The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1892-04-05
THE HIRED MAN.

Congressman GEORGE D. PERKINS, of
Iowa. will doubtless feel called upon to dis
charge his present hired man and get an
other one. Mr.. PERKINS is the editor of
the Sioux City Journal as well as a Con-
gresham. Last weeR as HERALD readers
are aware, he wrote the minority report of
the House committee on territories, on the
Utah Home Rule bill, in which report he
condensed good deal Of anti-Mormon
bile, adopted in full the Liberal professions
regarding the Saints and declared the lat
ter were not good enough, or true enough,
or loyal enough TO be entrusted with
self government, and therefore they
should be held under the oppres-
sive and unrepublican rule which has
so long afflicted the territory. While Mr..
PERKINS was penniug his vigorous anti
Mormon document, his hired man in the
Journal sanctum was writing a leader
breathing very different spirit concern
ing these same Mormons The editorial
and Mr.. PERKINS minority report both ap-
psared in print last Thursday morning,
and having published the latter we here
give room to the former, merely remarking
that the Congressman should have invited
the Liberal anti-Home Rule delegation to
to Washington to return to Utah via Sioux
City, and take up a labor with the temper
airy occupant Of the Journal sanctum:
President ELIOT, OF Harvard, is facing
storm which is blowing from the east. He dared
TO say good word about the Mormons and
Puritan New England holds up its hands in ex-
pressions OF holy horror. The incident indi-
Gates that progress is swifter, in moral as well
as material things in the west than the east.
The college executive stood on the tabernacle
platform in Salt Lake, surrounded by WOOD
RUFF, CANNON. SMITH and 1000 other Latter
day Saints, and compared the journey of the
men and women who planted that superb col
ony in Utah to the pilgrimage of the Puritans
across O watery wilderness TO escape persecu-
ton and seek freedom in worshlping GoD. Then
after reference to the heroism OF pioneer
women and the fact that there is no motive in
colonization like the religious motive, he spoke
of religious liberty and said there is no reason
why the freedom enjoyed in MASSACHUSETTS,
should not be granted the people Of all the ter
ritories.
The outraged New England conscience found
expression and promptly condemned ELIOT
the intimation being made that the dignifed
.
his head. 1t was declared an outrage 10 com
pare the 'beastly Mormons'' with the pilgrim
| fathers. But ELIOT says he only made a com
parison on the dauntless colonization spirit
displayed and as for religious liberation
among the settlements of the pilgrim fathers
he reminds his critics that he, o Unitarian,
would not have been permitted to exist among
them.
President ELIOT declares his belief that the
Mormons are sincere in their abandonment of
polygamy and they should stand in precisely
the same position under the law as those who
worship according to other faiths. This was
bad enough, from the baked beans standpoint,
but when he declared that there were ten Nor.
mon students in Harvard, all Boston was ready
to go into Mysteries. The other students de.
MED this and said that II the colony was found
the Mormons would be initiated into the
''Dickey" society. But ELIOT reaflrms it and
says the college is as ready to welcome Mormon
students as any other.
The controversy is timely. President ELIOT
has not Endorsed polygamy nor tried to gid the
history OF Mormonism, but he has had the
courage to say that right is right wherever
found, and seeing the dawn breaking in be.
nighted Utah he has not waited for the full sun
light before greeting the day.