The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1907-03-17
THE NEWS AND THE PASTORS.

OF the community. and JaborlouslN on
dcsvors 10 advise with them concerning
thcn clerical relation To public qucs-
iions.
The following language appeared in
the editorial columns Of the News,
March 10, 1907.
Christian ministers OF Utah and others
interested in religious work might nnd
II profitable at times 10 look over their
accounts with view of asCeriaininS Just
what thc benefit oT their alliance with
When the political plottcrs souudcd the
buglc I'm every direction as a signal for
anti Mormon" hosts To rally, many of
the professed Christians hast"ned TO take
their places In the ranks They were not
icnnrant of the faci that those ranks
were largely filed up by an element that
ought To he ahhOrrent 10 those who heed
/ the Scriptural Injunction against forming
unholy alliances. But they rallied under
the samc banner and so the strange
spectacle was presented To the world OF
! Christians and the enemies of the Cross
ministers and dive keepers standing
shoulder 10 shoulder in Il crusade against
| the Latter-day Saints.
The solictude of the News for the
consistency of evangelical preachers,
and for the correctness of their atti.
tude IN public matters, is an advanced
evolutionary form Of its continuous hy-
pocrisy. The real feeling Of the News
IS one of ioy-unstintcd joy-when it
/ discovers minister. or body of min
! lstry, in position which can be made
/ to seem disadvantagcous TO the cloth.
| That paper, through it's career, has dc.
! nounccd the preachers Of evangelical
churches as wolves in sleeps clothing.
preachers for hire and diviners for
money; and until the recent eXigency
which demanded that the News affect
a fraternity toward mankind in order
TO invoke the charity of mankind in
behalf Of the church leaders, the News
never lost an opportunity to parade the
| individual misdeed of minister as the
natural disposition and practice of the
"professcd Christians.
So much for the new aifcctation of
tho News of fraternity which it does
not feel
In its statement about the enlist.
mcnt under one banner of the clergy
men and certain evil clements of socic.
ty, the News is maladroit 1t was the
priesthood of the Mormon church that
was allied with the organized vice of
the town In the campaign to which the
News refers, Those patriarchs of the
church who used To lie in wait in the
alleys to collect from wretched women
the rent which they earn with the de-
structIon of their bodies, were the
whips to lash the lowest wretchedness
and crime Of the town 10 the polls for
commerce, every influence of city gov
ernment, every promise of future inn
munity, which could possibly be aggre-
gated together III behalf of the contin-
ued ecclesiastical rule by the priests
of the Mormon church-thesc were util-
lied in distinct copartnership be-
tween crime and prophecy, to carry the
election for the mutual advantage of
both. 1t was notorious that the lowest
dives In town, the hell-holcs where men
were robbed Of their wages on Satur-
day night and sent home half-crazed
with vile whisky, were nests of the
priestly political communion; and that
the common word passed around among
the boosters and the thugs was that If
the American party succeeded they
must close their doors, and that if the
church quorum succeeded they would be
permitted to run wide open. These
facts are undeniahle. Immunity was
promised, a wide,open town was as
sured. thousand heelers were working
with the certainty that if the Mormon
priests could win the election call
would be well in Zion for the proph-
cts and the tinhorns
AS soon as the election returns dem
onstrated an American victory the most
evil of the establishments closed their
doors. The notorious robbing gambling
games were discontinued-and they
have never resumed. In large degree
all the vice which can be suppressed in
a community like Salt Lake has been
suppressed. No effort in this direction
quite reaches the ideal OF the preachers,
who would have all men live spotless
life; but if the situation could be
reduced TO figures 1T would read some
thing like this: Under Mormon church
domination Salt Lake City had one
lean rule the vice and crime have been
reduced TO twenty per cent. The
preachers and all other citizens may
take their choice. The annihilation Of
the twenty per cent remaining is an
ideal which no city in the country
reaches. a return Of Mormon church
rule insures return to the one hum
dred per cent of protected criminality.
1t is no wonder that the evangelical
preachers sided with the American
party; and it is no wonder that they re-
main in support Of that party's rule,
despite the conspiracies Of the church
organs and quorums and bunko-steer-
crs-for intelligent pastors realize that
the attainment Of eighty per cent of
reform is better than n recurrence Of
one hundred per cent Of evil.
1t is like the Deseret News to taunt
evangelical ministers with being in as