The Idaho scimitar. [volume] (Boise, Idaho) 1907-1908, 1908-03-28
The Syracuse Letter.

disturbed about the Syracuse letter, although some
thing like couple of months have elapsed since tn
significant portion of that letter was given to tn
profane gaze of the Gentle population
On certain recent Sunday the letter was rea
to a Mormon congregation in meeting house a
Syracuse, Utah, by the bishop of the ward. 1t wa
letter from the president of the church, and it i
through such process that the orders of the cturcl
are conveyed to the Mormon people.
A lady of the Gentle faith was in the Syracuse
meeting house when the letter was read and she re
membered the striking topics with which it dealt
Again referring to the letter. The Tribune says:
AS reported first to u.s. that letter contained GER
tam references to suspended ordinances that were
to be restored; and that non-tthepayers were to be
disfellowshiped When the letter came to hand as
purported in full the second provision was in it,
sure enough, but the letter silent upon the
question of the suspended ordinances that were to
be revived And yet the lady who reported on this
letter to The Tribune is firm in her recollection that
this also read by the bishop of Syracuse as
part of the letter.
1t after the Salt Lake paper had published
the purport of the letter that the apostolic head of
the church became excited and letter was given
out for publication which purported to be the letter
that had been read in the Syracuse meeting house.
But the interesting portion, that relating to the in
ention OF the church to authorize the open practice
of polygamy, had been eliminated
Continuing, The Tribune says, referring to its
lady informant and to the interest the letter aroused
in the congregation:
We believe that her recollection is correct; be-
the context of the letter shows an evident
omission; because precisely the same thing was re-
ported as TO the reading of the letter at Spanish
Fork; and because the lady is familiar with the
Mormon ways, with their forms of expression, and
with their methods of thought; and she corroborateS
her recollection of the contents of the letter to
this by the fact that the brethren fingered about the
meeting house after services over, discussing
that phase of the letter, and while wondering what
1t might mean, unanimously to the conclusion
that polygamy was the ordinance that to be
revived.
The letter itself, as given to the public by the
church authorities, shows that in the preliminary
'doctoring' to which it had been subjected too much
IF the text had been extracted, for the censored
etter reads as fows:
Where quorums of seventy contain members who
n consequence of age, are united for missionary
service and at the same time unworthy of being
ordained high priests the question arises, what shall
e done with them?
By way of partially answering this question this
must be borne in mind, that such men must not be
commended to the high priests quorum, neither
aust anybody else be recommended excepting on
he of worthness and it will therefore be for
ne quorums of seventy who may be burdened with
his class of material to purge themselves of it as
est they can, thing they should be encouraged
nd urged to do, and which may be done in proper
nd legitimate way that is, by the quorums them
tier laboring with them without avail, and report
g the action to their bishop and high council
Attached to the letter it was published was the
flowing in the form of postscript which The
ribune informant remembers as being a portion
the body of the letter
Non-thepayers may be consistently dealt with in +
way Indicated that is, men who assign unbelef
the law of tithing their reason for not paying
hing, as unbelief in this law clearly renders a D
n incompetent to bear the priesthood :