The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-08-30
sPxRxx or Tzn PRESS.
Editorial Opinions ofthe Leading Journals
upon Current Topios-Compiled Every
Day for the Evening Telegraph.
KING YOUNG.


FSons the NJ y. Times.
The Mormon platform fairly sketched by
the highest authority is not by any means a
new thing In fact, the most remarkable
feature about the demands of the community
at Salt Lake is their uniformity 'Iiberty,
freedom, and equal rights is Brigham
Young's comprehensive though somewhat
pleonastic mode of summarizing them--a
preface, however which scarcely does justice
to the proposals with which the speaker fol-
lows it up. On the occasion of the recent
pioneer celebration at Salt Lake City, the
Norm on President made an address of which
it may be said that its statement of general
principles is perfectly unexceptionable, while
its enuncation of details is exceedingly open
to question.
q Ii is characterized throughout by the same
odd mixture of shrewd common sense. bla-
tant braggadocio, and open, undisguised con-
tempt for the authority under which he lives,
which distinguish most of the public utter
ances of the remarkable man who is the
present autocrat of Mormonland. The
spokesman of the Latter-day Saints skillfully
puts in the foreground of his declaration a
reference to the undoubted industrial tri-
umpbs which his followers have achieved in
the Salt Lake Valley. In claiming for them
the privilege of continuing their work of
making their desert bloom as the rose, and of
eevating the outcast and the destitute, Brig
ham Young must have known very well that
he was demanding right which nobody has
ever questioned; but in asking Congress to
pass an impossible law before consenting to
obey law already in existence, he must
have been equally aware that he was violat-
ing one of the first principles of an organized
State. U 3 H..4at f.il Ell. ol s7HE
Were the Government Of the United States
to decree, as the Mormon apostle desires.
''that every man that is capable of taking
care of himself shall marry wife, it might
indeed earn the gratitude of universal spin
sterhood, but it would transcend its functions
as completely as its aocuser does, by giving
every man the liberty of marrying as many
wives as he pleases. Brigham Young may
honestly believe that polygamy is the one
sovereign specific for the evils of society, but
the Government under which he lives has en-
acted certain statutes with which this means
of reform is perfectly incompatible, and SO
long as he and his followers choose to con-
tinue citizens of this republic, they must re-
cognize the fact that obedience is the first
law of civilized communities.
An equally dangerous development of Nor
monism appears in the Prophets reference
to the mode of conducting popular elections.
He says in effect, l hold myself the supreme
judge of who are and who are not fit to hold
office in your courts and local boards. I do
hot presume w uiCtdto WuOfu you SQAll
choose, but l shall certainly see that you
select no one who is not acceptable to me.
This attitude of the Mormon leaders, and the
disposition that comes from it on the part of
their followers to vote as one man, have
already been productive of civil broils in Iowa
and Missouri, and will be so again the mo-
ment that they are surrounded by a GENTLE
community numerous enough to have their
liberty imperilled by tactics SO foreign to our
free institutions The Mormonism of Salt
Lake is in its political aspect the unchanged
Mormonism of Nauvoo-it is a despotism
growing up in the midst of free State, an
autocracy confronting society where
the will of the people is supreme. strong
personal government may be desirable thing
enough for certain stages of social growth,
but in the United States it is an anachronism
and social anomaly. Even SO acute a
thinker as Carlyle was betrayed into prema-
ture admiration of the wonderful social order
established by the Jesuit missionaries among
the Indian races of Paraguay, Just as other
thinkers rather less acute have seen nothing
but what is admirable in the civilization of
Salt Lake. We have seen the historical re-
tribution of the unlimited and helpless state
of submission to which the Paraguayans were
reduced in their becoming the dupes of a
tyrant like Lopez, and an unchecked develop
ment of the principles of Mormon absolutism
would infallibly pave the way for an unprin-
cipled and reckless adventurer, who would
prepare for us another heritage of civil strife
and long-enduring hatred.
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