On March 30, 2024, a chunk of Highway 1 outside of Big Sur, California collapsed into the ocean stranding as many as two thousand people in the Big Sur area.1 Since its inception in the late 1910s, the cliff-perched highway has become an iconic feature of the American West, providing tourists with scenic views of the California coastline. More importantly, it has become an essential route for Californians. In some cases, it provides the only road between many of California’s coastal towns. With even the partial closure of Highway 1, many of California’s small coastal communities are severely impacted financially and physically with no tourists to drive business and no way to commute to other towns. The road collapse in 2024 was a minor incident in a long history of road collapses and landslides along Highway 1. Significantly, the January 2021 collapse left behind a 150-foot gap, and the March 2017 landslide covered twelve miles of the highway with more than a million pounds of debris.2 Most of the highway runs on top or alongside of the San Andreas Fault, which makes up the Circum-Pacific belt or the “Ring of Fire” where more than 80 percent of the world’s earthquakes occur—making the California coastline one of the most seismically active regions in the world. It is no wonder that each year tourists flock to the coast only to find parts of it closed, destroyed, or under construction. As part of the “Ring of Fire,” the California coastline is subject to constant change and geological shift, only made more unstable as the effects of climate change cause sea levels to rise, cliffs to erode, and temperatures to climb. The boundary between land and sea is moving farther inland, taking with it those lines and demarcations that are used to illustrate where California ends and the ocean begins. Undoubtedly, the future of California’s coastline will become a series of ghost stories of places long-gone, eroded and swept out to sea. The narratives, images, and maps representing California’s coast will no longer allow one to, as Don Quixote would have it, “stroll all over the world just by perusing a map” (Cervantes 588). Instead, those narratives, images, and maps will stand in for the remnants of coastlines sitting beneath the waves. The future looming over the coast forces us to consider what we will lose to the sea—what stories and artifacts will be lost to climate change? This essay takes up this question as a way of thinking with erosion, not as a devastating loss but as an opportunity to embrace change—to gnaw at the histories of colonial, racial, gendered, and environmental violence that make up the bedrock of America culture. To do so, it takes the history and continued effects of Sir Francis Drake’s supposed 1579 landing in Northern California as its case study to explore the violence of reconstructing and maintaining eroding narratives. It analyzes the narrative of Drake’s landing with erosion thinking, a bodily and geological practice of “gnawing” or “wearing away” (erode, v. 1.a and 2.a) at histories and narratives that continue to perpetuate violence upon bodies—human and nonhuman alike. This essay will move through time by adopting the methodology outlined by Frances E. Dolan in Digging the Past, whereby unearthing the past “is always in the service of the future.” To attend to an uncertain future, one must “hold different time frames in tension and face in multiple directions, moving forward in part by turning back” (2). This essay takes Dolan’s Janus-faced approach by first presenting the mythology of Drake and his landing. It will then oscillate between the early-twentieth century and the late-sixteenth century to illustrate the attempts to reconstruct and maintain the Drake mythology. Finally, it reflects on California’s coastal futures and the stories we tell about them. Erosion thinking affords us the opportunity to confront narratives and histories, whether explicitly violent or not, and decide whether they are worth maintaining, or whether they should, like the sands they were built upon, be swept out to sea. In December 1577, English privateer and sailor Francis Drake set sail on what would become the first successful circumnavigation of the world.3 When he returned to London in September 1580, he was lauded as a hero and knighted six months later aboard his ship, the Golden Hinde. The records of the actions that provoked Drake’s sailing and the events that followed are well-documented. What is less well-documented—and the subject of this essay—is the actual exploration that occurred during those three years. As England was in a decades-long conflict with Spain over control of the oceans and the wealth from overseas colonies, Drake’s voyage sought to legitimize England in the “New World” and, more importantly, find the speculative “Northwest Passage” that would allow England to reach the Pacific without passing through Spanish territories. Secretly, however, Drake was chosen for this mission due to his infamy among Spanish sailors, who referred to him as El Draque or “The Dragon.”4 Working covertly for the English Crown, Drake’s naval expertise established him as not only a successful captain but also one of the most dangerous pirates in the world.5 Though disguised as an exploratory voyage, Drake’s circumnavigation returned, at a low estimate, £500,000 in Spanish gold, “gems, and other precious items” (Bawlf 191).6 Adjusted for inflation, Drake returned with more than £100,000,000 in stolen Spanish goods, making him one of the wealthiest men in England.7 For his efforts against Spain, Drake was knighted in 1581 on orders of Queen Elizabeth by the French ambassador, the Seigneur de Marchaumont. This move was strategic, signaling to “King Philip [of Spain] the potential for a new alliance between England and France” (Bawlf 196). In choosing the French ambassador to knight Drake, Elizabeth indicated to Spain that France, despite aligning religiously with Spain, would condone piracy in service of the English Crown. After his knighthood, Drake requested to return to the sea, but he was ordered to remain in England for fear that further piracy might provoke Spain into war.8 Additionally, the specific details of Drake’s circumnavigation were kept secret due to the threat of such a war. During the voyage, Drake kept extensive journals and produced detailed maps of his route and the places where he anchored. These documents, however, were seen only by the crew of the Golden Hinde and the Queen following his return. Accounts of the voyage were spread by word of mouth, but while there were “books, pictures, and ballads [that] appeared in praise of Drake,” none revealed information about his actual journey (Bawlf 194). The details of where Drake sailed were a closely guarded secret and have remained so to this day. Drake’s first-hand account of the voyage has since been lost, with most historians agreeing that the journals and maps were either destroyed in the 1698 fire that razed Whitehall Palace or hidden and subsequently forgotten.9 Most surviving records come from second-hand accounts, notably Richard Hakluyt’s Principal Navigations (1589) and The World Encompassed (1628), compiled by Drake’s nephew, also named Francis Drake. These are, purportedly, true accounts of the voyage relayed by Drake or his Chaplain, Francis Fletcher, and published widely for the English public, but without Drake’s first-hand account, the validity of these texts is dubious at best. Both narratives provide details of Drake’s voyage, the lands he anchored on, and the that he along the The details of Drake’s are notably in narratives in of presenting a “New World” for English and of the of these accounts was to England as a set to Spain in its In this the Hakluyt’s Principal in presenting an England that was and to The of Drake’s first-hand narrative a in to Drake’s accounts relayed to and he sailed farther than Hakluyt’s of Principal Navigations that Drake sailed as from to him as as and as as in Drake’s account, Drake made it the which places Drake as as the de from by that in the of on the and his was in the of on the coast of Drake anchored at the or The of where Drake made with is and be no as to where Drake on the Pacific coast of the Drake’s Drake’s landing in there are, in so many for Drake’s landing that there is a from Northern to with through and the was has eroded and the remnants have been and to and for more than detailed Drake’s his Pacific for to his Sir Francis Drake was a sailor for his Sir an English naval captain for in the with Drake the for out his the of and the Crown, which were more than to on Drake’s naval in the that he would return from his overseas with In the of Drake from a sailor to one of the and most men in in would later become a for that was on the that Drake was a on the of The of Drake as a against an Spain with during the of the century as they to in California against the long history of and later and For many the of Drake as a of a of was an from which they a new for for to California have since Drake’s The true history of his Pacific sailing has been by with many of these narratives and religiously In the question of Drake’s we must his for an Pacific coast was not by but by the men who In the of a narrative has histories of and who have long the Pacific The of this essay some of these narratives and in the mythology of Drake’s Pacific In of a was on the San he a and a and a the was a of that be used to his so he it for months it to his than by with the would later be as the of from Drake’s voyage California to Queen Elizabeth by Richard in his Principal Navigations and by Francis Drake in The World Encompassed that long It its way to of and of the at the of long been on the for this specific so with it, his was this the only the accounts of Drake’s and Richard The was for by the of California and as an of California what and other either to that the of they so in a by the of and history who would to it been by in and the would not be a the it was first With the of and which was only the as Drake’s This in English since actual over California lands and The of the is that it was or even have in the of the of since the actual be The not and there were multiple of for since the to be that the was not in the English are to since the three of on the are the only of a it is that the were not as with the was but the was later by more Additionally, Queen Elizabeth is referred to as Queen Elizabeth of despite by the of Queen of France, and of the the more and widely used for the also the the English was with no there were of that are from the For was more was more and as out in a year the was is that the of the and it all such a Drake the in his and on to that is that the of the was so successful in the of such as and and up over the word and left out a in a of the it and always has that it is a The in the was a series of of the in that the to The who the at and at that the was most a of the late or century not a of Drake’s Pacific coast of of the at the of by and to more between the and the and to the out its the has always it is not a but its as a was no for the that As the it was a widely secret among the in history that the was and a the was not it was but behind just was and that there was a it, no one its validity for The established through Hakluyt’s and Drake’s more than three the was as history to a The of that the of the of on the of Hakluyt’s and Drake’s accounts of Sir Francis Drake’s voyage, in on who to those accounts by the Hakluyt’s and Drake’s the of on there a narrative that was by a The history of the Pacific from the San to and the that sought to and those coastlines has always on as the that sought to the to legitimize the of what Drake that attend to later in this Hakluyt’s and Drake’s of Sir Francis Drake’s In accounts, they such as and and that just as to of the landing also the of that to the to Queen Hakluyt’s account set a of as also of and to the a a was the and of with the of the and people into with and in a of of English the where was also the of Francis Drake’s account we from to be set a of as also of and and to that a of to a and is and the and of and of the of the and by the and into with and in a of English by a made of through the was the of These accounts to have been relayed by the with the of The World that the account is to Sir Francis are Drake’s is more these Drake’s the for the of The account that the must be with of and the and of of the and by the and into and a where of these accounts do not in the used by Drake to up a of they do provide information that one to a What that narrative like on who is the The the that to Queen Elizabeth and for two the to with the account in The World Encompassed to the and as in the land and history to the as a of English that of Drake’s account of has been lost to and eroded and swept out to sea, the second-hand accounts by and Drake’s to reconstruct a narrative that or not be in to an The of built upon those narrative to further on the Pacific these narratives one about the and by these narratives have been for the that in that have become The to the Pacific as an of is into the narrative of the Drake by and Drake’s Both narratives an of Drake as a who is as a the he Hakluyt’s account that Drake on to they supposed to be and would not be to the the which they were and of the of is as a to Drake as a The makes Drake as a to the that Drake and his men This of is a in the of an Pacific The between and is and it to the The of Drake as a a future in which are to English as the and of the land and the communities that The that have Drake’s all future part of and of Hakluyt’s account what the from and the lands that they on the has made it that the future of those and the land is a English In and the account the that the Pacific has always been English and will continue to be English in the to When Drake and his men to the Pacific the narrative that by Drake the This the of the the and the in its to those this not just the to Drake but also the of the people as they Drake’s and as a The people make and they are they and they Drake with the which the account is a of This the of that frames the people as not just but also as upon Drake’s in is to these and the and of the lands into his As Drake is a subject of the English Crown, the narrative a in the that he his as a The account that he his as a he not to he not what and it might be to The account Drake as a who not for his he the lands and its people for his at future is for them. This is built on the that the will the lands and and in this the makes it so that they the of landing and the land as the future where England and the Pacific The of the Pacific as on and the of a The narrative that Drake the and that for two the one in of the and which the and the it might some with in which was so The is in Drake’s landing as it a past to a not just it time in to the they are established as it is the land of in of of the of to the were of and by a for Hakluyt’s Principal Navigations is to as they to a between England and its Additionally, texts that praise the of English and It is for to not only a time in but also a as Drake’s taking up of the lands a future on the Pacific As the narrative is of a history and a of the of and cliffs in the In the was an as it of landing on As was first part of seen and later by in his the of In the Pacific coastline Drake is at a of a in of and and the of a that into the past and the The land and of are as new to the English and The of not just an English history but also a The a it is as it to a time the were one The that history into the future they are one with all the and lands from from the word or also the Pacific coastline to the of its English the as a to the maps the account and the a and the Pacific coastlines are as always been and while also Hakluyt’s the by Drake as a for the English and the land to between and the Pacific coastline. This narrative of its so into the Pacific coastline that it is to to consider those coastal without Drake. The Pacific and its demarcations on a in a narrative history from the that those narratives. the narrative is upon that Drake sailed along the Pacific coast and lands as as the and as as the and that he was the lands and the that be from those to to from In the of as the and the erode, the from and history has been to to the that and that to of Drake’s coastal landing. of as this essay what the is of the to the on is most in service to the the of Drake’s and and for one of the most the of the The with narratives, like Drake’s Pacific is to and this essay to through erosion as a of the on narrative that the coastal that they erosion also as it to the and artifacts that those narrative from the As one with this as part of the and is with the of artifacts and that the is and to the it have to in The to and make the question of what narratives one that expertise and and what is in that As the American Pacific coastline as a by climate it more to the of to specific coastal Both Hakluyt’s and Drake’s accounts of of the land and The accounts and which the with the only of the land that it is with and The people are to in the and from the of the of set and at the like on the of a which with no to and are It is to the of the upon specific Pacific despite attempts the to do the of the in the to a of a the account of these through Drake’s the and the actions of the his The account be outside of this and is by In the of specific the and cliffs have become a of all Pacific coastal For Drake and and American the of this has the opportunity to in the as is for and Most the lines of so by Drake have not just the Pacific coast and its demarcations but also the of the American Significantly, the of for England to to of that to set up a in Drake’s The of the of in English and of “is the and on the that Drake to of that and as his Pacific landing as would the of that that Drake established the America as used Hakluyt’s in his of which to the of overseas for the for the of coast and for the of to the Drake that “New England is that part of America in the to in the by the most Sir Francis Drake in his voyage about the In this is in the The was to Drake’s Pacific landing and to the English in the “New Drake’s landing on the Pacific coast the English over a not only of that coast but also over its The of and England was a for continued his established English over the America with the of hidden to be The from the to the Drake’s Northern and of by to illustrate that some of the land in the world. that “is also as as in the of which is as and as as other in the The first by Drake and then by for the English on the that lands at that been for the of such as and as from it, is the most part of the of the and the most of the and which is the part of which the Spanish in the time no with and then the The then the to in those as the the to and for a of of England moving from England to to and that that long World” The of the of and other artifacts and along the Pacific as of the Drake they have been and America making it to to consider these lands without Drake. In of has become and the land and coastlines that the and have come to into Hakluyt’s and Drake’s accounts at the of but the following have seen that to and Drake’s Pacific sailing has eroded The remnants one are not of history but of and attempts that are to What might it to have an America without the of Sir Francis What might it to gnaw at the question of Drake’s landing in of erosion, of narratives to but not to to not the lands that they have so As this essay has it has to California as not just an of but as a for the of many of the American the of the Drake in the Pacific has become a of The to to this like the Drake in continue to the that Drake in and the as as Drake’s as a only to a in the to of the to Drake and his landing. the narrative eroding with the lands that it was built upon, it of The to the only as to the of the the coastal that have been by its Northern California are to the As in his of in with the and as and The of the Drake with and the of climate with these making a of environmental and The over and coastal erosion reflects a fear of a future without future from a The future of California as a of its past through and and to only one future that the as it its as in California the more than one way to with but of what the coast be has the of what the past to the future has left for the with the coast as it is has been to reconstruct coastal to the of narratives to the Pacific even as this the of as in constant change and of the Drake eroding with the it has been The to and reconstruct the coast as an to environmental of a future of and This in many and are come to what coastal The potential future, just as it was for Drake, and all the that has for one must with change and the potential for environmental one also must not lose of the coast and the other potential futures that in the face of climate the with the coast is not about control or about the past and it with the It is about to change with the that erosion is and affords one the opportunity to gnaw at the continued histories of violence against and nonhuman by those histories to, and into the sea. Erosion thinking, as one to with the of and and such loss to of the coast and its narratives as they are and and and to those As erosion thinking is as it forces one to consider what is through the to the and for the coast and its narratives to the histories of the and who have the This essay for erosion, not as but as of with the coast of against it and with the histories and futures that one one
I was a high school senior in September 1993, when Lavina Fielding Anderson, Avraham Gileadi, Maxine Hanks, D. Michael Quinn, Paul Toscano, and Lynne Kanavel Whitesides were disfellowshipped or excommunicated from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. While these six people's lives were being upturned via Church discipline, the great drama in my life was spending too much money on the homecoming dance and then sulking that I didn't get asked to the next girls’ choice dance. My daily journal from the time, in which I painstakingly documented what I was learning in history, English, or calculus class on any given Tuesday, gives no intimation that I even heard about the excommunications. I was serving on seminary council and faithfully reading B. H. Roberts's History of the Church while some of the people whose works about Latter-day Saint history and theology I would read and admire only a few years later were being expelled from the LDS Church, if not necessarily the Mormon community. Despite my ignorance at the time, these events ended up having a profound effect on the trajectory of my life.I enrolled at Brigham Young University the following year, in fall 1994. No one in my social circles was talking about Mormon history, at least not in any academic sense. I don't recall any of my professors mentioning the September Six during my freshman year. The excommunications didn't really register for me until four years later, during my final year at BYU, when I took a course on Mormon history from David Whittaker, who was the curator of Mormon and Western Americana in the BYU library's special collections. It was my first exposure to scholarly Mormon history. Professor Whittaker talked about the September Six as the latest chapter in the long and complex relationship between the LDS Church and its intellectuals.That was the same year I applied to graduate school. I sought advice from several professors about my plan to pursue a PhD in American religious history. No one explicitly encouraged me to become a Mormon historian. Not Professor Whittaker—for whom I worked in special collections, who was one of my mentors, and who clearly thought highly of my abilities and potential. Not Richard Bushman, who was very gracious when I audaciously cold-called him. Maybe it was because they could tell I was interested in the broader American religious experience, not just Mormonism. Maybe it was because they believed—as I do—that it's important for students of Mormon history to also study other things. Or maybe it was because it was 1998, they had lived through 1993, and they were still nervous.From the perspective of institutional boundary maintenance, the September Six excommunications were a resounding success. The tactic worked, at least in the short to medium term. The show of force did exactly what it was supposed to. It made clear that Church leaders would not tolerate intellectual exploration that they perceived as challenging Church doctrine and what they deemed to be apostolic prerogatives. This wasn't about Church leadership feeling threatened by one individual or drawing the line on one issue, as we later saw in the high-profile excommunications of the 2010s (Kate Kelly and John Dehlin being the most prominent cases). It was a broadside, a frontal assault on the entire independent Mormon intellectual community. The fact that the six recipients of Church discipline were writing about different issues and occupied different positions across the ideological spectrum is precisely what made the excommunications so effective. The not-so-subtle message to the rest of the LDS scholarly community was clear: it could happen to you too.Part of the mythical power of Church discipline—the way that it intimidates those who are not directly affected by it—is the way that the decisions of Church leaders, working individually and together, are shrouded behind the veil of bureaucracy. Even three decades later, we don't know all the details about who directed these six cases to go forward all at the same time, or the degree of communication and coordination between General Authorities (which ones exactly?) and the various bishops and stake presidents on the ground. Boyd K. Packer's name frequently comes up, but the cast of characters was no doubt much larger. Their names and roles are largely anonymous, however, because they were acting in institutional roles that left no paper trail (or at least not a publicly available one). It's not really accurate to say that “the Church” excommunicated or disfellowshipped any of these six individuals; most Church members had no knowledge of these disciplinary actions. Though we frequently speak of it as such, “the Church” is not a historical agent. Collectivities (like “the Church”) neutralize the individual responsibility of any one person acting on behalf of the whole. Accountability is anonymized and diffused to the point that there is no longer any real accountability to speak of. And that allows collectivities—whether mobs, corporations, governments, or churches—to act with at least a certain amount of impunity.With all of this in the background, it makes sense that no one encouraged me to pursue a career in Mormon history. They didn't want to cheerlead me into a professional dead end or an antagonistic relationship with Church leadership. In the late 1990s, the prospect of ushering me, an eager and faithful young LDS undergraduate, to a doctoral program to study Mormon history would have seemed tantamount to pushing me out of the trenches and sending me across the demilitarized zone to a doomed fate on the other side. My professors had learned well the lessons of September 1993.But I hadn't. When I eventually learned about the excommunications, it seemed like ancient history—something that happened, like that homecoming dance, way back when I was in high school. Besides, the late 1990s were halcyon years for Mormons and Mormonism. The Church was the “fastest growing religion in the world”—at least, that's what we told ourselves, aided by sociologist Rodney Stark's grandiose projections.1 Anything that happened in 1993 was not just one but two Church presidents ago. The Church was in full Gordon B. Hinckley mode. No dour anti-communist, he. Instead, there he was smiling on national TV, matching Mike Wallace and Larry King stride for stride. What's more, the prophet was encouraging Church members to get all the education we could. Anti-intellectualism was a thing of the past!As I started graduate school, I had imbibed all of President Hinckley's ebullient optimism. I was living proof of Mormons’ newfound standing in the world. The Department of History at the University of Notre Dame was one of the best doctoral programs in the country for religious history, and it had admitted two—two!—Latter-day Saints. Yes, we were occasionally objectified, even exoticized; in almost every class session of a seminar we took with a distinguished Catholic historian, he gruffly asked, “What's the Mormon take on that?” But there we were, at the table! If any of my Catholic, evangelical, or secular colleagues and professors ever mentioned the September Six during those heady days, I don't recall.It was in the mid-2000s that it began to occur to me that perhaps 1993 was not so distant after all. I published my first article in Dialogue in the Spring 2004 issue. Two years later, I was invited to join the Dialogue Foundation's board of directors. I wanted to keep all my employment options open, so when I received the board's invitation, I called several people at BYU to ask if adding my name to the Dialogue masthead would be a problem were I to apply for a job in Provo. Most of them said that it was a new era—my board affiliation might get raised in an interview, but any concerns could easily be allayed once the interviewer heard me express my heartfelt commitment to the Church. Only one of my former professors cautioned me against joining the board, warning that any formal association with Dialogue would undermine an otherwise strong application to teach at BYU. I learned firsthand on two different occasions over the next few years that she was right.Fortunately, BYU wasn't my only professional option, as I found other good jobs to begin my academic career. Right as I was publishing my first book, The Mormon Menace, Claremont Graduate University opened a search for the Howard W. Hunter Chair of Mormon Studies. A chaired professorship in Mormon studies at a secular university was still a novelty. I decided, almost on a lark, to throw my hat in the ring. I knew I had no chance: I was thirty-four years old and had (barely) published one book. Endowed professorships are supposed to go to accomplished mid-career or senior scholars, people in their forties or fifties or sixties who have a long publication record and are recognized as leaders in their respective fields.The establishment of the Hunter Chair represented an opportunity to pass the torch to the next generation of Mormon studies scholars. But the handoff was a stretch. There was a pool of qualified candidates, but it was much smaller and more academically junior than it should have been. What explains the gap between Mormon history's founding generation and mine? No doubt there are multiple factors, but the fallout from 1993 must rank high on the list. The September Six excommunications resulted in a lost generation of Mormon intellectuals—smart, talented people who should have written books, led scholarly organizations like the Mormon History Association, and shaped both the academic field of Mormon studies and the broader public understanding of the religion.2 Latter-day Saints were primarily affected, but non-Latter-day Saint scholars also picked up on the cue that the Church wasn't enthusiastic about open inquiry into its past. A few Latter-day Saint intellectuals stuck with it, foremost among them Terryl Givens (interestingly, a literary scholar, not a historian). But there should have been an entire generation of Terryl Givenses.The Hunter Chair should have gone to a senior scholar. In fact, it had originally, with Richard Bushman coming out of retirement at Columbia University (where he held another endowed professorship) to get the endeavor off the ground. But when Bushman stepped down from the Hunter Chair in 2011, most members of the founding generation of New Mormon History were either at or near retirement age. Furthermore, many of that generation had spent their careers teaching at BYU or working in the Church History Department—neither of which was an especially attractive career profile for a secular university like Claremont. Philip Barlow would have been an excellent choice, but he had recently been hired as the inaugural holder of the Leonard J. Arrington Chair of Mormon History and Culture at Utah State University. There was another younger member of that generation who had published enough influential scholarship to be a potentially competitive candidate for the job. His name was D. Michael Quinn. Yet the principal donors to the Hunter Chair, who did not control the search but whose generous gifts creating the position afforded them some degree of influence with university administrators, made it clear that they did not consider an excommunicant to be an acceptable candidate for a position named after a Church president.3 September 1993 loomed large over Mormon studies, even at a secular university. The fact that a thirty-four-year-old with one book was hired for an endowed professorship at a highly regarded university can only be regarded as a fluke. The stars aligned in an unpredictable way that worked out splendidly for me, but only after many others had paid the price.Times change. Things did get better in the early 2000s. The archives started to open up again. The Church History Department started producing and supporting first-rate historical scholarship, most notably the Joseph Smith Papers and the research that culminated in Ronald Walker, Richard Turley, and Glen Leonard's masterpiece Massacre at Mountain Meadows. Latter-day Saint intellectuals found new confidence, and more non-Latter-day Saint scholars gravitated to the field. Mormon history has blossomed and expanded into the multidisciplinary field of Mormon studies. Social scientists, theologians, philosophers, literary scholars, scripture scholars, and others are all producing pathbreaking work. We are living in a golden age of Mormon studies. Tellingly, most of the work is being done by people who were either young enough, or started graduate school late enough, to have not been scared away by the events of September 1993.There are still whispers. Fear remains, even if we try to push it to the back of our minds. I am frequently asked, “Have you ever been called in by a General Authority for something you wrote or said?” The answer is yes, once. We spent a little over an hour together, enjoying a wonderful conversation that I genuinely cherish. He revealed himself to be a deep thinker and compassionate minister of the gospel. But I'd be lying if I said I didn't think of the September Six when I opened the letter and read this leader's “invitation” to meet with him in his office. When friends and colleagues publish or say things that push the envelope, I actively pray they will be met with the same generosity and understanding I experienced.4 There are no guarantees. Some of Joseph Smith's most poignant insights into the human condition came when he languished in Liberty Jail during the winter of 1838–39.5 In his masterful prison letter to the Saints, excerpted in Doctrine and Covenants section 121, he reflected on the nature of power in a fallen world. Power may be exercised in various ways. Too often it is used “to exercise control of dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men.” When this is the case, “the Spirit of the Lord is grieved.” In heaven's eyes, the unrepentant wielder of that kind of dominative, manipulative, compulsory power is in a posture of hostility or enmity not only toward other humans but also toward God. Alas, “sad experience” reveals that “almost all men” will “exercise unrighteous dominion” at some point.6 They may get what they want—God offers no promise to intervene in such cases—but this is not the order of heaven.The prophet's key insight comes next. “No power or influence can or ought to be maintained” unless it is predicated on the divine qualities of persuasion, longsuffering, gentleness, meekness, kindness, pure knowledge, and most of all “love unfeigned.”7 This oft-quoted scripture is usually interpreted with an emphasis on the ought. That is to say, we ought to be kind and gentle and loving in our relationships with one another. But the statement is more radical than that. This passage is not simply about the way the universe should work; it tells us the way the universe does work. It is descriptive, in other words, not merely normative. The key words are can, only, and maintained. Certainly, it's nice when people are nice. But in a world of agentive souls, power and influence can only be maintained over the long term when assent is granted freely. Compulsion, dominion, and manipulation can and do work in the short term. People can be controlled or subdued with the use of intimidation, fear, and violence. But the human soul yearns for freedom and fulfillment. Any form of power based on compulsion rather than persuasion, intimidation rather than invitation, fear rather than love is therefore inherently limited—not just in its ethical value but in its efficacy.The September 1993 excommunications effectively and tragically cowed a generation of Latter-day Saint intellectuals. When institutions and individuals are threatened by new ideas, there is always a temptation to retrench. The blunt force of Church discipline worked in the short term. Even within a few years, however, its effect had diminished. Why? Because ideas cannot be quelched by fiat. And, more fundamentally, because “no power or influence can or ought to be maintained” by fear, dominion, intimidation, and compulsion. A new generation of intellectuals arose and carried the torch of inquiry forward.Churches thrive when they count their intellectuals as assets not liabilities, partners not villains. Will intellectuals think unruly thoughts? Yes, because it is the divine nature of the human mind to inquire, to explore, to expand. The pursuit of knowledge resists institutional correlation. If members or leaders of a group encounter thinking they deem to be dangerous, they are generally served best not by attempting to prevent or squelch that thinking but rather by providing better, more persuasive thinking. Numerous historical examples suggest that the compulsory silencing of ideas deemed “bad” is ultimately more dangerous than the ideas themselves. Churches, like governments, lose their authority precisely when they have no recourse other than mere authority. If Church leaders want to promote or discourage certain ideas, they have ample opportunity to use their power as teachers to persuade the Church membership of their position. Even in a digital age, it is the rare intellectual who can even approach the reach of the general conference pulpit and other modes of official Church communication.Thirty years later, we can be grateful that the collective excommunications of September 1993 proved to be an exception rather than the rule in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints's ongoing relationship with its intellectuals. We cannot change the past. But hopefully we can learn from and avoid the unnecessary tragedy of future lost generations.
In Utah of late it seems that water has been both everywhere and nowhere at once. For the past two decades our state and much of the American West has been locked in a “mega-drought,” the region's worst in 1,200 years. At the same time, unprecedented population growth and the increasingly impossible-to-ignore effects of climate change have pushed the West toward the brink. The crisis on the Colorado River—where in late December 2022, Lake Powell stood at 23 percent of capacity and Lake Mead at around 28 percent—portends both painful cutbacks for water users and years of legal and political battles to come.1 Meanwhile, declining water levels on Great Salt Lake have exposed hundreds of square miles of playa, creating toxic dust storms that imperil human health, and threatening catastrophic impacts for the migratory birds, brine shrimp, and other species that depend on the lake's ecosystem. That is the nowhere part.The everywhere part is the awareness of the water crisis in the media and in the public consciousness. Once a local or regional story, the West's disappearing water has become headline news on the national and even global stage. The New York Times, the Washington Post, the Guardian, and CNN among many others have covered the crisis. HBO's John Oliver even made water the subject of an episode of his satirical news show Last Week Tonight, taking particular glee in skewering Utah and its political leaders.2 This is all in addition to sustained coverage by local and regional outlets, including the important work of the Great Salt Lake Collaborative, a consortium of twenty-three media organizations with the shared mission of raising public awareness of the crisis.3 Everywhere, it seems that alarm bells are finally sounding.Water has also been on my mind a lot over the past several years as I have worked with a dedicated team from Utah Humanities on Think Water Utah. My involvement began in 2019, when Megan Van Frank asked me to serve as the state consulting scholar for the Utah tour of the Smithsonian Institution's Museum on Main Street (MoMS) exhibit Water Ways. Utah Humanities regularly brings MoMS exhibits to Utah and I had acted as consulting scholar on a previous tour, so I thought I knew what I was getting myself into. Besides, as an historian of the American West, water is never far from the center of the story, whether it be mythologized, celebratory tales of hardy pioneers or grimmer accounts of environmental injustice and the struggle to control the precious resource. Indeed, some noted western historians such as Walter Prescott Webb and Donald Worster deemed aridity the region's defining characteristic.4 Then Van Frank had the vision to secure the tour of a second Smithsonian exhibit H2O Today, transforming Water Ways into Think Water Utah, which she informally and lovingly dubbed the “water circus.”5 By the time the big top was struck for the final time in October of 2022, our travelling circus reached every corner of the state. All told, Think Water Utah included the publication of my extended essay “Utah Water Ways,” companion exhibits and local programming at nine partner venues, a statewide exhibit developed to accompany H2O Today, associated exhibits at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts and the Natural History Museum of Utah, online resources for teachers, and multiple episodes of Utah Humanities’ Beehive Archive podcast.6While it was enough to leave me feeling waterlogged, I believe that Think Water Utah and projects like it can play a crucial role in our civic life. As a citizen who cares deeply about Utah and the West, I worry about our future. We live in a time when both the validity of science and the relevance of history are under attack. Neither trend bodes well for dealing effectively with the water crisis. Yet at the same time, as a publicly engaged historian, I remain hopeful that my work, and the work of so many others, facilitates meaningful public discussions as we face consequential decisions both as individuals and as a society. In saying this I do not suggest that history provides an objective roadmap for the future. We have all heard the old saw about those who cannot remember the past being condemned to repeat it. But in fact, historians are notoriously bad at predicting the future. And so, despite living in Utah for over three decades I make no claim to being a prophet. No historian should. What then is the role of an historian at the confluence of water and the public?If historians cannot predict the future, we can provide desperately needed historical context that in turn contributes to informed public discussion. In public-facing projects like Think Water Utah, our central goal is to provoke visitors and readers. I use the term provoke advisedly. In doing so I am following Freeman Tilden, the National Park Service's guru of interpretation, who long ago asserted that provocation was the chief aim of public interpretation. Effective interpretation, he wrote, served to “stimulate the reader or hearer toward a desire to widen [their] horizon of interests and knowledge, and to gain an understanding of the greater truths that lie beneath any statements of fact.”7 To provoke, then, is not to pick a fight. Of course, we knew that for Think Water Utah to truly have value, we must ask hard questions and tell difficult stories. By retelling well-known (and lesser known) stories with a critical eye toward their meaning in light of current concerns, our goal was never to disparage heroes or tear down heritage but rather to expand and complicate popular narratives and get our visitors and readers to stop and think more deeply about the past as context.That is also what I want to do here, by addressing several intertwined historical threads that provide particularly relevant context for understanding our present and pondering our future. All are linked by the central notion that water is not only life but also power. Moreover, they also illustrate the fundamental contingency of history. Utah's historic “water ways” were not predestined nor were they simply dictated by the state's harsh environment. Rather, they took shape where the natural world and human cultures met. It was there that people made decisions, rooted in their own cultural traditions and historical experiences, which impacted their own lives and in many cases transformed the lives of others. Our future water ways will be formulated the same way, through adaptation and resistance, conflict and compromise.There is an oft-repeated adage, popularly though falsely attributed to Mark Twain, that in the West “whiskey is for drinking, water is for fighting.”8 It is a funny line, but it also reflects a deeper truth: in arid places like the West water is power, and it is often a source of conflict. The general scarcity of water meant that the relatively few places such the Wasatch Oasis zone, where water was more abundant, became the focus of intensive and permanent Euro-American colonization, setting the stage for the dispossession of Native peoples. Later, the struggle to control water meant the difference between success or failure for those same colonists, be they farmers, ranchers, miners, and even whole communities.And if water is intensely political in the West, in Utah it is has also been also central to cultural identity, for it figures prominently in the LDS faith's cherished narrative of hardship, trial, and triumph. Fleeing persecution in the East, the popular narrative goes, Brigham Young led the Mormons into an unforgiving land where through hard work and with a shared sense of purpose they made the desert “blossom like the rose.” The whole story is, of course, far more complicated. To tell the more complete story, we must begin with the central premise that different cultures and societies can and have approached the natural world with radically dissimilar values and goals. These differences have shaped lands and waters in distinct ways and very often have engendered conflict. Indeed, making the desert bloom for Euro-American colonists came at the expense of Utah's Indigenous peoples.The central difference between Native and Euro-American water ways came down to adjustment, to adaptation: more precisely, who or what was expected to adapt or change. Utah's Native peoples generally accepted the natural limitations of their homeland and made optimal use of its resources without attempting to reengineer the world around them. For Numic-speaking peoples—Utes, Shoshones, Goshutes, and Paiutes—mobility was a crucial strategy for survival throughout much of the year, but this was balanced by more sedentary camps the of a on those which the people had to Water of course, a and in and and as well as In the were camps that with to and for In the people and in the Utah the at of the in the their both and colonists came to the arid lands of the American West with about human with For it was not a of but a of to to the of their their At a fundamental their in the that had been over they that transforming was as well as In the for and to and an of life they knew in the to the arid In doing so they only as far as to the natural world and its and then the land we Utah, water became a of conflict. and their that or linked and other water was the of and and The peoples of the Great living to the the In many cases the important water often the Native peoples who had for many of the of the of of in of a much greater other the Mormons to The Wasatch Oasis their only to a between the and to the of came at the expense of Native lands and In the over the and lands of the Utah It was the of two decades of that led to the of people from the Wasatch Oasis and central Meanwhile, to the LDS into the homeland of the there in the of the of Native peoples in the American not engaged in the as they had been in Utah colonists from the and the as the of the failure to they were control over Native Mormons engaged in struggle over this with other This not play on but in the of a values as well as its Brigham goal in the to Utah was to an with or of water was an part of those and through of the Utah's worked to that is legal struggle took environmental and the of a were to water the arid Water in the began with the of if land a or they a to use its they not the for others. The was well to the like the meant not water to their In the West, a very different took in the of the two in time, in and Water are not to land but rather depend on an claim with the the state to a with and use to others with on the same or The of the or the of not in time, in the also on a for this is where into water is a not It is the to use a of water that is not the water whether they be or must their claim by the water to some which or a or to meant of the water use is often more as it or the goal of the use was to and that a served the it has also led in of their to use every of their of or rather the LDS led to and served to the of At a time when other and the to the values of the of New Water was be but water As and the Wasatch local water not to but to the and of the As the in Utah the to control of in the Water and resources came under the of in the that for the of included to and Yet over time, the of in and Utah. In the and water with water and and on By when Utah its water was the of the the LDS to the world at through the control of water were they for an vision of western by John the to doing Powell a for with and public This is he a in the public particularly in Utah and among of the environmental and In popular Powell was the despite an in the led two through the and in the Today, some as to the of and more many more for the natural world and But Powell was a nor a of And so, there is in who he was and was as well as his vision for western That never came to not its for about water in the American West and for public think about the of was not a but an of and in the natural and he an of no and to following his into and a long in which he and the natural history and human cultures of the for years he both the and the of American and his interests were part of the same of national For a understanding of the land and its peoples was a for the of the arid saw the between water and in the It was central to his goal of a vision of that was rooted in the of and other of the For political The to the he was to a made of In the decades the this by a became the of who the of the the to and being in an Powell also this of And he to both to the of human and to that vision of American saw both the of the as well as to that to the in the of the These included the the and the that more any other the of the the This an to claim from the public that on the land for years and made they to their in other their very own in American the Powell that the in the not of and but of the natural environment. In places of the of in any year, the of that provide a living in the made sense in the arid West, where or much to were more to the environment. American in be to the lands of the American This was the that important And in it he a radically different of the waters and the which had it been have transformed the political and face of the American his Powell time in Utah and were by a different their the arid West became of the that Powell through his Powell not the same with and that LDS colonists, but he want to interests and the of and local control over that precious also to his That is and important began his for the American West, which deemed a for a with his on the of the of the the over the years in and finally a of in of an understanding of the environmental limitations by aridity in the American that only percent of the West be there are about under in Utah, or percent of the state's land this under to provide for over a American It be a and of and It also the of to every of the region's That the West's be was not a are Powell his he that resources be that no water to the The that we so were a like and the same some ways Powell be a of those he that and resources must be developed for human their on he for to science and be to make western he but only the by work to a regional that the of environmental and the New But there were also important differences between Powell and of not the vision of sustained by the provide and but the control of the must be to the of and political and the cherished vision of between the natural world and was at the of for the it the arid West's political to with its natural and were often the of the and making over water under of the waters human and political as well as water In the American West, that meant a of effectively be with two or more which Powell Powell have in of a of water Water be to land but the and of the land be central or from the to all the water that be To a of and of lands in the be to and all and be as the the or the on to local waters as well as the to the waters that down from in of the more their water be to those of water no their or only to the water that be their and have only a and the in and water be a of the arid the of western like who the and the in and Powell to But not want to of natural and and other western saw that not their for the only two years the effectively of a very different vision for the West was on in in October when Powell what to be his on water and western was there as the of the National The was the of who in his of Salt Lake where he had the two years The were a of and Powell his on the it was an began by his not to the or other but to a that will the of for the I am more in the and the I am in the they truly with such the and in the with the who shared he his the in the from for the and to The when Powell the of natural what I to make to is is not Water enough to all the that when all the are when all the in the when all the when all the are when all the the are when all the waters are when all the waters are when all the are or that can be in all this arid there is not water to all this arid I make that is but a of the land which can be when all the of then a years the interests in water will I tell are a heritage of conflict and over water for there is not water to that it became difficult for Powell to others with questions and at the who a became the of the the that whole on for some general The he was the only he had in this being from the Powell as the of the to the a vision of and and for it was an of that to any natural no of has our lives in an arid like Utah to a population in the it is to believe that can every often the very they were to This brings me to of water in Utah and the American western water an but in the and their in the struggle to control the region's precious resource. This not as a the West has been and it the of the about percent of live in places as in the West, it is over And about percent of the water in Utah to of that to a growth accounts for the in and has and very to current and that October in when Powell the of the who stood in was then of the Water and the of the of Water and In he the of of Water to and not of which was for that was but was not in was on the current more future of the he that his were on the waters of the as a to water the was a in the of and its population By the turn of the the and two decades as the in and the American Yet despite its growth and the water its as a The water source was the a of a that became a The was natural and without more water its that its growth The the water in American a struggle that the and the of the political of the West, all the environmental of our the of the and it made in the other in the Great the waters of the never reached the but rather into an It is a or as is Utah's Great Salt a the pioneers the Salt Lake and Utah other Indigenous people and began in the of the natural which were not those of the Wasatch it became the of the Service's in and had other a who served as and was in of the his was but came to believe that it was the only to the the began to water in the In a conflict of the in of the the in and the of water to to more water and the In fact, the water was not and be in the beneath the it was were by but the public it not be without In Frank present was the old and who as of the was a of of was in his own for the for the that there was greater to be served by the water in The a to a over that have the water the became and the following the the from the to become at the of Water and every of the between and it water miles the over miles of and twenty-three to and without the for It was a But it not the of the nor it to only the water in the led to the that he must it all in to the water No water meant no future for the and and they and the on several the to the with conflict but growth and its for more water The was extended to the Lake which became and the But even that was not In the an even was to water from the Colorado to over a in And the water over miles from Lake on the in to In and throughout the American West has more has the of the far from Utah, we not its historical the for being the of By a second and began even more and water of the The was environmental Once a for migratory birds, Lake became a toxic dust storms that the legal have in to water into but it and so the with and to The between Lake and our own Great Salt Lake are hard to In a on the Great Salt the New York not are of important differences For the toxic dust storms from Lake relatively few people in like and a Great Salt Lake the and of people living the Wasatch This is a to be but it also a of came at the expense of hundreds of miles the Wasatch we are doing this to and that the to change. is in and if have the will to a hard at they a there are no or public discussions of water in Utah have increasingly toward and more toward the that percent of the water in the state year, ask if it sense to so much of our precious to a that percent of the state's It is a and water from use to other seems like an to Utah's water But we also for the state's it to be no at the Utah was the state in the and are that population growth will for decades to we cannot stop growth is that not want to even if it were we can it more We can and over the of and water projects that have greater growth and even greater will and will in our cultural values and And they will from every of our cannot predict it all will turn but I do believe that historical context will be in our future water Think Water Utah was to provoke and meaningful discussions of our past and our future I public The goal was to get our visitors and readers to their to water and to That is also what I have to do In the ways in which Native peoples and Euro-American colonists engaged land and water in different or the vision of western by John or population growth and in the West, we to more and decisions about our water future. For me that is the role of a historian at the confluence of water and the
Sacred Games, Death, and Renewal in the Ancient Eastern Woodlands: The Ohio Hopewell System of Cult Sodality Heterarchies. A. MARTIN BYERS. Alta Mira Press, Lanham, MD, 2011. 558 pp., ill., maps. $99.00 (cloth), ISBN: 978-0-7591-2032-7; $97.99 (e-book), ISBN: 978-0-7591-2034-1.A. Martin Byers's newest book presents another of his attempts at synthesizing Eastern Woodland prehistory. At its base, Sacred Games, Death, and Renewal in the Ancient Eastern Woodlands promotes a new and alternative explanation of Hopewell social organization. The main thesis this book seeks to elucidate is how and why the Middle Woodland (ca. 100 B.C. to A.D. 400) ritual landscape developed in the middle Ohio River valley. On the back cover of this book, Byers's is described as and grounded in empirical data. Some of Byers's ideas are innovative, but radical may be a poor word to describe his current work; sodalities have been proposed as an organizing principle for Hopewellian societies before. In addition, only portions of the book are grounded in empirical data, none of which derives from new or unpublished work. The language used herein is typical of Byers's previous books; the vocabulary is exhausting, and constant rereading of various parts of the text is required to comprehend his thesis. Nonetheless, the amount of work Byers undertook to complete this book should not be dismissed. It is as impressive as it is important because it requires us to consider alternate theories that push the boundaries of current and enduring interpretations of the Hopewell phenomenon.Byers's book is organized into two parts. The first section critically assesses prevailing interpretations of Hopewell social organization and how it developed. His alternative is also presented in this section. The second section outlines how the Ohio Hopewell possibly interacted according to his model. Here Byers discusses specific sites and their significance. Both sections are addressed below.In the introduction Byers outlines his analytical methods and the models he critically tests. He employs what he calls the hermeneutic spiral (p. 15) to create a critical comparison of his models and the existing models of Hopewell social organization. This method consists of delineating situations in which specific social, political, and economic conditions may have developed that led to the creation of landscapes containing burial mounds and geometric earthworks. The two specific models that Byers juxtaposes are described as the monistic modular polity community model (MPC) and the heterarchical polyistic localecentric community model (HPC) (pp. 17-28). The former is identified as the vacant center/dispersed hamlet hypothesis argued for by archaeologists Paul Pacheco and William Dancey. The latter is Byers's model, a version of which he used in 2006 to describe the organization of Mississippian peoples who constructed Cahokia. The primary difference between these two models rests in the nature of sociopolitically decentralized kin-based societies. While the MPC considers Hopewellian societies to be organized along kin-based clans, Byers's HPC regards them as organized in autonomous and decentralized sodalities ordered in relation to seniority and age-sets transcending physical kinship in clans.Moving forward, Byers highlights cultural analogs and cosmological models used to describe nontangible aspects of Hopewell society. He rejects Pacheco's cultural analogs, drawn from the Mapuche of southern Chile, for not fitting the HPC of sodality origins (p. 39). Byers condemns Christopher Carr's arguments for earthen enclosure variation relating to different functions, uses, and community sizes by outlining his perspectives on Hopewell mortuary traditions and material culture in Chapters 3-5. He argues that Carr's of multiple, kin-based communities pooling labor does not properly characterize the variability of the sodality-based Hopewell system (pp. …
A Catholic chapel stands above the town of Amecameca, built into the top of a tree-covered hill called the Sacromonte. A doorway in the back of the chapel leads to a cave of volcanic rock, where an effigy is located that depicts the deceased, reclining Christ. This Christ in the cave is an image of Santo Entierro, the Holy Sepulcher of Christ, and it is believed to be miraculous. Native leaders in Amecameca helped to establish the site in the 1580s and benefited from their founding of the place throughout the colonial period. Spanish friars and Nahuas had different ideas of what was actually miraculous about the location and the image, and each understanding involved different senses of history. For the original residents, the hill, the cave, the territory around the shrine, and the beneficent human beings who directed the construction of the chapel all played roles in an astonishing moment in the history of the town when the polity miraculously did not perish but, instead, found a place in the new Christian order. In this article, I place the European Catholic tradition of miracle narra tives within the ethnohistorical cultural context of indigenous political, literary, and territorial experiences and show how such marvels acquired uniquely Mexican meanings.When the Franciscan Order arrived in New Spain just three years after the fall of Tenochtitlán to Hernán Cortés, its members brought their devotion to the Passion, believing that miracles of the cross represented the triumph of Christ in the New World. Indigenous leaders and communities soon began to accept Christological symbols and reports of the apparitions of saints in Chalco in their own locally triumphal way. I argue that one cannot understand the whole meaning of colonial Mexican miracles unless they are interpreted in terms of their importance to indigenous territorial and leadership concepts and historical thinking. Where the wondrous events happened and who they happened to were of equal, if not greater, importance as the theological message of apparitions or particular Christian symbolism of objects, which the Franciscans emphasized. The gravitational cultural force that held land, power, and holiness in the orbit of the shrine was cyclical history. I show how this Mesoamerican way of making sense of the past is also displayed in colonial indigenous written traditions such as the títulos primordiales, the maps of the Relaciones geográfícas of 1580, oral histories taken in the Relaciones geográficas del Arzobispado de México, 1743; and the Séptima relación, an early seventeenth-century Nahuatl history by Don Domingo de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin. The títulos primordiales are written and painted documents that established the preconquest foundations of indigenous towns and their legitimacy as loyally Christian in the postconquest era; they usually included maps of which were to Spanish as of the and written the of the hill and its cave in the of Amecameca of the foundations of the indigenous in to from the the were of of the roles of territory and This the that Franciscan and indigenous historical in in the new Mexican were in in the of Christ the and the of I arrived a of Nahuatl Spanish and a in indigenous in colonial this is not devotion or the of this of Christ and indigenous of miracle were to colonial Native and in the of Chalco and believed that which how members of the were of the of the miracles are not the of in which the the of the the of Catholic in indigenous in to of their to the and the meaning of Christ symbols the of the Nahuas of Amecameca, history the and after the hill as the and the around it were in the and of the The town of Amecameca is of in the and that the of the of the town of Amecameca are the and In one particular of the of Amecameca the the Chalco and the called held the Chalco in the of the of was in the of the of the of The was a in which to the and to a of In the of the the represented the The the of was the and were the the where human beings the The Nahuas to be and of were to the and were and human from the the who it were and and also had The the was a hill a the which is in as and in the were the of the and as the in the of of Amecameca, that a of the called to a an where they were the to and to and is written that the was the of the colonial period. from Amecameca documents a not place the the Sacromonte. the of Amecameca to the de that locally as in the of in Amecameca in San had the of the of the and the indigenous of were to was throughout the Chalco as a de of and the indigenous as a of had making around a the from when this was to the in Nahuatl which did not The in in a and the The was a place where indigenous leaders as I it was not a location of to but, instead, an of the of into the colonial indigenous and the who the hill of Amecameca to the hill of and its cave the of Christ. in the the of Amecameca the of the of the throughout the of where the cross miraculously in the the the the hill was an site indigenous as as of In the site was located within the of the town of de Amecameca, which was a town of San The in the the as did its of the towns that were Chalco was a to Amecameca and were located the from to the of by way of by from all The of to the site was the of events their the Christian of the of the in the were in the of the that they were in the This by the In the of that the of the Holy and Holy Sepulcher was one from of Chalco was the of and and each had which the indigenous of from devotion to and as of of into to the leaders of Amecameca, leaders benefited from In 1580, within the of a of into the of a who was in a place called a The and to In the about image of the of called de an indigenous directed who the and when the their they of miraculous of and by devotion and of the of was in Chalco and in and the of were the were miraculous image in the of and the that who brought and from and were of the Passion, or Holy Sepulcher of in in and in the of the The had a of miraculous in San in in in and in the de a of and its were by devotion to the In communities in the of and the displayed a that represented of Passion, and of the colonial miracle of the of Amecameca, was to the of Christ, and the Franciscan Order and its in the New de were in it in the the of Spanish the cave located the was an of the of the indigenous of New was the of a triumphal Spanish Catholic of miracles indigenous that the Franciscan and in the brought to such as the of postconquest New as the arrived in from Spain in they brought to the indigenous their devotion to the of Christ, the of which they had helped to in their de and of the de their to the of Christ This the of Christian in the and to of into the that de of in and of the and of and de that as a in was in and of the Holy the Franciscan of the of the the way the to indigenous The not Nahuatl and the Nahuas Christian and the Franciscan the the friars to the the of the and the which the and to the of was one of the of new concepts to the indigenous of New Spain just after their in In to of the the symbols of the the of the Franciscan indigenous in New San de in from the of de de San de indigenous or the de San in the in and it to as a This of is from of and and three an which Christ stands in are the cross and of the Passion, each in a that is of the of early colonial Mexican the de San is to an the around its its to in who had the of de The of the also of which they to in the of the they one in which Christ a its the of a by the symbols and of the 1580s and the of the had the indigenous of and had to the of Chalco the of the Franciscan and Franciscans of the and the of or in and this In Chalco the of Christ as miraculous the Santo de in and the Santo effigy de in had as a Christian site throughout the of that de from The of miracles the which are in Franciscan historical by de de and de European about the cross in cave above the Franciscan in to Amecameca, where saints and to as a in in the cave the Sacromonte. the of and to the the of Christ as into a the hill and in from the a from after from Chalco to that in the of was Franciscan a of their and and the of their in New the established a in Amecameca the the Franciscans to be a in their the a in Amecameca the location of and the of a from that the and the The were to the in a of and in believed in the of of a of the of The of the Franciscan to to the of the in New and the of in the that had the of 1580, to the of the and reports that when arrived in Amecameca from the in in the to and and that the Nahuas had it as a they believed it to the from an who had it in The also and and the chapel within the cave in the Christ effigy and in an and the Nahuas a in the are to as or of their they are to be of and The Franciscan as as the of were of the indigenous who their to the of not the of the indigenous the construction of the chapel in as the early seventeenth-century from the Nahuas did not in Nahuatl about miraculous events that the of New from the the indigenous of of the Sacromonte. interpreted in the of show that the cave was a of indigenous throughout the colonial period. In Séptima relación, a who was not a of in Nahuatl the miracle of the making of the The moment in of the is the of the chapel in which as a miraculous of Nahuatl how an indigenous historical was in which the of Amecameca the site into just a of European the Franciscan had the of the indigenous in the Séptima Chimalpahin the of the friars in the to that was a New as of Chimalpahin the and importance of the indigenous and Spanish in the in The miracles are found in the human that place the of the Chalco are as in the astonishing in which they into a chapel and of in the leaders the friars as they not to a triumphal Catholic Indigenous from Amecameca their to the friars in to to the in the of the of de in Amecameca, as the Franciscan the the of the cave chapel in the in the the de the cave it is in the context of events that the leaders of are that cave, and in is where the Holy Sepulcher of where they and In to are also in the what was miraculous about the In to the Franciscan Chimalpahin not the of saints and the of in a as they de and In this Chimalpahin the tradition of of one this in to of de in the Amecameca, Chimalpahin that the miracle in the cave was the of Amecameca as the place to an Chimalpahin not the that it was a who brought the image to the shrine above of the human of the the to the a of In the Chimalpahin the events the in of the who and of in the and three the Santo image in the cave, to to the terms and miracles that Chimalpahin did not the events as The miraculous were and For which is usually as the of In the it is in the that it or to Christ. The is to the Nahuatl that de as in the place of de The of to the that it to be in a to to or to This that Chimalpahin was making the the image and the Christ, which the image is a Chimalpahin did not the of the that which they were from of such of an image was not were that of the of a Nahuatl in the is which I as of miraculous The of is and it or which or the The of be found in the of de of The by the of the which of of the the image of the The of is a to the of image were Nahuatl the that to the of an or that an did not the of of the of that one Christian that of its and The meaning of the in the context of the is that human beings had a in the place the of which one Chimalpahin of the European Catholic tradition in of the be found in de of and that the of this The Spanish found in was when the of a miraculous image a of a a meaning to the Spanish is not found in the Franciscan histories of the Sacromonte. the terms are the Nahuatl that Chimalpahin the that human beings played in making the image as they were in miraculous to wondrous one of the indigenous to a new which was a that had a throughout the colonial period. of the of Amecameca who was as in the the of The Don de was the indigenous in which was an of the of In the the one Chimalpahin the indigenous the of the of the and their The which the new the leaders of as in the town leaders they in the which their the legitimacy of a In the of the who the of that a the new Christian and the preconquest This is in of Amecameca, the Don de of as as the de of and Don de of to and to and it cave top of the of which I as the which to the is the the or is this in the A as a by and of In this particular the three indigenous leaders are as of the who all to the as in Amecameca was to the cave where miracles their in an of by the as a a to the that the of the place particular and of the of the to were and The leaders were the of the and of and was an of in the preconquest and Christian The and of such of are when an in which Chimalpahin from Amecameca who of Franciscan in and to the of the of the as an of the in to the the of the Don de leadership as the of Amecameca and of the as a way of of The three communities represented by the three leaders were communities that to Amecameca also had each its own In the each had a that when it its to the as a in this In terms of was in the of that the top of and of Amecameca, Don de to the and was as a of the In the were the who as of the shrine were who were in the Don de the the leaders of the who the of of this site in and their this is by that to the of the de The of and of began in the of the chapel Sacromonte. indigenous leaders a of that the to the of the Catholic the of the colonial period. the Spanish that the to the Catholic and order. This in their in when the of Amecameca, Don de a of to of the from the also this period. Don de to cave into the Holy Sepulcher of the was the that the of of the Spanish colonial the the de to of their from the colonial In Don Don de to a to a a and to in a Spanish from Amecameca a of the years Don de a of located and of the town of was the by and the by the of the which included the This was its the and the the de which after Mexican leaders did not of the their own miracle the that Nahuas were and early in their of the Christian of the Franciscan and who to the New World. This was to in Chimalpahin established the colonial legitimacy of such as the de by their from preconquest the of the cave chapel in if the leadership the of of to a of and not a that indigenous the friars in the image of Christ in the they de cave into and it the Sacromonte. This was a the the Christ in the cave, which was the of their they their of place and which were in preconquest In the leaders of the by and making it the of their in their own this to they also helped to establish the new The the new Christian of their and by the Spanish Catholic order. The cave, which had the of the a of the the and throughout the colonial miracle and established the territorial of the For the of Amecameca, the Santo image of Christ, their of de to the cave and the into a Christian the as the in the of the Mesoamerican the Christ and in in the and 1580s established that as to which the Nahuas historical about the that they had making to the colonial the The Relaciones geográficas maps 1580, the and the of miraculous were all indigenous of which in the and early The in the Relaciones geográficas of towns and territory Catholic in the were to legitimacy to Spanish as as of of and the miraculous to the of towns and legitimacy in the of from the of the written cannot be the they early of such as of the they of a and tradition in which Mesoamerican to in the of are documents written and that indigenous documents and The and the all documents in their and the oral that the written were to be or indigenous included and in European and indigenous territory and events that had the founding of the the the the message that their communities were and the to how had in and the to they to colonial as of and the preconquest of who in the colonial Mesoamerican established that communities had to their the that they had not the of legitimacy the Catholic Catholic the history of the which were in the early they were written the of the friars and who to their towns and and their communities to the the of the a to the new colonial order. The that the of their towns the new is their of of are such as the of Catholic and of to Christian or histories the sense that leaders and the new and the the documents to oral events or or and the of are into a is and to a in the of history. The the the the of miraculous and the in their helped members their in a by their and the the of historical of the of experiences of to a past when the of oral and written miracle and the which they in and in how miraculous arrived in their communities in The in which they were the a Holy and their did not as in the were of the in the of the shrine of de in the a of a chapel which a miraculous image of was In the of San the of that an indigenous of as the to the miracles of their their image in the original where it in their all the members from the of The of San did not the of the they did and that had the miracles of the cross in had an sense of the past that it a the indigenous of the had their and who to In they as a the of Holy of the of Christ the of power, to the that the which in had its in the of the the the a the Christ effigy in the the indigenous in the and the new town the In indigenous the de a around the a Spanish in the the indigenous who had the own to the the town the and in of the was a the of their of founding events the sense of that the of the in the did and The of members to in the In and were from and town the founding which the of a and of miracle indigenous and of the founding of the the the of and a sense of the message that the had an to that involved the and of the of the to indigenous miracle that the as if they had to in a particular The miracles of the were that they not to from their communities of This in a in the Relaciones geográficas of a Santo image from that to In the of this image of the Christ, a of from had it in a to where they to it to in a cave in the way. they in the they found that the had to to the of they the and to the The that the be and they found that the image was had miraculously into the the built a chapel of the and the by it The Spanish who this that was written of the of the image in the and that had the from the indigenous a by the de in and in the image of de in a way. Don de who was as an the of the Holy the image a a hill called the of Don it it in a shrine or and it the image and found it in the place where the to Don de that to a chapel to the image the site of and of Spanish the chapel was built around which Don was In the Nahuatl of the found in de the image to in the was all by to the as is and as is in all of the image its own in one called and which to their documents symbols in to that that they and the by their to after the when was making and For in to a of the of in a a painted to colonial in as of the and territorial In the of town of who is painted as an a of the in as in the the the of their the and their to their territory a This is by a in which the are are to as in Nahuatl or as in the Nahuatl of or of which Chimalpahin in to de the the of the was from its as the from which members had territory and to in and established the of Amecameca the postconquest maps from and the the hill as the that the of the The that the from to by each of the The is from a that Don de in and and the is from the of the top of the Sacromonte. the hill was the place to all of the and of was the that the human the one to all the of the by the to the The this of the and the effigy of Christ in the back of the chapel are the as miraculous Christ effigy and the hill and chapel of Amecameca the the of and the of a of the colonial Nahuas the hill as a that to their such the that that they were The and miraculous image were of indigenous that a particular of as European of the in the indigenous the in the and the of indigenous of in the of triumph of did not the land, indigenous and the colonial period. This was a of the but, in the Franciscan of had the indigenous history. In the early to the Franciscans their the of the and this was into of leaders the that the leaders to the of Franciscan leaders de and de the of the and of to this of their in Amecameca the that as of legitimacy Catholic and of the of their which back to the colonial and of legitimacy by the indigenous were concepts of legitimacy in to their of as the colonial their of the miraculous image the the of their a new miraculous image of the of in the indigenous a of to that of A from the de the and how and the indigenous in to a miracle cross in a of the of such the of the of San a of the of a cross in the The to the as from the of also that were Spanish as in the the of the as and the the cross the of the of the the had arrived from to the of this The of the of Chalco from the de who was also an to the Don a of had the cross into the chapel of its had to the of the and the of who to understand if the miracle was or the indigenous town to to a chapel the were three from the and that they had the the indigenous of the that it to the de In to to a they to the that were after years of Catholic The be the site of their that triumph of their the indigenous the miracle in was by the that one of the communities of had a miraculous cross in the to in had an image of to be to a cross to the located in San In soon after the the members of the the image of Santo de to their in The of the cross did not the that the image had in In the a to the image that they believed and In the de that the of the cross in which the to a chapel their found original held a in the of as in of the of miraculous cave in the histories miracle and the from members of their town leaders and to miracles and as the of legitimacy to by to in the and to indigenous as the image or the original the that their miraculous image in their particular the context of New the of the was the of European triumphal and Mesoamerican of the postconquest The of the of the the site its historical the the of Amecameca to the traditions of and such as that of of The of Catholic symbols and into the of apparitions that and indigenous to the all into of the the Christian the of in Spain that are and to the events in New Spain that are in this to of and towns of New symbols that had represented the of the and of For of Christ and of all this to the a in the of the and the years of in the to the in of the to in Holy and of were their in the to the and when Spain was and the was from Christian the cultural to to by the of of and were the of such devotion in soon as the and such was and towns of the of Amecameca as a of European traditions is to the such a site the and was to the who were different in Spain and the to New indigenous was its by years of and to was and from European Catholic tradition is one of cultural the historical meaning of the Amecameca A the Spanish and the Mexican miracle traditions is the of and of miracles and miraculous in the New In Spain and to miraculous all of the miracles that indigenous to the of and did not the apparitions of The was in New who had miraculous as that miraculous image where were had the as the títulos primordiales, and the Relaciones the and early Nahuas their that their had this and to in and the of the this moment in and they a sense of In Franciscan the apparitions of the saints and miracles of de in Amecameca, that the Nahuas of Amecameca believed in a that miraculously their in a wondrous chapel the of this was not to the history of Mexican by to be the found in indigenous written and I that and historical to be indigenous and Franciscan the triumph of their in the and if one is in of the historical the of that and in New land, and did not that the of was to of European histories and the of indigenous above to the indigenous and of New Spain the of the miraculous cultural and indigenous The of the indigenous in the of the triumph of indigenous
Historians have recently given much attention to the active, formative role of state governments in the American economy before the Civil War.1 The states exercised nearly exclusive control over many aspects of economic life, and in such areas as labor, banking, and corporation policy the federal government interfered relatively little. The consequence was considerable decentralization of power in policymaking, together with variations in policy from state to state.2 Perhaps in no policy area were variations so dramatic as in state legislation on banking. In some states banking was prohibited outright, while in others the state government itself established and operated banks, sometimes on a monopoly basis. Elsewhere, safety funds were established and banks required to meet minimum standards of specie reserve and the like; and in a few states, stringent regulatory policies were pursued, with public commissioners given considerable discretion in administering policy.3