News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1885-07-16
MORM0NISM IN UTAH.
HOW 1T Is SLOWLY BUT SURELY
BEING WIPED OUT.
Something About the Policy of the Govern
ment Toward Tits Status To-day.

The Territories of New Mexico ana
Utah were organized in 1850, thirty-five
years ago. Since that time the Terri
tories of Kansas, Nebraska, Minnesota,
Nevada and Colorado have been organ
lied, and each has, in turn, been erected
into a State and been admitted to the
Union. These two Territories remain
under the temporary government estab-
lished more than a generation ago.
OF course. there has been a reason
for the hardness of these two COM
communities in receiving the promotion to
Statehood which has been conferred
upon their neighbors. New Mexico was
originally settled chiefly by Spanish
Mexicans and Indians, and, owing to its
remoteness, its growth was slow until
the railroad entered it. The population
did not double in thirty years.
Utah has grown with sufficient rapid
ity, and in 1880 had larger population
than any other Territory, though Dakota
has now passed it. But Utah was settled
and has been controlled by the religious
community of Mormons. To this people
there are two very serious objections in
| the minds of most Americans.
The first objection is, that the Nor
mons are SO completely under the DOM
ination of their church president, apos-
| ties, bishops, elders and priests that the
government of Church and State are
substantially one This system is wholly
repugnant to American ideas, and with
out any reference to the question whether
the Mormon religion is good or evil in
| its influence and tendencies, the people
Ill |. e.
admit such community to full fellow
ship in the Union.
But there is the special reason, in the
religion itself, that the practice of poly
gamy, or of marrying and having more
than one wife, is not only sanctioned,
but encouraged and enjoined, by the
Mormon Church.
For these and other reasons the Gov
eminent of the United States has always
maintained an attitude of guarded sus-
picion toward Utah. There has been a
law against bigamy in the Territories
ever since 1862, but SO long as the con-
troll of the local government was in Nor
mon hands, and so long az men them
selves guilty of polygamy were placed
on iuries, there was no enforcement of
the law whatever.
A few years ago Congress took up this
question in earnest, under the lead of
Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, and
passed law intended to take the adj
ministration of justice in Utah out of
the hands of polygamists. We can re-
fer to only one or two features of this
law.
Persons having more than one wife
were disqualified from holding office;
and before a man was permitted to serve
on a jury he was required to answer,
under oath, the question if he be-
lieved it to be right for man having
an undivorced wife living, to marry an
other. Unless he answered no, he was
rejected as juror.
Under this law several polygamists
have not only been tried, but convicted.
What is of more Importance, at least one
of the high dignataries of the Mormon
Church, after being convicted, has an
nounced his intention to submit to the
laws and to give up his ''plural'' wives.
Still more important is the fact that
the constitutionality of the law applying
a special test of belief to jurors in Utah
has been brought before the Supreme
Court of the United States, and in April
a decision was given which sustains the
law So at last way has been found in
which polygamy can be dealt with and
stamped out. 1t only remains to execute
| the law.