Massacre in Mexico a Stepping Stone Toward Legalization of Polygamy?

[smac97]

Here:

Quote

Philippa Juliet Meek wrote a series of tweets Saturday about Mormonism and the killings of nine U.S. citizens near La Mora, Mexico. Then she sent one about polygamy.

“Can we please just decriminalise and legalise polygamy?” Meek, a doctoral researcher at the University of Exeter in Devon, England, tweeted. “Like now. #marriageequality”

Meek is among the commenters referencing the Mexico massacre as an example of why polygamy should be made legal, or at least have its criminal penalties removed, in Utah and elsewhere.

It seems like the criminal penalties for polygamy have already been removed, at least in a de facto way.

I dislike de facto negation of a criminal statute.  If we want to decriminalize polygamy, then let's have the legislatures do it, rather than the prosecutors (who do so by ignoring or refusing to apply the statute).

I wonder if this will happen.  That doesn't mean polygamous marriages become legally recognized, just that entering into one is not, in and of itself, a criminal act.  

Fornication and adultery statutes appear to be very much on the decline.  See here:

Quote

{A} few states are starting to “tidy up” their criminal code by removing crimes from the statute books that no longer “spark joy.” More specifically, Utah, Massachusetts, Minnesota and Virginia have all proposed legislation to remove the crime of adultery and (where applicable) fornication from their statute books. Utah’s law was just signed by the governor, and Massachusetts,  Minnesota and Virginia all have laws at various levels of committee purgatory. Massachusetts and Minnesota’s laws look like they have a fighting chance at least.

Arizona and South Carolina are also attempting to amend their laws, but the basics of the crime will remain intact.  So that means that right now at least seven states are suddenly amending or repealing their adultery and fornication statutes, most for the first time since they were enacted.

What’s going on here?

The crimes of adultery and fornication, which essentially make consensual sex a crime if the parties aren’t married to each other, are probably unconstitutional in the wake of the 2003 Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down a Texas sodomy law because it violated the plaintiffs’ right to privacy. Even before Lawrence, prosecutions for adultery and sodomy laws were basically unheard of since the 1960s. Still, even after languishing for decades and being called into serious question by Lawrence, 18 states have kept their adultery laws on the books, and six kept their fornication laws.

Adultery laws, which make sexual acts illegal if at least one of the parties is married to someone else: Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin.

Fornication laws, which effectively make all forms of sex outside marriage illegal : Idaho, Illinois, Massachusetts, Mississippi, South Carolina and Utah.

Why not repeal these laws? Why keep laws on the books that likely violate the Constitution, and are therefore likely to be struck down by a court if challenged? Well, for a few reasons. Because these laws are rarely, if ever, enforced, it’s actually extremely unlikely that they will be challenged in court. You can’t challenge a law unless it directly affects you. In other words, you have to be prosecuted for that crime; mere outrage that the law exists isn’t sufficient. So why bother changing the law if no one’s using it and no one can really challenge it?

Second, more cynically, no legislator wants to champion the cause of decriminalizing adultery or fornication. It’s just not a good look. Even worse, any attempt to repeal these laws is  likely to get pushback from some members of the community, particularly religious groups. It’s happened in the past, even though everyone arguing to keep the laws also know that they are never really enforced and likely unconstitutional to boot. For some religious groups, it’s important for “morality” just to have the law in place, impotently glaring at us all.

If we as a society can accommodate rampant out-of-wedlock sex and procreation, can we also accommodate sex and procreation in polygamous relationships?

Back to the first article:

Quote

Herriman resident Brooke Richey, who has distant relatives living in the Mexican Mormon communities, said the fact that Americans are living there — despite threats from drug cartels — shows the dangers involved in maintaining their religious beliefs.

“If polygamy were legalized,” the 23-year-old Richey said, “they probably would come back to the U.S. It just seems like they’re in such a vulnerable place.”

At least one group has pushed back against the idea of making laws friendlier to polygamists. In a Facebook post Monday, Polygamy.org, a coalition of plural marriage opponents, said residents moving from La Mora to the United States “will create more polygamists recruiting wives here, and more advocates trying to decriminalize polygamy.”

Yes, that will almost certainly happen.

Here's an interesting bit:

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The La Mora killings took place as the Utah Legislature is preparing another debate on polygamy. State Sen. Deidre Henderson, R-Spanish Fork, is readying a bill for the legislative session, which begins in January, that would reduce the penalty for polygamy to about that of a traffic ticket while also making it easier for law enforcement to pursue polygamists who commit frauds and abuses.

Interesting stuff.

Quote

Current Utah law makes polygamy a felony punishable by up to five years in prison or up to 15 years if it is practiced in conjunction with other crimes such as fraud, abuse or human trafficking. The Utah attorney general’s office and other county attorneys in the state have policies of not prosecuting polygamy as a lone offense.

I think this is the only feasible approach to this issue (short of decriminalizing polygamy).

Quote

Last week’s deadly ambush did not necessarily change anyone’s mind about whether polygamy should remain against the law, but the killings did intensify Cristina Rosetti’s view.

She recently received a doctorate from the University of California-Riverside in religious studies and has focused her research on Mormon fundamentalism. She does not prefer polygamy but says it should be legalized so its practitioners, including those in La Mora, feel safe reporting crimes and seeking help.

I'm not sure it should be legalized, but decriminalization is worth considering.

Quote

“People need to recognize,” Rosetti said, “that with these marriages not being legal, there is a challenge for alimony for women who choose to leave. It is hard to get access to resources.

Alas, alimony is one of the complicating factors in polygamy.

Moreover, alimony seems to be an increasingly antiquated notion.

Quote

“When people want to go and report crimes that are happening in communities, they are criminals,” she added. “So how do women and children report that?”

In Utah, the policy is to not prosecute polygamy as a lone offense.  However, I could understand that a person involved in a polygamous relationship would still be nervous about being prosecuted (since it's just a "policy" to not prosecute it as a lone offense, rather than an actual law).

The entire article is worth a read.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

-Smac

[strappinglad]

What is the law in Mexico about polygamy ? I assumed that the attack on the families was about money/power/revenge and not religious beliefs. 

[smac97]

1 hour ago, strappinglad said:

What is the law in Mexico about polygamy ? I assumed that the attack on the families was about money/power/revenge and not religious beliefs. 

From the article:

Quote

Polygamy is against the law in Mexico, too, but that country has always been more lenient toward it. There has been no roundup of polygamists there like there was in Utah and Arizona as recently as the 1950s.

Weird that the Trib references the Short Creek raid, which took place in 1953, rather than the YFZ Ranch raid in Texas, which was much more recent (2008).

Thanks,

-Smac

[JLHPROF]

In Utah we were on our way to decriminalizing it (not legalizing, but decriminalizing).

Then some busybody Utah state senator with an axe to grind got all uptight and got it upgraded criminally.

And it's still never prosecuted.
Polygamy, the marijuana of marriage...the only reason it's illegal is because some busybody wants to interfere with agency.

Edited November 14, 2019 by JLHPROF

[JLHPROF]

47 minutes ago, smac97 said:

Weird that the Trib references the Short Creek raid, which took place in 1953, rather than the YFZ Ranch raid in Texas, which was much more recent (2008).

It's still better known.  And the public outcry was far more pronounced.  Cost the Arizona Governor his reelection.
Which makes it also the reason polygamy really hasn't been prosecuted since and a primary factor in the isolationism of polygamist groups.

Ironically, if they'd never raided Short Creek in the 1950's the community wouldn't have isolated as much as it did.  Which indirectly led to the Warren Jeffs situation in 2008.
The raids sent polygamists into secrecy, which led to far worse abuse than if they'd been allowed to stay in daylight.

[smac97]

10 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

Quote

Weird that the Trib references the Short Creek raid, which took place in 1953, rather than the YFZ Ranch raid in Texas, which was much more recent (2008).

It's still better known. 

Is it?  The Short Creek raid happened 66 years ago.  The YFZ Ranch raid happened 11 years ago, and received a ton of press coverage.

I would have thought the latter would be much more widely known than the former.

10 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

And the public outcry was far more pronounced.  Cost the Arizona Governor his reelection.

66 years ago.  I'm not sure Short Creek is really part of the public consciousness.  Not many people know about it.

10 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

Which makes it also the reason polygamy really hasn't been prosecuted since and a primary factor in the isolationism of polygamist groups.

I think you are correcton this point.

10 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

Ironically, if they'd never raided Short Creek in the 1950's the community wouldn't have isolated as much as it did.  Which indirectly led to the Warren Jeffs situation in 2008.  The raids sent polygamists into secrecy, which led to far worse abuse than if they'd been allowed to stay in daylight.

In contrast, the YFZ Ranch raid broke the back of the FLDS Church, or started the process (although the UEP Trust has also had a major impact).  The control/influence the FLDS folks exerted over governance and law enforcement in Hilldale and Colorado City has been eliminated or substantially diminished.  The FLDS have largely left Hilldale (only 2.9% of the city are FLDS).  Texas seized the YFZ Ranch in 2012.  Warren Jeffs will spend the rest of his life in prison.  2016 saw 11 FLDS folks indicted for fraud and money laundering.

Hard to say what the ripples will be.

Thanks,

-Smac

[ttribe]

29 minutes ago, smac97 said:

Is it?  The Short Creek raid happened 66 years ago.  The YFZ Ranch raid happened 11 years ago, and received a ton of press coverage.

I would have thought the latter would be much more widely known than the former.

66 years ago.  I'm not sure Short Creek is really part of the public consciousness.  Not many people know about it.

I think you are correcton this point.

In contrast, the YFZ Ranch raid broke the back of the FLDS Church, or started the process (although the UEP Trust has also had a major impact).  The control/influence the FLDS folks exerted over governance and law enforcement in Hilldale and Colorado City has been eliminated or substantially diminished.  The FLDS have largely left Hilldale (only 2.9% of the city are FLDS).  Texas seized the YFZ Ranch in 2012.  Warren Jeffs will spend the rest of his life in prison.  2016 saw 11 FLDS folks indicted for fraud and money laundering.

Hard to say what the ripples will be.

Thanks,

-Smac

I recently drove through Hilldale on a road trip; the town is nearly empty.  It's quite a strange sight.

ETA: My perception is that the YFZ ranch was less about polygamy and more about child abuse, whereas the Short Creek raid was premised almost exclusively on the practice of polygamy.

Edited November 14, 2019 by ttribe

[Robert F. Smith]

4 hours ago, smac97 said:

...................

It seems like the criminal penalties for polygamy have already been removed, at least in a de facto way.

I dislike de facto negation of a criminal statute.  If we want to decriminalize polygamy, then let's have the legislatures do it, rather than the prosecutors (who do so by ignoring or refusing to apply the statute).

I wonder if this will happen.  That doesn't mean polygamous marriages become legally recognized, just that entering into one is not, in and of itself, a criminal act.  

....................... (short of decriminalizing polygamy).

I'm not sure it should be legalized, but decriminalization is worth considering..................................

Since legalization of same-sex marriage, it seems likely that polygamy and polyandry will be declared legal on the same basis -- equal protection of the laws -- and that a test case will be the vehicle, starting with a Federal judge somewhere (if and only if a prosecutor somewhere wants to prosecute polygamy), and then making its way to the Supreme Court, and thus overturning Reynolds v United States.  Just now, as you suggest, we have de facto negation of polygamy statutes.

[smac97]

5 minutes ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Since legalization of same-sex marriage, it seems likely that polygamy and polyandry will be declared legal on the same basis -- equal protection of the laws -- and that a test case will be the vehicle, starting with a Federal judge somewhere (if and only if a prosecutor somewhere wants to prosecute polygamy), and then making its way to the Supreme Court, and thus overturning Reynolds v United States.  Just now, as you suggest, we have de facto negation of polygamy statutes.

Yes.  There is a difference between decriminalization and legalization.  The former removes criminal penalties, but but does not mean that polygamous marriages are recognized as legally valid.  

I think that both will happen.

Thanks,

-Smac

[rockpond]

In a country where a polygamous family, the Browns, can have a reality TV show for 12 seasons... it seems like we might as well make it legal.

Also, I thought this quote from the wikipdia page for Sister Wives, was relevant:

"Kody Brown, along with his wives, filed a legal case in the United States federal courts challenging the State of Utah's criminal polygamy law. The Browns prevailed in the district court in a 2013 ruling, but a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit ordered the case to be dismissed on standing grounds in 2016. The Tenth Circuit concluded that because local Utah prosecutors had a policy of not pursuing most polygamy cases in the absence of additional associated crimes (e.g., welfare fraud or marriage of underage persons), the Browns had no credible fear of future prosecution and thus lacked standing."

Here we've got the Tenth Circuit telling a polygamous family that they don't even have standing to challenge anti-polygamy laws.  Why?  Because prosecutors don't enforce the laws.

[Robert F. Smith]

1 minute ago, rockpond said:

In a country where a polygamous family, the Browns, can have a reality TV show for 12 seasons... it seems like we might as well make it legal.

Also, I thought this quote from the wikipdia page for Sister Wives, was relevant:

"Kody Brown, along with his wives, filed a legal case in the United States federal courts challenging the State of Utah's criminal polygamy law. The Browns prevailed in the district court in a 2013 ruling, but a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit ordered the case to be dismissed on standing grounds in 2016. The Tenth Circuit concluded that because local Utah prosecutors had a policy of not pursuing most polygamy cases in the absence of additional associated crimes (e.g., welfare fraud or marriage of underage persons), the Browns had no credible fear of future prosecution and thus lacked standing."

Here we've got the Tenth Circuit telling a polygamous family that they don't even have standing to challenge anti-polygamy laws.  Why?  Because prosecutors don't enforce the laws.

That's known as Realpolitik.  The Tenth Circuit panel knew that Reynolds would be reversed if they did not find a way to ignore that case.

[smac97]

3 minutes ago, rockpond said:

In a country where a polygamous family, the Browns, can have a reality TV show for 12 seasons... it seems like we might as well make it legal.

I think you might be right.  Alimony, child support, custody, visition, divison of assets, etc. are already quite difficult to address in a one-man-one-woman divorce.  Handling such things in a polygamous scenario will, I think be a nightmare.

And then there are insurance issues, housing issues, and on and on and on.

Thanks,

-Smac

[rockpond]

4 minutes ago, smac97 said:

I think you might be right.  Alimony, child support, custody, visition, divison of assets, etc. are already quite difficult to address in a one-man-one-woman divorce.  Handling such things in a polygamous scenario will, I think be a nightmare.

And then there are insurance issues, housing issues, and on and on and on.

Thanks,

-Smac

Well, I certainly am not volunteering to be the one to figure out how to resolve all the problems with legalizing it. 

As Robert indicated, the Tenth Circuit may have been working to keep Reynolds from being overturned.  Maybe that's more because of all the complications that would arise and less because they care about people having multiple spouses.  I don't know.

[strappinglad]

If a man has 5 wives , can the women be charged with polygamy, or just the man? 

[Metis_LDS]

2 Nephi 14:1

1 ^aAnd in that day, seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel; only let us be called by thy name to take away our ^breproach.

 

[JLHPROF]

6 minutes ago, Metis_LDS said:

2 Nephi 14:1

1 ^aAnd in that day, seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel; only let us be called by thy name to take away our ^breproach.

Interesting to note this refers to a future event.  The chapter heading states this is at the start of the Millennial period.

[Metis_LDS]

2 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

Interesting to note this refers to a future event.  The chapter heading states this is at the start of the Millennial period.

We will not name anyone but I have seen strong anti plural marriage posts from some members of this board.  That's fine, but what would be their take on this scripture?

[2BizE]

I’m not opposed to fully legalizing polygamy.  It probably will happen sometime in the next 20 years.  The first polygamists to go to Mexico were sent there by the President of the LDS church.  They established colonies and lived as God wanted them to. Even after the 1890 manifesto, which was really directed toward the United States, Mormons continued to practice polygamy in Mexico as faithful members.  The folks in Mexico today are our brothers and sisters in the faith. The question is whether they would leave and come to the USA if polygamy were legal. I think some would. Many are citizens of the USA. Some may want to stay and continue to grow peaches and nuts.    I found the colonies quite peaceful. Children learned both English and Spanish at the church operated high school, but this was before the drug cartels were prevalent.

[JAHS]

29 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

42 minutes ago, Metis_LDS said:

2 Nephi 14:1

1 ^aAnd in that day, seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel; only let us be called by thy name to take away our ^breproach.

Interesting to note this refers to a future event.  The chapter heading states this is at the start of the Millennial period.

Here's another way to look at that scripture as it appears in Isaiah. In the Hebrew text, the Isaiah 4:1 verse is placed at the end of chapter three. It serves as the conclusion to that chapter, not the beginning of chapter 4. So if you look at it in this way and read it in the context of chapter 3, rather than being about plural marriage, one could reason that the war that stripped Israel of her leadership and disgraced the daughters of Zion and killed off most of the men(See Isaiah 3:25-26), left a ratio of women to men at seven to one. So these women were now desperate and are willing to do anything to have the reproach of being childless removed.
So in a sense they are begging to the few men that are left to take them so they can bear children. 

[JLHPROF]

28 minutes ago, JAHS said:

Here's another way to look at that scripture as it appears in Isaiah. In the Hebrew text, the Isaiah 4:1 verse is placed at the end of chapter three. It serves as the conclusion to that chapter, not the beginning of chapter 4. So if you look at it in this way and read it in the context of chapter 3, rather than being about plural marriage, one could reason that the war that stripped Israel of her leadership and disgraced the daughters of Zion and killed off most of the men(See Isaiah 3:25-26), left a ratio of women to men at seven to one. So these women were now desperate and are willing to do anything to have the reproach of being childless removed.
So in a sense they are begging to the few men that are left to take them so they can bear children. 

Taking out the chapter breakdowns it starts earlier than chapter 3.  Chapter 2 specifies "in that day" refers to the day of the Lord, aka the Millennial period.

So regardless of the cause of the practice, the polygamy referred to here is future.  If you believe Isaiah.

Edited November 15, 2019 by JLHPROF

[Calm]

7 hours ago, smac97 said:

Moreover, alimony seems to be an increasingly antiquated notion.

Not in communities that do not have the women working in decent paying jobs or receiving education to do so.  If they have been dependent on their husband or the government because they have listened to their husband who told them he would always take care of them or something that amounts to that, I think they have the right to receive it.

It might encourage polygamists not to just marry and dump wives/husbands if it gets decriminalized/legalized.

Poverty still remains quite high among divorced mothers....if alimony is discontinued, I would suggest at the very least higher child support so the mother if she has custody can cover costs while going to school to get training so she has some upward mobility.  And if the wife worked to put the husband through college and the husband did not make a comparable career sacrifice, there should imo be compensation.

https://womensenews.org/2015/09/hidden-divorce-penalty-is-older-age-poverty/

Quote

A wife’s standard of living decreases by as much as 25 percent in the first year after a divorce while the husband’s rises because courts often overlook the couple’s careers when dividing the marital property, notes Carol Ann Wilson, a certified financial divorce specialist in Longmont, Colo.

This hurts women, Wilson said in a phone interview, because the husband’s career may be more valuable than other assets like cars and houses. In addition to higher pay, men’s careers are more likely to provide pensions, stock options, health, life and disability insurance as well as educational and training opportunities that boost future earnings.

“Although the number of working wives has increased during the past three decades, most couples still invest in the husband’s career while the wife’s career takes second place,” she says.

If the wife worked four years to put husband through school and then another four for herself (assuming they don't have kids, if they do there is a good chance it will take longer), even the four year late start to her career can make difference, especially if she has custody of the kids and there is an assumption at her work therefore she won't be able to be as invested in her career as others might be.

Edited November 15, 2019 by Calm

[strappinglad]

1 hour ago, Metis_LDS said:

2 Nephi 14:1

1 ^aAnd in that day, seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel; only let us be called by thy name to take away our ^breproach.

It appears from the verse that the 7 women were quite capable of taking care of themselves. What 'reproach ' they were suffering I can't imagine. Modern feminism would not stand for such an idea. 

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Metis_LDS said:

We will not name anyone but I have seen strong anti plural marriage posts from some members of this board.  That's fine, but what would be their take on this scripture?

I am not antipolygamy, but do you really think a marriage as described in the scripture as in name only for respectability with the women providing for all their own needs is really the type of marriage the Church would be supportive of?

[JAHS]

1 hour ago, JLHPROF said:

Taking out the chapter breakdowns it starts earlier than chapter 3.  Chapter 2 specifies "in that day" refers to the day of the Lord, aka the Millennial period.

So regardless of the cause of the practice, the polygamy referred to here is future.  If you believe Isaiah.

I see your point but I don't think it is referring to polygamy at all, but that women will be fighting over the few men that are available. 
"And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach."

This also just doesn't sound like a condition that would be associated with the millennium, neither does all the other things mentioned in chapter three, but perhaps refers to the time just before the Millennium happens. We can't be certain of the sequence or timing of things that are talked about in Isaiah.

[JLHPROF]

32 minutes ago, JAHS said:

I see your point but I don't think it is referring to polygamy at all, but that women will be fighting over the few men that are available. 
"And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach."

This also just doesn't sound like a condition that would be associated with the millennium, neither does all the other things mentioned in chapter three, but perhaps refers to the time just before the Millennium happens. We can't be certain of the sequence or timing of things that are talked about in Isaiah.

Yes, the time right before the Millennium.  The day of the Lord tends to refer to the time of his return.

My only point is that it doesn't refer to the restoration of plural marriage in the early Church but to events yet to come.

I think an understanding of reproach indicates the reason.  Whether it indicates they are looking to live polygamy  or fighting each other for a monogamous relationship opportunity isn't specifed I suppose.  But take hold means a variety of things.  One of them is marriage.  Another is more like Potiphar's wife and Joseph's clothing.

Edited November 15, 2019 by JLHPROF