Quinn's first volume of The Mormon Hierarchy (The Origins of Power, Signature, 1994) was a landmark in Mormon studies. This latest volume demonstrates the ways and methods by which the leadership maintains and applies its authority. Some believers may not be pleased with the portrait Quinn paints, but his documentation is so thorough and indisputable that few will be able to challenge his arguments. Some chapters are case studies in the rise to leadership of particular individuals, most notably Ezra Taft Benson (13th president/prophet of the church and Eisenhower's secretary of agriculture), and their employment of power. Other chapters look at the means by which power is exercised in governance. The biographical and chronological appendixes are worth the price of the book. Quinn, now an independent scholar, is unquestionably Mormonism's leading historian. A magisterial study; recommended for all libraries with collections in American history.?David S. Azzolina, Univ. of Pennsylvania Libs., Philadelphia
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
D. Michael Quinn takes a behind-the-scenes look at the hierarchy of the Mormon Church in his powerful new book, The Mormon Hierarchy: Extensions of Power. Quinn offers a glimpse of the power struggles that often characterize the elite group that leads the Church. In his investigations, he finds evidence of financial mismanagement and political corruption at the highest level of the Mormon hierarchy. Yet, Quinn also indicates that he is encouraged by the times that these leaders have pulled together when they have been convinced that God has spoken to them. Quinn's detective work makes for exciting reading. --Publishers Weekly
Extraordinary devotion to a research project begun thirty years ago has documented the workings of the Mormon church administration from its New York state beginnings in 1830 to the present. Quinn's first volume, Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power surveys the period to the arrival of the Mormons in Utah in 1847. This second volume, a magisterial compilation of information, is a history of Mormon church leadership from 1848 to November 1996. One should start at the back; first scan the 150-page chronology (Appendix 5), which outlines church positions taken in regard to social, ecclesiastical, political, and economic concerns of the western Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Then go to the beginning and peruse the narrative chapters, each of which grounds itself in the 1830-1847 period, without necessarily duplicating the first volume, and carries its topic forward to the present. Organized into sections, the book places its material in the larger context of social issues with specific emphasis on Mormon involvement. Conflict between the governing quorums as units of power, and between personalities of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve, The Council of Seventy and the expanding bureaucracy reveal the impossibilities inherent in the deceptive appearance of monolithic unanimity. Joined to an extraordinary degree by kinship and marriage, the Mormon hierarchy closed its ranks to democratic process without stilling internal disputes. Separate chapters look at policies regarding church finances, attitudes toward violence, the rule of the male priesthood, and involvement in politics. It documents the increasingly powerful role relatively few Mormons play in determining national policy. The research is so extensive that the text is less than half the book; no history speaks for itself without the aid of historians wiling to organize material in such manner as to give the past a voice. The strength of this volume lies in its ability to let events and policies juxtapose themselves with the traditional desire of the Mormon church to shape its history into an affirmative testimony of its divinity. When the bureaucrats speak and act, as Quinn has them so effectively documented, the secular side of Mormonism becomes available to Saint and gentile alike. Quinn's writing style is clear, graceful, and lucid; it relies heavily on colorful and descriptive quotations from its subjects to come to the heat of its matters. This book is the culmination of a distinguished scholar's work to the mid-point of his life. Part biography, part documentary, part social history, part statistics, and part interpretation, scholars seeking the extent of Mormon influence in American life cannot afford to ignore it. Michael Quinn has given us an understanding of Mormonism available in no other place. --Western Historical Quarterly, Valeen Tippetts Avery
The Mormon church today is led by an elite group of older men, nearly three-quarters of whom are related to current or past general church authorities. This dynastic hierarchy meets in private; neither its minutes nor the church's finances are available for public review. Members are reassured by public relations spokesmen that all is well and that harmony prevails among the brethren. But by interviewing former church aides, examining hundreds of diaries, and drawing from his own past experience as an insider within the Latter-day Saint historical department, Michael Quinn presents a fuller view. His extensive research documents how the governing apostles, seventies, and presiding bishops are strong-willed, independent men (much like the directors of a large corporation) who lobby their colleagues, forge alliances, out-maneuver opponents, and broker compromises. Quinn's The Mormon Hierarchy: Extensions Of Power reveals clandestine political activities, investigative and punitive actions by church security forces, personal "loans" from church coffers (later written off as bad debts), and other privileged power-vested activities. The Mormon Hierarchy considers the changing role and attitude of the leadership toward visionary experiences, the momentous events which have shaped quorum protocol and doctrine, and day-to-day bureaucratic intrigue from the time of Brigham Young to the dawn of the twenty-first century. --
Midwest Book ReviewThe Mormon church today is led by an elite group of older men, nearly three-quarters of whom are related to current or past general church authorities. This dynastic hierarchy meets in private; neither its minutes nor the church's finances are available for public review. Members are reassured by public relations spokesmen that all is well and that harmony prevails among the brethren. But by interviewing former church aides, examining hundreds of diaries, and drawing from his own past experience as an insider within the Latter-day Saint historical department, Michael Quinn presents a fuller view. His extensive research documents how the governing apostles, seventies, and presiding bishops are strong-willed, independent men (much like the directors of a large corporation) who lobby their colleagues, forge alliances, out-maneuver opponents, and broker compromises. Quinn's The Mormon Hierarchy: Extensions Of Power reveals clandestine political activities, investigative and punitive actions by church security forces, personal "loans" from church coffers (later written off as bad debts), and other privileged power-vested activities. The Mormon Hierarchy considers the changing role and attitude of the leadership toward visionary experiences, the momentous events which have shaped quorum protocol and doctrine, and day-to-day bureaucratic intrigue from the time of Brigham Young to the dawn of the twenty-first century. --
Midwest Book Review