The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-02-12
one receives this sum has no real JUS
LITIGATION for being wholly destitute.
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LITIGATION for being wholly destitute.
WELL-FEIGNED INDIGNATION.
It must be- clearly understood that 1
agree with Senator Cannon in his well
feigned Indignation at ecclesiastical in
terference in the political affairs of this
state. But say his Indignation is real
Is it not then true that it took five
years of office-holding and a certain de-
feat for reelection to convince him that
the methods by which he has been
made what he is--a senator of the
United States-are, after all, despicable.
One should not be unkind, but there IS
a striking unfitnesS in the rebuke by
Senator Cannon of those ecclesiastical
policies to which he owes his political
preferment. Citizens do not forget to
recall that Senator Cannon, when run
ming for congress in 1894 was accom-
panied by a recommendation from his
bishop, which recommendation had re-
ceiVed the endorsement of President
Joseph F. Smith Mr. Cannon did not
object to ecclesiastical interference
then. Nuggets of Truth was a pam
phlet generously distributed through
the Sunday schools in this state. To
date there is no public record of OBJ
lection by Mr. Cannon to this kind Of
church work. This pamphlet is
one in which the dead as
well as the living Saints of
the Mormon church, together with
Senator Cannon, We're pictured as il
Illustrating the beauties of Republican
doctrines. Senator Cannon is still ac-
cepted as one of the beauties. There
was no hesitation then in bursting
aSunder the cerementS that bound the
dead saints, so long as the act did no
harm to the aspirations of the living
politician. But when Apostle Grant, in
a private letter to an alleged friend,
does that which Senator Cannon some
five years ago permitted to be done
publicly and for his personal ends, he
must, indeed, be roundly denounced.
duplicates THE SENATOR.
By the way, and in this connection, it
may not be unfair to give publicity to
a scrap Of gossip the which most clear
ly indicates how ineXpreSSibly shocked
Senator Cannon can be at any refer
ence to the attitude of President Wood
ruff on the senatorship, while he was
living. Report gives Senator Cannon'S
father as authority for the statement
that President Woodruff had expressed
it as being his mind and will' that
Frank J. should be reelected by the
present legislature to the United States
senate. Report has it that Senator
Cannon's father and President Smith
were both present when President
Woodruff expressed himself as above
quoted. Mr.. Smith is in the Sandwich
islands. President Woodruff lies be-
meath the sod. Alone on the scene, as
the executor of the expressed mind
and wilP' of the late President Wood
ruff, is President George .. Cannon,
father of Senator Cannon. The story,
of course, will be denied; nevertheless,
gossips will persist in declaring that
Franks adherence of calling on the
dead saint" to the support of a rival
candidate lies more in the application
of the support than to the support
itself.
make no defense Of Mr.. Grant nor
of Mr.. Smith. Reputation has them
fairly well tongued. If what Mr.. Can
non says of them is true, then What
he said of them is well-deserved. If
what he says is true, it may we'll be
asked what can be said of one who
vehemently resents the employment Of
an unfair influence only because that
influence is no longer plant to his
touch Verify, verify, there are re-
actionists in Utah. In very deed there
must arise one to lead to a higher
plane. But shall the leader be one who
owes ali he has, all he is, to the very
system he aSSailS? For those who join
a cause, work for it, become glorified
by reason of it, and then for the base
longer to be continued to him and so
deserts the cause, and offers to become
the leader of the hosts warning against
that to which he owes his eminence
there is a. name abhorred of men. That
name is traitor. l may despise the
cause, but l must admire the loyalty
and unselfish devotion of its followers.
A brighter day dawns for Utah, but
its glory may not be dimmed nor its
advance stayed by those who would
kill the cause unless they are its cap
tains. I am with Senator Cannon in
his plea for progress, but I shall not be
deluded by that plea into following in
the footsteps of one who, as servant
and beneficiary. has done more to en-
trench in unimpregnable quarters the
reactionists against whom he so glibly
inveighs, because, forsooth, they have
dared dispute his right to all the hon
ors of reactionary victories.
MIR. JOHNSON.