The president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the senior officer of the movement and the only person held to be authorised to receive revelation binding on the whole body. He is sustained as prophet, seer and revelator, presides over the First Presidency with two counsellors of his choosing, and holds all the priesthood keys exercised by anyone else in the church. In practice the office combines three things that are usually separated: a teaching authority, the executive direction of a very large institution, and a claim to living revelation. Announcements that change church practice are made in his name and, when they are canonised, are presented to a general conference for a sustaining vote before taking their place in the Doctrine and Covenants. Succession is not by election or by appointment. On the death of a president the First Presidency is dissolved and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles becomes the presiding body; its longest-serving member, by date of ordination as an apostle rather than by age, is then ordained president. The rule is mechanical by design, and since 1847 it has produced an unbroken sequence with no contested succession within the main body.
Facts
Organisation
Reach of Its AuthoritySourced to the subject's own accountThe whole tradition, or a claim to it 1Tradition: The Latter Day Saint movement Authority Scope DetailSourced to the subject's own accountThe whole church. He is the only person held to be authorised to receive revelation binding on the entire body, and he holds every priesthood key exercised by anyone else. 1Tradition: The Latter Day Saint movement Mode of SuccessionAutomatic, by seniority of ordination as an apostle rather than by age or election. On a president's death the First Presidency dissolves and the longest-serving apostle is ordained, usually within a fortnight. 2Tradition: The Latter Day Saint movement Attributions
TraditionSourced to the subject's own accountThe Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints 1 Status
Status TodaySourced to the subject's own accountLiving tradition, practised today 1 Learn More
Prophet, Seer and Revelator
The president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the only person in the movement held to be authorised to receive revelation binding on the whole body. He is sustained by the church twice a year as prophet, seer and revelator, presides over the First Presidency with two counsellors of his own choosing, and holds every priesthood key that anyone else in the church exercises, delegating them rather than sharing them.
The office joins three things that most religions keep apart. It is a teaching authority, and what the president says in general conference is treated as the current mind of God on a subject. It is the chief executive of an institution with a global membership, tens of thousands of congregations, a university system, a welfare and humanitarian operation and a very large investment portfolio. And it is a claim to living revelation, which means the office can do what no interpretive authority can: change what the church does. Both of the twentieth century's largest changes to Latter-day Saint practice, the end of plural marriage and the end of the priesthood restriction, were announced by a president and then canonised.
The office is held for life and there is no retirement. Presidents have often been very old, and in the twentieth century some were seriously incapacitated for extended periods, during which the counsellors in the First Presidency carried the administration. The church has never established a mechanism for a president to step down, and has not been asked to.
A Succession Nobody Votes On
Most religious bodies choose their leader. The Latter-day Saint movement does not, and the mechanism by which it avoids doing so is one of the more consequential pieces of institutional design in modern religion.
When a president dies, the First Presidency ceases to exist at that moment. Its counsellors return to their seats in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles at their original seniority, and the quorum becomes the presiding body of the church. Its senior member, determined by the date on which he was ordained an apostle and not by age, is then ordained president, usually within a fortnight. There is no election, no conclave, no campaign and no shortlist, and because ordination dates are public the identity of the next president is known years in advance to anyone who cares to look.
The rule emerged from the crisis it now prevents. Joseph Smith's death in June 1844 left several claimants: Sidney Rigdon as surviving counsellor, James Strang with a letter of appointment, and the Quorum of the Twelve under Brigham Young, who prevailed at Nauvoo in August 1844 and was ordained president only in December 1847 after more than three years in which the Twelve governed directly. Comparable gaps followed the deaths of Young in 1877 and John Taylor in 1887. Since 1898 the reorganisation has been immediate.
Seventeen men have held the office. Not one succession in the main body has been contested since the rule settled, which for a movement that fragmented spectacularly at its first transition is a considerable result.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Held Differently
The Community of Christ has a president prophet, but the succession ran through Joseph Smith own son rather than through the Quorum of the Twelve, and the office has been held by people outside the Smith family since 1996.
Element Of
The president of the church is sustained as prophet, seer and revelator, and succeeds by seniority in the Quorum of the Twelve rather than by election.
Found In
The president and two counsellors of his choosing. The body dissolves on his death.
Related To
Two lineages of one office. This one is the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Utah-based body. The other is the Prophet-President of the Community of Christ, the body that followed Joseph Smith III from 1860. Both descend from Joseph Smith's presidency of the high priesthood and the two lines separated at the 1844 succession crisis.
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