Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1885-12-14
EITHER ONE OR THE OTHER.
The Mormon Church or the United
States Must Govern Wholly
i'm Utah.

States Must Govern Wholly
in Utah.
There is probably good deal of exag-
geration in the reports received from sew
eral Western towns regarding the Nor
mon outbreak" but there can scarcely be
any regarding the temper of the Mormons
themselves. The Territory of Utah, and
considerable portions OF Idaho, Nevada,
Colorado and Arizona, are Inhabited by a
people as hostile to the United States as
the Tories were in the Revolution, or as
La Vendee was to France in 1893, or as
the Fenians are to Great Britain to-day.
They are composed of an all-powerful
| hierarchy and a mass of ignorance
wrought up to the highest pitch of super
stitious fanaticism. The common people
have no ideas except such as they derive
from the priesthood. The "elders' hold
all the authority that is exercised in other
parts of the World by the Government,
| The United States is to them a foreign
power, as little entitled to the exercise of
sovereignty over them as Canada or Mex
leo. The early Mormons went to Utah
to escape from the United States. The
country in which they took up their abode
was then Mexican territory. 1t was
SO far distant from the seat of the
Mexican Government that they ex-
pected to be an independent nation,
and they were so in fact during the first
twenty years after their hegira, the func-
tions of the Federal Government among
them during that time being merely min
isterial. Consequently they have grown
up with conceptions
DRAMATICALLY OPPOSED TO EVERY AU-
THORITY
Outside of themselves. Indeed, they
carried such conceptions with them in
the first instance. Their removal from
Illinois and Missouri was the result of an
irrepressible conflict between themselves
and the governments of those States,
different points of view between them
selves and the people among whom they
lived. To the Mormon, man or woman,
the revelation of the church is, "Thus
saith the Lord,' and every dictum OPP
posed to it, or outside of it, is a nullity,
to be regarded only so far as it is backed |
by irresistible power. The strength of |
this superstition was put to the severest
known test when women were asked to
become members OF polygamous house
holds, for the sake of joys to be secured
beyond the grave. When the Mormon
first wife sees her threshold darkened by
the coming of the second, it is impossible
that she should notssuffer
THE sHARPEsT AGONY THAT CAN TOUCH A
woMAN's HEART.
Yet even these keen instincts have been
crushed by the dominating power of Nor
There may be other supersti-
ions in the world asdespotic- there have
been others as cruel-but
here is none in any part of the civilized
world comparable to it to-day.
There is growing up in the midst of us
exists on the globe elsewhere as
! subordinate and local government, hos
lie at every point to the central govern
nent to exist. Nor could such an
!nomaly exist here but for the institu-
ion of polygamy.
HIS SOCIAL CANCER, LIKETHAT OF SLAVERY,
Works necessarily for rebellion. Between
uch government and the Federal au-
hority there can be no peace. fpolyga-
ny could be conjured out of Utah by a
lew revelation by some quack at the
lead of the Mormon Church, the younger
eneration would. become familiar with ,
ieas of loyalty to the United States.
here would no longer be any /
lashing of hostile conceptions of I I
aan's first duty as a member r
t human society. But it is doubted by $
many who have closely studied the ques- +
ion whether such new revelation is \
ossible. BY destroying its distinctive b
eature it would subvert Moomonism it.
elf. No priesthood can be expected to i
nbind the consciences of men and lay o
own the wand by which it sways the Q
ouls of an entire people. Mormonism n
en be dealt with only by external force. F
'ealing with superstitions by external a a
'rce has always been attended with i'm K
lense difficulties, but, on the other hand, Il
o government can permit hostile gov 4,
rnment to grow up in its very bosom. D.
ither the Mormon church or the United fa
tates must govern wholly in the valley +,
Great Salt Lake. There is not room it
r both. Burnings at the stake, the rack,
ld the thumb-screw. as appliances for F
superstition are, happily, Il
anished from the world but short of
uelty the means of asserting the laws 81 81
the United States must be applied to n
in Utah, and adequate force y
ust be used to that end.-New York
Ost