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Show also proved unpopular with those Saints (often the leaders themselves) who held large estates : The economic order of Enoch's heavenly city was replaced in temporal Zion in 1838 by the 11 lesser law 11 of tithing, whereby members were obliged to turn over ten percent of their yearly production to the Church. 47 Brigham Young made several attempts to restore the Order, first in the mid-l850s and then again in the early 1870s. Both attempts were initially greeted with enthusiasm, but dissatisfaction triggered by the reluctance of many of the members to participate led to the failure of both of these consecration movements. The communitarian ideals of the Law of Consecration and Stewardship remained alive, however, and the tithing program itself was viewed as a temporary arrangement--a training period for preparing the Saints for the eventual reinstatement of the full United Order. As late as 1973, Marion G. Romney, a counselor to the Church President, told an interviewer: 11 ! think the United Order will be the last principle of the gospel we will learn to live and that doing so will bring in the millenium. 1148 The Vison of Enoch thus provided Zion with a distinctive economic order and the fact that it was never fully implemented does not diminish its symbolic power within the Church. The point worth stressing here is that communitarian thinking played an important role in defining the character of the emerging Mormon society. Despite their inability to implement a general social reorgan,~ tion along the lines outlined by the United Order, Mormons would continue to display a remarkable degree of group solidarity and collective behavior. Time and time again the Saints would marshall their financial and human resources for strong and effective group action. The overland migration from Illinois, the 47 |
