It's A Felony, But Polygamy Isn't Prosecuted In Arizona
 
By Tim Molloy
The Associated Press
 
PHOENIX (AP) - Gov. Jane Hull says polygamy is illegal. So does the state constitution. But that doesn't mean Mrs. Hull is doing anything to stop men from taking multiple wives in Arizona - or that she can.

None of Arizona's elected officials have done much of anything about polygamy laws since 1953, when a midnight raid on the tiny polygamist community of Short Creek turned voters against Governor Howard Pyle.

Arizonans were shocked at the sight of hundreds of children being taken from their families in the night and dozens of men dragged off to Kingman on charges ranging from bigamy to statutory rape. Pyle said the raid cost him his 1954 bid for re-election.

Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt reopened the polygamy debate last month when he said it might be legal under the First Amendment's guarantee of religious freedom. He quickly backtracked from that and said that polygamy was in fact illegal but that it would be as impossible to prosecute as sodomy or cohabitation, which are also crimes in Utah and Arizona.

He was responding to a Utah case in which a man was accused of whipping his 16-year-old daughter because she refused to become the 15th wife of her uncle.

There are an estimated 30,000 polygamists in the West, most of whom live in Utah. Most belong to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, an offshoot of the mainstream Mormon church disowned by mainstream Mormons a century ago.

Arizona's largest polygamist enclave is the modern-day Short Creek. The Arizona Strip town on the Arizona-Utah state line changed its name to Colorado City after the raid.

About 5,000 people live there, although not all are polygamists. Because most polygamists are intensely private about their unusual lifestyle, they're hard to count. Mayor Dan Barlow declines to try.

Opponents of polygamy say state governments have ignored polygamists for too long.

"It's male patriarchy to the extreme," said Vicky Prunty, a spokeswoman for the Salt Lake City-based Tapestry of Polygamy.

She and the other members of the group are women who have left polygamist marriages and now say the practice exploits women and forces young girls to marry.

Mohave County Attorney Bill Ekstrom says he hasn't prosecuted any polygamists since he took office in 1979 because it would be nearly impossible to win a conviction against consenting adults for the lifestyle they've chosen.

"We haven't had any cases referred to us that involved exploitation of minors or involuntary relationships or things that smack of kidnapping or abuse," he said. "These are adults and I just view it that way."

Mrs. Hull said in a statement to The Associated Press that polygamy is illegal and should be prosecuted by local authorities.

Francie Noyes, a spokeswoman for the governor, said Mrs. Hull believes the Colorado City polygamists are violating the law. But she said the state won't do anything to try to enforce the law because Ekstrom's office has jurisdiction.

"We're not going to get into some dispute with him on this," said Noyes. "He does his job and the governor does hers."

University of Arizona political science professor Peter Goudinoff says polygamy is an ugly issue for politicians because many people still associate it with Mormonism, even though the mainstream church broke with the practice in 1890.

"I think the problem would be that you'd be accused of Mormon-bashing if you brought it up," said Goudinoff, former Democratic minority whip of the state Senate. "You don't want to offend anybody."

Ekstrom says public opinion has nothing to do with his decision not to prosecute. He says one problem with trying to win a prosecution is that while the state Constitution bars polygamy, state statues do not. It's the same situation in Utah.

The state has a statute against bigamy, or multiple marriages, but Ekstrom says it doesn't apply. The reason is that polygamists only register their first marriage with the state. The others are arranged through the church, he said.
 
The Associated Press
Originally published August 12, 1998
 
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