History of Salt Lake City, Part 109

Author: Tullidge, Edward Wheelock
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Salt Lake City, Star printing company
Number of Pages: 1194

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" Why should I stand here and be assailed, abused, and denounced as I have been for lechery, because of marrying wives. Was it necessary that wives should be taken to gratify sensuality ? I have no need to take any wife to accomplish that. I have no need to take to myself the burden and responsibility of a family for that purpose. The people I represent would not need to be kept out of the Union ( that being, we are told, the great reason that Utah has not sooner been admitted as one of the States) if the motives which have been attributed to them on this floor were the ones which have prompted them to contract marriages. There would be no necessity to place themselves in such a peculiar position if the gratification of passion were, as alleged, the sole object. What then, is it ?

" Mr. Speaker, the people of Utah have profound convictions concerning many things. They have left their homes more than once for the sake of religion, and have been forced to make themselves new homes in a distant land. Marri- age is an institution concerning which they have strong convictions. It may be said that this is not religion ; but whether it is or not, they believe it to be re- ligion. The Catholic has ideas as to what is religion. The Episcopalian has his ideas also upon the same subject ; so with the Presbyterians the Methodists, the Baptists, the Quakers, the Unitarians, and others ; and who shall decide, until the great day when men shall be judged and rewarded or punished for the deeds done in the body, between them.

" My constituents believe that God has given a command concerning marri- age, and that he never gives a command without an object, and the object in this instance is to redeem the human family from the terrible evils under which in mod- ern society it groans. It may be asked how redeem them ? We answer by mak - ing marriage honorable ; by uplifting it, by elevating it above its present condi- tion ; by giving every woman an opportunity to be a wife and mother. To cut off opportunity for prostitution and concubinage, and to leave no margin for lust to prey upon. It may be said that the sexes are so evenly divided that there is not sufficient disparity between their numbers to justify the adoption of such a principle.

"The people of Utah do not believe that plural marriage ought to be or can be universal. In Utah itself it is not possible, for the males out number the fe- males. But give every woman the opportunity to marry, punish fornication and adultery, and what woman would occupy an illicit relation with the other sex ? The people of Utah believe marriage at the present time is falling into desuetude, and in consequence corruption is spreading over the land, and we have felt that the country was big enough to allow us in that far-off Utah, not interfering with others:

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not forcing our views upon others, to test the effect of the patriarchal system of mar- riage in checking the tide of vice and preventing the spread of evils which mod- ern society acknowledges its powerlessness to extirpate.

" I do not think it would be wise under present circumstances, that I should say anything more on this question. You may depend upon it, however, that there are more arguments in its favor than you have heard here or are likely to hear, and that the men and women choosing to embrace that principle are able to assign goud and sufficient reasons for doing so.

" I shall not allude to it from a scriptural standpoint. I may say, however. that so far as the condemnation of the world is concerned, we are willing to be placed upon the same plane with Abraham. And when we pray to go to Abra- ham's bosom we expect he will not look upon us as aliens cr law-breakers ; and when we pray to go to the New Jerusalem over each of whose twelve gates is written the name of each one of the twelve patriarchs, the sons of Jacob, we ex- pect when we pass through these gates we shall not be ashamed to be known for what we are.

" Since the commencement of this debate, the statement has been made so frequently, that I feel as though I ought to say something in regard to it in con- nection with this case ; I mean the statement respecting the alleged conduct of the people of Utah in absorbing all the public lands. In the first speech on the Utah case, the allegation was made that the people of Utah in pursuance of a well-defined and settled policy, had absorbed all the public lands. It would seem as though it were unnecessary for any person, and for myself particularly, to say one word in relation to this matter, it being so well known that in Utah Territory, as well as in the other Territories and States over which the land laws have been extended, every person can obtain land that is not occupied, every citizen who has the right to pre-empt or homestead land, and that there is no power in the lo- cal legislatures to alienate the lands or to take away the title and bestow it upon any individual. Acts of the Legislative Assembly of Utah Territory have been quoted to sustain the idea that they have really given title or sought to dispose of the public lands. At no time and under no circumstances was any action of this kind taken with a view to bestow the ownership or title upon any person who might occupy the land or to whom any grant might be given.

" But our canyon roads had to be made, and it required some action on the part of the Legislature to induce men to build costly roads into our mountains and to build bridges over our canyon streams. I have known canyon roads there costing over $12,000 to be swept away in a single storm. Grants of this kind were given in the early days of the Territory for such purposes, and also for herd grounds and other purposes, that local rights might be preserved. If such had been the design it would have been futile. We lived in Utah Territory twenty years before the land laws were extended over us ; we had to do the best we could. As soon as these laws were extended over our Territory we then obtained title to our lands. These towns which have been spoken of could only get the same amount of land to their population that towns in other parts of the United States obtained. Where the inhabitants number one hundred, the law says, and less than two hun- dred, sites shall embrace not exceeding 320 acres, and s The highest rum-

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ber that was allowed was 1, 280 acres. That was to a town containing 5,000 inhab- itanti. Now, Salt Lake City had outgrown the conditions for which the town- site act was designed, and the inhabitants could not obtain title under it to their homes My predecessor, Hon. W. H. Hooper, succeeded in getting a special act of Congress passed to meet the exigency.

" The boundaries of the incorporated cities of Utah Territory were made very extensive. There was a very good reason for this. It is to be found in the facts that the settlements of Utah Territory were differently situated from those of every other part of the country. We had to do our farming by means of irri- gation. We had to adopt the Mexican system of living in pueblos or villages. And it was thought a wise thing for municipal authority to be extended over the farms, the fields, the water, so that the water could be controlled and come within municipal regulations, and that men who farmed in the country might be within the towns, and have the social advantages, the school advantages and other ad- vantages that there were to be obtained. Besides, it was an Indian country, and we had to live in villages to secure protection. But under the old law no man could pre-empt inside of an incorporated city. This was found out after the land laws were extended over the Territory.

" It was not supposed at the time these corporations were granted that they would thus interfere with the settlement of lands outside of the town-side limits ; and it put the Mormon people as much as it did all others to great inconvenience. They could not obtain title to their lands any more than any one else until a law was passed by Congress which relieved the people in that respect in that Terri- tory and in all the Territories; so that every settler that came within the limits of an incorporated city could obtain his land if it was open to pre-emption or homestead entry. That is all there is connected with this allegation that the people of Utah have plastered the whole country with their incorporations in order to prevent settlement.

" Another point, Mr. Speaker, in connection with this case. Let the resolu- tion that has been proposed by the majority of the committee on elections be adopted and what will be the result ? Nearly eighteen months have elapsed since the election for this Congress. President Hayes was President of the United States at that time. President Garfield succeeded him. President Authur now fills the executive chair. During these three administrations the Governor of Utah Territory, who ruthlessly violated the law and robbed the people of their franchises, still occupies that position.

" Let this seat of the Delegate from Utah be declared vacant, and you say to every Governor in the United States who acts as a ministerial officer, in declaring the results of elections, 'You can give certificates to men not elected with im- punity if we are in power, as was done in the Utah case, and no one will call you in question.' And the returning board which goes to Utah Territory under the law just passed, if not superior men, will feel emboldened to do the same thing with every man who may be elected under that law, and who may be displeasing to a majority of the board. They may assume the same right, and say to the man, ' You have received the votes, but we question your right, your eligibility,

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and we refuse to give you the certificate.' Gentlemen can you see what the effect will be ?

" You may depend upon it that the consequences of this action, if the report of the majority of the committee be adopted, will not end with Utah Territory. Crystalize this fraud, make it effective by your votes, and its consequences will be far-reaching and extensive The delegate-elect from Utah may be an insig- nificant person, but a great principal is involved in this case. It will not be the Mormons always. There will be some one else, perhaps, who will be unpopular. There will be some party in the minority against whom strong prejudices will be aroused and strong feelings evoked. This case will be cited as a precedent for refusing right and justice to such persons and it will be pleaded in justification that this Forty-seventh Congress indorsed such action by sustaining the report of the majority of the committee on elections. A great wrong of this character can- not be perpetrated even upon the people of Utah without producing terrible results, which will be far-reaching and wide-spread.

" There is one statement which I feel that I ought not to permit to pass un- challenged. It was stated upon this floor by the gentleman from Pennsylvania, [Mr. Beltzhoover, ] and he assigned it as a strong reason for joining in the majority report, that in the Forty-third Congress I had unequivocally denied that I was what I have since acknowledged myself to be. And the gentleman from Ten- nessee, [Mr. Pettibone, ] made that the foundation for his argument. He read from the statement which I made in the Forty-third, Congress, and he certainly has an admirable way of reading anything so as to make it suit the purpose of his own argument. He read :

"1 deny that I am now living with four wives.

"And then he paused. Well, if that was without qualification it would look as though the gentleman from Pennsylvania was quite correct in saying that I had unequivocally denied the accusation. But there is something else in the sentence. There is a parenthetical sentence-' or that I am living or cohabiting with any wives'-which may be omitted. It will read then in this way .

"I deny that I am now living with four wives in defiance or willful violation of the laws of Con- gress, etc

"I denied it then and I can deny it now. I never defiantly or wilfully violated any law. In response to the tenth allegation contained in the statement, I said :

" I deny that I am now living or have ever lived in violation of the laws of God, man, my country, decency, or civilization, or any law of the United States.

" Every lawyer knows that in [leading for the purposes of the action in con- troversy, allegations are denied and proofs are called for, or a defendant might violate the old common-law rule that a man is not bound to accuse himself, but to leave the burden of proof to rest upon his opponent. But to show that the mem- bers of the committee in the Forty-third Congress understood exactly my position, for I want to make it so clear that it cannot be disputed, that that issue was raised and was accepted and was recognized as the true issue, I will read from their report. Before doing so I may say that the full committee decided, not- withstanding the accusation that had been made that I was not entitled to my

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seat because of mirital relations, that there relations were not a disqualification for a seat upon this floor, and the majority reported these resolutions :

1. Resolved, That George R. Maxwell was not elected, and is not entitled, to a seat in the House of Representatives of the Forty-third Congress as Delegate from the Territory of Utah.

2. Resolved, That George Q. Cannon was elected and returned as a Delegate from the Territory of Utah to a seat in the Forty-third Congress.

" There the majority of the committee stopped. But a minority of the com- mittee reported the following resolution :

"Resolved, That George Q. Cannon was duly elected and returned as Delegate from the Territory of Utah, and is entitled to a seat as a Delegate in the Forty-third Congress.

" The issue in controversy, and upon which the contest was based, was brought plainly before the House, and the House by about a two thirds vote adopted the majority report and the supplemental minority report. In the re- port which was made by the minority of the committee it was stated that-

' The majority of the committee have failed and decline to report a resolution to the effect that George Q. Cannon was entitled to the seat upon the ground that he was disqualified by reason of the fact thas he was the husband of more than one wife, and, as is assumed, is guilty of a violation of the act of Congress, etc.

" You will see by this that the issue was fairly brought before the committee on elections ; it was not only brought fairly before the committee on elections, but it was brought fairly before this House. And this House, with the full knowledge of all the facts, thoroughly conversant with the statement made concerning me upon this point, and which I neither disputed nor denied, this House of a Repub- lican Congress, by a vote of about two-thirds of the members present, confirmed me in my seat.

" In the Forty fourth Congress the same issue was made and the same resolu- tions were · adopted. The House being pressed for time on account of business, the sub-committee did not report to the House thinking it unnecessary to do so, as I already had my seat.

After I had been confirmed to my right to a seat in the Forty-third Congress, a resolution was introduced by a member of the committee on elections, making charges against me concerning marriages, and the committee was authorized to investigate the matter. The committee in submitting their report, made this statement :

" Your committee think the evidence, unchallenged as it is by the Delegate, establishes, etc.

" That is, that I was living with more wives than one. The committee then reported a resolution that George Q. Cannon, Delegate from Utah, being found, upon due consideration and the evidence submitted and not controverted by said Cannon, to be an actual polygamist, etc.,

" The committee was authorized to report to the House, but when it did re- port, the House refused to consider the report, and the case was dismissed.

" That was in the Republican Forty-third Congress.

" Mr. Speaker, I find myself in this position : I am here as the delegate from Utah Territory, regularly elected, properly qualified, fully entitled to the seat. My constituents, as well as myself, believed at the time of my election that there was no barrier to prevent me from taking my seat. Nothing has occurred since

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my election to interpose any such barrier. All these charges which are made against my constituency, which I have not time to allude to in detail or to dis- prove, but which I do state are false, all these charges were in existence years and years ago. They were in existence in the Forty-sixth Congress, in the Forty- fifth, in the Forty-fourth, in the Forty-third Congress. I have sat here during those Congresses. My right to my seat has been fully vindicated by the House. I came here under precisely the same circumstances then that I come now. But it is now said that a law of Congress has been enacted which prevents me from taking my seat ; that by the operation of this law I am excluded, and the seat is to be declared vacant. If this proposed resolution be sustained, then I say fraud will be supplemented by this method of strangling, of murdering the representa- tion of the Territory of Utah on this floor.

" If the report of the majority of this committee shall be sustained, I shall leave this Hall of Representatives with a feeling and a conscience which will give me far more satisfaction in the days to come than if I were a member of this House and voted in favor of the adoption of the report of the majority declaring this seat vacant. I am a resident of Utah Territory, and one of those people who are everywhere spoken against, and against whom many vile charges are made, as were made against their predecessors, the Church of Christ, in the early days, and as Jesus predicted would be the case ; yet I do respect my oath, and I pity any gentleman who, with nothing to sustain him but popular sentiment, is willing to trample upon the Constitution and the law, and to strike down a people against whom popular sentiment is strong.

[Here the hammer fell.]

. " Mr. Speaker and gentlemen of the House, I thank you for your kind indulgence."

CHAPTER XC.

POLITICAL CAMPAIGN OF 1882. NOMINATION OF JOHN T. CAINE. · VAN ZILES CHALLENGE. THE CANDIDATES BEFORE THE PEOPLE. VICTORY OF THE PEOPLE'S PARTY.

The action opened with the meeting of the Convention of the People's Party, in the City Hall, Salt Lake City, on Monday, the Ioth of October. The Conven- tion soon adjourned until the following Thursday without having effected its regu- lar organization , the temporary chairman was R. K. Williams, now of Ogden, late chief justice of Kentucky.

On the 11th of October, the Convention of the Liberal Party met at the Walker Opera House. Business commenced by a temporary organization with M. M. Kaighn, Esq., as chairman ; the organization was perfected with Judge Mc- Bride as regular chairman. The delegates quickly came to the adoption of the following platform of the Liberal Party of Utah.

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" The Liberal Party of Utah Territory, composed of citizens of all shades of political opinion, finding itself confronted by a condition of local affairs so anom - alous in character as to make the partizan distinction known in other portions of the United States of minor importance ; and being assembled in convention for the purpose of nominating a candidate for Delegate to the Forty-eighth Congress from this Territory, and being desirous that the public may fully understand the reasons which influence us in discarding the current political distinctions prevailing elsewhere, and justifying our independent action, do hereby proclaim the follow- ing platform of principles :

" I. That the highest political duty of every American citizen is to be loyal to the nation under whose flag he lives, and to yield ready obedience to all the laws enacted by its authority to effect its conduct and government.

" 2. That we are in favor of equal and exact justice to all citizens with- out regard to nativity, creed or sect, and the honest enforcement of the laws against all offenders, without regard to their opinions, social, religious or political.

" 3. That the laws of Congress heretofore passed for the purpose of suppress- ing polygamy, practiced in Utah under the pretense of a religious right and duty, and to prevent the Mormon Church from perverting the local government provi- ded by the Organic Act, into a means of advancing the interests of that sect in disregard of the rights of those not of that faith, have our emphatic approval and support, and the effort thus far successful of that Church to prevent the execution of those laws stamp it as a law defying organization, of which we express the most positive condemnation.

"4. We arraign the Mormon power in Utah on the following grounds : it exalts the Church above the State in matters of purely administrative and political concern. It perverts the duty of the representative in official and legislative mat- ters by demanding that the interests and wishes of that sect and of the priesthood shall be made paramount considerations. It destroys the freedom of the citizen by assuming the right to dictate his political action and control his ballot. It teaches that defiance of the law of the land when counseled by its priesthood is a relig- ious duty. It encourages jurors and witnesses, when attempts are made in the or- dinary course of law to punish the crime of polygamy, to disregard their duties in order to protect offenders who are of their faith. It discourages immigration and settlement upon the public lands, except by its own adherents, and by intolerance and gross personal outrages on non-Mormon settlers, drives them from the com- mon domain. It restricts commerce and business enterprise by commanding its members to deal only with houses of which it approves, thus creating vast monop- olies in trade in the interests of a few men, who engross the favor of its hierarchy and enjoy the income of its people. It oppresses the people by taxation, unequal and unjust, and its officers neither make nor are they required to give any satisfac- tory account of the disbursement of public funds. It taxes the people to build school houses and therein teaches the tenets of the sect by teachers licensed only by its priesthood-most of whom are incompetent and unlearned except in Mor- mon doctrines. It fills the public offices with bigoted sectarians and servants, without regard to capacity for official station or public employment. It divides the people into classes by religious distinction and falsely teaches its adherents

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that those not of their faith are their enemies, thus sowing suspicions and bigotry among the masses. It confers on woman the suffrage and then forces her to use it under the lash of its priesthood, to perpetuate their power and her own degredation. It robs thousands of women of honorable wedlock and brands their children with dishonor, so that they may be forever deterred from any effort for relief from its grasp. In a word, it has made Utah a land of disloyalty, disaffection and hatred toward the Government ; has retarded its growth, prosperity and advancement ; set its people at variance and discord with the fifty millions of people in the Uni- ted States, and made its history a reproach to the Nation. For these offenses, to which many more might be added, we arraign the Mormon power in Utah, and invoke against it and its monstrous pretentions and practices the considerate judg- ment of the citizen voter, the statesman and the Christian, and humbly submit that our attitude toward it is not only justified but demanded by every considera- tion that ought to control the true American citizen in the discharge of political duty.

" 5. That while this organization, calling itself a church, asks immunity for its acts on a plea of religious belief, it is in reality a social, commercial and polit- ical body ; and while we recognize the fact that many of its members are con- trolled by honest motives, and would, if freed from their obligations to the body, be faithful citizens, we equally assert that the organization is an enemy of all gov- ernment except its own, and that there can be no fair and impartial civil govern- ment in Utah while the Mormon Church is permitted to control the law-making power.

" 6. That while the act of June, 1874, commonly known as the Poland Bill, the act of March, 1882, commonly known as the Edmunds Bill, with the Hoar amendment of July, 1882, have all given great relief to the non-Mormons of Utah, and while for this legislation we express our sincere thanks to the senators and representatives who originated and passed it; we here repeat the resolve of our last Territorial Convention, that no attempted remedy which leaves the political power of the Territory under the control of the Mormon priesthood will ever be successful in reforming the evils we complain of, and that the peaceful, thorough and effective remedy will only be found by the adoption of a measure by which the legislative power of the Territory shall be given to a Council or Commission appointed by and under the authority of the United States, and answerable to it for the faithful performance of its duties.

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History of Salt Lake City, Part 109

Author: Tullidge, Edward Wheelock Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Salt Lake City, Star printing company Number of Pages: 1194

Author: Tullidge, Edward Wheelock
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Salt Lake City, Star printing company
Number of Pages: 1194