Conclusion
Of the men who could have written this narrative, some are dead; some
are prudent; some are superstitious; and some are personally foresworn.
It appeared to me that the welfare of Utah and the common good of the
whole United States required the publication of the facts that I have
tried to demonstrate. Since there was apparently no one else who felt
the duty and also had the information or the wish to write, it seemed
my place to undertake it. And I have done it gladly. For when I was
subscribing the word of the Mormon chiefs for the fulfillment of our
statehood pledges, I engaged my own honor too, and gave bond myself
against the very treacheries that I have here recorded.
We promised that the Church had forever renounced the doctrine of
polygamy and the practice of plural marriage living, by a "revelation
from God" promulgated by the supreme Prophet of the Church and accepted
by the vote of the whole congregation assembled in conference. We
promised the retirement of the Mormon Prophets from the political
direction of their followers--the abrogation of the claim that the
Mormon Church was the "Kingdom of God" re-established upon earth to
supersede all civil government--the abandonment by the Church of any
authority to exercise a temporal power in competition with the civil
law. We promised to make the teaching and practice of the Church conform
to the institutions of a Republic in which all citizens are equal in
liberty. We promised that the Church should cease to accumulate property
for the support of illegal practices and un-American government. And we
made a record in proof of our promises by the anti-polygamy manifesto
of 1890 and its public ratification; by the petition for amnesty and
the acceptance of amnesty upon conditions; by the provisions of Utah's
enabling act and of Utah's state constitution; by the acts of Congress
and the judicial decisions restoring escheated Church property; by the
proceedings of the Federal courts of Utah in re-opening citizenship
to the alien members of the Mormon Church; by the acquiescence of the
Gentiles of Utah in the proceedings by which statehood was obtained;
and finally, and most indisputably, by the admission of Utah into equal
sovereignty in the Union--since that admission would never have been
granted, except upon the explicit understanding that the state was to
uphold the laws and institutions of the American republic in accordance
with our covenants.
Of all these promises the Church authorities have kept not one. The
doctrine and practice of polygamy have been restored by the Church, and
plural marriage living is practiced by the ruler of the kingdom and his
favorites with all the show and circumstance of an oriental court. There
are now being born in his domains thousands of unfortunate children
outside the pale of law and convention, for whom there can be
entertained no hope that any statute will ever give them a place within
the recognition of civilized society. The Prophet of the Church rules
with an absolute political power in Utah, with almost as much authority
in Idaho and Wyoming, and with only a little less autocracy in parts
of Colorado, Montana, Oregon, Washington, California, Arizona and New
Mexico. He names the Representatives and Senators in Congress from his
own state, and influences decisively the selection of such "deputies of
the people" from many of the surrounding states. Through his ambassadors
to the government of the United States, sitting in House and Senate, he
chooses the Federal officials for Utah and influences the appointment of
those for the neighboring states and territories. He commands the making
and unmaking of state law. He holds the courts and the prosecuting
officers to a strict accountability. He levies tribute upon the people
of Utah and helps to loot the citizens of the whole nation by his
alliance with the political and financial Plunderbund at Washington. He
has enslaved the subjects of his kingdom absolutely, and he looks to it
as the destiny of his Church to destroy all the governments of the world
and to substitute for them the theocracy--the "government by God" and
administration by oracle--of his successors.
And yet, even so, I could not have recorded the incidents of this
betrayal as mere matters of current history--and I would never have
written them in vindication of myself--if I had not been certain that
there is a remedy for the evil conditions in Utah, and that such a
narrative as this will help to hasten the remedy and right the wrong.
Except for the aggressive aid given by the national administrations
to the leaders of the Mormon Church, the people of Utah and the
intermountain states would never have permitted the revival of a
priestly tyranny in politics. Except for the protection of courts and
the enforced silence of politicians and journalists, polygamy could not
have been restored in the Mormon Church. Except for the interference
of powerful influences at Washington to coerce the Associated Press and
affect the newspapers of the country, the Mormon leaders would never
have dared to defy the sensibilities of our civilization. Except for
the greed of the predatory "Interests" of the nation, the commercial
absolutism of the Mormon hierarchy could never have been established.
The present conditions in the Mormon kingdom are due to national
influences. The remedy for those conditions is the withdrawal of
national sympathy and support.
Break the power at Washington of Joseph F. Smith, ruler of the Kingdom
of God, and every seeker after federal patronage in Utah will desert
him. Break his power as a political partner of the Republican party
now--and of the Democratic party should it succeed to office--and every
ambitious politician in the West will rebel against his throne. Break
his power to control the channels of public communication through
interested politicians and commercial agencies, and the sentiment of the
civilized world will join with the revolt of the "American movement" in
Utah to overthrow his tyrannies. Break his connection with the illegal
trusts and combines of the United States, and his financial power will
cease to be a terror and a menace to the industry and commerce of the
intermountain country.
The nation owes Utah such a rectification, for the nation has been, in
this matter, a chief sinner and a strong encourager of sin. President
Theodore Roosevelt, representing the majesty of the Republic, stayed us
when we might have won our own liberties in the revolt that was provoked
by the election of Senator Apostle Reed Smoot. Misled by political
and personal advisers, the President procured delays in the Smoot
investigation. He seduced senators from their convictions. He certified
the ambassador from the Kingdom of God as a qualified senator of the
United States. He gave the hand of fellowship to Joseph, the tyrant of
the Kingdom. He rebuked our friends and his own, in their struggle
for our freedom, by warning them that they were raising the flag of a
religious warfare. He filled the Mormon priests with the belief that
they might proceed unrestrainedly to the sacrifice of women and children
upon the polygamous altar, to the absolute rule of politics in the
intermountain states, and to the commercial exploitation of their
community in partnership with the trusts. The one policy that President
Taft seems to have accepted unimpaired from his predecessor is this
same respect for the power of the Mormon kingdom. In his placid but
wholehearted way he has encouraged his co-ordinate ruler, the Mormon
Prophet, and extended the Executive license to the support and
inevitable increase of these religious tyrannies of the Mormon hierarchs
which now the people of Utah, unaided, are wholly unable to combat.
And the nation owes such a rectification not only to Utah, but also to
itself. The commercial and financial Plunderbund that is now preying
upon the whole country is sustained at Washington by the agents of the
Mormon Church. The Prophet not only delivers his own subjects up to
pillage; he helps to deliver the people of the entire United States.
His senators are not representatives of a political party; they are the
tools of "the Interests" that are his partners. The shameful conditions
in Utah are not isolated and peculiar to that state; they are largely
the result of national conditions and they have a national effect. The
Prophet of Utah is not a local despot only: he is a national enemy; and
the nation must deal with him.
I do not ask for a resumption of cruelty, for a return to proscription.
I ask only that the nation shall rouse itself to a sense of its
responsibility. The Mormon Church has shown its ability to conform to
the demands of the republic--even by "revelation from God" if necessary.
The leaders of the Church are now defiant in their treasons only because
the nation has ceased to reprove and the national administrations have
powerfully encouraged. As soon as the Mormon hierarchy discovers that
the people of this country, wearied of violated treaties and broken
covenants, are about to exclude the political agents of the Prophet from
any participation in national affairs, the advisers of his inspiration
will quickly persuade him to make a concession to popular wrath. As soon
as the "Interests" realize that the burden of shame in Utah is too large
to be comfortable on their backs, they will throw it off. The President
of the United States will be unable to gain votes by patronizing the
crucifiers of women and children. The national administrations will
not dare to stand against the efforts of the Gentiles and independent
Mormons of Utah to regain their liberty. And Utah, the Islam of the
West, will depose its old Sultan and rise free.
With this hope--in this conviction--I have written, in all candor,
what no reasons of personal advantage or self-justification could
have induced me to write. I shall be accused of rancor, of religious
antagonism, of political ambition, of egotistical pride. But no man
who knows the truth will say sincerely that I have lied. Whatever
is attributed as my motive, my veracity in this book will not be
successfully impeached. In that confidence, I leave all the attacks that
guilt and bigotry can make upon me, to the public to whom they will
be addressed. The truth, in its own time, will prevail, in spite of
cunning. I am willing to await that time--for myself--and for the Mormon
people.
The End