page_title: Edmunds Act
section_title: Convictions
hierarchical_section_title: Edmunds Act / Convictions
caption_attribution_description: English: Portrait of Mormon polygamists in prison, at the Utah Penitentiary, including: George Q. Cannon (1827-1901), an Apostle for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Niels Jensen Aagard (1835-1892) sitting in the front middle without prison stripes Elijah Funk Sheets (1821-1904) Lorenzo Argyle (1852-1940) Winslow Farr (1837-1913) Pleasant Green Taylor (1827-1917) James Campbell Hamilton (1846-1920) Abraham Alonzo Kimball (1846-1889) Levi James Taylor (1851-1935) John Jardine (1830-1903) Herman Frederick Ferdinand Thorup(1849-1929) Far Right, not in Striped Suit
context_page_description: The Edmunds Act, also known as the Edmunds Anti-Polygamy Act of 1882, is a United States federal statute, signed into law on March 23, 1882 by president Chester A. Arthur, declaring polygamy a felony in federal territories. The act is named for U.S. Senator George F. Edmunds of Vermont. The Edmunds Act also prohibited "bigamous" or "unlawful cohabitation", thus removing the need to prove that actual marriages had occurred. The act not only reinforced the 1862 Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act but it also made the offense of unlawful cohabitation much easier to prove than polygamy misdemeanor and made it illegal for polygamists or cohabitants to vote, hold public office, or serve on juries in federal territories.
  A claim was made that the law violated the constitutional prohibition on ex post facto laws; that is, polygamists were charged for polygamist marriages solemnized before passage of the statute. A challenge to the statute was framed on these and other grounds. The Supreme Court ruled, in Murphy v. Ramsey, 114 U.S. 15, that the statute was not ex post facto because convicts were charged for their continued cohabitation, not for the prior illegal marriage.
context_section_description: More than 1,300 men were imprisoned under the terms of the Edmunds Act. It appears that women were not prosecuted, being seen as victims of the practice and not willing participants, although a number refused to testify against their husbands and some were jailed for their refusal.
  Rudger Clawson — August 1882 — a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles who was the first person convicted. He was pardoned by President Grover Cleveland mere months before his sentence was going to expire.
  William J. Flake — 1883 — one of the founders of Snowflake, Arizona, who married his second wife in 1868. Was imprisoned in the Yuma Territorial Prison in 1883. After his release, when asked which of his wives he was going to give up, he replied, "Neither. I married both in good faith and intended to support both of them." As he had already served his sentence, he could not be retried on the same charges.
  Angus M. Cannon — 1885 — a Stake President, member of the Council of Fifty and younger brother of Apostle George Q. Cannon. Cannon was sentenced to six months' imprisonment and a $900 fine. Cannon was the appellant in the case of Cannon v. United States, which was decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1885. Cannon's appeal was on the grounds that he had immediately ceased having sexual relations with the two wives he was accused of cohabiting with after polygamy was criminalized. The Court rejected Cannon's argument, holding that "[c]ompacts for sexual non-intercourse, easily made and easily broken, when the prior marriage relations continue to exist, with the occupation of the same house and table and the keeping up of the same family unity, is not a lawful substitute for the monogamous family which alone the statute tolerates."
  John Sharp — 1885 — a Bishop, member of the Council of Fifty, territorial chairman of the People's Party, director for the Union Pacific Railroad, Zion's Cooperative Mercantile Institution, Deseret Telegraph, and Deseret National Bank. Sharp initially pleaded not guilty, but withdrew his plea and pleaded guilty to the charge. He was fined $300 and court costs. As a result of pleading guilty, rather than plead not guilty as other LDS Church leaders had done, Sharp was asked by the stake high council and the First Presidency to resign as bishop of the Salt Lake Twentieth Ward, which he did on 3 November 1885. The New York Times criticised the church's removal of Sharp and suggested that it "reveals again the stubborn character of the Mormons' opposition to the law".
  Lorenzo Snow — 1885 — an Apostle of the church at the time. In late 1885, Snow was indicted by a federal grand jury for three counts of unlawful cohabitation.  According to his indictments, Snow had lived with more than one woman for three years.  The jury delivered one indictment for each of these years, and Snow was convicted on each count.  After conviction he filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the federal district court which convicted him.  The petition was denied, but federal law guaranteed him an appeal to the United States Supreme Court.  In Ex Parte Snow the Supreme Court invalidated Snow's second and third convictions for unlawful cohabitation.  It found that unlawful cohabitation was a "continuing offense," and thus that Snow was at most guilty of one such offense for cohabiting continuously with more than one woman for three years. Snow became President of the LDS Church in 1898.
  Abraham H. Cannon — 1886 — a member of the First Council of the Seventy of the Church and son of Apostle George Q. Cannon. Cannon was convicted of unlawful cohabitation in 1886 and sentenced to six months' imprisonment, which he served in full. In 1889 he became an Apostle of the LDS Church.
  David John — 1887 — Provo stakeholder and Vice President of BYU Board of Trustees. John married a second wife, Jane Cree, in 1865. He had nine children with Mary and 11 children with Jane. In 1887 he spent time in prison for violating the Edmunds Act.
  George Q. Cannon — 1888 — an Apostle of the church and former non-voting delegate for the Utah Territory i
caption: Portrait of polygamists in prison, at the Utah Penitentiary, including George Q. Cannon in 1889, arrested under the Edmunds Act.
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