The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1902-01-04
"A Parting Word"

IF THE nE,SERET NEWS could en-
pIoy fewer words in explanation OF
any point n controversy. we should
be GLAD tc print its 5uIl replies To- The
In5ermountain Catholic over a matter
concerning New Mexico ana previous
demands for statehood for 1t is
! through such presentations thar the
best results are obtained and readers
Of both sides are enabled to form 4
fair judgment Of the writer's; at least
it would aid them to pick out the bigot.
But 50 much language is used by our
! contemporary of 10 value whatever in
making an argument stick; rather pre-
! senting only fresh proofs of writer
without argument losing his temper
that we reproduce this paragraph only
from the last reply Of the Deserer
News dec. 20, which is really the
kernel Of the whole production:
Now what is or rather was the
main question:" II was. as stated in
these columns. the claims of that ter
rltory New MeXicol to statehood.
Which re ser forth in the terms that
/ appeared IN The memorials Of its .peo-
pie to congress. incidentally we men
toned the objections that had beer
raised az the occasion of former IF
forts IL that direction One of thesa
was the ALTERATION that the state
was dominated. TO SOME EXTENT
by an order Of priesthood that had
bad reputation. The News did nor
ENDORSE the objection by any means
but merely mentioned it as fact
aud showed that if anything of that
kind might have been urged in the
past. it could not be advanced ration
ally at the present"
The capitals ara ours. and are in.
tended to mark the notifications of the
EDITORS last utterances from those
which save offense in his first editorial
on New Mexico, appearing in the News
of date Nov. u. Commenting on pre-
vious attempts of New Mexico to OBJ
tain statehood. and assuming to speak
from knowledge. the Deseret News
said such We're defeated because
In 1879, for instance, it was shown
that New Mexico was so completely
under the domination OF clerical influ- |
ence that the legislature passed over |
the governors veto bill incorporating |
the Jesuits and comforting on them ex-
uaordinary powers and exemptions in i
the matter Of taxation. Congress an
nulled the law, but this action made
congress wary of admitting the terri |
tory to the Union"
These reasons. according to the Des-
eret News. were ample to justify con-
gress in rejecting the proposals of the
people of New Mexico and make the
national legislature wary" Of admit
ting the territory TO statehood. Clearly
it was piece of impudence on the
Fart of people dominated by cler-
lea! influence" to ask any share in the
government of the country, although
this Catholic people routed an invading
army from the territory and raised
greater quota OF Union volunteers (per
capital than any other commonwealth.
But now conditions have changed in
this Jesuit-ridden territory and it is
no longer ,impudent even to demand
statehood, because
THE influx OF the Anglo-Saxon ele-
ment has been SO great in late years
that there can be no well-founded fears j
Of turning the state, if ii should obtain I
statehood, over to an order that has
bad reputation"
One would suppose that a writer