The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1882-05-19
THE DEBATE.
Confirmation of the Cam IA
Campbell Contest in tine
House.
Jacobs Argument.


mlttee IT the House, in the bill which
aferward SUBSTANTIALLY became the Law
OF 1862 calls the attention of Congress tC
the enscts1ent by the state Of Deseret oil
| q law entl' led IAN ordinance incoTpoTat
ing The Church of Jesus Christ Of Latter
Day Saints" and which was afterWAr6
re'ehacfed by the territorial government
and which not only authorizes the
Church OF Jesus Christ Of Latter-Dsy
Saints to hold and occupy rssl and per-
sonal estate, but by the section of the ACT
1t Is declared that the real and personal
property of the said church shall be ex-
empt from tAxstion, thus establishing a
hierarchy obnoxious TO the spirit Of our
Institutions. sna comforting privileges and
prerogatives unknown to any other &C.
cle.iAstical denomination. Such mon
strOus power and arrogant assumptions
are ct war With the genius Of our gov
eminent. He further says that the terri
| torisl statute, being constructively an
act Of Congress, is in direct violation OF
the amendment TO the constitution, arti-
Gle L, providing that ''Congress shall
make no law respecting an establish
ment of religion. or prohibiting the free
exercise thereof"
Mr.. Cook, in the Thirty-ninth Con-
gress, from The committee on the judi
cisrv, as to the memorial of Utah 10 re-
peal the act of 1862, says the huLhiliAting
fact is, however, apparent that the law is
| at present practically dead letter in the
Territory of Utah. and demands that it
shall be executed.
Then followed the act of 1892 which
provides, frat, for the punishment of DO
lygamy without providing any efficient
machinery for the execution of the law.
Section annuls all acts which shield or
countenance polygRmy. but provides
that this act shall be so limited and con
strued as not to interfere with the right OF
property legally acquired under the or
dinance Incorporating the Church of
Jesus Christ of Lstter-Dsy Saints, but
only to such acts as protect polygsmy.
This left the church the owner in fee
simple Of 100000 acres of the public
land and six hundred square milee of
territory, and the power of the church
undisturbed and unbroken and inter-
woven into eeery fibre and artery Of the
body polite. The law was everywhere
in Utah received with derision and has
ever since been treated with contempt.
Later, Mr.. Wade, from the committee
on territories, in his report upon Q bill
authorizing the printing and distribu-
ton Of the governors message, which
the Utah Legislature refused TO print,
says:
That the testimony taken by them
disclosed the fact that the territory was
controlled by sort of Jewish theocracy,
graduated to the condition of that terri
tory, having q supreme head, who gov
ems and guides every affair of import
snce in the church and practically in the
territory. and is the only real power
acknowledged there. We have
here the first exhibition within the limits
of the United Estates of "a church ruling
the state.
And there all sgitation and delibera-
ton looking to the breaking up Of this
''inveterste evil" all legislative effort in
the direction of uprooting this theocrscy
ended, until the Forty-seveAth Congress
has at last asserted its unlimited
power ard advanced with vigorous
meas ures % the discharge ofits high con-
stItutional duty. The fact that nation |
of people can be gathered on this CONT |
nent so besotted and ignorant who not !
only believe such rubbish as the Last !
Revelation" but who would doubtless |
fight and die for it in the canyons of the /
Rocky Mountains with the same devotion
as did the Huguenots and Wsldenses
in the valleys of Italy and France,
demonstrates that extraordinary meas
ures are demanded.
Again, Utah is unrepublicsn.
Second. Because no political commu-
nifty csn be free that maintains u civil or
ecclesiastical law which sbrogRtes the
American institution of marriage and
substitutes the system of plural wives.
In support, Mr.. Speaker, of this asser-
ton We have the plain lesson, the un-
divided testimony of all history. For
example, when the world was young,
Zimur led the savage nomsds Of the
north to the conquest OF the luxurious
nation of South Asia. The sway of the
pstciarcbal chiefs over the tribes having
been unlimited the rule of the conqueror
over the subiugated races became des-
potlc. Revolutions in Europe have al
ways resulted in more or less organic
change in the constitution ofgoVernment
snd society. But in Asis, while great
empires rise AMI fall, the same character
has been constantly transmitted from the
former to the succeeding dynasty.
And lest the views already stated may
be thought to take their color from
the passion and prejudice Of this heated
and widespread controversy, l invoke
the deliberate testimony, the cool and
judgment of the great German
philosopher, Heerens, the sblest of al
writers on the constitution of the society
and government the "Asistic nations"
and the causes of their decay and de-
graduation, when more than quarter of
3 century ago he said that all his other
and observations were not sufi-
Gent to account for the most gloomy
phenomenon in the history Of the human
race; the fact that the fairest and richest
portion of the globe, where the mind of
man might have been expected to attain
its grestest maturity, has in all ages been
to perpetual slavery.
How, he asks. did their strength come to
be so impaired that in the periods of their
greatest prosperity, they wore unable to
shake off yoke which to European ma
lions appears intolersble?"
To answer that question he says we
must 90 back 8 step and seek the cause of
the phenomenon in the defective consti-
tuition and condition, not of their civil
Institutions, but their domestic relations.
Polygamy has st all times prevailed
there; and pclygamy, according to all
the principles of nature, has tendency |
TO promote Unlimited desPoiism. No one
who is aware how closely they ara con-
nected can deny the influence which the
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