Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1886-01-09
EDMUNDs' BILL In THE SENATE,
Its Final Passage Yesterday by a
Vote Of 39 TO Z.

VIC VI DO eV
WAsH1NGToN, January S.-The Utah bill
came up in the Senate for consideration.
Morgan again called attention to the
twelfth section, which provides for fourteen
trustees to administer the property, bust
ness affairs and operations Of the corpora
ton known as the Church of Jesus Christ
OF Latter-day Saints" He wanted to know
what their duties and pay were, as the bill
was silent as to their salaries. He demanded
an answer from his fellow-members of the
judiciary committee.
Edmunds replied that Morgan should
have an answer.
Morgan saw no authority in Congress to
appoint trustees to manage church bust
ness. He characterized such trustees as
Mugwump Mormons. They would be occu-
pied necessarily, he said, in promoting Nor
monism, as he interpreted the bill under
consideration, for the trustees had to exer-
else all the powers granted by the Terrific
rial laws creating the corporation.
Edmunds replied that they had nothing
whatever to do with church matters or mat
ters of faith, but only with the property; to
see that the church moneys, which were
enormous, were not applied to the propaga-
tion of polygamy. Not one-quarter of the
Mormons, as Edmunds understood it, be-
ieyed in polygamy.
4OuC1 A04OlCu IL bu0 ulOTIuOE
moneys were applied illegally, that is, in
violation of the charter of that church,
Edmunds replied he believed they were.
Teller asked how.
Edmunds answered: "They are used for
the purpose of inducing and securing immi-
grafton that may contribute to the lusts of
these vagabonds." Maxey supported the
bill. He held that Mormonism was
MERE COVER FOB LICENT1oUsNEss.
He thought the judiciary committee had
Disseminated with great skill between re-
igious liberty and secular license.
Call said we owed our liberties to the free
dom of speech and worship. We were de-
parting from that ground when we passed
such bill as that under consideration. A
Mormon has as muchright to proclaim his
faith as "the distinguished man who denies
the divinity of Christ" The reason why
Mormonism had become so successful, he
thought, was because of its great activity as
q secular organization. It had gone abroad
over the earth and drawn people from misery
and poverty and brought them to land of
plenty. It was no wonder that under such
circumstances it had become successful.
But these people could now be brought under
the influence of the Christian religion. The
ministrations of that religion were sufficient
to conquer the Mormons, and would do so
more completely and happily than the bill
before the Senate could.
Some amendments offered by Call were
voted down.
As the bill was about to be brought to a
vote Morgan said its friends seemed deter
mined to press it without giving its oppo-
nents chance to study it. He again in
quired as to
THE SALARIES WHICH THE COMMISSIONERS
WERE TO HAVE.
He did not want to send fourteen men out
to Utah to loot the Mormon church. He had
announced his determination to wipe this
church out and leave nothing of it but a
name and an unholy memory, but had been
met by proposition in this bill to perpetu-
ate the church.
While the bill was on final passage, Van
Wyck endeavored to fix the duties of the
proposed fourteen trustees upon the men,
bers of the present Utah Commission, but
was ruled out of order. He asked Edmunds
whether he had any objection to such an
amendment, to which the Senator answered
that he had.
was passed-Yeas 38, nays Z, as follows:
Yeas-Allison, Beck, Berry, Chace, Cock
rell, Coke, Conger, Cullom, Dawes, Dolph,
Eustis, Evarts, Frye, George,
Harris, Harrison, Hawley, ingalls,, jackson,
Logan, Mcmillan, Manderson, Maxey,
Mitchell of Pennsylvania, Morrill,, Palmer,
Payne, Platt, Pugh, Sawyer, Sherman,
Spooner, Van Wyck, Walthall, Wilson of
Iowa, and Wilson of Maryland-3S.
Nays-Blair of New Hampshire, Call of
Florida, Gibson of Louisiana, Hampton of
South Carolina, Hoar of Massachusetts,
Morgan of Alabama, and Vance of North
Carolina.
Hoar, explaining his vote, said he voted
against the bill only because of the section
disfranchising women, but even with that
section in, he would have voted for the bill
had his vote been necessary to its passage.