response 349 of 526:

Mar 3 21:04 UTC 2006

There used to be and still are towns in Utah entirely owned by the Mormon
church.  There was time in the 19th century that people in those towns
practiced polygamy, because it was endorsed by the church and the church owned
the town.  But then Utah wanted to become a state.  Congress told them, if
you want to be a state, you cannot have the mormon church superimposing its
rules over the laws of the land.  You are either a part of this country or
you are not.  If you want to become a state, you MUST make polygamy illegal.
So they did.  But I suppose JEP thinks they should have been allowed to
continue being openly polygamous in these "private church owned" towns?