The Scandalous Crime Of George Reynolds

George Reynolds, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, was charged with bigamy under the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act after marrying Amelia Jane Schofield while still married to Mary Ann Tuddenham in Utah Territory. He was the secretary to Brigham Young and presented himself as a test of the federal government's attempt to outlaw polygamy. Reynolds was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison at hard labour and a fine of five hundred dollars. He appealed the decision, arguing that his conviction for bigamy should be overturned as his religion encouraged and mandated plural marriage. The Supreme Court rejected this argument and upheld the conviction, stating that religious beliefs do not rise above the law.

George Reynolds was charged with bigamy under the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act

The Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act was specifically aimed at the Mormon practice of plural marriage and the property dominance of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) in the Utah Territory. George Reynolds, a member of the LDS Church, was charged with bigamy after marrying Amelia Jane Schofield while still married to Mary Ann Tuddenham in the Utah Territory.

The LDS Church believed that the law unconstitutionally deprived its members of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion and chose to challenge the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act. Reynolds, a secretary in the office of the president of the church, agreed to serve as the defendant and was indicted for bigamy by a grand jury on June 23, 1874. In 1875, he was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison at hard labor and a fine of $500. The conviction was upheld by the Utah Territorial Supreme Court in 1876.

Reynolds' attorneys appealed the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that his conviction should be overturned on several grounds, including religious duty and the composition of the grand jury. On January 6, 1879, the Supreme Court unanimously affirmed Reynolds' conviction, rejecting the argument that the Latter-day Saint practice of plural marriage was protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. The Court distinguished between the legal right to believe in polygamy and the illegal right to practice it.

He was the secretary to Brigham Young and presented himself as a test case for the federal government's attempt to outlaw polygamy

George Reynolds was the secretary to Brigham Young, the second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). Young was a prominent figure in the history of the American West, having led thousands of Mormons on an exodus westward to the Great Salt Lake Valley, where he founded Salt Lake City and served as the first governor of the Utah Territory.

Young was a polygamist, having at least 55 wives and 56-57 children. In 1852, the LDS Church publicly embraced the practice of polygamy, leading to frequent clashes with the federal government. In 1862, the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act effectively outlawed the practice in US territories.

In an attempt to challenge the law, the LDS Church decided to furnish a defendant to establish a test case. George Reynolds, a secretary in Young's office, agreed to serve as the defendant. He was charged with bigamy under the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act after marrying Amelia Jane Schofield while still married to Mary Ann Tuddenham. Reynolds argued that he was fulfilling his religious duty as a male member of the LDS Church, which enjoined polygamy upon its male members.

The case, known as "Reynolds v. United States", reached the US Supreme Court in 1878. The Court unanimously decided that polygamy was not protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment and upheld the constitutionality of the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act. Thus, Reynolds' conviction was upheld, and he was sentenced to two years of imprisonment at hard labour and a fine of $500.

The LDS Church challenged the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act, arguing it deprived members of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion

George Reynolds was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) and was charged with bigamy under the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act. He had married Amelia Jane Schofield while still married to Mary Ann Tuddenham in Utah Territory.

The LDS Church challenged the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act, arguing that it deprived members of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion. The First Presidency decided to furnish a defendant to establish a test case to be brought before the United States Supreme Court, to determine the constitutionality of the anti-bigamy law. Reynolds, a secretary in the office of the president of the church, agreed to serve as the defendant. He provided the United States Attorney with numerous witnesses who could testify about his being married to two wives and was indicted for bigamy by a grand jury on June 23, 1874. In 1875, he was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison at hard labor and a fine of five hundred dollars.

The LDS Church's argument was that the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act unconstitutionally deprived its members of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion. They believed that it was the religious duty of male members of the church to practice polygamy if possible.

The Supreme Court recognized that under the First Amendment, Congress cannot pass a law that prohibits the free exercise of religion. However, they held that the law prohibiting bigamy did not meet that standard. The Court investigated the history of religious freedom in the United States and quoted a letter from Thomas Jefferson in which he wrote that there was a distinction between religious belief and action that flowed from religious belief. Jefferson wrote:

> Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.

The Supreme Court unanimously decided that polygamous activity would not be tolerated, even under the protection of the Free Practice of Religion in the First Amendment. They upheld the criminalization of polygamy on the reasoning that polygamy was

> odious among the northern and western nations of Europe, and, until the establishment of the Mormon Church, almost exclusively a feature of the life of Asiatic and of African people... [Polygamy] fetters the people in stationary despotism.

The Court ruled that the First Amendment forbade Congress from legislating against opinion but allowed it to legislate against action.

Reynolds was indicted for bigamy by a grand jury on 23 June 1874

George Reynolds was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) and was charged with bigamy under the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act after marrying Amelia Jane Schofield while still married to Mary Ann Tuddenham in Utah Territory.

On 23 June 1874, Reynolds was indicted for bigamy by a grand jury. This came after the LDS Church, believing that the law deprived its members of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion, decided to challenge the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act. Reynolds, a secretary in the office of the president of the church, agreed to serve as the defendant. He provided the United States Attorney with numerous witnesses who could testify to his being married to two wives.

In 1875, Reynolds was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison at hard labour and a fine of $500. In 1876, the Utah Territorial Supreme Court upheld the sentence. Reynolds appealed to the US Supreme Court, which, on 6 January 1879, affirmed his conviction and rejected his argument that the Latter-day Saint practice of plural marriage was protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. The Court held that Reynolds had freely admitted that he was a bigamist and that the judge had simply "call [ed] the attention of the jury to the peculiar character of the crime".

Reynolds was sentenced to two years in prison and a $500 fine

George Reynolds, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, was sentenced to two years in prison and a $500 fine for breaking the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act. Reynolds was charged with bigamy after marrying Amelia Jane Schofield while still married to Mary Ann Tuddenham in the Utah Territory.

The case, Reynolds v. United States, was a significant test of the federal government's attempt to outlaw polygamy. The LDS Church believed that the law deprived its members of their First Amendment right to freely practice their religion. As such, the church decided to challenge the anti-bigamy law, with Reynolds agreeing to serve as the defendant.

During the trial, Reynolds' attorneys argued that his conviction for bigamy should be overturned on four grounds:

• That it was his religious duty to marry multiple times, an act protected under the First Amendment.
• That his grand jury had not been legally constituted.
• That challenges of certain jurors were improperly overruled.
• That testimony was inadmissible as it was under another indictment.

However, the Supreme Court upheld Reynolds' conviction and rejected his argument that the practice of plural marriage was protected by the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. The Court's decision set a precedent, stating that religious beliefs do not override the law.

The sentence of two years' imprisonment and a $500 fine imposed on Reynolds was not without controversy. Initially, the sentence included a provision of hard labor, which was not included in the statute. This prompted a petition for rehearing, and the Supreme Court vacated its previous judgment. The Court reversed the lower court's decision and instructed them to set aside the original sentence and issue a new one without the hard labor provision.

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