D. Michael Quinn

JOSEPH SMITH’S EXPERIENCE OF A METHODIST “CAMP-MEETING” IN 1820

Dialogue E-Paper July 12, 2006
As an alternative to myopic polarization, this essay provides new ways of understanding Joseph’s narrative, analyzes previously neglected issues/data, and establishes a basis for perceiving in detail what the teenage boy experienced in the religious revivalism that led to his first theophany

Joseph Smith III’s 1844 Blessing and the Mormons of Utah

Members of the Mormon Church headquartered in Salt Lake City may have reacted anywhere along the spectrum from sublime indifference to temporary discomfiture to cold terror at the recently discovered blessing by Joseph Smith, Jr.,…

From Sacred Grove to Sacral Power Structure

In more than 150 years, Mormonism has experienced a series of interrelated and crucial transitions, even transformations. This study de scribes five of these linked transitions as individualism to corporate dynasticism, authoritarian democracy to authoritarian…

The Mormon Church and the Spanish-American War: An End to Selective Pacifism

The impact of the Spanish-American War on the people of the American West has been overshadowed by its profound effect upon the American nation as a world power. A little-known sidelight to the war is…

LDS Church Authority and New Plural Marriages, 1890-1904

Dialogue 18.1 (Spring 1985): 9–105
Quinn shares that even with the Manifesto that officially ended plural marriage, plural marriages were still happening in the church between the First and Second Manifestos. Despite church leaders arguring that no plural marriages were happening, there is evidence to support the fact that both church members and church leaders were entering into new plural marriages.

Ezra Taft Benson and Mormon Political Conflicts

From the 1950s to the 1980s Ezra Taft Benson was at the center of a series of political conflicts within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In 1943 he became a member of…

A Reply

There are significant differences between historical investigation of controversial issues and the polemical use of history. Jeff D. Blake’s essay is a textbook example of polemics impersonating as history.  First, he employs the classic “straw…

Male-Male Intimacy among Nineteenth-century Mormons: A Case Study

Dialogue 28.4 (Winter 1995): 105–119
This was a prelude to his book-length treatment Same-Sex Dynamics in 19th C. America: A Mormon Example, that looked at “intimacy” broadly defined, before the rise of homophobia in the post-WWII period. It is a fascinating study of changing norms and practices that once allowed for a huge range of bonding practices between people of the same-sex. Quinn himself had come out in the course of researching this article and the book a few years before, and this work remains influential.

Plural Marriage and Mormon Fundamentalism

Dialogue 31.2 (Summer 1998): 1–68
Quinn shares what Mormon Fundamentalists believe. some stereotypes about them, and identfies the different groups.

Prelude to the National “”Defense of Marriage”” Campaign: Civil Discrimination Against Feared or Despised Minorities

America is currently in the midst of state-by-state political activism and judicial appeals to prevent the legalization of same-sex marriage. In 1996 the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated one example of the related effort to roll back laws protecting homosexuals from civil discrimination, but this campaign moves forward on various fronts in every state of the Union. Its organizers will certainly extend this political activism into all states currently lacking a “Defense of Marriage Act” (DOMA) which both prohibits same-sex marriage and refuses to recognize such unions legally performed in other states or countries. In view of the pace for this state by-state political activism during the 1990s, the Defense of Marriage campaign will probably continue throughout the United States for at least another decade.

LDS “Headquarters Culture” and the Rest of Mormonism: Past and Present

In December 1830 the founding Mormon prophet Joseph Smith Jr. announced a revelation which established the doctrine of “gathering” the new church’s members at a headquarters area: “And again, a commandment I give unto the church, that it is expedient in me that they should assemble together at the Ohio. … ” (D&C 37: 3). Prior to that date, believers in The Book of Mormon were concentrated in three locations of western New York State: at Manchester /Palmyra (where the Smith family had lived a dozen years), also at Colesville, and at Fayette. Then from February 1831 to the end of 1837, the church was headquartered in Kirt land, Ohio (near Cleveland). 

Post-Manifesto Marriages