The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-11-26
HOW A POL CAr1IST VIEWS
The ANTIPOL YGAr1y CRUSADE
Why Stake Counselor Taylor Made No Pledges to the
Court.

Joseph E. Taylor of the Salt Lake
stake presidency is the first one of the
church members prosecuted for unlaw-
full cohabitation to express himself on
the subject. Mr. Taylor, it will be re-
membered, was asked the other day
in court, before sentence was passed
upon him, if he would promise to obey
the law in the future. He refused to
make any promises, and his course in
so doing has occasioned considerable
comment on both sides of the question
Mr. Taylor yesterday made the fol-
lowing statement in connection with his
case:
Il have been asked many times since
Wednesday last why 1 declined to
promise to obey the law in the future
in regard TO unlawful cohabitation. l
will say that 1 am quite willing to
give my reasons therefor.
Some have suggested that if l had
made such q promise. instead of hav-
ing to pay as l did $3.50, that perhaps
the judge would have, considered the
promise sufficient, without imposing
any fine at all.
"Some have made other suggestions,
all of which were seemingly favorable
to myself, but not very favorable to
the other parties who were equally in
terested with me.
while thank my friends for their
apparently kind suggestions, l think
can offer some very satisfactory rea-
sons for not wishing to make any
promise of the kind named. There are
involved in this question some very
serious considerations, and conse-
quences also of the gravest character.
would ask: Is the act OF which IL was
accused essentially a crime? Or in
other words. Is is a crime in and OF
itself? From my standpoint it is not
That it is. made so by statutory en-
actment l freely admit, but that does
not constitute it crime Independent of
such statute.
rs adultery or promiscuous sexual
Indulgence a crime in and of itself?
Yes No matter whether there exists
statute defining it as such or not.
That this is a correct line of demarka-
ton drawn between the two acts no
reasonable person will deny.
'The relations now existing between
myself and the persons named in the
Information charging me with unlaw-
full cohabitation were entered into in
ago and were sanctified by an ordi-
nance of marriage. which binds to-
gether for time and all eternity. We
then and there made a VOW to faith
fully observe this covenant of mar
riage.
This was done in innocence and pu-
rity-not in defiance of law. The anti
polygamy law known as the Cuilom
bill, passed in 1862, was considered to
be a dead letter and that it would
never possess any life. Such was the
honest conviction of the Mormon peo-
pie. Twenty years. afterwards, when
this old law was famed into life and
sustained by other laws passed for a
specific purpose-which must be claSSed
in future history asnspecial legislation,
as we'll as ex post facto in character,
which is strictly forbidden in the con-
stitution of the United States cart. L,
sec. Give then firmly believed that
the court of last resort would declare
the same unconstitutional.
las an evidence of our firm convic-
tons upon this point need on!y REFER
TO the untold .sufferings of polygamous
families during period OF SIX years
beginning in the year 1884, when the
law was executed with such extreme
cruelty and its provisions so outrage
ously construed as to infiict the hard
est punishments possible. In fact. i'm
prisonment for periods longer than life
itself were sought to be inflicted; war
ranted, it was said by certain pc
culiar segregation process-all of which
the future historian will denounce in
the most scathing terms.
"All this, say, was heroically en-
dured under the finn conviction that
we would be indicated when our cause
was heard before the highest court in
the land. In this we were doomed to
disappointment, however. While the
supreme court very properly and
promptly reversed some of the unlaw
full decisions of the Utah judges, 1t
ruled that the lawsitself was corstitu-
tional.
Did the Mormon people then as
sumo a defiant attitude? No. On the
contrary. recognizing the decision of
the supreme court of the land, the
president of the church at that time
(Wilford Woodbury.. in conformity
Herewith. issued the widely known
manifesto forbidding all members of
the church to enter into polygamous
marriages in the future.
This was sustained by the unanim-
Gus vote of the leading authorities and
representatives Of the church in a gen.