CHAPTER VII.
The "Reformation" 

Young's Disclosures about the Character of his Flock--The Stealing from One Another--The Threat about "Laying Judgment to the Line"--Plain Declarations about the taking of Human Lives--First Steps of the "Reformation"--An Inquisition and Catechism--An Embarrassing Confession--Warning to those who would leave the Valley

    YOUNG soon had occasion to make practical use of the dictatorial power that he had assumed. The character which those members of the flock who had migrated from Missouri and Illinois had established among their neighbors in those states was not changed simply by their removal to a wilderness all by themselves. They had no longer the old excuse that their misdeeds were reprisals on persecuting enemies, but this did not save them from the temptation to exercise their natural propensities. Again we shall take only the highest Mormon testimony on this subject.

    One of the first sins for which Young openly reproved his congregation was profane swearing. He brought this matter pointedly to their attention in an address to the Conference of October 9, 1852, when he said: "You Elders of Israel will go into the canons, and curse and swear -- damn and curse your oxen, and swear by Him who created you. I am telling the truth. Yes, you rip and curse and swear as bad as any pirates ever did."¹

    ¹ Journal of Discourses, Vol. I, p. 211.

    Possibly the church authorities could have overlooked the swearing, but a matter which gave them more distress was the insecurity of property. This became so great an annoyance that Young spoke out plainly on the subject, and he did not attempt to place the responsibility outside of his own people. A few citations will illustrate this.

    In an address in the Tabernacle on June 5, 1853, noticing complaints about the stealing and rebranding of cattle, he said: "I will propose a plan to stop the stealing of cattle in coming time, and it is this -- let those who have cattle on hand join in a company, and fence in about fifty thousand acres of land, and so keep on fencing until all the vacant land is substantially enclosed. Some persons will perhaps say, 'I do not know how good or how high a fence it will be necessary to build to keep thieves out.' I do not know either, except you build one that will keep out the devil."² On another occasion, with a personal grievance to air, he said in the Tabernacle: "I have gone to work and made roads to get wood, and have not been able to get it. I have cut it down and piled it up, and still have not got it. I wonder if anybody else can say so. Have any of you piled up your wood, and, when you have gone back, could not find it? Some stories could be told of this kind that would make professional thieves ashamed."³

    ² Journal of Discourses, Vol. I, p. 252.
    ³ Ibid., Vol. I, p. 213.

    Young made no concealment of the fact that men high in the councils of the church were among the peculators. In his discourse of June 15, 1856, he said: "I have proof ready to show that Bishops have taken in thousands of pounds in weight of tithing which they have never reported to the General Tithing Office. We have documents to show that Bishops have taken in hundreds of bushels of wheat, and only a small portion of it has come into the General Tithing Office. They stole it to let their friends speculate upon."⁴

    ⁴ Ibid., Vol. III, p. 3.

    The new-comers from Europe also received his attention. Referring to unkept promises of speedy repayment by assisted immigrants of advances made to them, Young said, in 1855: "And what will they do when they get here? Steal our wagons, and go off with them to Canada, and try to steal the bake-kettles, frying-pans, tents, and wagon-covers; and will borrow the oxen and run away with them, if you do not watch them closely. Do they all do this? No, but many of them will try to do it."⁵ And again, a month later: "What previous characters some of you had in Wales, in England, in Scotland, and perhaps in Ireland. Do not be scared if it is proven against some one in the Bishop's court that you did steal the poles from your neighbor's garden fence. If it is proven that you have been to some person's wood pile and stolen wood, don't be frightened, for if you will steal it must be made manifest."⁶ J. M. Grant was quite as plain spoken. In an address in the bowery in Salt La ke City in September, 1856, he declared that "you can scarcely find a place in this city that is not full of filth and abominations."⁷

    ⁵ Ibid., Vol. III, p. 49.
    ⁶ Ibid., Vol. III, p. 342.
    ⁷ Ibid., Vol. IV, p. 51.

    Young's denunciations were not quietly accepted, but protests and threats were alike wasted upon him. Referring to complaints of some of the flock that his denunciation was more than they could bear, he replied, "But you have got to bear it, and, if you will not, make up your minds to go to hell at once and have done with it."⁸ On another occasion he said, "You need, figuratively, to have it rain pitchforks, tines downward, from this pulpit, Sunday after Sunday." On another occasion, alluding to letters he had received, warning him against attacking men's characters, he said, "When such epistles come to me, I feel like saying, I ask no advice of you nor of all your clan this side of hell."⁹

    ⁸ Journal of Discourses, Vol. III, p. 49.
    ⁹ Ibid., p. 50.

    When mere denunciation did not reform his followers, Young became still plainer in his language, and began to explain to them the latitude which the church proposed to take in applying punishment. In a remarkable sermon on October 6, 1855, on the "stealing, lying, deceiving, wickedness, and covetousness" of the elders in Israel, he spoke as follows: --

    "Live on here, then, you poor miserable curses, until the time of retribution, when your heads will have to be severed from your bodies. Just let the Lord Almighty say, Lay judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet,¹⁰ and the time of thieves is short in this community. What do you suppose they would say in old Massachusetts should they hear that the Latter-day Saints had received a revelation or commandment to 'lay judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet'? What would they say in old Connecticut? They would raise a universal howl of, 'How wicked the Mormons are. They are killing the evil doers who are among them. Why, I hear that they kill the wicked away up yonder in Utah.'... What do I care for the wrath of man? No more than I do for the chickens that run in my door yard. I am here to teach the ways of the Lord, and lead men to life everlasting; but if they have not a mind to go there, I wish them to keep out of my path."¹¹

    ¹⁰ These words, from Isaiah xxviii. 17, are constantly used by Young to denote the extreme punishment which the church might inflict on any offender.
    ¹¹ Journal of Discourses, Vol. III, p. 50.

    From this time Young and his closest associates seemed to make no concealment of their intention to take the lives of any persons whom they considered offenders. One or two more citations from his discourses may be made to sustain this statement. On February 24, 1856, he declared, "I am not afraid of all hell, nor of all the world, in laying judgment to the line when the Lord says so."¹² In the following month he told his congregation: "The time is coming when justice will be laid to the line and righteousness to the plummet; when we shall take the old broadsword and ask, Are you for God? And if you are not heartily on the Lord's side, you will be hewn down."¹³ Heber C. Kimball was equally plain spoken. A year earlier he had said in the Tabernacle: "If a man rebels, I will tell him of it, and if he resents a timely warning, he is unwise.... I have never yet shed man's blood, and I pray to God that I never may, unless it is actually necessary."¹⁴ Sultans and doges have freely used assassination as a weapon, but it seems to have remained for the Mormon church under Brigham Young to declare openly its intention to make whatever it might call church apostasy subject to capital punishment.

    ¹² Journal of Discourses, Vol. III, p. 241.
    ¹³ Ibid., p. 266.
    ¹⁴ Ibid., pp, 163-164.

    Out of the lawless condition of the Mormon flock, as we have thus seen it pictured, and out of this radical view of the proper punishment of offenders, resulted, in 1856, that remarkable movement still known in Mormondom as "The Reformation " -- a movement that has been characterized by one writer as "a reign of lust and fanatical fury unequalled since the Dark Ages," and by another as "a fanaticism at once blind, dangerous, and terrible." During its continuance the religious zealot, the amorous priest, the jealous lover, the man covetous of worldly goods, and the framers of the church policy, from acknowledged Apostle to secret Danite, all had their own way. " Were I counsel for a Mormon on trial for a crime committed at the time under consideration, I should plead wholesale insanity," said J. H. Beadle. It was during this period that that system was perfected under which the life of no man, -- or company of men, -- against whom the wrath of the church was directed, was of any value; no household was safe from the lust of any aged elder; no person once in the valley could leave it alive against the church's consent.

    The active agent in starting "The Reformation" was the inventor of "blood atonement," Jedediah M. Grant.¹⁵ That his censure of a Bishop and his counsellors at Kayesville was the actual origin of the movement, as has been stated,¹⁶ cannot be accepted as proven, in view of the preparation made for the era of blood, as indicated in the church discourses. Lieutenant Gunnison, for whom the Mormons in later years always asserted their friendship, writing concerning his observations as early as 1852, said: --

    "Witnesses are seldom put on oath in the lower courts, and there is nothing known of the 'law's delay,' and the quibbles whereby the ends of truth and justice may be defeated. But they have a criminal code called 'The Laws of the Lord,' which has been given by revelation and not promulgated, the people not being able quite to bear it, or the organization still too imperfect. It is to be put in force, however, before long, and when in vogue, all grave crimes will be punished and atoned for by cutting off the head of the offender. This regulation arises from the fact that without shedding of blood there is no remission.'"¹⁷

    ¹⁵ A correspondent of the New York Times at this date described Grant as "a tall, thin, repulsive-looking man, of acute, vigorous intellect, a thorough-paced scoundrel, and the most essential blackguard in the pulpit. He was sometimes called Brigham's sledge hammer."
    ¹⁶ "Rocky Mountain Saints," p. 293.
    ¹⁷ "History of the Mormons," Book 1, Chapter X.

    Gunnison's statement furnishes indisputable proof that this legal system was so generally talked of some four years before it was put in force that it came to the ears of a non-Mormon temporary resident.

    After the condemnation of the Kayesville offenders and their rebaptism, the next move was the appointment of missionaries to hold services in every ward, and the sending out of what were really confessors, appointed for every block, to inquire of all -- young and old -- concerning the most intimate details of their lives. The printed catechism given to these confessors was so indelicate that it was suppressed in later years. These prying inquisitors found opportunity to gain information for their superiors about any persons suspected of disloyalty, and one use they made of their visitations was to urge the younger sisters to be married to the older men, as a readier means of salvation than union with men of their own age. That there was opposition to this espionage is shown by some remarks of H. C. Kimball in the Tabernacle, in March, 1856, when he said: "I have heard some individuals saying that, if the Bishops came into their houses and opened their cupboards, they would split their heads open. That would not be a wise or safe operation."¹⁸

    ¹⁸ Journal of Discourses, Vol. III, p. 271.

    Some of the information secured by the church confessional was embarrassing to the leaders. At a meeting of male members in Social Hall, Young, Grant, and others denounced the sinners in scathing terms, Young ending his remarks by saying, "All you who have been guilty of committing adultery, stand up." At once more than three-quarters of those present arose.¹⁹ For such confessors a way of repentance was provided through rebaptism, but the secretly accused had no such avenue opened to them.

    ¹⁹ "A leading Bishop in Salt Lake City stated to the author that Brigham was as much appalled at this sight as was Macbeth when he beheld the woods of Birnam marching on to Dunsinane. A Bishop arose and asked if there were not some misunderstanding among the brethren concerning the question. He thought that perhaps the elders understood Brigham's inquiry to apply to their conduct before they had thrown off the works of the devil and embraced Mormonism; but upon Brigham reiterating that it was the adultery committed since they had entered the church, the brethren to a man still stood up:" -- "Rocky Mountain Saints," p. 296.

    One of the first victims of the reformers was H. J. Jarvis, a reputable merchant of Salt Lake City. He was dragged over his counter one evening and thrown into the street by men who then robbed his store and defiled his household goods, giving him as the cause of the visitation the explanation that he had spoken evil of the authorities, and had invited Gentiles to supper. His two wives could not secure even a hearing from Young in his behalf.²⁰ This, however, was a minor incident.

    ²⁰ "Rocky Mountain Saints;" p. 297.

    That Young's rule should be objected to by some members of the church was inevitable. There were men in the valley at that early day who would rebel against such a dictatorship under any name; others -- men of means -- who were alarmed by the declarations about property rights, and others to whom the announcement concerning polygamy was repugnant. When such persons gave expression to their discontent, they angered the church officers; when they indicated their purpose to leave the valley, they alarmed them. Anything like an exodus of the flock would have broken up all of Young's plans, and have undone the scheme of immigration that had cost so much time and money. Accordingly, when this movement for "reform" began, the church let it be known that any desertion of the flock would be considered the worst form of apostasy, and that the deserter must take the consequences. To quote Brigham Young's own words: "The moment a person decides to leave this people, he is cut off from every object that is desirable for time and eternity. Every possession and object of affection will be taken from those who forsake the truth, and their identity and existence will eventually cease."²¹

    ²¹ Journal of Discourses, Vol. IV, p. 31.

    The almost unbreakable hedge that surrounded the inhabitants of the valley at this time, under the system of church espionage, has formed a subject for the novelist, and has seemed to many persons, as described, a probable exaggeration. But, while Young did not narrate in his pulpit the tales of blood which his instructions gave rise to, there is testimony concerning them which leaves no reasonable doubt of their truthfulness.