Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1870-04-07
The Peculiar institution Of Utah.
A new York dispatch says that " Rev


q. b. rockingham, in his discourse took
ground against the action of Congress in
relatoa to Utah. The State, he held.
had no more right to interfere with po-
lygamy than it had to prescribe the linn
Its OF Professionalism, or TO interfere
with Catholicism" This is much the
same position as Rev. w. A. Bartlett Of
this city, took yesterday. The latter pros
tested also against persecution for opin-
ions sake Herein they have our fullest
sympathy 1t matters not what theoretic
notions one may entertain upon any
polnt--the world Of thought knows ne-
Their letter or bars but polygamy is not
a creed, a system of belief, but a life. a
social organism lying at the foundation
OF all things. 1t is claimed that the
Mormans make u strong distinction be-
tween polygamy and bigamy, and that
they are only following out the example
Oh men who have been wont to reverence
Abraham, Jacob, David and the patri,
nrchs generally. We recognize the diff
ference sugge ed and admit the presce-
dent, as fact but not as an argument
Abraham tried to palm his wife off for
his sister through craven fear Of noble
Prince Jacob cheated his brother out of
his prlmogenitureship by taking advan-
tage of his furnishing hunger, and David
stole another mans wife and then muir,
dered the despoiled husband. As wei
justify falsehood theft, adultry and mur
der by patriarchial e1amp as polygamy.
This system, destructive of family ties,
is relic Of barbarism. When the Ees
brew nation had been civilized bv the
Babylonian captivity, and other causes,
polygamy was abandoned. The are
which gave US Christianity, and thus
converted an obscure provincial people
into the foremost ma ton Of the globe, in
point OF benificent influence, h ad slough
ed off polygamy, much as the prese mt
day has outgrown the fagot and the pill
DRY. No violent revolution swept the
sccursed institution from the face of the
earth, but it withered and disappeared at
the rising of the sun Of progress. 1t
may be said that the same gradual decay
and bIoodless revolution may he expect .
ed in the country But the trouble is that
with polygamy is involved other evils
that stand or fall with it. If the Nor
mons could be shut in by themselves, it
would perhaps be best to let them alone
but they are no longer isolated Utah is
in the wor d now, and its peculiar insti-
tuition must grapple in a struggle Tor
life, If we adopt the same indulgent
policy with it that we did with slavery
another "patriarchal, institution, it. too
will spread, and the irrepressible con-
lict tetween polygamy and monogamv
will be all the more desperate for the de-
lay. Just emerging, as We are, from a
war that might have been avoided but
for the indulgence policy, it would
be blindness for US to repeat that blum
der in a closely analogous case.
Then, too, polygamy is not AL of Nor
mansm. 1t is rather the elder member
of a large family Of social, moral and
material evils Incest goes hand and
hand with it, and is cardinal character
istic of Utah Crime without punish
ment is another. Brigham will not
bring his saints to judgement, if he
can help it, out of regard to Mormon
reputation. At the same time Gentiles
are denied, except under the shadows
Of our barracks, the fundamental righs
guaranteed by tho Great Charter, "A
third evil is the Illegal absorption by
Young and his satellites of the public
domain Against all these wrongs the
Cullom bill is directed. Without such
legislation as that measure contemplated
the new Governor of the Territory will
not fail to do its duty in the premises
and give a death blow to the institution
now polluting our country and imperil'
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