Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1886-04-15
WHERE MIR. EDMUNDS STANDS

WHERE MIR. EDMUNDS STANDS.
| In the Congressional Record OF the 9th
inst. appears full report of the debate
in the Senate on the ant-woman suffrage
amendment moved by Mr.. Eustis of Lou
isiana to the bill providing for the ad-
mission OF Washington Territory as
a State. The DEMOCRAT yesterday
referred to this debate, and said
that no good ground existed for
charging Mr.. Edhunds with incon-
sistency because, while opposed to
woman suffrage in Utah, he advocated
the right OF the gentler sex to vote in
Washington Territory, and voted against
Mr. Eustis' proposal to restrict the
suffrage in the proposed new State
to qualified male electors only.
The DEMOCRAT attributed Mr.. Edmunds'
opposition to woman suffrage in Utah to
the fact that he is fully cognizant of the
purpose for which the franchise was ex-
tended to the women of this Territory,
and is also fully advised OF the manner in
which the Church controls all the votes
And since it is apparent to him, and to
everybody else who has any knowledge
at all OF the workings of the politico-ec-
clesiastical despotism holding sway here,
that the ballot was placed in the hands
OF the Mormon women, and by them has
always been and now is being used,
solely for the purpose OF perpetuating the
rule OF Il law-defying priesthood in this
Territory. whose aim is to build up an in
dependent kingdom within the lines of
this free Republic, who can see any in
consistency in opposing woman suffrage
in Utah, even while advocating the right
of women to vote in neighboring Terri
tory?
During the debate on the amendment
above referred to, Mr.. Edmunds fully
defined his position on the woman suf
frage question in the following language,
which we take from his speech rs report
ed in the Record
now stands and has stood in every Territory
that has been established in this Union,
think | am safe in s9ying it has been pro-
vided that the people of the Territory them
selves after their first organization were to
determine who should be the people entitled
to the elective franchise. That is the law
of Congress as applied to every Territory,
believe. Now, then, the people of Washing
ton Territory have chosen, in regulating
their own affairs under the authority of an
express law of Congress, to provide that
females as well as males, having other simi-
lar qualifications, should be entitled to vote
These ladies, therefore, in Washington Ter
ritory comprises part at this moment, under
the authority of Congress, of the political
autonomy of that Territory. You are about
to submit to the political autonomy of that
Territory question. Should you not sub
init it to whatever is that political autonomy
without making changes or distinctions?
Nobody can deny that and yet my distin-
guished friend from Louisiana says that we
have passed Utah bill, and in that We have
provided that the women of Utah shall not
hereafter be entitled to exercise political
power, and that we are therefore committed
to the idea that no woman in any Territory
or in any place where Congress has iurisdic-
tion shall be entitled to exercise that func-
ton. 1 deny the proposition altogether.
Nobody knows better than the Senator
from Louisiana, whose intelligence and
scope and craftsmanship l SO gladly recog-
niZe, that there can be no parallel or coinci-
dence in the situation of affairs in Utah and
in any other Territory in the United States,
or in any State, The Territory of Utah
to be mere political hierarchy that de-
pends upon the will substantially of one
man, an autocrat, and that devoted to the
PRONUNCIATION of polygamous practices.
When we came to deal with Utah, not as n
Territory to be admitted into the United
Stnta Of ttc h,,tn a l;,,,,
with its condition as Territory, and in or
der to relieve IL from this enormous crime,
which, as my friend from Massachusetts,
has stated, is against all social and religious
notions of every civilized government on the
face of the globe, we provided that women
should not vote in Utah for the time being.
1t was asked by my friend from Louisiana
why did you not except the Gentle
women, who are not under this sa-
very? For the simple reason that
when you undertook to make such
an exception you have got to provide merely
for questions of opinion, and you have got
to draw line that under the theory of this
Government and under the theory of the
Constitution you can not draw, and that is,
that the right to vote is to be made depend
ent upon the opinion, political, religious, or
moral, or whatever of the person who is to
vote. So then if we relieve these slaves under
the control of the Mormon Church there
from the obligation to vote as their masters
said, we must at the same time leave out
their fellow-women who did not think as
they did at all, because otherwise you must
draw the line upon the question of opinion
and belief. And / am glad to say that
among all the women in the United States,
q great many of whom have written me
with objurgations, there has never come to
me from Utah from any of the Gentle
women, as they are called, any complaint of
the fact that they were among the disfran-
chised, but on the contrary among commen-
dations of the circumstance that we had
passed the bill as we did.
The case of Utah is unique; il is separate;
it can have no parallel or relation to any
other question that can engage the attention
of the Congress of the United States; and
therefore, had | been like my friend from
Massachusetts, the most intense advocate of
woman suffrage everywhere, should have
felt that was doing my best for true woman
suffrage everywhere and all the time as my
Gentle fellow-citizens women of Utah feel
as believe and am advised-I should have
felt that / was doing the best thing for true
womanhood and true woman suffrage every
| where in doing exactly what did in voting
for the bill that passed the Senate.
Coz. III e. SHAW has ratirpd from tha