How an Obscure Mormon Offshoot Group Made Utah LGBT History
If you were to ask somebody to name what comes to mind when they think of the Mormons you’d probably get one of three answers: polygamy, sacred undergarments, or staunch anti-LGBT stances. The latter is a fundamental doctrinal tenet of the modern church. Not only are anti-LGBT teachings constantly repeated by LDS leaders, they have shaped Utah into a state that is not just unwelcoming to the LGBT community, but one that is actively hostile. It might be surprising then that a Mormon faction is directly responsible for a key achievement in Utah LGBT history. The faction in question isn’t The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, nor is it one of the next smaller groups like the Community of Christ or FLDS. It’s a small, obscure faction headquartered in a small town on the Utah-Arizona border.
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Alex Joseph was not born into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints but converted when he was 29. It only took him a few years to dive into the original teachings of the church and decide that he wanted to practice polygamy himself. The Mormon church, having disavowed polygamist marriages at the turn of the century, was not welcoming to his ideals. Joseph left the church and joined the Apostolic United Brethren, the polygamist group popularized by the TLC reality show Sister Wives. The AUB was a better fit for him, but gradually the centralized leadership of the group chafed. Mormon polygamist outfits rigidly maintain a priesthood hierarchy, with the men in charge approving the marriages themselves. You can have multiple wives, but only with the permission of your priesthood leaders.
Joseph’s rebellious streak came to a head when he successfully convinced four University of Montana students to marry him. The families of these women were aghast and complained to Rulon Allred, the head of the AUB. While the polygamy itself was not an issue, Joseph had taken his four wives without seeking permission from Allred. Joseph was unrepentant, leaving Allred with no choice but to kick the rebel out of his church.
Now set free to practice polygamy however he wanted, Joseph founded a new church: The Church of Jesus Christ in Solemn Assembly. In Mormon belief, solemn assemblies are special meetings that require church members to bring a higher level of spirituality to the proceedings. The first was held in 1836 when Joseph Smith dedicated the first LDS temple. Since then, they have been used for every subsequent temple dedication and the ascension of new Mormon prophets, the last one being held in 2018 to sustain Russell M. Nelson as the new president and prophet of the church. Alex Joseph’s church was then a perpetual sacred meeting, implying that all of his followers were required to have an always-on elevated sense of purpose and dedication to the cause. But despite the lofty name, Joseph later admitted that he organized the church as a tax dodge.
Though his core organization may have had less-than-sacred purposes, he was not messing around when it came to his political beliefs. As history has shown time and again, the political kingdom of God has been a focus of Mormonism since the very beginning, with the Book of Mormon declaring the divine destiny of the United States as well as assigning heavenly guidance to the actions of Christopher Columbus and George Washington. During his Nauvoo era Joseph Smith was preoccupied with taking his theology into the political arena, running for president and organizing Nauvoo along the theocratic lines. Like his predecessor, Alex Joseph had similar goals. On the vernal equinox (an important date in LDS theology, for the one in 1823 was when the Angel Moroni directed Joseph Smith to the hill under which the Book of Mormon was buried) he founded the questionably named Confederate Nations of Israel, a religio-political project based on the Joseph Smith’s Council of Fifty.
Unlike the other two numerically themed Mormon governing bodies, the Council of Fifty was intended as the ruling party for Joseph Smith’s political project, the founding of what he called a “theodemocracy.” Somehow considered different from a normal theocracy, the theodemocracy would be a republican government with Christ, acting as a political king, at the head. Or — in the interim before Christ’s Second Coming - Christ’s chosen prophet would be in charge. In the 19th century, it was Joseph Smith. In the 20th, it would be Alex Joseph.
Running your own experimental government doesn’t work if you have to contend with the laws of locals that might not be sold on your program. Joseph Smith had quickly established his church as the ruling government body of Nauvoo, with the influx of Mormon converts rapidly shifting the demographics in his favor. Alex Joseph needed his Nauvoo.
Fortunately, he already knew a spot, one that was basically uninhabited. Joseph had spent a short stint as a flotilla commander at Lake Powell, and saw firsthand how isolated the desert on the Arizona-Utah border could be. After leaving the AUB compound, Alex Joseph and his nascent church moved into the middle of the desert outside Kanab, declared homesteading rights, and prepared to bring about the kingdom of God.
There was one big problem. While the original Mormon pioneers had just settled wherever they wanted in Utah — regardless of who actually lived there — Alex Joseph was about a century too late for homesteading. The Utah government had turned from encroachers to the law of the land, and they had strict rules about what could and could not be counted as human settlement.
Alex Joseph didn’t see things the same way. When the government showed up, demanding that the polygamous group vacate the public lands, Alex Joseph dug his feet in. A standoff ensued that gained international coverage. Libertarian agitators joined Joseph to protest… well… the government, generally. Joseph believed that the press attention stopped the Utah government from violently overwhelming his group. But, despite all the harsh words and threats, Alex Joseph stood down.
Not far from Kanab stood Glen Canyon City, an unincorporated community of some abandoned trailers and shanties left over from the production of the 1965 Jesus biopic The Greatest Story Ever Told. The desert around Lake Powell had stood in for ancient Galilee and when production ended the crew left behind their temporary structures. Before Alex Joseph moved his group to the area there was little besides these structures, some old retired construction workers, and a handful of former prostitutes. In came the polygamists.
The Confederate Nations of Israel went about transforming Glen Canyon City into the future kingdom of God. Out went the name, replaced with Big Water, a name chosen because Alex Joseph thought it sounded vaguely Native American. To one of Joseph’s wives, the name brought to mind decidedly gothic imagery:
It bespeaks the element most valuable in a desert place: water, which in abundance spells wealth, contentment, health. Big Water most fundamentally reminds me of mortality, the experiment in living, the Great Abyss into which we are cast to sink or swim.
Of course, Alex Joseph was elected mayor, but he was very clear that anybody was welcome in Big Water — polygamist or not. The retirees could stay, and one of the former prostitutes was appointed Chief Justice. Dirt streets were laid down, each bearing a name from the early American Revolution: Dry Powder, Lexington, Old North Church, etc.
Steeped in the mythologized Revolution and his libertarian ideals, Joseph set about creating the political kingdom of God in the only way that made sense to him. All taxes in the city were abolished. While he had run as a Republican, even their laissez-faire policies were too restrictive. He left the party, turning from a libertarian to a Libertarian and becoming the first party member to become mayor in the United States.
Big Water wasn’t exactly a boom town, but it did grow, building up a population of a few hundred. It was a small number — especially compared to the FLDS’s Colorado City an hour and a half away on the US-89 — but it was Joseph’s kingdom. That is, until the Kane county officials started receiving complaints about the weird little shanty town. Joseph had filled every government position with his closest allies, often his family members. However, as more freedom lovers moved into town his everybody-welcome attitude was becoming a problem. The polygamists always voted as a bloc. While non-polygamists were allowed into the town, these new residents were starting to realize that they were always going to be on the lower rung of the political ladder. In response to complaints, Kane County took control of the city's water supply — their main source of income — and instituted a tax for the first time in Big Water’s history.
Joseph’s political power was fading. Residents started calling him a dictator and accused him of voter fraud. In 1990 they attempted to pass a ballot measure to disincorporate the town. Joseph’s allies were able to beat back the measure, but the damage was already done. From this point on the political positions slipped out of Joseph’s fingers. By the time he died in 1999, he was no longer the king he once was. However, the new Big Water politicians only disliked Joseph, not libertarianism. And that cleared the way for Utah’s first openly LGBT mayor.
His name is Willy Marshall. He’s gay, but he doesn’t have multiple husbands. Alex Joseph’s live-and-let-live attitude drew Marshall to Big Water. With Joseph now in an urn buried under his throne in his church’s assembly hall a new generation of Libertarians came to power in Big Water.
Marshall is dedicated to libertarian principles, or at least the current American understanding of those principles — he flies a Confederate flag after all. In 2001 he ran for mayor. Sensing that if he kept his sexuality to himself it would become the #1 issue in the race, he came out to his potential constituents. Click on this link to see how he describes this decision, it’s quite a bit less… delicate. Marshall blew $15 printing out campaign fliers and knocked on every door in the small town. The strategy paid off. Marshall handily won the election, becoming the Libertarian mayor of Big Water and the first openly gay mayor in Utah history.
Like his predecessors, Willy Marshall followed the game plan of the Confederate Nations of Israel and worked to bring out the political kingdom of God through libertarianism. Taxes were slashed by 50% across the town; weed was decriminalized. The latter garnered attention throughout Utah but earned him enemies from the townspeople. It seems that with Alex Joseph out of the way, the town’s libertarianism was slowly converging with more mainstream American conservatism. The town asked him to resign, complaining that Marshall had made Big Water little more than a haven for polygamists and pot-smokers. They also were angry that he had let a pack of wild dogs roam free. Marshall didn’t give a shit, informing his unhappy constituents that they could impeach him if they wanted but he was set on serving his four-year term.
And serve his four years he did. Since leaving office he’s remained active in libertarian politics, serving as a delegate for the national Libertarian party. At conventions, he can be spotted parading around in a cowboy hat, a Gadsden flag bandana, and mutton chops. He drives a classic Corvette with four bumper stickers: “Goldwater for President,” a Confederate flag, a talk radio ad, and — naturally — a Pride Flag.