While Mormons may not be willing to make such grandiose claims themselves, Bloom clearly feels that the church will continue to experience unprecedented growth in this new century. Still, the news is not all good. Like our predecessors in Nauvoo, remarkable growth may cause renewed resentment toward the church and its members by our fellow Americans. Bloom presages the reaction that may emerge in America to the growing LDS population when he asks, What would the Mormons wish to do if the United States ever has so large a Mormon population, and so wealthy a consolidation of Mormon economic power, that governing our democracy became impossible without Mormon cooperation? (Ibid., p. 90.) This question has distinct similarities with the question Illinois politicians and power brokers of the 1840s must have asked about the mushrooming Mormon population. They most certainly felt that they were about to lose control of their own state to the Mormons. Power and wealth were at stake. Illinois’ movers and shakers were fearful of losing it to the Mormons. Surely they questioned what changes Mormons might seek to impose on the general populace if they gained political and economic control of the state. No wonder nearly all elements of frontier American society combined in an unholy conspiracy to drive Mormons from their midst. Growing Mormon political influence threatened to depose and dispossess the existing power structure. One wonders, given the deaf ear the U.S. government turned on the Mormon issue at that time, if the concerns of Illinois were not also those of Washington as well. In all probability, Joseph Smith’s candidacy for the U.S. presidency was a wake up call to politicians and power brokers at the national level. Seeing the events in Illinois and given the grassroots interest in the candidacy of the Mormon prophet, they could not help but fear a repeat of frontier events on a national scale. Such a blatant power grab could not be tolerated. Hence, officials at the national level turned a blind eye to events in Illinois, allowing the locals do their dirty work. As with the Nauvoo saints, today’s church has more political influence in the nation than its membership would seem to indicate. Bloom recognizes that reality. “Mormon financial and political power is exerted in Washington to a degree far beyond what one would expect from one voter in fifty.”
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 21:15:55 +0000
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