This Branch of the Church

A primary concern of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the spiritual and physical welfare of its members, and local congregations have always been the mechanism for that ministry. However, the structure and leadership of local administrative organizations have changed over the history of the Church, most significantly under Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. During these years, the terms and structures that are familiar to us—presidents, bishops, stakes, wards, and so on—emerged, but so did many practices that did not survive what has been called the 1877 Priesthood Reorganization.1

This is the fourth and final article in a series evaluating the early development of local Church administration. The first three articles covered the administration of Joseph Smith Jr., the temporary sojourn along the Missouri River, and the early settlement of Utah Territory through the 1850s.2 This installment covers the period from 1860 to 1877, when the ward and stake structure familiar to us predominated with a few very different approaches until it was ensconced as the Church standard in 1877.

By late 1859, the first premodern regional stakes were firmly established in Logan (organized in November),3 Ogden, Salt Lake, Provo, Manti, and Parowan.4 Each had a presidency, high council, presiding bishopric, and organized priesthood quorums. Each consisted of multiple wards that fully functioned as distinct congregations presided over by a bishop.

The Death Knell of Dual Leadership and the Nauvoo Branch Ideal

At the April 1862 general conference, the issue of dual ward leadership5 came to a head. The night before, Church leaders resolved a dispute in the Spanish Fork Ward involving the ward president.6 At the time, this was the only remaining ward with both a president and bishop who seemed to work together.7 Orson Hyde proposed that the separate roles of ward president and bishop be officially clarified to the Saints, and if that could not be done, that they be combined into the office of bishop.8 This seems anachronistic, given that the practice had been virtually extinct for several years.

Yet there were at least six sermons on the topic over the next three days. The conference became a kind of post-mortem on Joseph Smith’s ideal of the branch-stake continuum discussed in part 1 of this series.9 Three of the six sermons, given by Brigham Young, George A. Smith, and Daniel H. Wells, lamented that the dual-leader ideal had largely failed. In the words of Wells, “Is it impossible to have a President and a Bishop in the same Branch without there being strife and contention among the people?”10 Brigham Young made the case that the day-to-day responsibilities of the Melchizedek and Aaronic Priesthood were clearly laid out in scripture, so the roles of their respective local leaders should be equally clear.11 George A. Smith implied that in the units where the two offices had been combined “and almost everything is made to devolve upon the head of the Bishop” (these were the days before auxiliary organizations and numerous members serving in callings), the bishops were overextended and overworked without a President.12 Orson Hyde agreed that in principle, we are capable of having a bishop and a president, but “the present state of our limited knowledge” often prevents the successful implementation of both offices.13 They all felt that less ignorant presidents and bishops would be able to work together.

President Young made it clear that he still believed in the inspired structure that he called a “fully organized branch:”14 the congregational stake with a presidency, bishopric, high council, patriarch, and priesthood quorums. In his often-provocative style, he concluded,

It is chiefly because of the ignorance of the people that we often concentrate in one man these different offices and callings, but when the people are sufficiently informed and have advanced further in the knowledge of the truth, it will not be so, but every branch will have its full quota of officers . . . that are necessary for the work of the ministry, and the edifying of the body of Christ. Until the people can receive and honor these helps and governments . . . the different offices will be concentrated in as few men as possible, for men will contend for power, and as to which shall be the greatest, until they are better informed.15

Ironically, Brigham Young’s prediction eventually came true, in a way. By the mid-1900s, most of the 1862 wards were eventually formed into stakes with their complete organization. The trend away from dual-leader wards was irreversible. As late as 1865, Brigham Young claimed that the practice was still occurring,16 but only Spanish Fork can be documented, and even that was only a temporary arrangement.17 Conversely, the dual leadership of president and bishop continued rather successfully at the stake level until 1877.

In light of this April 1862 conference, the 1860s and 1870s can be seen as a transitional time. The old ideal gave way to a period of pragmatism, of seeing what worked best among the Saints, resulting in the practice codified as a new ideal and new policy in 1877.

More Apostolates

The Apostle-led stake (or stake-like region) not only continued in Box Elder County under Lorenzo Snow but also proliferated during the 1860s. In fact, several of these were created in 1860–1861, hinting at a strategy by Brigham Young to have the Apostles more directly leading the Saints of Utah. He suggested to Ezra T. Benson in April 1860, “I want them [the Twelve] to preach in the Territory and ask other elders to preach abroad.”18

In the spring of 1859, Orson Hyde of the Twelve Apostles was called to assist the stake in Sanpete Valley, and in the following year, Ezra T. Benson was given a similar assignment in Cache Valley.19 In Logan, precise titles for Benson were rarely used (we have found no record of a stake conference during Benson’s tenure), but he appears to have followed the model of Lorenzo Snow in Brigham City and acted as stake president. Peter Maughan, who had originally been set apart as stake president less than a year previous, is called “Bishop Maughan” after Benson arrived, and appeared to function as the stake presiding bishop.

In Manti, the existing stake organization remained in place for a few years with Hyde having an untitled advisory role. In his first sermon after arriving, he said that his instructions from the prophet were “‘to feed the sheep’ and to preach the Gospel to the saints who needed teaching.” Hyde also claimed that “he did not design to interfere with Sanpete authorities only through necessity.”20 However, after early 1862, when President Welcome Chapman (who had been presiding since 1854) left to work on the Salt Lake Temple, Hyde was the sole functioning leader over Sanpete and eventually Sevier counties.21

When Apostles Orson Pratt and Erastus Snow led “the Southern Mission” in 1861 to settle St. George,22 and when Charles C. Rich led the settlement of the Bear Lake Valley in 1863,23 they followed different patterns. In both cases, they quickly organized wards or branches in the new settlements, but initially, regional organization was not a concern. Snow and Pratt (the latter left in 1864) called a high council in November 1862,24 but there is no record of any early regional organization in Bear Lake Valley. Both areas were fully organized as stakes in 1869, with stake presidencies distinct from the Apostle, akin to Erastus Snow’s earlier sojourn in St. Louis (see part 3 in this series). In St. George, Snow held the title of “President of the Southern Mission,” and in Bear Lake, Rich was “President of the Bear Lake and Bear River region.”25

However, it is not at all clear what the real difference was between the stake and the apostolate, especially in St. George. Remote settlements in Nevada and Kane County regularly reported at mission/stake conferences and were visited by Elder Snow,26 but it is possible that they were only part of the mission, and the stake was limited to the congregations close to St. George. The wards of southern Iron County (Cedar, Harmony, and Kanarra) were usually represented in St. George stake conferences. In fact, in May 1872, Snow admitted that the jurisdiction of these two stakes was not clearly defined. “There were no specific boundaries defined between this Stake and the adjoining Stake north; for instance, a case of appeal from the Bishop’s Court of Cedar City, might be carried to the High Council of St. George, or the High Council at Parowan, as might be most advisable, under the circumstances.”27

In summary, over its thirty-year existence, the idea of having Apostles preside over stakes or stake-like organizations took several forms, and the organizational structure changed over time:

• Apostolate region, an area not organized as a stake, with a resident Apostle presiding, but with some elements of a stake, such as a high council: Iowa 1846–1852, Parowan 1851, Box Elder 1856–about 1866, St. George 1861–1869, 1875–1877, Bear Lake 1863–1869, Sanpete 1863–1877, Sevier 1872–1874
• Apostolate stake, a fully organized stake with an Apostle as president: Cache 1860–1869, 1872–1877, Box Elder about 1867–1877, St. George 1874, Weber 1870–1877, Sevier 1874–1875, Bear Lake 1874–1877
• Two-tier apostolate stake, a fully organized stake with a president and high council, as well as a resident Apostle as advisor and/or presiding over a larger region: San Bernardino 1851–1857, Provo 1852–1853, Parowan 1854–1855, St. Louis 1855–1856, Carson Valley 1856, Sanpete 1860–1863, Weber 1869–1870, St. George 1869–1872, Bear Lake 1869–1874

This may seem rather haphazard, but at times there seemed to be some strategy here. In 1868, a directory of Church leaders was published that listed the Apostles then in place as “county presidents”: Erastus Snow over Washington, Kane, and Iron Counties; Orson Hyde over San Pete, Sevier, and Piute Counties; Lorenzo Snow over Box Elder; Ezra T. Benson over Cache; and Charles C. Rich over Rich County.28 This suggests that the ideal arrangement (at least at this time) was intended to be the two-tier approach, with each Apostle serving several counties/stakes. However, each time that was attempted, the stake eventually ceded complete authority to the Apostle. This makes sense. It would be difficult for a presidency to operate with an Apostle constantly looking over its shoulder. The apostolate idea was eliminated in 1877 and never appeared again, although Apostles were given indirect regional supervisory roles within dozens of stakes in the 1960s.29

Consolidating Bishoprics

During the 1860s, the practice of a bishop presiding over multiple settlements gained popularity throughout the territory. This trend occurred in several different forms for several different reasons, but collectively, it represented an increasingly broad authority vested in bishops.

The first new presiding bishops were in valleys that were settled with insufficient density to warrant a full stake, as in Tooele. In these situations, the bishop’s regional jurisdiction was collectively called a ward (such as the Tooele Ward discussed in part 2),30 but generic terms such as county or valley were more common. Some of the constituent congregations were occasionally called wards but were usually branches with a presiding elder.31 Such an organization could be considered a kind of proto-stake, and all these areas eventually became stakes in either 1869 or 1877. Contrary to past assumptions, there is no indication that the valleys surrounding the Wasatch Front other than Davis County (that is, Morgan, Summit, Wasatch, Tooele) were ever considered part of the Salt Lake Stake.32 Instead, the presiding bishop of each directly worked with the First Presidency and the Presiding Bishop, as stake presidents did.

Morgan County (1860–1877). The Weber Valley was first settled in 1859 in two clusters: one around Charles Peterson’s ranch in the north (Weber City, now Peterson) and one around Thomas J. Thurston’s ranch in the south (Littleton/Milton). The valley appears to have initially been under the administration of Lorin Farr and the stake in Ogden.33 In 1860, Thurston was made the bishop over the entire valley,34 but the ward was divided in 1861 or 1862 when Farr made both Peterson and Thurston bishops over the settlements around them.35 By 1865, the two wards consisted of at least ten small settlements.

Wasatch County (1860–1877). The earliest settlement of the Provo Valley (Heber City) in 1858 and 1859 was under the direction of Provo Stake President James C. Snow, but when a dual-leader regional branch (including the entire valley) was created in November 1860,36 it does not seem to have been connected to anywhere else and may have operated almost like a congregational stake (although it is not called one and did not have a high council). After President William Wall resigned in 1864, Bishop Joseph S. Murdock presided over the whole valley,37 even when it was made part of the regional bishopric of William W. Cluff in February 1865.38

Millard County (1861–1869). Since 1851, Fillmore had been an isolated ward or branch or congregational stake (see previous articles in this series for the uses of these terms) with a bishop and usually a president, having no regional administration for it and its surrounding village branches.39 Then in April 1861, Brigham Young called Thomas Callister “to be the bishop in Fillmore . . . and also to be the Presiding Bishop over all the other wards or settlements in Millard County.”40 Bishop Callister traveled among these settlements, calling new leaders and settling disputes (much like a stake president) until he became the first president of the stake when it was organized in 1869.41

The Weber Super-Ward

Then a much more radical event occurred. In August 1863, Brigham Young and several other leaders took a trip north to hold stake conferences.42 On the 25th, President Young surprised the congregation in Ogden when he “dismissed all the bishops.”43 In a follow-up letter to stake members a month later, he explained further: “We have appointed Br. Chauncey W. West to act as Bishop for all the settlements and inhabitants in Weber County, and that we hereby release all other Bishops in said county . . . the inhabitants in each settlement are hereby permitted to elect a president, which Presidents will superintend Church affairs in their several localities and will assist Bishop West in his Bishopric.”44

Each ward was then reorganized as a district during the autumn.45 The exact reason for this mass demotion is difficult to ascertain without the exact text of Brigham Young’s talk.46 It could be that there was some lingering apostasy and other scars from the movement of Joseph Morris the previous two years, which had been more disruptive in Weber County than elsewhere.47 One evidence of this disruption is that over the next few months, the first missionaries from the New Organization of Joseph Smith III (later the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, now Community of Christ) came to the Ogden area and found more sympathetic listeners than elsewhere.48 However, these missionaries did not arrive in Great Salt Lake City until August 1149 and could not have had an effect on this stake within two weeks. Neither could it have been Bishop West instigating a power grab, as he had been on a mission to England and did not return until August 27.50

In his sermon on the 25th, Brigham Young admonished the Ogden members to stop selling grain at low prices,51 but he had just given the same sermon in Logan and Brigham City without demoting them to districts. He also “chastised the bishops for neglect of duty, and for doing things they had not been commanded to do.”52 This appears to be the most likely cause. Extant records do not detail what the bishops had been doing while Presiding Bishop West was overseas, but it must have been quite problematic and pervasive. The September letter suggests it may have involved the mismanagement of tithing (a common reason for bishops getting in trouble).

Occasionally, Bishop West’s new organization is called the Weber County Ward,53 and for all practical purposes, the districts were essentially dependent branches of the county ward. They were called “branches” occasionally,54 and a few were called “wards” once or twice.55 New districts were formed as the settlement expanded. In 1877, this larger organization disappeared, and all the districts were reorganized as wards.

The Mission of A. Milton Musser

The next round of regional presiding bishops in 1864–1865 came in a variety of forms but largely reflected the work of one man: Amos Milton Musser. He began his church service as a clerk in the General Tithing Office until he was called as a “traveling bishop” in 1858 (although he was never ordained a bishop but remained a seventy).56 His primary responsibility was to tour the territory, assisting local bishops to ensure the tithing system worked efficiently and honestly, especially in transferring donated goods to and from the General Tithing Office. He soon became something of a field agent for the First Presidency, gathering information on how the stakes and wards functioned and implementing changes as directed by Brigham Young.

Although the evidence is only indirect, the result of this factfinding mission was that some bishops and their wards were working out better than others. In a few extreme cases, members had accused their bishop of mismanaging tithing, with a couple bishops being removed as a result.57

In 1864, President Young put Musser in charge of an initiative to give some bishops (likely the most trusted and reliable) regional authority over multiple congregations, a procedure Young and Musser often referred to as “blending.”58 In June 1864, Musser made his first trip to Grantsville, which had been without a leader after Bishop William G. Young resettled in Bear Lake Valley (becoming the first bishop of St. Charles).59 Instead of calling a new bishop, Musser appointed the previous bishop as a branch president under Tooele Bishop Rowberry. Reading a letter from Brigham Young granting Rowberry authority over all the branches in the county (despite a very similar letter in 1853 discussed in part 2 when he was presiding over only two or three settlements),60 Musser said that President Young was “lessening the number of bishops where he can find good presiding bishops.”

At this time, emigrants from Sanpete County formed the first settlements in Sevier County, under the regional apostolate of Orson Hyde. Thus, it made sense for Hyde, not Musser, to implement the First Presidency’s directive for Nelson Higgins “to officiate as Bishop in Richfield and the region adjacent.”61 Higgins served in this position until the area was abandoned during the Black Hawk War in the summer of 1867.62

Musser continued his work elsewhere. In October 1864, John Murdock was ordained in Salt Lake City “to preside in Beaver City and throughout Beaver County,”63 but it was Musser who brought Murdock to Beaver in November and had him sustained by the community.64 At this point, Millard and Beaver Counties had very similar organizational structures.

Brigham Young put Musser to work at the beginning of 1865 with instructions for several blendings of wards along the Wasatch Front, likely wards that were small or struggling.65 He attached Santaquin to the Payson bishop on January 3rd;66 Cedar Valley to Lehi and Alpine to American Fork on January 25; Little Cottonwood (now Cottonwood Heights) to South Cottonwood (now Murray) on January 26;67 and reattached Herriman to West Jordan on February 12.68 All these dependent wards remained as separate congregations under the neighboring presiding bishop through 1873 and likely until the 1877 Reorganization, although some of them had their own bishop (usually only acting) by 1867.69

President Young then introduced yet another wrinkle into the presiding bishop concept on January 26, 1865: He called William W. Cluff to serve as the bishop over all of Summit, Morgan, and Wasatch Counties (some of which already had their own regional presiding bishops), creating a unique three-tier system.70 Again it was A. Milton Musser who escorted Cluff to be sustained by his new dispersed flock, first in Heber City on February 2,71 then Peoa and the rest of Summit County on the 5th and 6th.72 Unlike other regional bishops, his jurisdiction was only regional, as his home ward of Coalville retained its bishop.73 Cluff presided over this expansive jurisdiction until a new independent presiding bishop was called for the four branches in Wasatch County in 186774 and southern Summit County received its own presiding bishop in 1870.75 Cluff retained authority over Morgan and northern Summit Counties until 1877 when he became president of the new Summit Stake.

Musser intended to continue his work after the flurry of activity in early 1865. After further visits around the territory, in October, he proposed several more blendings, including presiding bishops over all the Southern Mission, over Sevier and Piute County, and over Sanpete County.76 However, none of these were implemented as such, and in 1866 he shifted his focus to building the Deseret Telegraph network.

In the Southern Mission, the trend continued in yet another form of regional bishopric. Here, as in Sevier County, Erastus Snow had the authority as an Apostle to enact organizational changes himself. Snow’s mission covered a much larger area than the other stakes, and limited water sources in the desert led to the creation of dozens of tiny settlements that were often too small to support a full ward but could function in some form (see fig. 6). Here it became common to follow the model of West Jordan Ward (see part 3) by giving bishops of the larger settlements (regional wards) authority over surrounding smaller places. These alignments would often change as settlements grew, multiplied, or were abandoned.

The regional wards around St. George included:77 Toquerville Ward (two to four dependent branches, March 1862–May 1868); Grafton/Rockville Ward (three to six branches, March 1862–1871); Panaca Ward (three branches, August 1865–July 1867); the Muddy River Valley centered on St. Thomas (August 1865–1870);78 Pine Valley Ward (four branches, May 1866);79 Virgin City (three branches, May 1868);80 Hebron Ward (two branches, November 1869–1877); Pinto Ward (three settlements, November 1869–1877); Long Valley Ward (two to four settlements, 1865–1866, May 1871–1877);81 and Kanab Ward (three settlements, August 1875).82

City-wide Presiding Bishops

One more form of presiding bishop occurred in some of the larger cities. As in Great Salt Lake City, neighborhood wards were created in Provo (four in 1852);83 Ogden (three in 1856);84 Logan (four in 1861, a fifth in 1865);85 and St. George (four in 1862).86 All of them started out as semi-organized wards that met collectively on Sundays. In fact, the Logan wards were initially little more than teachers’ quorum districts led by presidents, not bishops.87 By 1875, all of them had evolved into separate wards, but most took longer than in Salt Lake.

For much of the time in Provo, Ogden, and St. George, one of the ward bishops also served as a presiding bishop over the others, at least for collecting tithing. Logan had a separate presiding bishop.88 In Cache and Weber County, the city presiding bishop was also responsible for the entire stake. But in St. George they appear to have only had jurisdiction over the city wards, and they were often collectively referred to as a single ward.89 In fact, the St. George Ward bishop usually had different counselors than he did in his neighborhood ward, so they were clearly distinct organizations. Isolated dependent branches were sometimes attached to the St. George Ward collectively.90

Things were more unorthodox in Provo during this period. In 1859, Stake President James C. Snow was not available to serve (most likely, he was in hiding to avoid arrest for plural marriage),91 and Silas Smith (who for the first time was not one of the city ward bishops) was made the presiding bishop and temporary acting president.92 This situation turned out to not be so temporary; Snow never returned to his presidency even when he returned to public view, and Bishop Smith was followed by William M. Miller in 1860 and Abraham O. Smoot in 1868.93 They had the same position, primarily as presiding bishop of Provo and also acting as president of the stake (or at least, president of the high council) in a secondary role. All three were almost always referred to as “bishop,” although Bishop Smoot was occasionally called “president” starting in mid-1870.94 None of these three bishops appear to have exerted much authority beyond Provo, although they may have had it in theory.

This wave of regional/presiding bishops may seem like the emergence of a new consistent practice, but there are a number of differences in these various implementations. In some cases, the individual wards and branches still retained their distinctness as a separate organization, with the presiding bishop in a secondary specialized role, primarily to organize the transfer of tithing money and goods and to advise ward bishops. This was the case in the more mature stakes such as Salt Lake, Utah County, and Sanpete. At the other extreme were dependent wards and branches, such as in West Jordan and St. George Stake, where the smaller congregation was only partially or simply organized and depended on the bishop for much of their operation. The Weber County Ward was somewhere in the middle. Their districts functioned day to day like regular wards or branches but were structurally very much attached to the presiding bishop, who had a broader role than other presiding bishops.95 Between these examples lay varying degrees of autonomy and dependence that (yet again) make it difficult to clearly categorize congregations.

A Wave of New Stakes

By the late 1860s, several outlying settlement areas were maturing, leading to five of the regional bishoprics and apostolates being reorganized as full stakes in late 1868 and 1869. This is likely evidence of the stake gaining acceptance as the ideal form of regional administration, although it was not universal until 1877.

Brigham Young personally organized the first new stake at Nephi on September 20, 1868, with Jacob G. Bigler as stake president.96 The following spring, Apostles George A. Smith, Erastus Snow, and Joseph F. Smith organized a stake in Fillmore on March 9, with Thomas Callister as stake president,97 and a stake in Beaver on March 12, with John R. Murdock as stake president.98

These three stakes had a lot in common. All three had been regional bishoprics, and the three new presidents had been the presiding bishops. All three were very small: Juab County had one ward and two branches; Beaver had four wards, with the city being divided in two at this time; and Millard County had three wards (two new) and three branches (fig. 4). Meanwhile, there were other areas with more members and more settlements that were not reorganized. Why was this? A likely reason was that these were upgraded to stakes—not because of their size and complexity but because their leaders were seen as more ready to be trusted with the added responsibility.

The next two stakes organized in 1869 were in larger settlement areas that had been functioning as apostolates. Bear Lake Stake was organized June 19, 1869, with David P. Kimball as stake president.99 St. George Stake was the last of this wave of stakes, organized November 5, 1869, with Joseph W. Young as stake president.100 As mentioned, the Southern Mission had a high council since 1864 under the apostolate of Erastus Snow, who continued to oversee the mission after 1869.

A Little of Everything in the 1870s

The three trends that dominated the 1860s (apostolates, regional bishoprics, stakes) continued through the early 1870s. Rather than any new initiatives, the significant organizational events of these years were usually implementing various existing practices in reaction to events on the ground (especially deaths).

Cache County. After Apostle Ezra T. Benson died suddenly in September 1869,101 Presiding Bishop Peter Maughan acted as president (as Abraham O. Smoot was doing at this time in Provo) until he died in 1871.102 On August 31 or September 1, 1872, the apostolate returned when Brigham Young Jr. was sustained as “President of Cache Valley and the Bear River and Soda Springs country.”103 Subsequently, he was occasionally called the stake president,104 although there is no documentation that a full stake organization (including a high council) ever functioned during his tenure.

Weber County. The stake in Ogden became an apostolate stake when Franklin D. Richards arrived in 1869. Initially, he was there to serve as county judge,105 but in March, Brigham Young gave him authority to “see to all tithing matters” and to “take a general supervision” of Weber County.106 In a two-tier system similar to Bear Lake and St. George, Elder Richards and Stake President Lorin Farr worked together for over a year, but Richards gradually took on more of the primary role.107 By the time Farr left on a mission in November 1870,108 Richards was essentially the sole presiding authority, and by 1874, he was referred to as “President of the [Weber/Ogden] Stake.”109 This was very similar to what had happened in Sanpete County a decade earlier, except that other stake officers, including the high council, continued to function as normal.

Juab County. During the 1870s, Nephi had one of the most unique and simplest leadership situations. After twenty years of off-and-on feuding between the various leaders,110 in November 1871, Joel Grover was called and ordained to simultaneously serve as the Nephi Ward bishop, the Juab stake president, and the Juab stake presiding bishop, which would continue until 1877.111

Sevier County. In 1870, Brigham Young gave William Morrison, the former county judge, permission to lead previous settlers back to the Sevier Valley,112 which Morrison interpreted as a call to preside there.113 However, upon returning, Nelson Higgins reclaimed the regional presiding bishopric he had held previously.114 The ensuing dispute between them was only resolved when Brigham Young called his son Joseph A. Young in May 1872 as “president of the settlements in Sevier Valley”115 as far south as Kanab.116 At first, he presided over the region single-handedly, like an apostolate rather than a stake.117 A stake was fully organized in May 1874 with Young as president.118 After he died suddenly in August 1875,119 his counselors led the stake in a semi-organized state until the 1877 Reorganization.120

St. George. When St. George Stake President Joseph W. Young died in 1873 while Erastus Snow was on a mission, his counselors took charge.121 Brigham Young’s son John Willard Young, an Apostle outside the Quorum of the Twelve and a member of the First Presidency, was called later that year to serve as both mission and stake president. But it does not appear that John Young did much, arriving from New York months after his call and returning east within a few months.122 After Erastus Snow returned in 1875, the mission returned to its pre-1869 semi-organized state as an apostolate, although it was occasionally still called a stake.123

Bear Lake Stake. The Bear Lake Stake also had an issue in 1873 when its stake president, David P. Kimball (son of Heber C. Kimball), was brought before a council of Brigham Young and other visiting Church leaders for an unstated issue in August. Although they considered removing him from the presidency, in the end they chose to retain him “on trial,” and he was sustained as president at the next stake conference in November.124 However, by 1874 he had left the area, and Charles C. Rich again served as de facto stake president, returning the region to an apostolate.125

Sanpete County. After several years leading on his own, Orson Hyde somewhat renewed the stake form in Sanpete County. In March 1870, a high council was reorganized for the south half of the county, although little evidence of its long-term activity has survived.126 In May 1874, as the United Order was being organized across the county (with Hyde as president), a new stake was organized “in the northern part of Sanpete County” with William M. Seely as stake president.127 However, this new stake is never mentioned again. Meanwhile, a stake president at Manti is not mentioned during this time.

Millard County. Stake President Thomas Callister was called on a mission in 1875, asking Fillmore Bishop Edward Partridge Jr. (who does not appear to have been the stake presiding bishop) to act in his absence.128 This temporary presiding bishop/acting president situation was similar to what had occurred earlier in Cache and Utah Counties.

Panguitch. The status of the isolated settlement of Panguitch during its early history is unclear to us today, and possibly it was unclear to its residents at the time. From the time the first settlers arrived at the upper Sevier River in 1864 until they abandoned it in 1866 and resettled in 1871, Panguitch was visited once or twice by Erastus Snow from St. George. Snow does not seem to have exerted a great deal of authority there.129 From 1872 to 1875, it was designated as part of the jurisdiction of Joseph A. Young in Richfield,130 but usually it seems that Panguitch functioned on its own. It had a bishop starting in 1871 but was never called a ward.131 By early 1877, the small new settlements at Hillsdale (now Red Canyon), Mammoth (Hatch), Asay, Clifton (Cannonville), and Escalante appear to be dependent branches of Panguitch,132 so it is as much a regional bishopric as anything else (see part 3, fig. 3).

Thus, by the beginning of 1877, several stakes (Bear Lake, Cache, Sanpete, Sevier, Millard, St. George) were in a state of disrepair, operating in a less organized state than they had previously been. In fact, in many Church chronologies, the earlier organizations of some of these have been forgotten or minimized, and their 1877 reorganizations are often listed as the original organization of the stake.133

At the same time, dozens of wards were in similar disrepair, with acting bishops who had never been officially ordained with counselors. A few, such as Liberty in Bear Lake Stake and Panaca in St. George Stake, had been in this state since the late 1860s.134 Dozens more had previously been led by acting bishops for several years before being ordained.135

It is unclear why this prolonged acting status was so common. It was not for a lack of available leadership with the authority to ordain bishops; many of these wards had nearby resident Apostles. In fact, in a few cases, Brigham Young himself appointed someone as acting bishop or visited an acting bishop without ordaining him.136 In some cases, acting bishops may have been ordained with no surviving documentation. In many cases, an acting bishop was seen as temporary. For example, when the ordained bishop was called on a mission (a common occurrence) or was ill, he often put a counselor in charge; occasionally, the bishop never returned to service. Other acting bishop appointments may have been probationary, with Church leaders delaying ordination until confident in the acting bishop’s ability—a practice most common in small wards with few qualified priesthood holders.

The United Order

In 1874, all this variety and complexity of local administration was further compounded by the addition of another layer of organization: The United Order was instituted across the territory, starting with St. George in February.137 During the year, visiting Apostles reorganized each stake and ward as “branch[es] of the United Order” with a parallel corporate-like structure of a president, vice president(s), secretary, and board of directors.138 The president was almost always the bishop or stake president, and the vice presidents were his counselors.

In fact, in the rare cases when the Order and ecclesiastical leaders were different, conflict usually arose as in the dual-leader wards in previous decades. For example, in Kanab, John R. Young was called by Brigham Young to lead the United Order, not Bishop Levi Stewart. Almost immediately, questions arose over which leader was supposed to supervise the other. Members sided with one leader or the other. This came to a head when letters to Brigham Young questioned whether the United Order was still sanctioned by the prophet.139 Young solved the problem by sending L. John Nuttall in August 1875 to replace both men.140

In some areas, the Order and its organization had little effect on the day-to-day operation of the wards and quickly dissipated, especially in the Salt Lake Valley. However, in other areas, especially in Brigham City and the St. George Stake, the regular ward and stake organization was subsumed for months while activity was focused on instituting the Order. Traditional meetings of the bishopric, high council, and priesthood quorums were replaced by board and subcommittee meetings.141 Within a year, the Orders had ceased to function in most wards, and even in the several that persisted for many years, the ecclesiastical organization was again operating separate from and parallel to the United Order organization by 1876.142

The Priesthood Reorganization of 1877

At the beginning of 1877, Brigham Young was in relatively poor health. As he prepared for the dedication of the St. George Temple, he was likely aware that he would soon leave the Church in the hands of the Twelve Apostles. The Church he led, with most of the members living in hundreds of settlements across Utah Territory, was organized in several different ways.143

• Five stakes were organized and operating much like a modern stake, with a presidency and high council. The only difference was the common but not universal presence of stake-level presiding bishops. These stakes were Salt Lake, Provo/Utah, Nephi/Juab, Beaver, and Parowan.
• Six stakes or counties were some form of apostolate, led by a resident Apostle with or without a high council or other elements of stake organization. These stakes were Bear Lake, Cache, Box Elder, Weber, Sanpete, and St. George.
• Two stakes were in a lapsed state without a president. These stakes were Sevier and Fillmore/Millard.
• Five counties or valleys were led by a presiding bishop alone. These stakes were Morgan, Tooele, Summit, Wasatch, and maybe Panguitch.

The variety had little to do with size. Beaver and Juab Stakes were organized but very small, while there were many more congregations in Tooele, Morgan, and Summit Counties with very little regional organization. It was also not a matter of age or maturity. Juab and Beaver Stakes were much younger than Sanpete and Weber but had a more modern form. Clearly, there was a need for standardization.

William Hartley gives a detailed account of the events of the Reorganization during 1877,144 but a summary and reappraisal here is useful in light of our other findings. The movement started when the St. George Temple was dedicated during April general conference in St. George.

The first documented mention of the plan was when Brigham Young announced it in meetings of the Twelve on March 30 and April 3, just before conference began. Unfortunately, we do not have a detailed record of what he said, but his son Brigham Jr. wrote, “Father proposed the Twelve spending their time this season in perfecting the organization of the Church in the various stakes of Zion.”145 Franklin D. Richards recorded, “The Twelve are to travel and organize Stakes of Zion.”146 Wilford Woodruff, the most prolific diarist of his day, only mentioned that the meeting occurred.147

Hartley acknowledges that very little has been documented about Brigham Young’s deliberations prior to this and any early rationale he developed for the reorganization.148 During the five days of public meetings in St. George, April 3–8 (including the temple dedication, general conference, and the St. George Stake organization), Young never mentions any reorganization plan or the issues that might justify such.149

In a meeting the day before general conference, a new St. George Stake presidency and new priesthood quorum presidencies were sustained with no fanfare.150 It likely seemed to the congregation as simply an overdue return to the stake’s well-organized period of the early 1870s, but this clearly set a crucial precedent for the rest of the territory. As they returned north after the close of conference, Brigham and the Twelve immediately began reorganizing other units. Then over the next five months, Brigham Young and other Church leaders traveled around the territory to organize the stakes and their wards and branches.151

• April 5: St. George Stake (with the First Presidency and eleven of the Twelve Apostles in attendance); President John D. T. McAllister;152 wards organized in subsequent meetings, total fourteen wards, twenty-three branches
• April 18: Kanab Stake (by Apostles Taylor, Pratt, L. Snow, and E. Snow);153 President L. John Nuttall (Kanab bishop); wards organized in subsequent meetings; six wards (four new), two branches
• April 18: Parowan Stake (by the First Presidency);154 reorganization deferred
• April 23: Panguitch Stake (by Apostles Taylor, Pratt, L. Snow, and E. Snow);155 President James Henrie; five wards (four new), two branches
• May 12: Salt Lake Stake (by First Presidency and seven Apostles);156 President Angus M. Cannon (existing); wards reorganized in subsequent meetings, thirty-five wards (ten new), three branches
• May 25: Cache Stake (by First Presidency and six Apostles);157 President Moses Thatcher; wards reorganized in subsequent meetings; twenty-three wards (three new), seven branches
• May 25: Weber Stake (by First Presidency and six Apostles);158 President David H. Peery. May 28: organized sixteen wards (all new, most from former districts, adding Ogden 4th Ward), two branches
• June 5: Utah Stake (by Presidents Brigham Young and John W. Young, and Apostles Taylor, E. Snow, Richards, and Cannon);159 President Abraham O. Smoot (existing); sixteen wards (three new), one branch
• June 16: Davis Stake (by Presidents Brigham Young and Cannon, and Apostle Taylor);160 President William R. Smith (bishop of Centerville); wards reorganized in subsequent meetings; eight wards (three new, including Bountiful divided into three wards)
• June 23–25: Tooele Stake (by Apostles Taylor, L. Snow, E. Snow, Richards, Cannon);161 Pres. Francis M. Lyman; six wards (all new), 2–4 branches
• July 1: Juab Stake (by Presidents Young and John W. Young, Apostles Hyde, E. Snow, Cannon, and Young);162 President George Teasdale; four wards total (three new, including Nephi divided into two)
• July 1: Morgan Stake (by Apostles L. Snow and Richards);163 President Willard G. Smith (bishop of Morgan); eight wards (seven new), three branches
• July 8–9: Summit Stake (by Apostles Taylor, L. Snow, and Richards);164 President William W. Cluff (presiding bishop); ten wards (eight new), one branch
• July 11: Circular of the First Presidency issued, documenting the reorganization policy165
• July 15: Sevier Stake (by Apostles Hyde and E. Snow);166 President Franklin Spencer (bishop of Salina); eleven wards (four new, including Richfield divided into two), two wards became dependent branches
• July 14–15: Wasatch Stake (by Apostles Taylor and Richards);167 President Abram Hatch (presiding bishop); six wards (all new), one branch
• July 22: Millard Stake (by Apostles Woodruff and E. Snow);168 President Ira N. Hinckley; eight wards (five new, including Fillmore divided into two)
• July 25–26: Beaver Stake (by Apostles Woodruff and E. Snow);169 President John R. Murdock (existing); five wards (none new)
• July 29: Parowan Stake (by Apostles Woodruff and E. Snow); no permanent president sustained; seven wards (one new), two branches170
• August 5: Sanpete Stake (by First Presidency and Apostles Hyde and E. Snow);171 President Canute Peterson (bishop of Ephraim); eighteen wards (ten new, including Mt. Pleasant, Manti, and Ephraim divided into two)
• August 19: Box Elder Stake (by First Presidency and Apostles Taylor, Richards, Carrington, and L. Snow); President Oliver G. Snow; seventeen wards (thirteen new, including Brigham City divided into four), three branches172
• August 25–26: Bear Lake Stake (by Apostles Taylor, L. Snow, Richards, Carrington, and Rich); President William Budge (former presiding bishop); eighteen wards (one new, Paris 2nd Ward), five branches173
• August 29: Brigham Young’s death174

The first public hint of this broader initiative was in Parowan on April 18, where Brigham Young said, “We have begun at St. George to reorganize the people.”175 This meeting also held the first hint of general policy, as he mentioned in passing that there would be no presiding bishops in the stakes. On the same day in Kanab, Erastus Snow also introduced the coming initiative: “It seems to be the mind of President Young and the rest of us that the stakes of Zion be more thoroughly (and in some places new ones) organized. The people are increasing and spreading abroad on the right and on the left on the north and more especially on the south.”176 By the time of the Salt Lake conference in May, the plan was clearly a major public initiative. Elder George Q. Cannon mentions the “more thorough organization of the Church, which was about to be effected by the Apostles through the various stakes of Zion.”177

What were the most likely reasons for this major undertaking? In the July Circular of the First Presidency itself, there is a clear undercurrent that the added organization and better recordkeeping would make sure nobody is forgotten, “that every family, no matter how far removed from settlements, is recognized and numbered with the people of the nearest ward.”178

The best evidence of rationale for the Reorganization can be gleaned from the sermons given by the First Presidency and the Twelve in the reorganization conferences. These sermons followed several common themes: (1) the current variety of practices was messy and confusing; (2) the growth of the Church necessitated changes in policy and practice from time to time; (3) this reorganization was dictated by a prophet of God (some specifically mentioning a revelation); (4) the newly standardized practice was in accordance with scripture; and (5) the clearer organizations should enable members to be better disciples.

A good example was given by John Taylor at the Davis Stake organization in June:

Our President has been moved upon to call upon the Twelve to go through the Territory and attend to these matters, in accordance with a revelation which makes it the duty of the Twelve “to ordain and set in order all the [. . .] officers of the Church;”179 to see that the Church is “righted up” in all its various departments, and in the organization of its various quorums. . . . We have found more or less confusion among the churches wherever we have gone; and hence the wisdom manifested by the President in requesting a more perfect organization seems the more to be appreciated, because of the necessity that exists for improvement.180

It appears that some of the details gradually emerged over the next few months. This might explain why the official policy was not published until July, when the process was more than halfway completed.

Conclusion

The 1877 Reorganization did not set up an administration identical to that of today. Some practices would be phased out decades later, such as dependent branches, mission conferences, and having a separate stake presidency and high priest quorum presidency. However, the basic local administrative structure of bishop-led wards, presidency-led branches, stakes, and priesthood quorums has survived to the present. Even the sweeping changes of the Correlation Era of the 1960s and 1970s181 and the practices recently introduced during the presidency of Russell M. Nelson (such as ward ministering, two-hour Sunday meetings, disaffiliation from scouting, delegation from bishops to ward Relief Societies and elders’ quorums, a new youth program) have not been as fundamental.

The development of local administration prior to 1877 was not a simple linear advancement from novel, experimental forms in the early years directly to the mature form we see today. Among the earliest organizational structures were some that still exist (such as branches and bishops). New ideas were still being developed into the 1870s, and some wards and stakes backtracked from a modern form into something different.

Neither was the development a case of revelation gone awry, where revealed doctrine did not work in practice and had to be changed. Very few details of the policies before or after 1877 were ever claimed to be “ordained by God.” This includes the branch-stake continuum ideal that emerged in Kirtland and Nauvoo and gradually faded in Utah until it died in the 1860s. Both Joseph and Brigham portrayed the branch continuum as a logical application of scripture but did not directly claim divine approval of it. The revealed principles and offices found in the Doctrine and Covenants, especially those spelled out in sections 20 and 107, are as applicable to today’s post-1877 administrative structure as they were to the various pre-1877 structures.

We should not be surprised that practices in the Church have changed over time. Even though core doctrine should not change, and some of the application of doctrine as policy seems set in stone (the stone in this case being the 1877 Reorganization), policies and practices continue to change today. It is an unavoidable fact that as the Church has grown, as the world around it has changed, and as the members have varied in their ability to live the gospel, that gospel has been and will continue to be practiced in different ways. As Orson Pratt stated at the Cache Stake reorganization in May 1877, “To say that there will be a stated time, in the history of this Church, during its imperfections and weakness, when the organization will be perfect, and that there will be no further extension or addition to the organization, would be a mistake. Organization is to go on, step after step, from one degree to another, just as the people increase and grow in the knowledge of the principles and laws of the kingdom of God, and as their borders shall extend.”182

Ultimately, the organization of the Church should not be viewed as an end unto itself but rather as a means of organizing ministry efforts. At the Davis Stake organization in June 1877, Brigham Young answered why the quorums must be set in order, stating, “Paul says, ‘For the perfecting of the Saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.’ But whether this will be the result here I do not know. All I know is that it should be so, and if every one does his duty and lives his religion, it will be so.”183

Note: If you are interested in researching this era further, detailed organizational histories of each of the wards, branches, and stakes discussed in this series can be found at the MormonPlaces website: https://mormonplaces.byu.edu/. We welcome any corrections and sources you find in your own research. Also, we have published the research notes for this series, in the form of timelines for each stake with quotes and sources, on the site: https://mormonplaces.byu.edu/research.html.