The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1884-01-31
N1GGLU09 .IAL aG9
SALT LAKE. DAILY HERALD,
EXIT MURRAY.

A gloom has been cast over the
aggressive monogomy Of this coun-
try by the disclosure of the facts in
the case of Murray, Governor Of
Utah. Before he was G vernon of
Utah Murray was United States
Marshal for Kentucky. He seems
to have worked that place of trust
for all it was worth s.by charging
fictitious expenses, fictitious fees,
and constructive mileage, and also
by beginning vexatious criminal
proceedings for the purp zee Of max
ing fees" A broad and somewhat
circumstantial rumor of these things
reached the Department of Justice
in the year 1876, and was brought to
the attention of the good MIR. Hayes
early in his administration. Some
Presidents would have directed the
prosecution Of Murray, but MIR.
Hayes is Of clement disposition,
and he made the offending Murray
Governor Of Utah.
1t would have appeared to almost
any body in Murray's new position,
considering the good fortune of his
present and the records OF his IL
legally profitable past, that nothing
would so become MIN as mOde-t
stiffness and humility. But to Muir
ray it seemed otherwise. AS he
had worked the marshalship for all
that 1t was worth in the way Of per.
sonal emolument, he determined to
work the governorship for all that
1t was worth In the way of political
capital. He compounded for the
sins he was inclined to by damning
with q peculiarly vociferous
vigor those he had no mind to.
For polygamy he felt no voca.
ton whatever, and tho wives OF
a Mormon bishop would not suffer
him to sleep-meaning Murray, of
course, not the bishop. He ap-'
peared, did Murray, as a profes
sionaI monogamist in the promiscu>
ously hospitable columns of the
North american ReUieU. If mono
gamy in Utah, instead of the tariff
or the electoral commission, or turn.
the-rascals-out, had become the
"over-shsdowing issue" In our polls
tics, which Murray declared it to be,
the least q grateful country could
have done for Murray would have
been to give him the second place on
the ticket. Failing in that, Murray
might perhaps have condescended
to accept the Senatorship from the
redeemed, regenerated and disen-
thralled State of Utah. to which he
would have been joyfully chosen by
q suffrage limited, as he urged it
must be, to the GENTLE and the
homogeneous of its inhs bitants.
And now all these visions have
faded. A blight has come upon the
cause of mOnOgamy. The hands, if
we may borrow a novel and Striki g
metaphor from our theological con-
temporary, the Tribune, are turned
back upon the dial Of civilization.
And all because Murray's old acS
counts, as Marshal of Kentucky, are
exposed to the scrutiny of an un-
sympathetic public. In vain will
Murray point out that the accuracy
Of his accounts in Kentucky is ut
terly irrelevant to the merits of his
crusade in Utah, and that the dam
ger and disgrace of the giant evil
with which he is manfully battling,
on salary inadequate to his merits,
would not be lessened though he
had trumped up accusations against
every Gistiller in Kentucky and
charged the mileage Of the
equator for every trip he took from
Frankfort to Louisville. Earnest
and aggressive monogamists will
alone bewail the fate of Murray,
while the Mormons fsunt their
plural wives more insOlently than
ever in the face of an outraged pub
lie, and scofers repeat yet once more
the eroration upon Colonel Yell, Of
Yellville, which we commend to
Mr.. Matthew Arnold as the master,
key to the phenomena of American
politics: "Although, fellow-citizsne,
as president Of the Yellville National
Bank, our deceased friend did not
account satisfactorily for the funds
of that institution, yet his remarks
upon the busting of the same showed
that his heart beat warmly for his
native land."-NeW York Times.