The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-12-12
KENTUCKY AND UTAH.

1t has become quite fashionable for the
newspaper fraternity to talk about the law
lessness alleged to prevail in Kentucky and
to have a good deal of fun out of it. There
can and in fact is no question that there is
at times a good deal of trouble in the land
of blue grass, blooded cattle, fast horses
pretty women and brave men. Feuds
which began in the early days of the re
public are in existence yet, and may last as
long as the families themselves last. Ken
lucky is VIGOROUSLY a fighting state. 1t
has produced fewer nOn-combatants than
any other state in the union, as is amply
illustrated by its muster roll on both sides
during the war. Its people are brave, chival-
ric and rash, and it has always been
conspicuous as a commonwealth wherein
the man who would not contend for his
rights did not deserve them. 1t is the COM
mon verdict that few have been found who
did not deserve their rights.
And yet this gets to be rather tiresome
in a land where the mental and intellectual
faculties are presumed to have full sway.
Conceding all that belongs to Kentucky in
the way of bravery, combativeness and
daring, we are still disposed to look upon
its other side for its greater and better re
cord. It has produced some of the greatest
statesmen the world ever knew, con-
spicuous among whom are HENRY
CLAY and JOIN C. BRECKENRIDGE,
who may fairly be classed as political
giants, and the staUe's representation
in either house Of Congress has always
been of the strongest material comprising
the federal legislature. This is not because
Kentucky is fighting state, but because
it blends with its disposition to resist en-
croachments a certain quality which can
best be described as a regard for and dispo-
sition to maintain the fundamental quail
ties of eternal justice.
Similar statements to those made con-
corning Kentucky have been put forth at
various times and in all practicable places
regarding Utah. The fact that the piO-
neers of this region have been, and their
descendants are people who have not been
particularly fearful, and have been
disposed to hold on to what
they had and resist any at
tempt to take it from them, has on many
occasions, in fact as a general thing, been
given to the world as an evidence of rank
disloyalty, if not treason. Undoubtedly, in
resisting unlawful pressure unlawful
things may have been done, but more nor
half so much here as elsewhere. The PEG
pie have simply, in the absence of the most
refined conditions of law, done what they
conceived to be best and most fitting IN
der the circumstances, just as any and
every other community under similar con-
ditions has done. It is undoubtedly the
case that men who have committed crimes
here have been visited with condign
punishment by lawless MODS;
this IS one of the outcrop-
pings of every frontier community.
But how does the record of any of Utah's
nei- hbors compare with its own in regard
to sue. proceedings? Either Montana or
Ioano las destroyed more lives without re
course to the forms Of law than Utah ever
has. Notwithstanding the facts that this
territory is older and has always been much
greater in point of population. And all this
only shows that human nature is very much
the same not only in all ages but in all
parts of the world, particularly in the west
ern part of it. Some parts are able to do
more and better service in the way of sup
pressing their lawless element, and have in
addition less of it to suppress; this is the
case of Utah, which can, by comparison at
least, show a very decent record as regards
the condition of things previously herein
set forth.
Kentucky is great state and Utah is a
great territory. Both have been extern
sively maligned and misrepresented be-
ca Use Of peculiarities of geographical loca-
ton and turbulent behavior on the part of a
certain class of their populace, and yet
neither has been anything like what was
represented Neither should be held an
swerable for things which were and are
the results of conditions rather than of
W. liul and deliberate intent.
The Republican party in the nation and
the Liberal party in Utah take great pains
to impress or try to impress it upon the
public mind that the southern states par-
ticularly Kentucky and all of Mormon
dom, whether embraced in Utah
or elsewhere, are elements which
require surveillance and
even domination amounting to threatened |
overthrow by the general government |
The foundation for such and all such |