HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The Short Creek raid was an
Arizona Department of Public Safety The Arizona Department of Public Safety (AZDPS) is a state-level law enforcement agency with a primary function of patrolling and enforcing state laws on Arizona highways. Director Heston Silbert was promoted from Deputy Director to Director in ...
and
Arizona National Guard The Arizona National Guard is the National Guard of the American state of Arizona. It consists of the Arizona Army National Guard and the Arizona Air National Guard. Both components are part of the Arizona Department of Emergency and Milit ...
action against Mormon fundamentalists that took place on the morning of July 26, 1953, at
Short Creek, Arizona Colorado City is a town in Mohave County, Arizona, United States, and is located in a region known as the Arizona Strip. As of the 2020 census, the population of the town was 2,478, down from 4,821 in 2010. At least three Mormon fundamental ...
. The Short Creek raid was the largest
mass arrest A mass arrest occurs when police apprehend large numbers of suspects at once. This sometimes occurs at protests. Some mass arrests are also used in an effort to combat gang activity. This is sometimes controversial, and lawsuits sometimes result. ...
of polygamists in American history. At the time, it was described as "the largest mass arrest of men and women in modern American history."


Events

Just before dawn on July 26, 1953, 102 Arizona officers of public safety and soldiers from the
Arizona National Guard The Arizona National Guard is the National Guard of the American state of Arizona. It consists of the Arizona Army National Guard and the Arizona Air National Guard. Both components are part of the Arizona Department of Emergency and Milit ...
entered Short Creek. The community—which was composed of approximately 400 Mormon fundamentalists—had been tipped off about the planned raid and were found singing
hymn A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hymn' ...
s in the schoolhouse while the children played outside. The entire community was taken into custody, with the exception of six individuals who were found not to be fundamentalist Mormons.Ken Driggs, "After the Manifesto: Modern Polygamy and Fundamentalist Mormons", ''Journal of Church and State'' 32:367 (1990). Among those taken into custody were 263 children. One hundred and fifty of the children who were taken into custody were not permitted to return to their parents for more than two years, and some parents never regained custody of their children.


Public and media reaction

Arizona Governor The governor of Arizona is the head of government of the U.S. state of Arizona. As the top elected official, the governor is the head of the executive branch of the Arizona state government and is charged with faithfully executing state laws. Th ...
John Howard Pyle initially called the raid "a momentous police action against insurrection"Martha Sonntag Bradley (1993). ''Kidnapped from That Land : The Government Raids on the Short Creek Polygamists'' (Salt Lake City, Utah:
University of Utah Press The University of Utah Press is the independent publishing branch of the University of Utah and is a division of the J. Willard Marriott Library. Founded in 1949 by A. Ray Olpin, it is also the oldest university press in Utah. The mission of th ...
).
and described the Mormon fundamentalists as participating in "the foulest conspiracy you could possibly imagine" that was designed to produce "white slaves." More than 100 reporters had been invited by Pyle to accompany the police to observe the raid. However, the raid and its tactics attracted mostly negative media attention; one newspaper editorialized:
By what stretch of the imagination could the actions of the Short Creek children be classified as insurrection? Were those teenagers playing volleyball in a school yard inspiring a rebellion? Insurrection? Well, if so, an insurrection with diapers and volleyballs!
In the same week that the Korean War Armistice Agreement was signed, the raid achieved notoriety in media across the United States, including articles in ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...
'' and ''
Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely ...
'', with many media outlets describing the raid as "odious" or "un-American." Richard S. Van Wagoner (1989). ''Mormon Polygamy : A History'' (2d ed) (Salt Lake City, Utah:
Signature Books Signature Books is an American press specializing in subjects related to Utah, Mormonism, and Western Americana. The company was founded in 1980 by George D. Smith and Scott Kenney and is based in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is majority owned by th ...
).
One commentator has suggested that commentary on the raid was "probably the first time in history that American polygamists had received media coverage that was largely sympathetic." Another has suggested that the raid's "only American parallel is the federal actions against Native Americans in the nineteenth century." When Pyle lost his bid for re-election in 1954 to Democratic candidate Ernest McFarland, Pyle blamed the fallout from the raid as having destroyed his political career.


Support from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

One of the few media outlets to applaud the raid was the
Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the capital and most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in Utah. With a population of 200,133 in 2020, t ...
-based ''
Deseret News The ''Deseret News'' () is the oldest continuously operating publication in the American west. Its multi-platform products feature journalism and commentary across the fields of politics, culture, family life, faith, sports, and entertainment. Th ...
'', which was owned by
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is a nontrinitarian Christian church that considers itself to be the restoration of the original church founded by Jesus Christ. The ...
(LDS Church). The ''News'' applauded the action as a needed response to prevent the fundamentalists from becoming "a cancer of a sort that is beyond hope of human repair." When the paper later editorialized its support for separating children from their polygamist parents, there was a backlash against the paper and the church by a number of
Latter-day Saint Mormons are a religious and cultural group related to Mormonism, the principal branch of the Latter Day Saint movement started by Joseph Smith in upstate New York during the 1820s. After Smith's death in 1844, the movement split into several ...
s, including Juanita Brooks, who complained that the church organization was approving of "such a basically cruel and wicked thing as the taking of little children from their mother." The Short Creek raid was the last action against polygamous Mormon fundamentalists that has been actively supported by the LDS Church.


Aftermath

After the Short Creek raid, the fundamentalist Mormon polygamist colony at Short Creek eventually rejuvenated.Neil J. Young
"Short Creek's Long Legacy"
, ''Slate'', April 16, 2008.
Short Creek was renamed Colorado City in 1960. In 1991, the Mormon fundamentalists at Colorado City formally established the
Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS Church) is a religious sect of the fundamentalist Mormon denominations whose members practice polygamy. The fundamentalist Mormon movement emerged in the early 20th century, ...
(FLDS Church). The members of the sect did not face any prosecutions for its polygamous behavior until the late 1990s, when isolated individuals began to be prosecuted. In 2006, FLDS Church leader Warren Jeffs was placed on the
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...
Ten Most Wanted List; he was arrested in 2007 and in 2011 was convicted in Texas of two counts of child sexual abuse and sentenced to life in prison. On 3 April 2008, following allegations of
physical Physical may refer to: *Physical examination In a physical examination, medical examination, or clinical examination, a medical practitioner examines a patient for any possible medical signs or symptoms of a medical condition. It generally cons ...
and
sexual abuse Sexual abuse or sex abuse, also referred to as molestation, is abusive sexual behavior by one person upon another. It is often perpetrated using force or by taking advantage of another. Molestation often refers to an instance of sexual assau ...
by an unidentified caller who claimed to be a 16-year-old girl, law enforcement officers raided a FLDS compound Jeffs had founded in Texas called the
YFZ Ranch The YFZ Ranch, or Yearning for Zion Ranch, was a Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) community of as many as 700 people, located near Eldorado in Schleicher County, Texas, United States. In April 2014, the State of ...
. As of 8 April, a total of 416 children had been removed from the compound by authorities. A former member of the FLDS Church,
Carolyn Jessop Carolyn Jessop (born January 1, 1968) is an American author and former Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints member who wrote '' Escape'', an autobiographical account of her upbringing in the polygamist sect and later flight ...
, arrived on-site 6 April and stated her opinion that the action in Texas was unlike the Short Creek raid. Others, however, have drawn direct connections between the two events.


See also

*
Joseph White Musser Joseph White Musser (March 8, 1872 – March 29, 1954) was a Mormon fundamentalist leader. Musser was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, to Amos Milton Musser (an assistant LDS Church historian) and Mary E. White. He is known for his Mormon funda ...
: Mormon fundamentalist leader during the raid * Hildale, Utah *
Short Creek Community The Short Creek Community (now Colorado City, Arizona, and Hildale, Utah), founded in 1913, began as a small ranching town in the Arizona Strip. In the 1930s it was settled by Mormon fundamentalists. History In May 1935, members of the Council ...


References


Further reading

*


External links

*
Police raid Arizona polygamist enclave
a special report by ''
The Salt Lake Tribune ''The Salt Lake Tribune'' is a newspaper published in the city of Salt Lake City, Utah. The ''Tribune'' is owned by The Salt Lake Tribune, Inc., a non-profit corporation. The newspaper's motto is "Utah's Independent Voice Since 1871." History A ...
'' – " historical account of a radio address given by Arizona Governor Howard Pyle shortly after the Short Creek raid in 1953."
Photos From a Notorious 1953 Raid on a Polygamist Arizona Town
– LIFE Magazine archive {{Apostolic United Brethren Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints History of Mohave County, Arizona Latter Day Saint movement in Arizona 1953 in Arizona 1953 in Christianity 1953 crimes in the United States July 1953 events in the United States 20th-century Mormonism Crimes in Arizona Imprisonment and detention in the United States Mormon fundamentalism Christianity and children Apostolic United Brethren Christianity and law in the 20th century United States law and polygamy in Mormonism Law enforcement in Arizona