle of the twentieth century 1 Place of OriginShort Creek (Colorado City, Arizona and Hildale, Utah), United States 1 Trajectory
Membership Over TimeA census of Mormon fundamentalist groups compiled by historian Anne Wilde put the FLDS church at an estimated 10,000 members a few years before 2007. 3 Membership Over TimeBy August 2007 the same census put FLDS membership at 8,000, a decline of about 2,000 in a few years. 3 Membership Figure As Of Membership Figure As Of Basis of the Membership Figure Basis of the Membership FigureScholarly or Demographic Estimate 3 Status
Status TodayIn active religious use 1 The church persists under his direction from prison. Warren Jeffs was convicted in Texas in 2011 and remains imprisoned History
Separation or DivergenceSeparated from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints over the abandonment of plural marriage, following the Manifesto of 1890 and the Second Manifesto of 1904 1 Separation or DivergenceThe LDS Church excommunicates those who practise it 1 Date of Separation Disputed
FounderNo single founder; the modern fundamentalist movement traces itself to Lorin C. Woolley and the priesthood council he organized after The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' 1890 Manifesto against plural marriage, with the present-day church formally organized in the 1950s. 1 Woolley's own account of a 1929 priesthood commission is not independently corroborated, and historians of Mormon fundamentalism differ on how much institutional continuity really runs from Woolley's circle to the church as it exists today, so this is recorded as the movement's own founding account rather than as a settled historical fact. Learn More
A Polygamous Sect and the Prosecution of Its Leader
The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) is a sect that separated from the mainstream Latter-day Saint tradition in order to continue the practice of plural marriage (polygamy), which the main LDS Church formally abandoned in 1890. Concentrated in communities on the Arizona-Utah border and elsewhere, the FLDS maintained a distinctive, highly ordered communal life under a "Prophet" holding near-absolute authority. The group is important in the public record chiefly because of the prosecution of its leader Warren Jeffs. Concerns centered on the practice of marrying underage girls to older men within the community.
Following a 2008 state raid on the group's Texas ranch (which itself became controversial over the removal of many children, most later returned by court order), evidence gathered led to Jeffs's prosecution: in 2011 he was convicted in Texas of sexual assault of children he had taken as "wives" and sentenced to life imprisonment. These are matters established through the criminal courts, not merely allegation. The FLDS continues in a diminished and fractured form. The case is widely discussed in connection with the legal and human-rights questions raised when religious-freedom claims intersect with the protection of minors.
The Raid on the Yearning for Zion Ranch, and the Court That Reversed It
In April 2008 Texas child protection authorities entered the group's ranch near Eldorado and removed four hundred and thirty nine children, the largest such action in American history. The warrant rested on telephone calls reporting a sixteen year old girl being abused at the ranch. No such girl was found. The calls were eventually traced to a woman in Colorado with no connection to the group, who was later prosecuted.
What followed is the part usually omitted. In May 2008 the Third Court of Appeals in Austin held that the state had not shown the danger required to remove the children, and in particular that it had treated the community as a single household rather than assessing each family. The Texas Supreme Court substantially upheld that ruling within days. The children were returned. The state's own review afterwards conceded that the removal had been too broad.
Both things are true at once, and holding them together is the difficulty the case presents. The appellate courts were right that a mass removal on those facts was unlawful, and the criminal prosecutions that followed, built on evidence lawfully seized at the ranch and on the group's own records, established that girls well under the age of consent had been married to adult men. Warren Jeffs was convicted in Texas in 2011 and sentenced to life.
The case is cited in two literatures that rarely meet: on religious liberty and state overreach, and on the difficulty of protecting children inside a closed community.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints rejected the Manifesto and continues the practice.
Derived From
Formed by Latter-day Saints who declined the 1890 Manifesto ending plural marriage.
Studied By
Sources
1. The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism
Terryl L. Givens and Philip L. Barlow (eds.), Oxford University Press, 2015the chapter on Mormon fundamentalismView the Source 2. Judge Signs FLDS Trust Reform (Deseret News, 2006)
3. Winslow, 37,000 'Fundamentalists' Counted in and Near Utah (Deseret News, 2007)
Encyclopedia of American Religions
J. Gordon Melton, Gale, 2009entry on Mormon fundamentalist bodiesView the Source The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements
James R. Lewis (ed.), Oxford University Press, 2004The FLDS
Texas Department of Public Safety Statement on Warren Jeffs Convictions
Texas Department of Public Safety, 2011Studied By: Warren Jeffs Aggravated Sexual Assault ConvictionView the Source Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
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