The Sun.
London, England, 1866-08-08 00:00:00

The Mormon Settlement at Utah.

The American Government have issued a report
made by the " House Committee of Territories" on
the condition of Utah. The commissioners ap-
pointed to make an investigation say that the tes-
timony discloses the fact that the laws of the United
States are openly and defiantly violated throughout
the territory, and that an armed force is necessary
to preserve the peace and give security to the lives
and property of citizens of the United States resid-
ing therein. The only witness introduced at the
request of the delegate from Utah admits the ne-
cessity of maintaining United States troops in the
territory, in order to secure protection and safety to
persons and property. The committee have been
unable to adopt the suggestions made by some of
the gentlemen examined for the abolition of the pre-
sent territorial government of Utah, and the estab-
lishment of a military government. They also re-
gret to state that they have been unable to agree
upon and submit for the action of the louse a plan
which seemed to them to promise a practical solution
of the abuse and evils complained of, and which are
admitted to exist. They do not deem it advisable
either to divide the territory and annex it to Nevada
and the territories adjacent, nor do they favour the
establishment of a military government. They have
therefore been compelled to postpone the further
consideration of the matter until December next.

On the 18th June, Mr. Hooper, the delegate from
Utah, addressed a letter to the chairman of the
committee, in which he denied the statements of
some of the witnesses, and asks that no report be
made to the House until the people of Utah could
be heard in reply to the charges made against them.
Ile also asked for a copy of the testimony already
taken, which the committee declined to furnish him.
He subsequently appeared before the committee,
and requested that a select committee or a sub-
committee from the Territorial Committee be sent
to Utah by direction of the House, with authority
to examine and report on all the allegations made
by the witnesses examined, and also on the condi-
tion of all classes residing in the territory. The
committee were unable to satisfy themselves that
any material facts could be obtained even if a sub-
committee should go to the territory; they therefore
declined to ask the house to make an order, which
would necessarily involve a large expenditure of
moneyin sending such a committee to Utah. Among
the witnesses examined was Joseph Smith, the son
of the founder of the Mormon Church, who says
that the Book of Mormon explicitly condemns and
forbids polygamy, which was not known, acknow-
ledged, or held as an article of faith until Brigham
Young became the leader of that part of the church
which went west with him. The church did not,
under the presidency of his father, nor does it
now under his. The witnesses testify that the
Presidency teaches hostility to the Government of
the United States. Gen. Connor, who hasbeen mili-
tary commander of the district of Utah since 18G2,
testified that polygamy is taught as a fundamental
principle of the Mormon religion, and disloyalty and
treason to the \Government is a practice enjoined by
its tenets. It is regarded by good Mormons not only
allowable, but meritorious, to assail and despoil the
Federal Government in every way. Gen. Connor
has no doubt the Mormon leaders have assumed to
authorise and justify homicide. He believes it from

their own record, from current report among them-
selves, and from a Mormon who confessed to him
that he had committed murder by direction of the
Mormon leaders, and believed at the time he was
doing right as taught by them. As further evidence
the witness submitted the following copy of a special
order issued by Brigham Young for the murder of
80 innocent men, discharged teamsters of General
Johnston's command, then at Fort Bridger, Utah,
who were en route for California. Fortunately the
officer designed to execute the order was a humane
person and did not execute it, and lately gave the
original order to a Federal officer in Utah, and it.is
now in Gen, Connor's possession. The signature of
James Ferguson is authenticated by the affidavits of
two respectable merchants of Salt Lake City :
(Special order.) " Salt Lake City, April 9,1858.
" The officer in command of escort is hereby or-
dered to see that every man is well prepared with
ammunition, and have it ready at the time you see
those teamsters a hundred miles from the settle-
ments. President Young advises that they should be
all killed to prevent them returning to Bridger to
join our enemies. Every precaution should be taken
and see that not one escapes. Secrecy is required.
—By order of " DANIEL H. WELLS, General.
" JAMES FERGUSON, A.A.G."
Other witnesses testified to the demoralised con-
dition of the Mormons.

THE ANCIENT ORDER OP FORESTERS AND THE
LlFEBOATCALTSE.—TheitheientOrdor of Foresters have just
sent to the National Lifeboat Institution, as a contribution
for the current year, the munificent sum of £3431s 11d. in
aid of the suppott of their lifeboat stationed in Cardigan
Bay, and of the general purposes of the Lifeboat Institution.
Altogether the order, to which upwards of 300,000 persons
belong, has contributed to the institution, through the prin-
cipal and able Secretary, Mr. Samuel S ha.wcross, £ 689145. 2d.
The contributions have varied from a penny to ono shil-
ling from members of this great body, and a more substan-
tial token of sympathy and support for a great and national
work has probably never before been recorded iu the annals
of any benevolent institution. It should be remembered
that the Lifeboat Society contributes every year to the sav-
ing of between 600 and 700 lives from shipwrecks. Pro=
bably many of the persons thus snatched front a watery
grave aro members of this beneficent and popular order,
which accomplishes so much in mitigating the sufferings
of its members, their widows, and orphans.

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—The debate in-the House of Lords on.
the continuance of the Habeas Corpus Suspension
Act in Ireland, deserves notice on account of the
opinions expressed by the two chief speakers, Lord
Derby, the head of her Majesty's Government, and
Lord Kimberley, the Lord-Lieutenant who recom-
mended and put in force the Act which is to be re-
newed. Lord Derby could not add to the force of

the reasons which have convinced every prudent
man that it is absolutely necessary to maintain the
present powers of the Executive. A conspiracy
born and nourished in a foreign country, and at this
very time receiving new encouragement from the
Federal Legislature in the relaxation of the neu-
trality laws, has for more than a year past filled
Irish society with disquiet, and checked the rising
prosperity of the country. Those who are best ac-
quainted with it agree in the opinion that, though
it does not extend to so high a grade of society as
the treason of 1848, it is, or has been, more deter-
mined, vindictive, and dangerous. The impulsive
people, whose only inducement to join these half-
alien agitators is a traditional hostility to England,
are likely to be kept in a ferment so long as they
see the apostles of treason coming and going and
plotting at will in the island; when the Government
shows itself resolute in dealing with such people
they who would be their followers subside into tran-
quillity, and perhaps inwardly rejoice that they are
not called upon to act as well as to talk and threaten.
Lord Derby avows his sense of the responsibility

that weighs on a Government which assumes the
power of imprisoning without trial, and we may be
sure the Act will only be enforced with the same
good sense and moderation as heretofore. Lord
Kimberley has in the judgment of men of all par-
ties acted with singular discretion ; he watched the
conspiracy throughout the winter ;* in spite of
the uneasiness which it caused him and

every one connected with the Irish Administra-
tion, in spite of the panic among the gentry
and the pressure of those who desired an
earlier and more summary action, he would not
depart from the ordinary course of law, or give an
occasion for disaffection by conduct that dema-
gogues might denounce as arbitrary. The most
audacious of the leaders were apprehended, com-
mitted for trial, and sent before a Special Commis-
sion, but it was not until the middle of February, at
a time when from trustworthy information it was

known that the Fenians contemplated an actual

outbreak, and when arms were-being daily brough
into the country, that he urged upon the Ministry
the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act in the
case of persons arrested for treasonable practices.
Since that time a large number of persons have been
imprisoned ; but more than half have been re-
leased, and the whole might have been set at liberty
if they would give any reasonable pledge that they
would live quietly and abandon the conspiracy.
The moderation of these measures will no doubt be
strictly imitated by the present Ministers. Lord
Derby said, "It is the earnest desire of the present
Government to extend that system, and to allow the
dismissal from prison of all persons who can give
any security, and who can hold out any prospect
that they will act for the future as loyal subjects of
the Crown." The most scrupulous Constitutionalist
need have no fear that the public.liberty willsuffer
by the continuance of the Act. Any man now in
confinement may walk out of prison on a simple un-
dertaking that he will cease to be a member of a
conspiracy for murder and pillage. That more than
three hundred desperadoes actually refuse to make
such a promise is sufficient proof that further secu-
rity for the public safety is necessary during the Par-
liamentary recess. The most important part of the
debate, however, did not regard the continuance of
the Act, about which there could be no serious dif -
ference of opinion. Lord Kimberley made a frank
exposition of his views, and there is no reason
to suppose that he spoke under the influence of
party feeling, or that any prejudices acquired in
the land he has been governing blind his judgment.
In the first place, the late Viceroy fully confirms
all that has been said of the dangerous character of
the conspiracy. It had not people of property and
gentlemen at its head, like the rebellion of 1798 or
the noisy movement of 1848 ; but all the other
classes of Irishmen were more or less represented in
it. " The persons who were most active in pro-
moting the conspiracy," says Lord Kimberley,
" were not the poorer and more ignorant classes,
but persons I can best describe as belonging to
the artisan and small tradesmen classes." "As
regards the farming classes, of whom I have
frequently seen it asserted that they did not
sympathise with this sedition, I regret that in its
full extent I cannot repeat that statement." In the
south and west of Ireland the farmers, though they
did not take part in the conspiracy, would, in Lord
Kimberley's opinion, have been perfectly ready to
join a rebellion if it had proved successful. There is
nothing unreasonable in this view, and it is confirmed
by the course events have taken. The active Fenians
may be few in number, and as long as the Govern-
ment can deal with them the country may be quiet.
But there is a large class of society ready to take ad-
vantage of any reverse that may befall British rule,
and a still larger class, probably amounting to a ma-
jority of Irishmen, who would acquiesce, not unwil-
lingly, in any authority w hich might contrive to over-
throw it. Let us, then, for a moment suppose that the
Irish populationis alienated from its allegiance, and
would gladly, or, at any rate, without resistance,
see the political connection of the two islands at an
end. It is an extreme supposition, but it is better
to look at the worst boldly, and to consider what is
to be done with a people who, living under the same
Government, are so unfriendly to us. If they could
unmoor their island and float two thousand miles
to the westward, the question would be soon set-
tled, and they might become a State of the Ameri-
can Union, or an independent Republic, one and in-
divisible, withouthindrance from us. But they are on
our coasts, and the political union between the two
countries must at all costs be maintained. There are
only two means of effecting this—coercion or con-
ciliation. There are thoughtless or unscrupulous
speakers who assert that British policy has exclu-
sively used the former means ; but such assertions
are hardly worthy of refutation. The removal of
all the grievances which were urged by the orators
of the last generation is a sufficient answer to such
an assertion. The wish of men of all parties in
England—we intentionally except Irish Tories
is to do justice to every class and creed in Ireland,
and to remove every real cause of discontent.
The difficulty is to find the cause of the admitted
disorder. Irish politicians have each their remedy,
and, whereas a few years since the complaint was
that Irish laws were not assimilated to those of
England, we are now told that it is an absurdity
to talk of " identical institutions" for the two
countries. We may put aside as trifling the ques-
tions of the Lord-Lieutenancy and the payment
by the nation of the creditors of insolvent Irish
railways ; but there is a large agreement of opinion
to the effect that the reform of the Irish Church,
and some legislation on the tenure of land which
shall protect the more defenceless tenants, would
conciliate the Irish people. On the merits of the
Irish Establishment we presume there cannot be
two opinions among impartial men. The Church
of 700,000 people, established amid a population
of 5,500,000, is an anomaly which no one on
this side of St. George's Channel attempts to
defend. But, strange to say, it has always
been more keenly felt by Englishmen than in
Ireland, and the Fenians professed an equal hos-
tility to the Ministers of both religions. ne land
question is more difficult, and we doubt whether
any legislation will effect a solution which will
be just both for landlord and tenant. The real
evil of Ireland is the excessive" competition for
land, arising from the existence of a large popu-
lation which lives exclusively by agriculture. So
long as there are half-a-dozen bidders for every
farm, landlords will be able to make their own terms,
and it is not in human nature that those terms
should be other than hard. The peasantry must
have land at any price, and if one will not consent
to the landlord's conditions, another will. The real
reform in the tenure of land will come when emi-
gration or new employments have allowed the oc-
cupier to drive a better bargain for himself. But,
undoubtedly, this question deserves all the conside-
ration Parliament can give it. We are bound as a
nation to do all that may be justly and reasonably
done to content the Irish people ; if they then still
continue hostile, we shall know that their antipathy
is beyond any legislative remedy.
HERALD.—A public execution is one of those
scenes which society only bears from a conviction of
its necessity, and which it would very unwillingly
see heightened by the addition of unaccustomed
horrors. Sad and solemn as is the sight at all times
it is especially so when the culprit is in the prime of
life, respectable in position, and, up to the time
when he committed a capital crime, of fair character
and conduct, belonging to a class of society which
furnishes but few perpetrators of offences against
the person, and having taken upon himself those
social responsibilities which generally tend to deve-
lope the qualities of the peace-loving and law-ob-
serving citizen. Humanity shrinks from fhe thought
of putting a fellow-man to a violent death, except in
cases of the sternest necessity; and even when that
necessity has been demonstrated, it desires to make
the mortal struggle as brief and as painless as possi-
ble. The unfortunate incident which took place at
Stafford yesterday is therefore one especially to be
regretted by those who regard the infliction of the
death penalty in certain cases as a duty which
society owes to its peaceful and well-conducted
members. William Collier, convicted at the last.
.assizes of the murder of Mr. Thomas Smith, was
brought out to suffer his deserved doom. The
fatal 110050 was adjusted, the drop fell, and of

course the prisoner with it. Unhappily, how-
ever, through some bungling of the executioner, the
halter had not been properly secured to the beam,
and the wretched man consequently did not remain
suspended in mid air, but fell to the ground, amid a
thrill of horror from the spectators. lie was taken
up again, the work of fastening the rope was per:
formed a second time, and he was thus° compellec.t,
twice to taste the bitterness of death—the crowct
meanwhile hooting and crying shame at the clumsl,
ness of the official. The opponents of captal,
punishment will doubtless endeavour to create a
little capital in support of their favourite crotchet
out of this untoward and unfortunate occurrence.
We must, however, protest against any attempt
of
this kind to make the abrogation of a particular_
punishment dependent upon an occasional act of
incaution or inexpertness on the part of the folic'
tionary by whose hands it is inflicted. Sincerely as
we should deprecate the repetition of such scenes as
that which took place at Stafford, we regard it, not
as an argument for abolishing capital punishments
altogether, but for taking care that some more cow'
petent person than the Dudley cattle dealer, viTh°
officiated yesterday,shall be employed to inflict ther•
We must not allow our sympathy for Collier's in,
advertently augmented sufferings to warp our jud-
ment as to the great and peculiar atrocity of t,be,
crime which he committed. He bad been for 20,
years a neighbour of his victim's father, and bad
known the unfortunate deceased from his infancy
upwards. His poaching propensities had brought Wm
under suspicion, and on the 4th of July last the
young squire" went out to watch his father's cov.erf,4.
While thus engaged he met his death at Collier
hands, under circumstances which show the crime
to have been of the deepest dye. Hot words,
hasty blows, aye, even sudden shots, may be ex-
changed between watchers who have been unexPe°-
1'
tedly successful in attaining the object of many
weary vigil, and poachers suddenly detected in the
pursuit of their dishonest and lawless occupatiol!.
No one, not even the most rabid game-aboh-
tionist, can justify their resort to violence, but some
slight extenuation may perhaps be allowed on aoeount
of excited feeling and anxiety to escape, if poasible,
from apprehended punishment. But the crime which
Collier committed was far more deliberate and dar
tardly. An examination of young Mr. Smith's bo°l
showed that he must have been brought down by a
couple of shots which pierced his hat, and struck,
without piercing, the bone at the back of his heed•
An ordinary poacher would have been content with
this, and would have hurried away from the spot as
quickly as guilt and fear could have carried Ino•
But Collier's purpose was more fell and his revenge
more deadly. While his victim lay before klino
stunned, bleeding, and helpless, he appears to have
attacked him mercilessly with the butt end of his guilt
battering the head like an anvil until his weapon was
shattered to pieces, and the victim's skull was con_.;
pletely beaten in. The prisoner had borne a good
character, and the jury on that account recommended.
him to mercy ; but the judge very properly declined
to give effect to the recommendation on behalf of ad
man against whom an act of such atrocious, an
almost incredible savagery had been so conclusively
established. The bungling at the execution is, Wl'
ever, calculated to make us regret that among oth. her
delays and disappointments, the late Ministry's it
advised conduct of their reforming campaign has
involved the postponement of an alteration of the
law by which capital punishments are reguiaten•
Policemen, as we have had abundant evidence dur-
ing the last fortnight, are never popular with this
mob; gaolers, we are assured, are still more thoroughil
disliked; while, by the mass of spectators at an et)
i"
cution, the person of the executioner is regarded with
undisguised hostility. The knowledge that this sse
must of necessity have its influence upon the hardeso
nerves. Calcraft himself has been known on sor°_,
occasions to tremble and become agitated at the critics;
moment ; and if the master in the art of hangingiso°.,,
proof against such feelings his provincial disciple );
not very likely to escape them. Bence—happily
distant intervals—we have to chronicle scenes 01 t
unusually distressing character when the n oose is bolt
constructed, when the rope breaks, or. as it haPPeil t
yesterday, it was insecurely fastened to the beam.
if executions took place within prison walls tit
element of disturbance would not be present. Thor:
would be no howlings and hootings to distract saes.,
tion, no nervous anxiety to hurry over the neFea.
sary preliminaries, no shock to public sensibilltio
from misadventures which no one has so much ream,
to regret as those whose deliberate convictions ,
pel them to believe that society cannot entirely ow„
pease with the death penalty consistent with its OP,
safety. The objections,urged against private 00,°%,
Lions would not apply to punishments inflicted 1
the same building and before the same officers
are charged with the carrying out of severe thou. go
minor sentences ; nor would the suspicion of p0551,,b,,0
impunity attach when proper precautions were
for satisfying the public mind that the prisoner
doom was not a whit the less certain because it /c„..
performed within prison walls, and not in the could
try try market-place or the area in front of the u'„,
Bailey. The dangerous classes would of cour.,),
lose a spectacle on which they are wont to look
an amount of gratification which it is hard to undere
stand or excuse, and the pickpockets would lia°,l
one the less opportunity for exercising their 514.1
and ingenuity. But the decency and dignity WI
which every process of law should be condnetef
would be greatly increased, while the exhibition II
h
a black flag and the tolling of the passing y,,
would give a solemn notification to the world
side the walls of the dread duty which the preserve:
of peace were discharging within. We trust, the.r_.°,
fore, that early next session the bill for effectu.atwoe,
this much desired alteration may be again lotto
duced, and that the discussions of the last few Wee to
and the occurrence of yesterday may alike tenctoi,
sooth
i its passage through Parliament, and to fa'og
tate its progress towards a permanent place 310
our statutes.