The Dangers of Mingling Religious Influence with Civil Government: A Mormon's Point of View

The Dangers of Mingling Religious Influence with
Civil Government: A Mormon's Point of View

I am responding to your editorial/article regarding your negative experiences with Mormons in communities where Mormon's make up the majority of the population.

You state that in such a situation you have experienced and witnessed an abuse of civil power by Mormon politicians, lawyers, business leaders, etc.

As a Mormon, I can assure you that the Church does not encourage, support nor condone such behavior -- in fact it warns against it in one of its canonized books of scripture,
the Doctrine and Covenants:

"We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government, whereby one religious society is fostered and another proscribed in its spiritual privileges, and the individual rights of its members, and citizens, denied. Doctrine and Covenants 134:9

Where a large if not dominant population of people who share the same beliefs exist, there is a tendency to abuse their civil authority and exercise excess dominion over others -- no matter what their religious or cultural beliefs.
We are dealing here with the frailties human nature over which no one religious, social, political group has a monopoly. When such repugnant behavior runs contrary to the espoused values of the few offending members of the group, it is tempting to label the whole group as scoundrels. This would be wrong. But calling it wrong, does not mean that it doesn't exist.
It most certainly does.

As case in point is a Utah law recently enacted by Utah Supreme Court (all members of the LDS faith).

The court recently ruled that a judge does not have to disclose his/her personal religious relationships/affiliations with any of the parties involved in the litigation over which he/she is presiding. So if a prosecuting attorney and the judge work closely together in the church, pray together, or have any other one-on-one personal church relationship, the judge does not have to disclose that relationship to the defendant nor the
defendants attorney and therefore does not have to recuse him/herself from the trial.

Talk about the potential of abuse. One of the most vital aspects of due process -- that of an impartial judge -- has been eliminated in Utah. Why? Because the supreme court ruled to protect one of the most powerful business interests in Utah -- Intermountain Health Care -- Utah's Mormon-member dominated medical monopoly.

Here's the facts:
IHC was being sued by one of its doctors for breach of contract. The doctor had a strong case and he and his attorneys thought they had a slam dunk. To the surprise of all, the judge (Ralph Mabey) ruled against the doctor and ordered the doctor to pay $250,000 for IHC's legal expenses. The judge also ordered all of the doctor's legal records destroyed. (At that time IHC was
under investigation by the justice department for anti-trust violation and the records, if justice knew about them, would be instrumental in their case against IHC). The doctor refused to turn over the records to the judge and notified the justice department who then took custody of the files. Within a
few weeks, sheriff deputies descended upon the doctors home and seized all of his property --even his children's toys and bank accounts -- on the order of the judge.

A few months later, the doctor discovered that the judge had served personally in an LDS church assignment with the chief executive of IHC (the plaintiff in the case) Cecil Samuelson for over 10 years! Samueslon was a Stake President and Mabey was a Bishop who work intimately and directly under Samuelson in a subservient relationship.

Mabey never disclosed this relationship to the parties. If he would have, the doctor would have chosen another judge.

In Mabey's surprise ruling against the doctor he said that he was not ruling on the merits of the case, the evidence, nor the law, but rather on what he felt had happened.

When the doctor discovered the relationship, he appealed the ruling to the Utah Supreme Court in an effort to get a new trial. The court ruled against the doctor on the following basis:

Because of the large Mormon population in Utah it would be impractical for every judge to disclose his/her prior or existing church relationships to the parties involved in the litigation over which he/she presides.

After the court ruling, it was discovered that the court's chief justice (who wrote the opinion) was best friends with the IHC plaintiff Cecil Samuelson. They served together in the church, attended college together in Indiana, and vacationed together every year. The judge's spouse was also on IHC's payroll as well as other court member's families.

So in an effort to protect their friends, the court threw out hundreds of years of common law --law that was created by our forefathers and their fathers to protect against the very thing that happened in Utah.

When this ruling came down, the LDS owned-media (Deseret News, KSL-TV/radio) refused to cover the ruling. When the doctor called the editor of the newspaper to ask him why, the editor said the doctor was a trouble maker and to leave well enough alone.

When the supreme court judge's conflict of interested was disclosed by the utah'snon-Mormon newspaper (The Salt Lake Tribune), the judge said she would recuse herself in all
future cases relating to IHC -- which she has since done. How convenient!

The implications:
(1) The 500,000 non-Mormon Utah citizens have lost a fundamental right of due process because of cronyism. These people should be up in arms. But no one cares.

(2) In less than one year Utah will have millions of people come for the Olympics. These people will check their rights to due process at the airport gate and if they do encounter legal problems they face the possibility of a Utah Supreme Court sanctioned kangaroo court.

As a post script, Cecil Samuelson, the IHC executive and defendant, when asked why he had requested the court to seize the doctor's assets, he said it was a warning volley to all whom might want to embarrass the sacred institutions in Utah. A few months later, Samuelson was elevated to the LDS Church's leadership hierarchy.

As a twist of irony: Recently the doctor was a key expert witness in a medical malpractice suit against IHC and it was his expert testimony that persuaded a jury to award the injured patient $9 million in actual and punitive damages against IHC. This was the highest jury award for medical malpractice in the history of Utah. The judge also sanctioned IHC for altering evidence in the case (they withheld a video tape of an ultrasound
that proved their guilt and then, when compelled by the court to produce it, they edited out the damaging part. Fortunately, the editor left three frames (not visible to the eye) of the offending evidence on the tape and it was discovered by the doctor. What comes around goes around.

Another side light: The doctor, a world-renown expert in fetal care, was originally hired by IHC to diagnose bad babies before they were born in an effort to fill its infant critical care ward (the most profitable part of the hospital). To induce him to work, they offered him 50% of his billing revenues. Within a few years, the doctor became the highest paid employee in
IHC and as a result of his intervention, fewer babies were admitted to the critical care unit than before he joined IHC. The doctor also reduced the still birth rate by 80%.

IHC was presented with a dilemma -- their highest paid employee was, due to his successful intervention, was reducing the companies profits. So they terminated him without cause in violation of a 10 year contract. A few years after he left, the infant mortality rate not only rose back to the level it
was before the doctor came but it increased. The net effect: 30+ babies die unnecessarily every year in Utah for the almighty dollar!!

Even through all of this, I am a supporter of the Church. I separate the mission of the church (to instill the values of love, forgiveness, and charity toward all) from some of the people who mess it up by using the church for their personal gain. I don't throw out the baby with the bath water. Some of the nicest people I have ever met have been Mormons as well
as some of the vilest --not vile on the surface but within their hearts because of their abuse of the religion for personal gain. I believe that these type of people will be judged as harshly by our creator as the Hitler's of the world.

Again, in light of the above story, I quote the LDS scripture:

"We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government, whereby one religious society is fostered and another proscribed in its spiritual privileges, and the individual rights of its members, and citizens, denied. Doctrine and Covenants 134:9

The writer of this scripture knew of the potential for abuse when one segment of society becomes dominant over the other. What insight and how sad that the few LDS people who abuse their religion for personal gain and power don't take this wise admonition to heart as well as another LDS scripture of
warning:

"We have learned by sad experience that is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion.: Doctrine and Covenants 131:39.

This human tendency is not only the LDS Church's major challenge but it is a challenge for us all since this is a basic human tendency. Rather than attack the Church as the instigator in cases such as this, we should speak out against the hypocrites
who hide under the skirts of the Church to do their dirty work.

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