RETROSPECTION--APOSTOLIC MISSION OF THE MORMON WOMEN--HOW THEY HAVE
USED THE SUFFRAGE--THEIR PETITION TO MRS. GRANT--TWENTY-SEVEN THOUSAND
MORMON WOMEN MEMORIALIZE CONGRESS.
Ere this record be closed, let us review the later acts of these
extraordinary women, who have fairly earned the position of apostles to
the whole United States.
They have pioneered the nation westward, where Providence was directing
its course of empire, and now they are turning back upon the elder
States of the Union as pioneers of a new civilization.
The manifest prophesy of events is, that Utah, in the near future,
is going down from the mountains of refuge to the very seat of
government, with woman's mission to all America. Very consistently,
yet very significantly also, are the women of Utah rising to power and
importance in the nation, through woman suffrage and the exercise of
the constitutional right of petition.
Since the grant of woman suffrage they have exercised the ballot
repeatedly in their municipal and territorial elections. Moreover,
within that time, they have voted upon the constitution for the "State
of Deseret," which will doubtless be substantially the one under which
the territory will be admitted into the Union. Female suffrage was
one of the planks of that constitution. It will become a part of the
organic act of the future State. No Congress will dare to expunge it,
for such an attempt would bring a million of the women of America into
an organized movement against the Congress that should dare to array
itself against this grand charter of woman's freedom. Though Wyoming
was the first to pass a woman suffrage bill, which met a veto from its
governor, and has experienced a somewhat unhappy history since, the
honor of having voted for the greatest measures known in social and
political economy rests with the women of Utah. They have taken action
upon the very foundation of society-building. Already, therefore,
the women of Utah lead the age in this supreme woman's issue; and,
if they carry their State into the Union first on the woman suffrage
plank, they will practically make woman suffrage a dispensation in our
national economy for all the States of the Federal Union. And it will
be consistent to look for a female member of Congress from Utah. Let
woman be once recognized as a power in the State, as well as in society
and the church, and her political rights can be extended according to
the public mind.
The Mormon women have also fallen back upon the original right of
citizens to petition Congress. Their first example of the kind was
when they held their grand mass-meetings throughout the territory and
memorialized Congress against the Cullom bill. The second was the
very remarkable petition to Mrs. Grant. It is here reproduced as a
historical unique:
"MRS. PRESIDENT GRANT:
"_Honored Lady_: Deeming it proper for woman to appeal to
woman, we, Latter-day Saints, ladies of Utah, take the liberty
of preferring our humble and earnest petition for your kindly
and generous aid; not merely that you are the wife of the chief
magistrate of this great nation, but we are also induced to appeal
to you because of your high personal reputation for nobility and
excellence of character.
"Believing that you, as all true women should do (for in our
estimation every wife should fill the position of counselor to her
husband), possess the confidence of and have much influence with
his excellency, President Grant, we earnestly solicit the exercise
of that influence with him in behalf of our husbands, fathers, sons
and brothers, who are now being exposed to the murderous policy
of a clique of federal officers, intent on the destruction of our
honest, happy, industrious and prosperous people.
"We have broken no constitutional law; violated no obligation,
either national or sectional; we revere the sacred constitution of
our country, and have ever been an order-loving, law-abiding people.
"We believe the institution of marriage to have been ordained
of God, and therefore subject to his all-wise direction. It
is a divine rite, and not a civil contract, and hence no man,
unauthorized of God, can legally administer in this holy ordinance.
"We also believe in the Holy Bible, and that God did anciently
institute the order of plurality of wives, and sanctioned and
honored it in the advent of the Saviour of the world, whose birth,
on the mother's side, was in that polygamous lineage, as he
testified to his servant John, on the Isle of Patmos, saying: 'I am
the root and the offspring of David;' and we not only believe, but
most assuredly know, that the Almighty has restored the fullness
of the everlasting gospel, through the prophet Joseph Smith, and
with it the plurality of wives. This we accept as a purely divine
institution. With us it is a matter of conscience, knowing that God
commanded its practice.
"Our territorial laws make adultery and licentiousness penal
offences, the breach of which subjects offenders to fine and
imprisonment. These laws are being basely subverted by our federal
officers, who after unscrupulously wresting the territorial offices
from their legitimate incumbents, in order to carry out suicidal
schemes, are substituting licentiousness for the sacred order of
marriage, and seeking by these measures to incarcerate the most
moral and upright men of this territory, and thus destroy the peace
and prosperity of this entire community. They evidently design to
sever the conjugal, parental and paternal ties, which are dearer to
us than our lives.
"We appreciate our husbands as highly as it is possible for you,
honored madam, to appreciate yours. They have no interests but such
as we share in common with them. If they are persecuted, we are
persecuted also. If they are imprisoned, we and our children are
left unprotected.
"As a community we love peace and promote it. Our leaders are
peacemakers, and invariably stimulate the people to pacific
measures, even when subjected to the grossest injustice. President
Brigham Young and several of his associates, all noble and
philanthropic gentlemen, are already under indictment to be
arraigned, before a packed jury, mostly non-residents, for the
crime of licentiousness, than which a more outrageous absurdity
could not exist.
"Under these cruel and forbidding circumstances, dear madam,
our most fervent petition to you is, that through the sympathy
of your womanly heart you will persuade the President to remove
these malicious disturbers of the peace, or at least that he will
stop the disgraceful court proceedings, and send from Washington
a committee of candid, intelligent, reliable men, who shall
investigate matters which involve the rights of property, perhaps
life, and more than all, the constitutional liberties of more than
one hundred thousand citizens.
"By doing this you will be the honored instrument, in the hands of
God, of preventing a foul disgrace to the present administration,
and an eternal blot on our national escutcheon.
"And your petitioners will ever pray," etc.
It is believed that this petition had due weight in accomplishing the
dismissal of Judge McKean, which afterward occurred.
The third example was still greater. It was a memorial to Congress,
by the women of Utah, upon their marriage question, the grant of a
homestead right to woman, and for the admission of Utah as a State. It
was signed by twenty-six thousand six hundred and twenty-six women of
Utah, and was duly presented to both houses of Congress.
And these are the acts and examples of enfranchised Mormon women; not
the acts and promptings of President Young and the apostles, but of the
leaders of the sisterhood. It may be stated, however, that President
Young and the apostles approved and blessed their doings; but this
confesses much to their honor.
How suggestive the question, What if the leading men of every State
in the Union should do as much for woman in her mission, instead of
setting up barriers in her way? Were such the case, in less than a
decade we should see female suffrage established in every State of the
federation.