Even the notion of tax-supported public schools was initially opposed by Latter-day Saints, who saw it as a potential threat to church dominance. Until the 1920s, few Mormons certified to teach, and disputes over the likes of small pox vaccinations took on conspiratorial overtones. Of the first four district superintendents, three were non-Mormon. But they were followed by such prominent representatives of the LDS church as L. John Nuttal Jr., grandson and namesake of the influential secretary to the LDS First Presidency; Howard S. McDonald, future BYU president; and M. Lynn Bennion, former LDS supervisor of seminaries.

David O. McKay and others once strategized about how to infiltrate and take over the schools. But once they succeeded in gaining control, they decided not to make the schools a theocratic "bulwark against the world, " as originally conceived.