Utah's Educational Innovation: LDS Religion Classes, 1890-1929

Utah Historical Quarterly

Vol. 43, 1975, No. 4

Utah's Educational Innovation: LDS Religion Classes,1890-1929

BY D. MICHAEL QUINN

SIMILAR TO THE SUBSEQUENT LDS seminary and institute program, the LDS "Religion Class Movement" was the first effort of the Mormons to supplement (but not to replace) secular education. Started in Utah in 1890, this was America's first experiment in providing separate weekday religious training for public school children. As developed by the LDS church, this instruction was given to children from the first through the ninth grades. Ultimately, more than sixty thousand elementary school children annually attended these classes prior to the discontinuation of the LDS Religion Class Movement in 1929. Since that time the Mormons have concentrated on providing weekday instruction to secondary and college students.

The Religion Class Movement was in part a response to Utah's political and religious situation in 1890. By 1889 parochial schooling in Utah was dominated by the Protestants, who had almost sixty-five hundred pupils in 183 schools, and by the Catholics, who had a thousand pupils in 7 separate schools. By contrast the Latter-day Saints were relatively new to the field of purposeful denominational education in Utah.

During the early territorial period of Utah, Mormon leaders had controlled the public schools through appointing church members to educational positions and through incorporating LDS theology in the school curriculum. This policy disintegrated under the pressures of the federal "raid" on Utah in the 1880s. Because of the enforcement of the Edmunds Act of 1882 and the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1887, both aimed at breaking the temporal power of the church, the control of public education in Utah moved into the hands of non-Mormons. At this time denominational education in Utah was already dominated by Catholics and Protestants. In response, the First Presidency of the LDS church, in April 1886, urged the creation of an LDS school system and two years later inaugurated such a system.

The initial result of the establishment of the General Church Board of Education in 1888 was the expansion of the number of LDS academies. The academies combined secular and religious education just as did parochial schools. By 1890, however, the LDS leaders concluded that the academy program alone was inadequate to meet the challenge of sectarian schools and the "godless" education of the public schools.

The focal point of concern was the Free Public School Act that was passed by the Utah Territorial Legislature on February 18, 1890. A month later, the legislature passed a compulsory attendance law^. Because LDS doctrine could not be included in the secular curriculum of the public schools and since there were only fifteen LDS academies in operation in Utah by 1890, the church sought another method of providing LDS religious instruction for school children. On June 2, 1890, Karl G. Maeser, general superintendent of the LDS school system, suggested that church schools of elementary grade be established throughout the territory. This was impossible due to the condition of church finances under the Edmunds- Tucker Act. As an alternative, Apostle Anthon H. Lund proposed to the General Church Board of Education that arrangements be made to hold theological classes for elementary ages in a separate building at the end of the school day.

The proposal of Apostle Lund was the foundation for the Religion Class Movement. On October 8, 1890, the LDS General Board of Education approved the establishment of such classes to be held either on a weekday basis or on Saturdays.Official announcement of the establishment of the religion classes was made on October 25, 1890, in a letter of the First Presidency which specified that such classes were to be organized in every ward and stake ofthe church where a church school had not been organized. With this pronouncement the Religion Class Movement began its forty-year history.

Presumably, religion classes were organized in several wards during the 1890-91 school year. In later years Joseph B. Keeler claimed that under the direction of Karl G. Maeser he had organized the first religion class in the church in one of the wards of Utah Stake, located forty milessouth of Salt Lake City. From the beginning, however, there was less than enthusiastic support of the classes on the part of local LDS leaders.

One phase of the hesitance toward the Religion Class Movement concerned the relation it maintained to the other auxiliary organizations of the church, especially the Sunday Schools and the Primary. Two months after the religion classes were inaugurated, Superintendent Maeser alluded to such contention but affirmed that "any kind of conflict between them is impossible whenever the spirit of the gospel is directing our course," Despite his admonition, rivalry between the religion classes, the Sunday Schools, and Primary continued to some extent throughout the movement's history. Leaders of the Religion Class Movement repeatedly denied that it was "injuring the other organizations," yet some local officials insisted upon referring to religion classes as "the fifth wheel." As late as 1926 it was necessary to remind the church members that the religion classes were not merely a repetition of the Sunday Schools. When the religion classes were launched, children of the same ages were already involved in Sunday School and Primary. It was perhaps inevitable that the instruction and activities administered by the three organizations would overlap, and initial resentment by workers in the two older organizations was probably unavoidable. This situation resulted in what may be the first conscious effort of the LDS leadership at correlation of its internal organizations and class instructions.

The system of correlation that resulted from the introduction of the Religion Class Movement involved diversification of both goals and instruction. In the early years of the Religion Class Movement its purpose was to emphasize ethics and practical religion, wdiile the Primary was to stress theology. This divergence of emphasis can be seen in the first outlines for the religion classes. Despite this effort to separate the roles of the religion classes and the other organizations, critics claimed the religion classes infringed on the other two organizations.

In 1913 the LDS church formed a Correlation Committee wdiose principal object was to correlate the lesson manuals of the various organizations with a view to overcoming frictions that had existed for a decade. With representatives of each of the auxiliary organizations, this committee established areas of emphasis for each auxiliary. The Primary and Mutual Improvement Associations were directed to concern themselves with practical religion, ethics, economics, sociology, and athletics. The Sunday School and Aaronic Priesthood (male youth) were to devote lessons to sacred scriptures and church history. The women's Relief Society and Melchizedek Priesthood (adult men) were to stress the principles of the gospel, and the religion classes were to deal with sacred scriptures and church history. Programs of correlation in the church were revised many times during the next six decades, but the effort at systematic correlation had its beginnings in 1913.

Although the work of the 1913 Correlation Committee had been designed in part to eliminate conflicts between the religion classes and the other auxiliaries, in some respects the committee inadvertently had the contrary effect. First, the committee reversed the general emphases of the Primary and the religion classes, giving to each the teaching role formerly reserved for the other. After over a decade of exactly opposite emphasis, the new directions required the workers in both organizations to alter their instructions radically. The time-lag for this transition quite naturally involved overlapping. Moreover, the correlation committee also gave the Sunday School and the religion class organizations similar subject matter for lesson material, which resulted in a more direct overlap and potential conflict. Therefore, although systematic correlation in the LDS church derived from a desire to avoid conflicts between the Religion Class Movement and the other auxiliaries, these potential conflicts were not entirely removed.

This friction between the organizations may have intensified the indifference of some ward bishops and stake presidents. Some local leaders contended that the religion classes were superfluous and resulted in too many meetings for the officers and teachers. In 1902 Apostle Matthias F. Cowley reported that "he had found a lack of interest on the part of Stake Presidents and Bishops" regarding the religion classes. Perhaps the greatest embarrassment to the movement was the central stake of the church, Salt Lake Stake. In August 1903 the president of the stake, Angus M. Cannon, and the Salt Lake Stake High Council informed the General Board of Religion Classes that they would not support religion classes in the stake but that they would allow bishops their discretion in the matter. It was not until after Cannon's release in April 1904 that religion classes were officially supported by the Salt Lake Stake. As late as 1928 the Juvenile Instructor reported that eight stakes were having difficulty getting bishops to cooperate with the movement. The president of the church, Heber J. Grant, became so exasperated at the reluctant support of some bishops that in 1928 he threatened to release every bishop who did not actively support the religion classes. Nevertheless, the Religion Class Movement was discontinued a year after President Grant's statement.

Despite passive resistance from some local leaders and indications of friction with the other auxiliaries, there is evidence that the LDS Religion Class Movement was vigorous and successful. One indication of its success is found in the statistics of enrollment and attendance. Where local leadership supported the program, as was true in most wards and stakes, the program developed rapidly. For example, the bishop of the w r ard in Cleveland, Utah, reported in 1906 that 100 percent of the children of the community, both LDS and Gentile, attended religion classes. In the same year 83 percent of the school children in Wasatch Stake were enrolled in the program, with 60 percent average attendance. In most instances non-Mormon children also attended the LDS religion classes.

Nevertheless, the enrollment of the Religion Class Movement was consistently about 40 percent less than that of the Sunday School and Primary. This is accounted for largely by the fact that enrollment in religion classes was a more formal procedure than either the Sunday School or Primary, with special arrangements to be made by parents for their children's attendance. Therefore, it was to be expected that total enrollment for religion classes would be less than for the other auxiliaries. With respect to participation of enrolled children, the religion classes often proportionately equaled or exceeded the other auxiliaries. In 1919, for example, Rudger Clawson reported that religion classes had "an average attendance of 59% which is a higher percentage of attendance than in any other organization, except the Sunday School organization which has an average attendance of 62%." In a statistical sense, at least, the religion classes demonstrated vitality.

RELIGION CLASS STATISTICS

The statistics on the Religion Class Movement are incomplete, but the following table was collated from a variety of sources at the church archives:*

In part, the success of the Religion Class Movement at the local levelwas due to the direction provided by the educational departments of thechurch. There were two administrative positions of the church that wereconcerned with all LDS educational activities and therefore exercisedsupervisory control over the religion classes. These were the general superintendents of church schools (1888-1933) and church commissioners of education (1919-23). Moreover, from 1900 to 1922 a general superintendent had the exclusive responsibility to supervise the religion classes throughout the church. During their history, the religion classes were also under the general jurisdiction of the Church Board of Education and from 1900 to 1922 had their own general board. These men traveled throughout the wards and stakes of the church, visiting religion classes and encouraging local workers in the program. The religion classes were characterized in the early years by a lack of central coordination of instructional materials until they were gradually directed by the same general officers. In 1896 the General Church Board of Education published its own suggested outlines, but it was not until 1913 that separate lesson manuals were issued for the individual school grades one through eight. Without the persistent, though bureaucratic, devotion of the general officers, it is unlikely that the religion classes would have enjoyed the success they did.

In addition to its work with school children of the elementary grades (expanded to include the ninth grade in 1923), the Religion Class Movement initiated a similar program for high school and college students. As early as the 1890s the LDS church had created institutions at Randolph, Salt Lake City, Huntington, Manti, Gunnison, and Parowan, Utah, and at Franklin, Idaho, which were called seminaries. These were not seminaries in the present LDS sense, but that term was initially borrowed from the usage of the sectarian schools of Utah Territory. These LDS seminaries were embryonic church schools in which academic and religious education was administered under the same jurisdiction. In the 1912-13 school year, the religion classes were experimentally extended to the high schools in the Granite and Morgan stakes in Utah. The General Board of Religion Classes supervised these experiments and on January 7, 1914, unanimously voted to ask for a budget of $5,000 "to be used for the Religion Classes, including High School Religion Class work." By 1919 the program of religion classes for secondary students had been extended to so many schools that it was named the seminary program, was removed from the jurisdiction of the Religion Class Movement, and was made a separate program under the direction of the Church Board of Education. In addition, the General Board of Religion Classes in 1901 unsuccessfully attempted to initiate a similar program for students at the University of Utah. The Religion Class Movement was both forerunner and founder of the present-day seminary and institute program of the LDS church.

Moreover, the inauguration of the Religion Class Movement in Utah in 1890 pioneered the national program of inviting public school children to attend separate weekday religious instruction. Not until 1906 did other religious groups experiment with such a program in New York City, and not until the 1914-15 school year were organized programs of weekday religious education initiated by other religious groups in the nation. In this respect the Religion Class Movement of the LDS church was a truly innovative educational development. The Sunday School programs had been borrowed from the Protestant denominations, a fact that caused initial resistance to it from Mormons. The LDS academy program was also patterned after its Protestant and Catholic counterparts in Utah, and the development of church-sponsored colleges and universities was hardly unique to Mormons. Separate weekday religious education for public school children was a distinct contribution in Utah and Mormon history.

The Religion Class Movement also extended its influence beyond the public schools. In 1920, for example, the religion classes officially sponsored a fund-raising drive for the relief of suffering Jewish children in Europe. Announced in March of 1920, the "Jewish Children's Relief Day" had received donations of more than a thousand dollars within two months. The General Board of Religion Classes also was responsible for the establishment in 1908 of the Lund Home for Boys, designed to provide an LDS environment for wards of the juvenile court. In all its operations the LDS Religion Class Movement adhered to a concern for the spiritual welfare of youth.

As with its later Catholic and Protestant counterparts, the LDS Religion Class Movement came close to church-state conflict in its relationships with public schools. The meetings of the religion classes were held in the public school buildings either before or after school hours. Most of the teachers of the religion classes were public school teachers, and the ward and stake leaders were in fact encouraged to select religion class teachers from among the LDS teachers in the public schools. All of this tended to make the LDS religion classes an ex officio extension of public school education. Although these arrangements were practical, they caused such vociferous opposition that in February 1905 the LDS First Presidency officially urged the religion classes to withdraw from public school buildings. This required that the classes meet in private residences or in the nearest LDS meetinghouse; either of these alternatives made it more difficult for elementary school children to attend. Therefore, despite the announcement of the First Presidency, religion classes continued to meet in school buildings, and the leaders of the movement lobbied for legislation that would allow released time and the use of public schools for religion classes of all denominations. On September 7, 1927, however, the Church Board of Education considered a paper by Judge Harold M. Stephens, distinguished Mormon jurist, on "The State, the School, and the Church." This paper seemed to climax a series of judicial opinions against the use of public school buildings for LDS religion classes. Religion classes were discontinued less than two years after this document was discussed by the LDS Board of Education.

It would be a mistake, however, to conclude that the Religion Class Movement ended only because of church-state conflicts or for any other single reason. In the financial decline of 1928-29 all educational programs were cut back by the church. Discontinuing the religion classes and merging that program with the Primary organization eliminated a budget of several thousand dollars. This eventual action had been recommended as early as 1906 by Charles W. Penrose, counselor in the First Presidency after 1911, because he considered the religion classes a "partial failure." Moreover, local leaders had continued their opposition to the program despite its demonstrated successes, and rivalry between the religion classes and the other auxiliaries had persisted for nearly forty years. These internal factors undoubtedly contributed to the decision to end the program. When the religion classes were merged with the Primary organization in May 1929, it was a response to internal pressures, economic considerations, and the church-state question.

During its forty-year history the LDS Religion Class Movement achieved distinction. It was an innovaion in religious education, and similar programs were later adopted by other religious denominations throughout the United States. Within the LDS church, the Religion Class Movement not only instructed elementary school children but was also instrumental in the establishment of systematic correlation of instruction within the church. Although no longer a part of the LDS educational system, the goals and institutional concepts established by the Religion Class Movement have been perpetuated in the LDS seminary and institute system.

For full citations and images please view this article on a desktop.