New-York tribune., 1881-09-08
TWO THO USAND MORMON RECRUITS

A recent dispatch from Liverpool announc-
ing the embarkation of $50 Mormon converts
bound for Salt Lake City says that over 1000
recruits for the Utah settlements have left that
port during the past summer. This fact shows
in a striking manner that the Mormon hier-
archy is making greater effort than ever to
strengthen its power. Every one of these
converts costs money, and the money comes out
of the treasury of the Mormon Church. Nobody
joins the Latter Day Saints from his or her own
unint1uenced judgment. The converts are poor
creatures, for the most part, gathered up in the
ignorant back country districts of Europe by
shrewd missionaries who are paid good salaries
and travelling expenses, and who work under
the orders of the President and the "Twelve
Apostles of the church. 1t is doubtful whether
anything is said to them about the institution
OF polygamy, and they are not intelligent
enough to have learned much about the practice
of the Saints save what is told them by the
missionaries. The prospect of free farms and
an easy life, together with free passage to
America, are the chief motives which lure them
from their homes. Many of them are doubt
less converted by emotional preaching, ex-
horting and singing, but it is not to be sup
posed that they get any clear conception of the
fantastic doctrines of the Mormon sect or any
correct idea Of the manner of living in Utah.
When the Mormon converts reach Salt Iake
City they find themselves in the situation of
the private soldiers of Il regular army The
Mormon Church is like a military organization,
and the first duty of its members is to obey its
officers. The new arrivals, ignorant and dest-
tute, have no choice but to go where they are
told to go. They are detailed like the pioneers
OF an army to extend the lines of Mormonism by
occupying fertile valleys not yet settled, or are
sent rs reinforcemcnts to feeble frontier COM
munites.
We are beginning to realize of late that Nor
monism is not Il weak aud dying institution.
1t is the best organized religious sect in the
world with the possible exception of the Catho-
lie Church, and has a church poity especially
adapted for steady growth. The governing
body has temporal as well as spiritual authority.
AID is constantly on the watch for oppo, tunties
to establish new settlements. The whole of
Utah and much of the adjoining Territories of
Idaho and Arizona have been explored with a
view to finding favorable localities for Mormon
coloneS. When it is decided TO plant a new
colony, detail is made of a few old and trusted
brethren, who sell their homes at the word of
command, and move to the site chosen in COM
pany with detachment of newly arrived for
elgn recruits. The new community thus
formed is carefully nurtured by the central
authorities until it is prosperous and ndepen-
dent. Poygamy is favorable to rapid in
crease of population, and the Mormon doctrine
that those who have the most children will
enjoy the highest seats in heaven is special
encouragement to large families Thus the
Mormons increase rapidly by natural growth as
well rs by heavy importations of foreign con-
verts. They have already overspread the limits
of lp arabia of
Elements may he found five hundred miles
south of Salt Lake City in Arizona, and two
hundred miles north in idaho
We must give the MormOns credit for redeem
ing from "A desert section of country winch
would hardly have attracted immigrants not
moved 10y religious fauaticism. Perhaps their
dclusion may have indirectly accomplished a
great work for the future civilization of the
coutinent in changing the barren valleys of its
central plateau INTO green cases of fertility, but
they are too powerful for their continued
growth to be regarded with Indifference bv the
rest of the country. They are not Americans
in any proper sense, for their only allegiance to
the United states il an enforced and unwilling
one. lhey are Mormons first and last the
authority of their Prcsidcntr is held TO he
more binding them than that of the prcsi-
dent of the United States and Governors and
Judges are regarded with nothing like the
respect they pay to their "Bishops and
Apostles They are capable of doing n great
deal of mischief if they should ever carry their
hatred of the civil authorities to the extent of
armed resistance. 1t is high time to show them
that the United States law is superior to the
dccrecs of the Salt Lake City hierarchy A
strict enforcement of the statutes against
polygamy, to the extent, at least, of preventing
any moIe plInal marriages, is probably all that
is needed to convert the powerful Mormon
Church into harmless sect for it is their
peculiar insttu ton which makes the Mormons
"A people apart and n menace to the tranquility
of the country. If they were not awbreakers
they would soon lose the superstitious senti-
ment of duty which makes them the slaves Of
their church authorities, and might in time be-
come as good citizens as the members of n
score of other queer sccts which our liberal
laws have allowed to grow and prosper upon
our soil.
4 SUGEE