BRIGHAM YOUNG
AND HIS MORMON EMPIRE
By Frank J. Cannon and George L. Knapp
Illustrated.
Fleming H. Revell Company
New York * Chicago * Toronto
London and Edinburgh
Copyright 1913, by
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY
New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 125 N. Wabash Ave.
Toronto: 25 Richmond St., W.
London: 21 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street
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CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION : The Man Who Went from a Puritan Farm to Found a Mohammedan Empire in the Desert .................. 9
Chapter 1. Birth and Ancestry of A Sultan's Small Beginnings.....................13
Chapter 2. Mormonism Finds Its Field in the Spiritual Chaos of the Mississippi Valley ............. 18
Chapter 3. Joseph and Brigham---Prophet vs. Business Manager..............28
Chapter 4. Growth of Brigham's Influence-Climbing the Tower of Faith.............33
Chapter 5. The Original Garden of Eden is Found in Missouri -And Abandoned ....39
Chapter 6. Prophecy and Finance Fail to Mix-Conflicts with Gentiles...................44
Chapter 7. Nauvoo the Beautiful---Brigham's British Mission ..................54
Chapter 8. Polygamy Made Known for the Glory of the Prophets.......................63
Chapter 9 Growth of Church and Clash with Civil Power .......................75
Chapter 10. Joseph Smith Seeks the Presidency of the United States, and Finds a Death at the Hands of a Mob ................84
Chapter 11. Brigham Takes Command as the New Priest-King ....................96
Chapter 12. The Persecuted Saints Start on Their Last Exile ....................... 103
Chapter 13. Brigham Issues the One Revelation of His Career ................. 115
Chapter 14. Across the Great American Desert to the Inland Sea................127
Chapter 15. Zion is Founded by Salt Lake Because the Saints Can Go No Farther....142
Chapter 16. Signs and Miracles Attend the Colony of the Saints ...............152
Chapter 17. The Church Political Begins Building Its Empire .................... 159
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CONTENTS
Chapter 18. The Gentile Rush for Gold Brings Riches to the Faithful........................ 167
Chapter 19. The Way of a Sultan---Brighamized Industry........................179
Chapter 20. Brigham as a Patron of Art ............ 189
Chapter 21. The Church Dukes............197
Chapter 22. The Church Organizes the State of "Deseret"..................... 212
Chapter 23. Public Proclamation of Polygamy .......................... 224
Chapter 24. Analysis of the Plural Wife System .....................237
Chapter 25. Troubles of the Saints---The King Can Admit No Wrong ..............248
Chapter 26. Shedding of Blood as a Means of Salvation...............261
Chapter 27. Massacre of Emigrants at Mountain Meadows.............273
Chapter 28. Clash with Federal Government-The Mormon War ......................... 284
Chapter 29. Disgraceful Ending of the Mormon War.......................... 296
Chapter 30. The Church Keeps Its Power---A Profit-Seeking Prophet............309
Chapter 31. Spoiling the Gentiles----Utah During the Civil War..................319
Chapter 32. Building Trusts and Crushing Heresies.........................................338
Chapter 33. The First Crusade Against the Saints Defeated.........................355
Chapter 34. Brigham's Closing Years---"Lion of the Lord" to the Last-----His Death .....374
Chapter 35. And Afterwards---The Polygamous Despotism Founded by Brigham Young Still Survives .................. 386
INDEX . 393
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ILLUSTRATIONS
Brigham Young in 1877
His Earliest Known Photograph .
Mormon Temples Built by Young
The Imperial Offices and Residences in Salt Lake City
Assembly Hall, Tabernacle and Temple
Interior of Great Tabernacle, Where Brigham
Scolded the Saints . . 198
Brigham Young About 1865
A Mormon Family
Brigham Young and Some of His Wives
Brigham Young in I870
Modern Capital of the Empire
Main Street, Salt Lake City
Ann Eliza, the Nineteenth Wife
His Grave
His Monument
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INTRODUCTION
IN the middle decades of the nineteenth century, there arose in America a man destined to a career more strange and incredible than most romancers have dared to imagine for their heroes. That man was Brigham Young.
Born on a soil saturated with New England Puritanism, he became a follower and then a leader of the Mohammedanism of the West. Born in a community which held that Heaven had withdrawn from man, and which admitted no revelation less than eighteen centuries old, he was accepted by half a million people as the mouthpiece and representative of God. Born of a race in which monogamy has been the accustomed form of marriage since before the dawn of history, he is famous today as having been husband of a score of wives, and sire of half a hundred offspring.
Brigham Young was not one of those children of fortune who move with the current of the age, and draw greatness from the greatness of their country. Good fortune did not pass him by altogether, but neither did she embarrass him with favours. Brigham never came in contact with the real life of the nation, save to defy it, and flout it, and do his best to change it. He set up an Asiatic despotism on American soil. He maintained a Mohammedan marriage system in a Puritanical land. He built a theocracy in an age which already had witnessed the birth of Renan and Ingersoll. He took a broken and dispirited people, led them across a thousand miles of desert, and
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INTRODUCTION
with them founded his kingdom in the fertile valley by an inland sea.
The man who could achieve these things, even with some aid from fortune, was a man of no common calibre. Without a day of military training, he became a very efficient general-in-chief to his people. Without an hour's reading of law, he made himself judge and lawgiver-and in the main a just one-for a whole community. Where his own knowledge was deficient, he had skill to use the ability of others; and to this day, the finances, the government, the merchandising, the architecture, the social life, and even the agriculture of the Mormon community bear the stamp put upon them by Brigham Young.
He matched his wits against the might of the United States government, and did not come off secondbest. He yielded in outward seeming to federal power; but in reality he was emperor of his little realm to the hour of his death, and his subjects never doubted his supremacy. He drove federal appointees in disgrace from his kingdom, and took their positions for himself and his favourites. No matter how overwhelming the power with which he was dealing, Brigham Young never was a suppliant. He stormed, bullied, lied, intrigued, finessed, cajoled; he never pleaded for mercy nor owned himself in need of mercy. He met chastisement with fresh provocation. Knowing polygamy to be the most offensive of his sins in the eyes of the nation, he lived openly with a score of wives, sent his most honoured polygamous apostle to Congress as a territorial delegate, and permitted his subordinate priests to debate with Christian clergymen on the divinity of plural marriage.
He has become a central figure of weird and dis-
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INTRODUCTION
torted legends. He has been made the target of numberless invectives. He has been made the idol of a worshipping people. But never has he taken his place in calm, impartial history; never has the story of his life been told, save by some one more anxious to curse or to bless than to understand and set forth. In the hope of performing this belated service, of setting out in true perspective one of the most romantic and interesting characters of American history, this book is written.
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A SULTAN'S SMALL BEGINNINGS
BRIGHAM YOUNG was born in Whitingham, Windham county, Vermont, on the first day of June, 1801. He was the ninth child in a family of eleven. His mother's maiden name was Nabbie Howe. His father was John Young, who had been a farmer in Massachusetts, and who moved to Vermont a few months before the birth of his ninth child.
Both parents belonged to old New England stock, and probably were of unmixed English descent.
The Youngs at this time were very poor. Linn quotes a second-hand tradition which makes a town patriarch say: "Brigham Young's father came the poorest man that had ever been in town; he never owned a cow, horse or any land, but was a basket-maker." Passing the probable exaggeration of such tradition, we may remark that John Young raised eleven children to be competent, self-supporting members of society. Children were less expensive in those days than now; but surely even then the father of such a family did not deserve reproach merely for his poverty. Though poor, the Youngs had little in common with the family from which Joseph Smith sprung. John Young had served in the Revolutionary army under Washington. His father, Brigham's grandfather, was a surgeon in the colonial forces in the French and Indian war. The surgical knowledge of the
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eighteenth century did not make a very bulky package, but at that time it was not easy to get. The elder Young's occupation at least is proof of more than ordinary ambition, and probably of a fairly high order of intelligence and courage.
Such tradition as deals with the family of Brigham's mother tells little but vague rumors of "good connections," which may or may not be truth. Altogether, Brigham seems to have sprung from sound, thrifty stock, which had been faring rather hardly for at least one generation. In him the capacities of the breed rose to their highest level-indeed, he well-nigh monopolized them. This history will furnish abundant proof that Brigham Young was a man of remarkable intelligence and character, and several of his descendants have shown unusual abilities. But of his brothers, sisters, nephews, and nieces, few have risen above mediocrity.
When Brigham was a child of three years, his parents moved to Chenango county, New York. They were still poor, though perhaps less destitute than during their stay in Vermont, and John Young could give his numerous offspring little in the way of education. Brigham started in life for himself at the age of sixteen, and without doubt he had contributed to the family treasury before that time. He was by turns a carpenter, painter, and glazier-a-Jack-of-all-trades, like any other bright Yankee boy of that unspecialized period. He learned the glazier's trade thoroughly, and his knowledge of practical carpentry was useful to him on more than one important occasion in later life.
There is little authentic information about Brigham's movements for the next few years. He located in another county; tradition says he spent a season in
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A SULTAN'S SMALL BEGINNINGS
wandering, like other restless youngsters before and since. His parents were Methodists, and at the age of twenty-one he united with that church. Three years later, he married a Miss Miriam Works. She bore him two children, ---both daughters,--- followed him into the Mormon church, and died not long after, in 1832.
In a sermon in Salt Lake years afterwards, Brigham Young declared that he studied the Book of Mormon two years before accepting it as the word of God, and ordering his life by its teachings. The period of two years between his first acquaintance with the new religion and his acceptance of the same is undoubted; but the deep study implied must not be taken too literally. Neither then nor later was Brigham Young a great student of books, and the Book of Mormon is no exception. At no time in his career do we find him basing his conduct in a crisis on the texts in Joseph Smith's supplementary scripture. When supporting Smith against the rebels within the fold, when fighting Sidney Rigdon for mastery, and when unquestioned ruler of the church and all within its grasp, Young's pronunciamentos are always practical and immediate, never didactic and argumentative. They deal with men and things, never with fine-drawn interpretations and learned expositions of written guides to duty.
In 1829, Brigham moved to Mendon, Monroe county, New York, where his father and brother Phineas were living, and there first came into contact with the teachings of Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormon faith. Phineas was already a devotee of the new prophet, and at his house, in 1830, Brigham made acquaintance with the Book of Mor-
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BRIGHAM YOUNG
mon. The daring creed attracted him from the beginning, though there is nothing to indicate that the chief centre of attraction was found in the new sacred book. Reading, discussing, arguing, and on rare occasions hearing a Mormon sermon, Brigham gradually dropped his lightly held Methodism, and accepted the divine mission of Joseph Smith. There is a story that after making up his mind to join the church, he went to Canada and brought his brother Joseph into the fold before offering himself for baptism. The tale is at least characteristic of the man.
On April 14, 1832, Brigham Young was baptized into the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints by one Ebanezur Miller, at Mendon, New York. Miller evidently thought he had obtained a prize, for he ordained his new convert an elder at the water's edge. The next day, Heber C. Kimball, already Brigham's devoted friend and adherent, followed his leader into the water to testify his faith that Joseph Smith was the prophet of God ---and his yet chore certain faith that Brigham Young knew what was best for both of them.
Henceforth, the fate of Brigham is bound up with the fate of Mormonism. His trials are the trials of a new religion; his successes the triumphs of the new theocracy. He spent the summer preaching to his friends and neighbours around Mendon, and early in the fall started for Kirtland, Ohio, to meet the new prophet to whom he had sworn allegiance.
Legend has busied itself for more than seventy years with that meeting, and the exact date and many other circumstances of the occasion are buried from sight. In the presence of the prophet, the gift of tongues descended upon Brigham, and he spoke in
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A SULTAN'S SMALL BEGINNINGS
strange sounds. Thereupon, the gift of interpretation was vouchsafed to Prophet Smith, who declared that his new disciple was speaking in the "pure Adamic language"---a dialect even more remote from the ken of scholars than "reformed Egyptian," and having the further merit of variety.
The Prophet of Mormonism had met its Business Manager.
page 18 CHAPTER TWO
A SPIRITUAL CHAOS
IN 1830, there was published at Palmyra, New York, the Book of Mormon, a work which claims to set forth the dealings of God with the peoples of the Western Hemisphere, and which has given its name to the most unique of modern religions.
The person who offered the Book of Mormon for publication was a young man named Joseph Smith. His story of its origin has an interest which few persons have discovered in the book itself. According to his account, the Book of Mormon was a translation of an ancient scripture, written in a lost language on golden plates. An angel had come from heaven to give these plates to Joseph for, translation, and to inform him that he had been chosen by the Most High to restore true religion to a lost and corrupted world. Joseph had but little knowledge of his own language, and was totally ignorant of any other; but the Divine mission was not balked by that slight obstacle. Buried with the plates were two transparent stones, "Urim and Thummin!" The golden plates were written in "Reformed Egyptian." By looking through "Urim and Thummin," Joseph was enabled to translate this mysterious dialect into English which any lover of that tongue will agree is in need of reform.
The plates were "revealed unto Joseph " in 1823, given into his hands in 1827, and the translation was
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ready for the printer in 1829. The Mormon Church ---whose official title is "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints"--- was organized April 6, 1830, at Fayette, New York. During most of this time, Joseph had been putting forth diverse "revelations," some of a very practical import, and generally claiming the powers and prerogatives of a prophet. Recognizing ---or being informed--- that his tale was a tax on credulity, Joseph provided himself with "witnesses." The first group, known as the "Three Witnesses," signed a statement declaring that they had seen both the golden plates and the angel who brought them. The second group, known as the "Eight Witnesses," couched their affirmation in a closer approach to legal language, and bore record "with words of soberness" that they had seen and "hefted" the wonderful plates, which "had the appearance of gold."
In spite of these testimonials, Smith's claims were not accepted by most of his neighbours, who declared that he had been a " money-digger" and "crystal gazer" from boyhood. The prophet was without honour in his own country, and ---it may be added--- his religion had not found its proper habitat. Not until Joseph's missionaries pushed their way into the settlements of the Mississippi valley did the new religion meet any considerable measure of success. Then for a time its progress was amazing. At the prophet's death, in 1844, from 50,000 to 100,000 people accepted him as the spokesman and vicegerent of God. Today probably not less than a million persons hold the same faith.
No one can understand the rise of Mormonism without some knowledge of the time and place in which it arose. Human movements which achieve
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even partial success usually have had help from circumstances; and never was such help more manifest than in the early years of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Joseph Smith was not the man to surmount great obstacles and compel great and lasting changes by his own unaided force. He lacked energy, diplomacy, and steadfastness for such a task. In a less favouring age and society than that of Arabia in the seventh century, Mohammed might not have founded a world religion; but he would have made his mark as a notable schismatic or reformer. In a less favouring age and society than that which was ready to his hand, Joseph Smith would have been lost to sight. He could play his part only on a prepared stage; and such a stage was the Mississippi valley in the early decades of the nineteenth century.
The great valley was then a social, political, and religious chaos. It was part of the territory of a civilized nation, it had been settled by civilized men; but in manners, customs, and institutions, it was very imperfectly civilized. Subjected to primitive conditions, wrestling with a formidable wilderness, and for a long time engaged in warfare with a barbaric enemy, the western settlers brought with them the strength and tenacity of civilization, and left its refinements and restraints to follow as they might. Rifles and axes stocked the first emigrant wagons that crossed the Alleghanies; plows and spinning-wheels came next; mahogany and fine linen had to wait for a quieter day and an easier trail.
It was much the same with those intellectual and spiritual matters which more nearly concern this history. In 1830 the Mississippi valley presented the singular spectacle of a community which had escaped
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the bonds of religion without outgrowing its doctrines. Practically all the people came of religious ancestry, even of devout ancestry. They had a deep reverence for "things of the Spirit." They were fond of theological speculations. They deemed it a matter of vital import to learn what had become of the Lost Tribes of Israel; and they went insane formulating data on the second coming of Christ. As far as any scientific scepticism was concerned, they were innocent as the followers of Godfrey de Bouillon. But of definite religious standards, or organizations and teachers, to satisfy the prevailing interest in religious matters, they had most none.
Dorchester computes that in the year 1830, the Mississippi Valley contained 4,000,000 inhabitants. He reckons 348490 of these as communicants of divers Protestant churches. Perhaps half as many more may classed as Catholics. In Kentucky and to a less extent in other states were little groups of rational freethinkers, inheritors of Rousseau and Voltaire, men who had worked their way to a reasonably stable frame of mind on religious matters, however unsatisfactory their conclusions were deemed by the orthodox. The rest of the population of the valley ---five-sixths of the whole--- were religious without having an organized religion; were hungry for spiritual guidance without knowing how to get it. Their faith was in solution, ready to crystallize about any personality, any organization, any doctrine that could give point and purpose to their spiritual strivings, and lead them to the peace of assured conviction.
The religious instability of the time and region, and the feeble hold of existing churches on social life cannot be expressed by figures. They can be illus-
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page 22 BRIGHAM YOUNG
trated only. In many places of considerable popula- no sermon had been preached by an authorized clergyman for ten, twelve, or fifteen years. When a minister appeared in some of the back settlements, it was not uncommon for him to be asked to perform
the marriage ceremony for couples who had been living together for years, and who, perchance, had children old enough to be interested in the novel occasion. The distances covered by some early circuit riders in their efforts to reach every part of the land are downright appalling, when the primitive modes of travel are considered. The Methodist clergyman stationed at Detroit, in 1822, had the whole territory of Michigan for his circuit, except one town in the upper peninsula, and was expected to minister to Maumee, Ohio, as well. It took four weeks to make his round, in good weather. In Danville, Kentucky, in 1818, there were two churches, Presbyterian and Roman Catholic. The Catholic membership is unknown, but it cannot have been large. The Presbyterian church did not have a single male member.
The churches were weak not only in numbers, but weak in learning, weak in organization, weak in the narrowness of their appeal. Most of the institutions which now bring the church into close contact with the workaday life of a community did not then exist ---at least, not west of the Alleghanies. There were church gymnasiums, social settlements, debating societies, Young Men's Christian Associations. The preachers, who with incredible toil and splendid courage made their way to and fro through the half wilderness, preached virtue as well as doctrine. But they had no organic plan of helping men to be either moral or devout: and, with few exceptions, their lack
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of learning and authority restricted them to a purely emotional appeal. Under such conditions, religious exercises came to consist in chief measure of gathering in crowds to hear about, the lost state of one's soul. The pioneer attended a meeting, and listened to the Word. His heart was touched, he was convicted of sin, converted, and sincerely believed that he had entered upon a new life. But there was nothing to keep him in the new life. When the novelty had worn off and the emotional crisis had passed, the convert backslid; to remain in outer darkness till converted again.
One exception must be made to this rather sweeping statement of church weakness. The Roman Catholic church, then as now, had all the varied machinery which enables a shepherd to watch over his flock. But the Puritan heritage of most American settlers in the great valley was so strong that conversion to Catholicism was practically out of the question. The prejudice against "Romanizing" was invincible. A man of Protestant lineage might transgress every disciplinary rule of his ancestral church, and nearly every rule of morality. He might never go near a church nor hear a sermon; or, on the other hand, he might run after every ragged street preacher who lifted the banner of a freakish faith. These things reflected in some measure on his repute as a man of sense and good conduct, but they did not cost him that indefinable and invaluable thing best expressed by the word "caste." But if such a man turned to the oldest and most opulent of all forms of Christianity, he was beyond the pale. The church which had crowned Charlemagne and blessed Columbus and planted the Cross on the Great River was deemed somehow un-
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page 24 BRIGHAM YOUNG
worthy to the ragged squatters along that river's banks.
The gulf which divided Roman Catholic and Protestant churches was the deepest and most nearly impassable barrier in the religious field, but not the only one. The age was an age of schism; and almost every new sect on the continent had a branch in the Mississippi valley. To give but a few instances, the Disciples of Christ took their rise in 1810. The Cumberland Presbyterians began a separate existence in the same year. The Reformed Methodists followed in 1814. The Hicksite Quakers broke away from the main body in 1827! The Methodist Protestant church was organized in 1830, and the Millerites discovered the exact date of the end of the world in 1831. Since the aforesaid ending was to come March 23, 1844, it will be seen that Miller and his disciples did not allow themselves very much time to effect the world's conversion. This point is worth noting when studying the claims and expectations of Mormon leaders at about the same period.
Into this chaos of churched and unchurched, this welter of formless fears and unformed faiths, came Mormonism. It was as arrogant as the teachings of Mohammed; as eclectic as the advertising of a quack doctor. It appealed, not to argument, but to authority; an angel of God had come down from heaven to re-establish His lost religion on earth, and make plain to His chosen prophet the way of salvation for mankind. It was ready to meet all doubts and to solve all problems. It had a prompt, specific answer for every question. It was willing to explain at length whence a man came, why he was here, and whither he was going. The definiteness of its answers appealed with
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irresistible force to that type of mind which cannot refrain from questioning and cannot endure suspense. The magnitude of its claims took the place of evidence. A man who merely claimed to have found a new and true meaning in a well-known Bible text might be asked for his authority. But the man who nonchalantly offered the world a whole new scripture, and proposed to retranslate the old one, who told what the pre-existing spirits of men were doing before creation and where Christ spent the three days between crucifixion and resurrection, found his audacity accepted as proof of divine guidance in inspiration.
The new religion was as catholic as it was audacious. It left nothing out of its revelations which could attract any one of whom its prophet had ever heard. To the curious, it proffered an authentic history of some part of those Lost Tribes, whose fate was so perplexing to our grandfathers. To the devout, it supplied a record of the dealings of God with the peoples of the Western Hemisphere. To the ambitious, it gave the companionship of a man who had conversed with angels, and who bore the seal of the Most High. To the humble, it offered enlistment in the literal army of God. It copied the grips and signs and passwords of secret societies; it mirrored the very health fads of the hour. "Hot drinks are not good for the body or for the belly," declared the prophet on one occasion-perhaps when a Thompsonian "draught was racking his internal economy; and from that day to this, the Mormon who indulges in tea or coffee is counted a dangerous latitudinarian.
The very mechanism of the new propaganda was made ready in advance. Revivals had done little to provide permanent church homes for the devout, but
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page 26 BRIGHAM YOUNG
they had accustomed the people to the phenomena of conversions in mass, and to trusting that ecstatic impulse known to Quakers as the "inner light." When Joseph Smith conversed with spirits, he did only what hundreds of others had done; what thousands hoped some day to do. When he found mysterious books and magic gems, he had merely succeeded in a search which engaged the attention of many. When he declared hysterical convulsions were caused by the presence of devils, the whole community agreed with his diagnosis; and who should dispute him when he assumed to drive those devils away? There was nothing in Smith's most extravagant claims to offend the average understanding in the society which heard those claims; and there was everything to excite curiosity.
Had there been a state church in the western country, or even a close-knit and well-appointed church system without state alliance, Mormonism would have progressed slowly if at all. Had there been a strong and stable government in the valley, Mormonism would have dropped some of its most characteristic features, or been suppressed as treason. Mormon writers have complained ---and justly--- of the barbarous mob violence which afflicted their church in Missouri and Illinois. But if there had been a government capable of suppressing the mob, the new religion might have prospered less, even if it had suffered less. Assuredly, no government with well-defined traditions of sovereignty would have granted such a charter as that given to the city of Nauvoo; and no state of European firmness of fiber would have looked on complacently at the efforts of Smith and Young to establish a boundless theocracy.
And here we touch the reason why Mormonism,
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with all its elements of attractiveness, roused furious and unreasoning opposition wherever it came in contact with non-Mormon communities. It sought to establish not only a church but a government, and a government whose character was opposed to every instinct and tradition of American life. The pioneer of the Mississippi valley saw no reason why Joseph Smith might not talk with angels; and the idea of a scripture showing God's workings on the Western Hemisphere appealed to his continental pride. But when asked to renounce his liberty of action, and when told that he must yield implicit obedience to the decrees of an irresponsible ruler, the pioneer rebelled; and he denounced those who did not rebel as traitors to the principles of American life. The democracy of the land was rough and chaotic; but it was deep and vital and it revolted instinctively at the idea of a theocratic despotism.
The troubles of Mormonism always have sprung from two sources; its claims to despotic and exclusive authority in civil affairs, and its teaching and practice of polygamy. The pioneer communities of 1830-45 resented most sharply the threat against their liberties. The nation today reprobates most severely the violation of its accepted social order. To the thoughtful student of affairs, the two offenses are one.
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PROPHET VS. BUSINESS MANAGER
BRIGHAM YOUNG was thirty-one years old when he came to Kirtland, Ohio, nearly four years the senior of his accepted prophet. The two men now were adherents of the same religion; they were alike in being of New England birth and ancestry; alike in their physical vigour, their love of the good things of life, their boundless faith in the future. There the resemblance ended. The twelve years which Brigham and Joseph spent in the common cause but emphasized the difference in their natures.
Joseph was a prophet of pronunciamentos. Brigham was an apostle of work. Joseph indulged in revelations on every commonplace topic. Brigham put forth but one revelation in his life. Joseph was sometimes impressive, sometimes jocular, but he was destitute of real seriousness and real humour. Brigham had plenty of both. Joseph was a scatterer. Brigham was a collector. Joseph turned aside after everything that crossed his path. Brigham never left his appointed trail. Joseph dreamed of being ruler of the United States. Brigham made himself czar of a desert empire; small, to be sure, but unique among modern communities ---and his own.
Both men were necessary to the creed they supported. Brigham could not have founded a church. Joseph could not have preserved one. Joseph and his earlier aids had gathered a thousand planks of doc-
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PROPHET VS. BUSINESS MANAGER
trine. Brigham built these planks into a compact house of faith which endures to this day.
In 1832, Mormonism consisted of a supplementary scripture, the Book of Mormon; a quantity of unassorted revelations; a number of unconferred ecclesiastical titles; an inchoate theory of communism; and ----the claim of direct communication with the Most High through the prophet, Joseph Smith. This last was the basic asset of the new religion; the other things were but its trappings and suits. Other creeds derived authority from doubtfully interpreted texts, concerning which theologues had wrangled for sixteen centuries. Mormonism claimed a new revelation, which would make plain whatever the older scriptures had left uncertain; a continuous revelation, which would guide the faithful in every trial of their lives. It was this claim which made Mormonism a unique creed when Brigham Young came to Kirtland; and after more than fourscore years ---it is this claim which interposes the strongest barrier to the political or religious assimilation of the Mormon community with the rest of mankind.
There is a basic difference between religions of argument and religions of revelation. Revelation is despotic; argument is democratic. Of all world religions, Mohammedanism rests most completely on revelation; and by the same token, it has been associated in all ages with unblinking despotism. Calvinism is the most argumentative ---not to say the most disputatious--- type of Christianity; and for more than three centuries Calvinism has been the creed most intimately connected with struggles for liberty. In its claim of a new and directly inspired prophet, Mormonism was closely akin to the religion of Mo-
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BRIGHAM YOUNG
hammed. It was destined to copy its Oriental prototype in political and domestic matters, as well as in theological ones.
But with the best will in the world to be a pasha as well as a prophet, Smith in 1832 lacked the machinery to carry out his own wishes and the logic of his church. He had been dealing in revelations for about five years. He had enjoyed the companionship of several men far abler and immeasurably more learned than himself. But up to this time, their joint labours had resulted chiefly in words, words, words. They had made converts ---times and conditions were such that any one could make converts to anything. They had at hand a vast body of material from which a skilful organizer could construct much. But of themselves, they could build nothing that did not need to be shored up afresh each day by a new dispensation from heaven. The church was so loosely organized that Smith had to have a special revelation from the Lord before he could settle the most trifling dispute or proceed with the most obvious work. If cities could be built by revelations alone, Smith would have peopled the continent. But city-building requires hard work and sound sense; and until Brigham Young came on the scene, these qualities were conspicuously lacking in Mormon leadership.
Mormon writers always assume that the personality of Joseph Smith and the authenticity of the Book of Mormon are as important to their religion as the personality of Christ and the authenticity of the Bible are to Christianity. Opposing writers tacitly grant that claim by learned philological and archaeological dissertations on the fraud of the Book of Mormon, and verbose affidavits to prove that Smith was not
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page 31 PROPHET VS. BUSINESS MANAGER
the sort of person the Lord would choose for a prophet. The controversy is worse than absurd. The claim to act as social mentor for the Almighty, and to pick out the people with whom He may deal is as presumptuous as the claim to be the bearer of His message to mankind, and deserves not a whit more consideration.
As for the Book of Mormon, the case is purely a question of evidence. Its detractors never have proved that the book was revamped from "Manuscript Found." Its believers never have proved that the book was written on golden plates and miraculously translated by the prophet; and this would seem to be the greater lapse of the two. Without going so far as to adopt the maxim that miracles never can be proved, since the credibility of the witnesses must always be less than the improbability of the event, we may ask at least as much evidence to establish a new revelation as would be required to establish title to a contested piece of real estate. Such evidence never has been offered for the Book of Mormon. The testimony of the so-called "witnesses" is not convincing-better testimonials and more of them can be had any day to confirm the merits of any quack medicine on the market. We may add that the "reformed Egyptian" in which the book was supposed to be written is a language wholly unknown to scholars, one of which no trace is preserved on monuments or papyrus.
The religion Smith founded, as well as his recorded history, shows him to have been a facile borrower. His mind was too untrained, his habits of thought too loose, to permit of plodding devotion to any of the ideas which in succession possessed him. He acquired
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the patter of a dozen subjects, and solid information about none. Under the influence of Orson Hyde, whose scholarship was limitless by comparison with Smith's ignorance, the prophet affected a devotion to learning, and for a time seemed to study violently. Sidney Rigdon inspired Smith with dreams of illimitable wealth and power; but Sidney's mind was as loose as Smith's. It was Brigham Young who brought care and method to the grandiose projects of the church leaders. It was Brigham who knew how to move by practical ways to a desired result. Smith had revelations that a temple should be built. Brigham went to work to build one. Smith and others tried to call wealth into existence by fiat, as in the "Bank" at Kirtland. Brigham laid plans to accumulate wealth by commonplace toil and thrift. Whatever he may have thought of the prophet at their first meeting, before his twelve years of probation were over, Brigham was planted on the bedrock of his native Yankee common sense, and had returned to the original New England gospel of work ---hard work for everybody.
It is thus that the real history of Mormonism came to be the biography of Brigham Young. Less brilliant, and far less learned than many devotees of the new faith, he excelled them all in his capacity for ordered, practical work. The prophet borrowed from the words and thoughts of others; but more and more as the years passed, he leaned on the works and deeds of Brigham. Without Smith ---and probably without Sidney Rigdon--- Mormonism could not have been founded. But without Brigham Young, the work of all his predecessors and colleagues would have been scattered and brought to naught.
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page 33 CHAPTER FOUR
CLIMBING THE TOWER OF FAITH
BRIGHAM had shown missionary zeal, even before visiting the prophet. It was not likely that his ardour would be lessened by personal acquaintance with the source of divine light and wisdom. In December, 1832, shortly after the death of his first wife, Brigham and his brother started for Upper Canada on a mission. They went on foot. Men of that day were better accustomed to hardship than city dwellers of our own time; but even with this allowance, questions of the sincerity of Brigham's conversion seem rather idle in the face of such an expedition. In February, 1833, the brothers returned to Mendon, New York, where they stayed until spring. On the first of April, Brigham was afoot for Canada once more. He was not only a persuasive missionary but a good colonization agent; in July of the same year he arrived in Kirtland, bringing with him a number of Canadian families whom he had converted to the faith.
After establishing his Canadian recruits at Kirtland, Brigham went back to Mendon, settled his affairs there, and then with his two little daughters and his warm friend, Heber Kimball, rejoined the prophet at the Kirtland "stake of Zion." Here he settled down to his trade of glazier, preaching from time to time as requested; and here on March 31, 1836, he
married his second wife, Mary Ann Angell. A
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month later, he joined in another expedition, this time of a warlike rather than a religious character.
The Mormon settlements in Missouri had been enduring trials which will be sketched at greater length in a subsequent chapter. They had been driven from Jackson county in November, 1833, under circumstances calculated to anger the gentlest people alive. In the spring of 1834, Joseph Smith organized an "army" for the purpose of chastising the Jackson county mob, and restoring the Missouri Saints to their homesteads. Brigham was asked to go along, receiving the prophet's promise that not a hair of his head should be harmed. The assurance was grateful, though hardly necessary with a man like Brigham Young, and he was one of the prophet's party which set out from Kirtland in May.
This performance illustrates in striking fashion the looseness of social organization and the weakness of governmental authority in that day and region. Here were two hundred and five men, more or less equipped with weapons and fully equipped with military titles, bound on a martial invasion of a community in a distant state. Yet the federal government seems to have taken no notice of the matter, neither did the state authorities of Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, or even Missouri. With heavenly signs and wonders about them, and very human squabbles among them, the army of the Saints crossed three states and penetrated well into Missouri without molestation. Not far from Liberty, Clay county, however, Smith received a friendly warning to come no further. With a promptitude which goes far to acquit him of the charge of rashness, he heeded the advice, turned
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aide, and after stopping for a revelation on Fishing river, camped on the bottom lands of Rush creek.
Here on June 22 1834, the expedition was attacked by cholera. Smith undertook to heal the sick by prayers and laying on of hands, but he foundas many a similar practitioner has found since-that such remedies work best in the presence of imaginary ailments. "I quickly learned by painful experience that when the great Jehovah decrees destruction upon any people, and makes known his determination, man must not attempt to stay His hand," he writes with engaging frankness. Over sixty members of the expedition were smitten with the disease, and at least thirteen died. This much punishment having been inflicted for the unspecified sins of the brethren, prayer became efficacious, and the plague was stayed. The abortive expedition soon returned to Kirtland.
The trip had not harmed the Jackson county mob, but it seems to have been of decided help to the advancement of Brigham Young. Two events with their respective dates are very enlightening in this regard. On February 17, 1834, before the expedition to Missouri,-there was organized at Kirtland the "high council" of the church. It consisted of twelve members; and both its name and the circumstances of its choosing indicate that it was intended as a sort of church senate, a governing body supreme under the prophet.
Brigham was not chosen one of the high council. He was not deemed important enough for such an office. One year later, in February, 1835, there was chosen the Quorum, or Twelve Apostles, which was raised above the high council, and made second only to the prophet. Brigham was named one of the
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Twelve Apostles; and not only this, but he was matte third in order of seniority. A single year, marked genuine hardship and struggle, had brought the quiet man from comparative obscurity to a place near the top of the strongest council of the church.
There is ground for suspecting that the Quorum of apostles became a substantial part of church government at Brigham's suggestion. Other signs that an organizing mind was at work in the church followed. In the same month of February, the Seventies were organized. This was a very important step for it provided the working machinery to manage the church, and to arouse and direct religious enthusiasm. Prior to the coming of Brigham Young, whenever Joseph wanted anything done, he had a revelation. He had a revelation urging the printer not to press for his bill when getting out the first edition of the Book of Mormon, and another revelation fixing the price at which the work was to be sold. He had a revelation telling a convert to sell a tannery, and turn the proceeds over to the church. He had a revelation telling people to lend him money, and other revelations indicating when and where he would pay the debt. Young's practical mind thought that such matters could be managed without troubling the Almighty, and he seems to have pressed this view to some purpose.
Not for nothing, however, does one bring order out of chaos. Herbert Spencer's dictum that some minds hate exact measurements is as true in theology as in cookery ---though less frequently put to the test. Sidney Rigdon had been Smith's chief counsellor in the days before the coming of Brigham; and the brilliant but unstable orator could not view with any
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{illustration: BRIGHAM YOUNG'S EARLIEST KNOWN PHOTOGRAPH. This portrait is pronounced by well-informed members of Brigham Young's family to be the earliest known photograph. No date is assigned to it. It presents the prophet as wearing a Masonic emblem in his shirt front. There is a legend that Brigham was ambitious to be a Mason before he met Joseph Smith and that he carried a Masonic emblem. This picture may be of that period but it is probable that it was taken after Brigham became a Mason at Nauvoo. The Masonic Grand Lodge of Illinois granted a charter for a Masonic lodge at Nauvoo. Smith immediately inducted all his chief men into the order. For violation of Masonic rules, the Grand Lodge renounced the charter. Joseph Smith thereupon denounced 'Masonry as an erroroneous tradition, an unholy imitation of the priesthood, and he invented what has been known as the "Endowment Rite," which he called the "true Masonry as known to Seth and Solomon" and revealed to Smith direct from the Almighty. This rite was administered in Smith's "endowment" rooms over his brick store at Nauvoo.
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page 37 CLIMBING THE TOWER OF FAITH
pleasure the steady advance of his unassuming, bullchested, practical-minded competitor. Direct information as to the rivalry of this pair for influence with Smith is wanting; but the indirect evidence is plentiful and convincing. There is the central fact that Rigdon lost ground while Young was gaining it, from the beginning of their acquaintance to their final struggle for mastery after the death of Joseph. There is the steady disparagement of Rigdon by Mormon writers, a fashion set by Young and plainly agreeable to him. Lastly, and most amusing of all, there is the peculiar alternation between instances of the Prophet Smith's increasing trust in Brigham, and the calls which came for Brigham to go on missions.
Brigham's elevation to the quorum of the Apostles came on February 14th, 1835. In May of the same year, he was ordered to go on a mission to the "Lamanites," or Indians. Joseph promised the missionary that his work in this particular field would "open the doors to all the seed of Joseph." The cryptic phrase was never tested, for it is not of record that Brigham ever reached the Indian country. Had he done so, and there left his scalp in the lodge of some heathen "Lamanite," it is a reasonable guess that Sidney Rigdon's grief would have been purely official.
In September of 1835, Brigham was back in Kirtland, working at his trade, working on the temple, preaching from time to time, pitting his sturdy comiiion sense against whatever intrigues his rivals may have devised. This quiet life continued through the winter. The temple was dedicated March 27, 1836. Such an occasion in that day could not pass without miracles. There were visions, and outpourings, and the gift of tongues; and, perhaps in deference to this
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last phenomenon, the occasion was called the LatterDay Pentecost. The elders of the church gathered for anointings; the quorum of the Twelve Apostles was present; and the prophet himself conferred on Brigham Young the signal honour of washing his feet.
It is not likely that Brigham expected this favour to pass unnoticed; but this time he was not required to take chances with the Lamanites. He was sent on a mission to New York and New England; passed the summer in the East, and returned to Kirtland in the fall.
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page 39 CHAPTER FIVE
AN UNTENABLE EDEN
BEFORE going farther with the history of Brigham Young, it is necessary to trace the course of Mormon settlement in Missouri.
In the fall of 1830, Oliver Cowdery, Parley P. Pratt, Peter Whitmer, and a man named Peterson were sent by Smith to preach to the "Lamanites," or Indians west of the Missouri River. They went, afoot and carrying their scanty packs on their shoulders much of the way, and reached Independence, Missouri, in the spring of 1831. Two of them went to work as tailors in the settlement. The other two crossed the river and began to preach to the Indians, but were turned back by the Indian agent. Balked of their original purpose, the four pioneers preached Mormonism to the settlers, and apparently made some converts. But the preachers became more enamoured of the new land than their hearers did of the new doctrine; and after a short time, Pratt was sent back by the other three to carry an account of this western paradise to the faithful in Kirtland.
The message found a ready audience. The westward flow of population had been the dominant note in American life for a generation, and was to remain such for more than a generation to come. Besides, the Mormons were already drawing apart as a peculiar people, and beginning to gather in compact communities. Kirtland was their Mecca for the time;
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but Kirtland was in the midst of a comparatively well-settled country. Missouri would offer more freedom if equally suitable otherwise. The prophet and some thirty of his disciples started on a visit of inspection to Missouri.
Smith and his followers arrived at Independence in July, 1831. The prophet approved the site, declared it was the original location of the Garden of Eden issued a revelation setting forth the grandeur of the community which the Saints were to build there, and staked out a site for a temple. Some of his followers took up land from the government or from the state, which had a considerable grant in Jackson county. Others bought of the original settlers. The prophet returned to Kirtland in time to meet Brigham Young; and word went abroad that the city of the Saints was to be built in western Missouri, on ground hallowed by the footsteps of Adam and Eve, before their primal innocence was sullied by worldly wisdom derived from the Tree.
The tide of Mormon emigration which set westward seems to have surprised even the prophet. The roving tendency which even yet marks the American was then at its strongest; and the idea of settling on the site of the Garden of Eden might appeal to any one. Mormons flocked to Missouri-most of them very poor ---but a few with possessions enough to secure a comfortable establishment in the new home. By July, 1833, there were 1,200 Mormons in Jackson County ---one-third of the total population; and destruction was at hand.
Much ingenuity has been wasted explaining, or rather, assigning blame for the quarrel between Mormons and the Gentiles in Jackson county. The real
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cause of the difficulty is not far to seek. A rude but aspiring democracy was brought into contact with a rude but aggressive theocracy; and the two systems flew at each other's throats like strange dogs. Had the civilization of the day and place been less imperfect, the conflict might have taken a gentler form, but it could not have been suppressed. Men who believe that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed cannot work in harmony with men who accept the despotic rule of a prophet appointed by the Most High God. Men accustomed to divide and cross-divide on public questions as their whims or principles or interests dictate, do not love men who take their political opinions ready-made from a secret conclave of priests. Mormonism and Americanism have clashed wherever they have met; and they will continue to clash so long as the church tries to occupy the field set apart in our land for the state.
Trouble began in Jackson county early in 1832; and from beginning to end, the "Gentiles" seem to have been the aggressors. By 1833, matters had reached an acute stage. A mass-meeting was called July 20 at the court-house in Independence, and resolutions were passed ordering they Mormons to leave the county, pledging the purchase of their property at a fair price. This manifesto, even now, does not inspire the reader with much faith in the high honour of those who framed it; and the Mormon disciples, given fifteen minutes to consent to exile, very properly refused compliance. The mob thereupon tarred and feathered Bishop Partridge and one of his co-workers, wrecked the office of the church paper, The Millennial Star, and repeated their order for all Mormons to leave the county on pain of indefinite
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but assumedly dire penalties. Three days later, the Mormons accepted the terms off their enemies, and moved or signed an agreement for moving.
It was a treaty extorted from a weaker party by lawless force; and no great casuistry was used to argue away its binding force on the Mormons. They appealed to the governor for aid, and received a perfectly correct statement of their legal rights. They appealed to Joseph Smith, and received a revelation. Thus encouraged by the law and the prophet, the Mormons stayed on, and thereby tempted a fate which was eager for temptation. Troubles recommenced. Armed bullies raided isolated Mormon communities, flogged the men, and drove out the women. There were a few skirmishes, and then the Mormons gave up, and fled across the Missouri river into Clay county, early in November. The sudden move was marked by much hardship and more pecuniary loss, and was the first of a long series of events which embittered the leaders of the church against American institutions in general and the state of Missouri in particular.
The revelation marking Jackson county as the site chosen by the Lord for His city of Zion has never been recalled, superseded, nor forgotten. After four emigrations and fourscore years, yellow parchment deeds to property in Independence may be found in Utah homes; and more than one man high in the councils of the church to-day boasts that neither he nor his forbears ever relinquished title to their holdings in the City of God in western Missouri.
The people of Clay county received the fugitives kindly, and condemned ---as all law-abiding men mint--- the actions of the Jackson county mob. Joseph Smith
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issued several revelations pertaining to the case, and organized the expedition whose story was told in the last chapter. Mormons flocked into Clay county, which at least had the advantage of being near to the "Garden of Eden"; and with the growth of the church came trouble. The old, irrepressible conflict rose to view as the Saints gained numbers and confidence.
Fortunately, there were men in Clay county of higher character than those who had dominated the councils of Jackson; and the Mormon leaders had learned that fear of the mob is sometimes the beginning of safety. A mass-meeting of Gentiles was held in June, 1836; and the Mormons were asked to leave the county. "We do not contend," says the remarkable document drawn up on this occasion, "that we have the least right, under the constitution and laws of the country, to expel them [the Mormons] by force." But, pointing out the growth of bitterness, and the certainty of armed conflict if the Mormons remained, the resolutions asked them to leave while their exit could be made in peaceable fashion.
The Mormons consented. A committee of Clay county Gentiles was appointed to raise money with which to buy at a fair price the lands and property of such Mormons as had anything to sell, and to help the needy in their emigration. The affair was conducted with honour and self-control, and is a credit to the leaders of both sides. Moving north by east, the Mormons entered an unsettled region. Caldwell county was organized for their benefit; the town of Far West was founded, another stake of Zion was set; and for the third time, the weary Saints of Missouri pitched their tents in temporary peace.
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WHILE the prophet's empire was being builded amid trials in Missouri, his career in Ohio was drawing to an inglorious close. There, Smith had tried to establish not only a church and a political organization, but divers commercial enterprises, including a "bank." Much information on many subjects has been vouchsafed to prophets at one time or another; but financiering is too sordid, or perhaps too exact, a business to be conducted by revelation. Smith's "bank" eked out a troubled existence for less than a year, and finally closed its doors in November, 1837.
Many better and more wisely managed institutions than this at Kirtland went to the wall in that disastrous year; but Smith's bank failed under circumstances which no glozing can render creditable. He had been refused a banking charter by the state legislature, and then, to evade the law, reorganized his financial association as the " Kirtland Society Antibanking Company." The notes with this queer name on them were printed with "Bank" very large and the rest of the name very small ---"Anti-BANKing " ---by which trick it was hoped to make ordinary people think that the institution was a bank and convince courts that it was not. Worse ---if possible---than this deceit was the recklessness with which notes were issued and the affairs of the bank conducted. With
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a nominal capital of $4,000,000 and an actual paid-up cash capital of something under $10,000, Smith's bank was marked for destruction from its birth.
But the prophet had other troubles than financial ones that year. It was impossible that a chance gathering of new believers, drawn in chief part from the most independent and undisciplined population on earth, should dwell together in perfect harmony, even under the rule of a prophet. That would have been a miracle indeed; and such proof of Divine grace was lacking. Dissensions broke out, which ripened into quarrels, and in 1837 there was open insurrection.
Various grievances were put forth by the malcontents at this time. Some objected to Smith's business enterprises, or rather to his conduct of them. Some complained of his arbitrary rule. Some accused him of dissolute habits. Probably most of the accusations were true, but such complaints are the signs of disaffection, not its cause. Smith was undergoing the experience which sooner or later comes to almost every prophet, that of seeing at least part of his followers regard him with the disillusioned gaze of experience instead of the fervid eyes of faith; and he could not well endure the new method of inspection. A young girl, who had discovered the art of extracting visions from a black stone, prophesied that Smith would be deposed for his transgressions, and that David Whitmer or Martin Harris would succeed him in the prophetic office. Martin Harris had printed the Book of Mormon at his own expense, and David Whitmer had made oath that he saw the golden plates from which Smith had translated that scripture; yet there is not a doubt but they were working
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for the fulfilment of the young woman's predictions. Rebellion had come in high places.
Left to his own devices, Smith might have made terms with the malcontents ---thereby ruining himself and forfeiting his prophetic character. Under the counsels of Sidney Rigdon, the prophet would have stood firm enough, but helpless except for cursings and revelations. It was Brigham Young whom Joseph needed, and Brigham was at hand. He was at least as despotic in natural temper as his chief, and he had the wit to see that one who rules by direct authorization of God must be all or nothing. No terms were made with the disaffected. Some escaped immediate excommunication, oil account of the disturbed state of business affairs in the community. Others who repented were received back into the fold. But of concession on the part of the church authorities there was none then ---and save in the presence of superior force, there never has been any since. Of all ecclesiastical organizations in the Western Hemisphere, the Mormon church is the most consistently despotic.
Financial troubles thickened fast around the Kirtland stake of Zion. The "Anti-banking Company" was organized in January, 1837; with Joseph as president and Sidney Rigdon as secretary. In March, Smith and Rigdon were arrested on the charge of violating the banking laws of the state. They were tried and convicted in October, but appealed to a higher court on the ground that their institution was not a bank. There was more truth in this plea than either of them realized; but the court never gave a ruling upon it.
The "bank" closed its doors in ---November, 1837.
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This open failure and the overhanging sentence of the trial court emboldened Smith's enemies within the church, and they made a determined effort to depose him. Brigham left Kirtland in December. According to the Mormon account, he was driven away by the mob; but in view of the consistent way in which he had defied and Smith and Rigdon stayed on, fighting the malcontents with no great success; and in January, 1838, they, too, fled from Kirtland, and started to the Zion in Missouri. Young joined the prophet on the way, and they entered Far West together, March 14, 1838.
The first care of Joseph and Brigham was to purge the church of those sinners who had dared to raise their voices against the Lord's chosen prophet. Thomas B. Marsh, David W. Patton, and Brigham Young were appointed a committee of three to drive apostasy from the tents of Israel, and tighten the reins of church government. They performed the task in a manner which had at least the merit of simplicity; they excommunicated every one of importance who dared to protest against the absolute authority of the prophet. Hildebrand was not more reckless of consequences in asserting the supremacy of the church than this committee. Two of Joseph's "witnesses to the plates," four members of the Twelve Apostles, several men high among the Seventies, and others of scarcely less importance in the church were excommunicated and cast into outer darkness. Marsh himself weakened and apostatized before the work was through, and was excommunicated as promptly as if he were but an ordinary backslider. The unyielding tenacity and intolerant mastership which
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marked Brigham all through his life were never more apparent than during this purging of the church in Missouri.
Another piece of work of this summer may fairly be ascribed to Brigham. This is the tithing law which for three-quarters of a century has been the source of the church's financial strength. Smith and Rigdon had devised a chaotic scheme of "consecration" of property, which was a sort of religious communism, neither clearer nor more workable than other schemes of the same class. But on July 8, 1838, the rule of contributions was fixed at one-tenth of the property owned by the convert when he came into the church or when the law was announced, and thereafter one-tenth of his increase each year. It was drastic; but Brigham never shrank from drastic measures; it was practicable; and his was the practical mind in the councils of the church. The working out of this plan can hardly be other than his.
But even as the government and finances of the church were improved, the storm was brewing which which should sweep it from the state. Up to the prophet's coming, the Mormon settlement in Caldwell county had roused little antagonism. Within that county, the Saints had nearly everything to themselves; and without, they were too few to be esteemed dangerous. Smith's arrival brought a large increase of Mormon immigration, much of which was colonized in Carroll and Daviess counties ---thereby insuring the social contact which was bound to insure hostility. Smith's grandiloquent pretensions did not calm the rising alarm of the Gentiles as they saw the increase of the Saints; and the drastic church discipline enforced by Brigham Young's "commission"
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of faith ---could not have helped matters. Sidney Rigdon was much blamed by some of the Mormons at a later day for his famous "salt sermon," in which he vowed that the Mormons would not be driven from their homes again without bloodshed; but the present writers are unable to see that this sermon had anything to do with the resulting trouble. Rigdon expressed a perfectly proper sentiment in a needlessly provocative way. But a peace so tenuous that it is shattered by such a trifling indiscretion cannot be preserved long in a world where everything must bide the stress of circumstance ---or fail altogether.
Trouble began on August 6, at Gallatin. The state election then took place on that date; and some Mormons, going to Gallatin to vote, were stopped by a group of Gentiles. There was language and breaking of heads, but no serious injury was done; and the Mormons seem to have voted at the end of the fray. Instead of ignoring the disturbance, as any sensible man in his position would have done, Smith collected at Far West a band of one hundred and fifty on horseback, and went to the "relief" of the brethren in Daviess county. The brethren did not need relief; but Smith came across a justice of the peace who had been active in opposition to the Mormons, and bullied him into signing a paper which nothing less than prophetic wisdom is competent to interpret. As soon as Smith had returned to Far West, the Daviess county Gentiles swore out warrants for him and some
of his followers on the ground of entering another county in armed array and threatening a judicial officer ---Adam Black. After some demur, the accused
surrendered and were bound over in bail to a hearing. September 7.
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But the mischief was done. The county divided into two armed camps. Skirmishes took place with the usual great cry and little wool of militia operations, and the newly elected Governor Boggs called out the state troops. These were placed under General Doniphan, who afterwards won fame in the Mexican war, and his tact and skill soon brought about a more quiet feeling in Daviess county. Then the Gentiles of Carroll county began to arm and form plans for expelling the Mormons. An attack was made on the Mormon settlement of Dewitt. After a comic opera bombardment and a Venezuela-like exchange of proclamations, the Mormons agreed to evacuate Dewitt on condition of receiving payment for their improvements, and permission to return to Far West. This was granted. It is worth noting that the governor had refused to protect the Mormons of this settlement.
The Mormons now were gathered in two chief settlements, Far West and another town which staggered under the title of "Adam-ondi-Ahman." The Gentiles had retired from the open countryside to a number of towns which were regularly patrolled by sentries. Society had dissolved in a border war like that which, perchance, the common ancestors of both parties once waged across the Tweed; or that which sons of the Gentiles concerned were destined to wage a generation later on the Kansas line. Three companies of regulars would have driven both camps into the Missouri river; but the regulars were not to be had. Captain David W. Patten at the head of a little troop of Mormons performed the only noteworthy exploit of the "war" by routing a much superior force of Gentiles at Crooked River; but he was killed
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in the fight, and the resentment roused at the defeat of state troops by Mormon partisans far outbalanced the advantages of the victory.
The "battle" of Crooked River was fought October 25, 1838. Two days later, Governor Boggs issued leis famous order to General Clark, commanding a part of the militia, telling him that the Mormons must "be exterminated or driven from the state." It was not necessary to carry out these sanguinary orders. After some time spent in parley, Far West surrendered to General Lucas before Clark could arrive. Smith, Rigdon, and several other prominent Mormons were given up as "hostages," and were thrown into jail. Forty-six others were arrested a little later by General Clark, who informed the Mormon colonists that they must leave the state at once, on pain of "extermination." That word seems to have been a favourite among the statesmen and soldiers who had charge of affairs in Missouri at this time.
Before Far West surrendered, there occurred a massacre which gave a sinister meaning to the verbose threats of Governor Boggs and his militia officer. On October 30, a considerable party of Missourians attacked the Mormon settlement at Hawn's Mill. The Mormons took refuge in a log blacksmith shop. The Missourians surrounded the shop, and poured a fire through the cracks between the logs, until every one within the enclosure was dead or wounded. Then they broke in the door, butchered some of the survivors with any implement handy, and ended by throwing dead and wounded together into a nearby well. Some of the wounded were rescued from the well by friends from Far West, and they ultimately recovered; but all told, more than twenty Mormons
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lost their lives in this affair. The Missourians did not lose a man.
It was an utterly unjustifiable massacre. The men who perpetrated it were legitimate progenitors of those "border ruffians" who established a reign of terror along the Kansas line twenty years later. The historical responsibility for this massacre must rest on Governor Boggs. He was justified in calling out the militia to restore order; he was justified in taking any measures necessary to break up the theocracy which Smith had established in one county of the state, and was endeavouring to extend to all neighbouring districts. But the governor's inflammatory language and open partisanship were a direct incitement to such multiple murders as this of Hawn's Mill, and a direct encouragement to the lawlessness which remained so long the curse of Missouri. The Mormons and their un-American theocracy vanished; but the anarchy excused and, indeed, commended, in high places, endured for more than a generation.
Brigham Young passed unscathed through all these ordeals. He was a consistent champion of the prophet, a prominent figure in the church, and neither then nor later did he shirk his due share of danger. Yet for the moment Gentile hostility almost neglected him. He was not shot, he was not named in any list of proscribed exiles, he was not even thrown into jail. Dozens of less important men among the Saints were awarded this honour, but somehow Young was, passed by. He was present When Joseph Smith and others were given up as "hostages," but the eyes of the Gentile commander were held, and he did not see that a greater than Joseph remained at large. Small wonder that a people like the Mormons, who lived in
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the midst of signs and wonders and interpositions of Providence, came to believe that Brigham Young was miraculously preserved to be the leader and saviour of his persecuted people in the yet greater trials which lay before them.
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page 54 Chapter Seven
NAUVOO THE BEAUTIFUL
JOSEPH SMITH was not only prophet, seer, and revelator, but president of the church. Hyrum Smith and Sidney Rigdon were at this time counsellors to the president, the three forming what is known as the First Presidency. With this supreme governing body in jail, active control of church affairs fell to the Twelve Apostles, and at this same time, Brigham Young succeeded to the headship of that body. Of his two seniors, Thomas B. Marsh had apostatized and David Patten had been killed at Crooked River. Brigham, protected by good fortune and immune from apostasy, was for the moment the active head of the church.
To a man who cared for ecclesiastical preferment and believed in the future of Mormonism, it was a fine opportunity. Brigham never doubted the permanency and glory of the church, and priestly power had become the breath of his nostrils. But he had no notion of using his chance to secure rulership of Zion. From the day when he spoke in tongues at Kirtland, Brigham had been the firm upholder of Joseph's power, prerogatives, and prophetic dignity; and he did not weaken, even under this temptation. He worked with the Saints in Missouri, doing all he could to lessen their suffering and organize the exodus, and spent his spare moments consulting with Joseph and devising plans for the prophet's release.
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These plans came to nothing. Sidney Rigdon was freed on a writ of habeas corpus ---perhaps because his captors had learned how unimportant the fiery exhorter was--- and he lost no time in putting the Mississippi river between himself and "Missouri justice." Later in the same month, Brigham was obliged to make a hurried exit, and joined his old rival at Quincy, Illinois.
An informal meeting of such members of the Twelve as remained faithful and such other Saints as were within reach was held at Quincy, March 17, 1839. The condition of the church was desperate. Its prophet was in prison, its western home was in the hands of its enemies, apostasy within and assault without threatened the whole structure of faith. The people had lost nearly all their property, and were, making their escape from an inhospitable state under conditions of suffering seldom equalled in a civilized land in time of peace. Marching without supplies in the dead of winter, making tents of their bedclothing ---when they had any--- straggling over the Iowa line, crossing the Mississippi on the ice ---the followers of the prophet who remained true to his cause seemed more in condition to plead for charity than to assert dominion.
But Brigham, who was real chief of the meeting in spite of the presence of Rigdon, never wavered. His priestly pride was as fierce and intolerant as if he had behind him a hierarchy of immemorial antiquity, instead of the disheartened followers of a backwoods crystal-gazer, who had gone into the revelation business a scant dozen years before. Brigham advised the people to find some spot in Illinois where they could build their Zion, urged and carried the ex-
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communication of some members who had failed in recent trials, sent aid to the faithful still in Missouri, and generally took charge of everything. The Saints were well served that in this hour of difficulty the supreme command was held by the clear-headed, practical Brigham, rather than by the eruptive Joseph, or the discouraged Sidney.
On April 6, 1839, the ninth anniversary of the church, Smith was taken from jail for trial, secured a change of venue, and shortly after was permitted to escape. He reached Quincy April 22, and at once assumed leadership. Plans for a new Zion were forthcoming without delay. The town of Commerce, Illinois, was chosen as a site, its name was changed to Nauvoo ---after a non-existent Hebrew word supposed to mean " beautiful"--- large land purchases were made, and the fourth eternal stake of Zion was set.
Smith had the active support of Young in this project for a new Zion. Bishop Partridge advised strongly against trying to collect the Saints together into one place. Sidney Rigdon seems to have agreed with Partridge, and certainly advised against the land purchases actually made. In this emergency, Rigdon was for once a better counsellor than Brigham. The reason is not far to seek. Rigdon knew when he was whipped. Brigham did not.
Almost the moment that Smith arrived at Quincy, Brigham and his companions of the Quorum of Apostles were off to Missouri on a secret mission. Smith had given a revelation the year before that on April 26, 1839, the Twelve, Apostles should meet at Far West, recommence layig the foundations of the temple, and from that point start across the great waters to convert the world. Brigham and his fellow
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Apostles were determined that this revelation should be fulfilled. Hiding in a nearby grove till night, the Apostles then slipped into the deserted town of Far West and proceeded to the temple block. They "recommenced laying the foundations" by rolling a big stone to one corner of the temple, had prayers, sang a few hymns, excommunicated a few sinners ---for that was an important part of a hierarch's duties in those trying days--- and then vanished before the belligerent Gentiles were awake.
The tale is told by Mormon writers as a striking fulfilment of prophecy, and a proof of the courage and loyalty of the Twelve. To us, it seems rather to illustrate the extent to which sensible men can trick themselves with words; and the meagre returns that are accepted, as payment of golden promises, when those promises are made in the name of supernatural authority.
After this episode, which was saved from absurdity only by the deadly seriousness of those concerned in it, the Twelve returned to Nauvoo. But they did not proceed at once on their mission across the waters. The beginnings of a new Zion were not propitious. The lower part of the town site was swampy, affording harbour to innumerable mosquitoes, and these of course, carried malaria. Deaths among the newcomers were numerous, and there were times in late summer when half the population were shaking or burning in the alternations of the disease. Joseph tried his hand at faith-healing, and Brigham testified that lie was made whole at the prophet's command. The value of this testimony may be gauged by the wellproven fact that a little later he was carried on a mattress to the house of his friend Heber Kimball.
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and remained there four days in bed, constantly nursed by his wife.
The plasmodium malaria knows no prophet but quinine.
If Brigham was wrong in countenancing the building of Nauvoo, he was right in seeing that to make a workable Zion the prophet must have less disputatious and refractory converts than those gathered from the turbulent settlements of the Mississippi valley. Heber Kimball had achieved remarkable success in his British mission of 1837, and he longed to have Brigham accompany him to that land again. The time had come to put Heber's judgment to the test. While still so weak with fever that the first stage of the journey was made on a mattress, Brigham started in September, 1839, on his delayed mission, accompanied by six other members of the Quorum. They stopped by the way, especially in Kirtland; and Brigham spent the winter in New York. On April 6, 1840, ---the great church anniversary once more ---he landed in England.
During Kimball's mission in 1837, it was claimed that nearly two thousand persons had been converted to the faith of Joseph Smith. This record was quickly surpassed by the mission of Brigham and his fellow Apostles. From whatever cause, there was in Britain a large element in a state of waiting. If their religious instability was less than that of people in the Mississippi valley, their religious eagerness was even greater, and distance lent enchantment to the view. They accepted the Mormon message as an answer to their prayers and hopes. The zeal of the exhorter met the zeal of the devotee; and instead of waiting to be argued into acceptance of the new faith, scores and
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hundreds boasted of their instant conversions. To this day, when other reasons fail, the descendants of these same people fall back on the family claim that their ancestors had a revelation from God that the gospel preached by the missionaries of Joseph was the truth.
A few instances may help to set the picture of that mission before the reader. John Taylor, an Englishman of good birth and breeding, was reared in the Anglican church. Wishing a more active organization, he joined the Methodists while in his teens, and became a well-known preacher of that denomination in Canada. There he heard the Mormon gospel, became converted, and returned to carry the message to his old friends in England.
Taylor's wife was the daughter of an old Manx family; and in the Isle of Man, legends and traditions of the supernatural are a necessary part of the household furniture. This family had a legend to fit the case. A sister-in-law of Taylor accepted his preaching of Mormonism as fulfilment of a tradition of her race that some day a messenger under the command of God should bring the true gospel out of the west, and that the same should raise their house to great power and glory. This strong-minded lady brought her whole family into the church, and with her surplus means, she emigrated a large number of the poorer Saints.
Another anecdote of the early times: John Lamont, a Scotch miner well versed in the "metapheesics" of Calvinism, and noted all through the region for his continuity as well as skill in debate, was present at a meeting addressed by one of the Mormon missionaries. One over-zealous Calvinist was rude in his
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opposition to the new gospel. Lamont rebuked him for violating the rules of discussion, and in turn was twitted by his fellow miners: "Jock, ye're in a fair way o' becoming a Mormon yoursel' ! "
" I ? Never!" shouted Lamont. "I'll deny me God first!"
A week later, Lamont was baptized in the Mormon faith, and gave his testimony in the Mormon meeting. Then some of his friends taunted him: "Did ye no say, Jock, that before ye'd join the Mormons, ye'd deny your God?"
"I did," retorted the unabashed controversialist. "My God was a useless, helpless figment o' man's mind, without body, parts, or passions. I have denied that devilish error. I now have the one true God, the Father o' all mankind, a glorious personage who was once a man like myself!"
That conversion of John Lamont and his quick reply to his former companions were counted among the latter-day miracles. In fact, to those early workers in the British field everything was a miracle. If a man were converted from some other church, God had miraculously opened his eyes to the truth. If he had been an infidel and blasphemer of all churches, that but made more manifest the power and purpose of the Almighty to make Joseph Smith at once pope and emperor of the world. Under pressure of this contagious excitement, families and neighbourhoods began to vie with each other in having miraculous conversions; and the chief work of some Mormon missionaries was to baptize and instruct the droves who came to offer themselves as disciples of tie unseen prophet.
But Brigham's mission was more than an effort to
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secure converts. It was also a most efficient colonization agency. Up to the time a man was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the church had worked for him. If was now his turn to work for the church ---and so long as Brigham had anything to do with Mormon affairs, that work was performed. The proper place to perform this redeeming labour, of course, was in the chosen Zion, which for the moment was Nauvoo. Brigham began sending his converts to America almost at once. The first company, forty-one in number, sailed exactly two months after Brigham landed. Two hundred more followed in September, one hundred and thirty accompanied Brigham on his return, and several companies came during the year 1841. Zion was being built by the works of the faithful, rather than by the dreams of the prophet.
The result of Brigham's missionary activity is best told in his own words:
"We landed . . . as strangers in a strange land, and penniless, but through the mercy of God we have gained many friends, established churches in almost every noted city and town of Great Britain, baptized between 7,000 and 8,000 souls, printed 5,000 Books of Mormon, 3,000 hymn books, 2,500 volumes of The Millennial Star and 50,000 tracts, emigrated to Zion 1,000 souls, establishing a permanent shipping agency which will be a great blessing to the Saints, and have left sown in the hearts of many thousands the seeds of eternal life which shall bring forth fruit to the honour and glory of God; and yet we have lacked nothing to eat, drink or wear; in all these things I acknowledge the hand of God."
After the fervid tales of miracles and instantaneous
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conversions, this report comes like a refreshing breath of cold air. In spite of the pious language with which it is besprinkled, this is not the rhapsody of a zealot, nor the "testimony" of an enraptured visionary. It is the report of a business agent to the corporation which sent him forth on a difficult task, which 'he has performed in superb fashion.
Brigham with five companions and one hundred and thirty converts sailed for New York on April 20, 1841. On July F, they arrived at Nauvoo. Brigham made his report, and had his season of communion with the prophet. Eight days later, Joseph had the following significant revelation
"Dear and well-beloved brother, Brigham Young, verily thus saith the Lord unto you, my servant Brigham, it is no more required at your hands to leave your family as in times past, for your offering is acceptable to me; I have seen your labours and toil in journeying for my name.
"I therefore command you to send my word abroad, and take special care of your family from this time, henceforth and forever. Amen."
The most contumacious Gentile will admit that this is one revelation which Brigham never transgressed. His family received his very especial care to the last hour of his life.
What Sidney Rigdon thought of this Divine authority for Brigham to stay at home is not recorded.
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page 63 CHAPTER EIGHT
THE GLORY OF MANY WIVES
DURING the sojourn at Nauvoo, the bestknown feature of the new religion was made known to the church-or at least to a few of its members. This is the doctrine of polygamy. From the hour that polygamy became a recognized part of Mormonism, it has almost monopolized Gentile discussion of that creed; and to-day, when the religion of Joseph Smith is mentioned, the responding thought in the mind of nearly every hearer is plurality of wives. The present writers consider this tenet merely one of several which make the Mormon church a thing apart; but it is an important one, and well worthy of careful study.
Mormon polygamy cannot be understood, except in connection with the doctrine of " celestial marriage," of which plurality of wives is a part. Mormonism is ancestor worship. In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, salvation depends not upon faith, but upon offspring. The following summary of the doctrine of " celestial marriage" is as nearly exact as any statement can be made on a subject with which theologians are yet busy.
1. Marriage must be contracted for eternity, or it is not binding in the spirit world.
2. Persons who have not married for eternity on earth cannot be so married hereafter. Such persons occupy inferior places as "ministering angels," i.e.,
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heavenly clerks and waiters, to their snore fortunate fellows who have fulfilled the "new and everlasting covenant" of celestial marriage.
3. Persons who have married for time and eternity under a sealing by the prophet's authority, retain their marital relations in the next world. They become, not " as " gods, but actual gods unto the fruit of their loins.
4. As illustrating the last statement, Brigham Young said in a sermon that the only god who concerned mankind was Adam, of whose seed are all the generations of the earth. Adam was a polygamist.
5. The highest, salvation-or true godship-is reserved for those who have entered the practice of polygamy. Since a man becomes a god to his descendants, the more descendants, the higher the godship. Women who have helped him attain this higher estate shine in the heavens by his reflected glory.
6. Women who have not married and borne children occupy an inferior place in the next world, lower than that assigned to celibate men.
7. Marriage is not only a means of heavenly advancement, but it is a duty. Space is peopled with spirits waiting to put on a tabernacle of flesh. This is necessary to their progress, and they are willing to enter the gates of birth by the most ignoble route, rather than not be born at all. They even haunt houses of ill-fame, hoping to receive the endowments of flesh.
The revelation establishing polygamy is dated at Nauvoo, July 12, 1843. This, however, is merely the date on which this peculiar word of the Lord was reduced to writing, not the time at which it was first made known. Joseph F. Smith, present head of the
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Mormon church, and nephew of the prophet, declares that the original revelation on polygamy was given to his inspired uncle about the year 1831. At about that date, Joseph often remarked that the brethren would take his life if he dared to tell them the new truths which God was making plain unto him. This may mean that he was already incubating the scheme of polygamy, or it may mean only that Joseph thought this mysterious phrase would sound well, and help to keep his followers in awe. His patter was as ready and clever as that of an experienced conjurer, and often had about as much connection with the matter in hand.
There is good ground for believing that the practice of polygamy began at Kirtland. The charge was freely circulated against the Saints in that region; and-unlike such a commonplace matter as horsestealing ---it is not the kind of accusation that jealous neighbours would be likely to invent. In 1835, the church put forth at Kirtland a formal denial of polygamy; itself rather suspicious in the light of recent events. Two years later, April 29, 1837, the presidents of Seventies passed a resolution that they would not hold fellowship with any elder who was guilty of polygamy. This would imply that some elders were admittedly guilty of polygamous practices at this time, unless we make the rather far-fetched assumption that the high-sounding term of " polygamy " was applied to chance cases of sexual irregularity.
The more important parts of the revelation are as follows
(Verses quoted as in book)
1. Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, my servant
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Joseph. that inasmuch as you have inquired of my hand, to know and understand wherein I, the Lord, justified my servants Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; as also Moses, David and Solomon, my servants, as touching the principle and doctrine of their having many wives and concubines;
2. Behold! and lo, I am the Lord thy God, and will answer thee as touching this matter
15. Therefore, if a man marry himself a wife in the world, and he marry her not by me, nor by my word; and he covenant with her so long as he is in the world and she with him, their covenant and marriage are not of force when they are dead, and when they are out of the world; therefore, they are not bound by any law when they are out of the world;
16. Therefore, when they are out of the world, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage; but are appointed angels in heaven, which angels are ministering servants, to minister for those who are worthy of a far more, and an exceeding, and an eternal weight of glory;
17. For these angels did not abide my law, therefore they cannot be enlarged, but remain separately and singly, without exaltation, in their saved condition, to all eternity, and from henceforth are not Gods, but are angels of God, for ever and ever.
19. And again, verily I say unto you, if a man marry a wife by my word, which is my law, and by the new and everlasting covenant, and it is sealed unto them by the Holy Spirit of promise, by him who is anointed, unto whom I have appointed this power, and the keys of this Priesthood; and it shall be said unto them, ye shall come forth in the first resurrection; and if it be after the first resurrection, in the next resurrection; and shall inherit thrones, kingdoms, principalities, and powers, dominions, all heights and depths. . .
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20. Then shall they be Gods, because they leave no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue; then shall they be above all, because all things are subject unto them. Then shall they be Gods, because they have all power, and the angels are subject unto them.
21. Verily, I say unto you, except ye abide my law, ye cannot attain to this glory;
37. Abraham received concubines, and they bare him children, and it was accounted unto him for righteousness, because they were given unto him, and he abode in my law, as Isaac also, and Jacob did none other things than that which they were commanded; and because they did none other things than that which they were commanded, they have entered into their exaltation, according to the promises, and sit upon thrones, and are not angels, but are Gods.
52. And let mine handmaid, Emma Smith, receive all those that have been given unto my servant Joseph, and who are virtuous and pure before me; and those who are not pure, and have said they were pure, shall be destroyed, saith the Lord God;
53. For I am the Lord thy God, and ye shall obey my voice; and I give unto my servant Joseph, that he shall be made ruler over many things, for he hath been faithful over a few things, and from henceforth I will strengthen him.
54. And I command mine handmaid, Emma Smith, to abide and cleave unto my servant Joseph, and to none else. But if she will not abide this commandment, she shall be destroyed, saith the Lord; for I am the Lord thy God, and will destroy her, if she abide not in my law;
55. But if she will not abide this commandment, then shall my servant Joseph do all things for her, even as
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he hath said; and I will bless him and multiply him and give unto him an hundred-fold in this world, of fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, houses and lands, wives and children, and crowns of eternal lives in the eternal worlds.
56. And again, verily I say, let mine handmaid forgive my servant Joseph his trespasses; and then shall she be forgiven her trespasses, wherein she has trespassed against me; and I, the Lord thy God, will bless her, and multiply her, and make her heart to rejoice.
57. And again, I say, let not my servant Joseph put his property out of his hands, lest an enemy come and destroy him, for Satan seeketh to destroy; for I am not the Lord thy God, and he is my servant; and behold! and lo, I am with him, as I was with Abraham, thy father, even unto his exaltation and glory.
61. And again, as pertaining to the law of the Priesthood: If any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent; and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then he is justified; he cannot commit adultery, for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.
62. And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are given unto him, therefore is he justified.
64. And again, verily, verily I say unto you, if any man have a wife, who holds the keys of this power, and he teaches unto her the law of my Priesthood, as pertaining to these things, then shall she believe, and ad, minister unto him, or she shall be destroyed, saith the Lord, your God, for I will destroy her; for I will magnify my name upon all who receive and abide my law.
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Taken by itself the revelation seems wordy and involved. By comparison with many other revelations, it is clear and concise, and bears unconscious witness that Smith had it in mind long before he reduced it to paper. The pains taken to bring the prophet's wife, ---Emma Hale Smith,--- into line are noticeable and amusing.
What prompted Smith to make this strange departure from the accepted traditions, laws, and ideals of the country in which he lived, and of all other countries from which even a shred of his ancestral blood was derived? The question is inevitable, but an authoritative answer is wanted-unless we are ready to accept his own explanation of direct revelation from God. New creeds are habitually fruitful in sexual vagaries; but these commonly run towards celibacy, rather than to greater license. The defences of a custom given by Mormon theologues are excuses after the fact. The plea that polygamy is necessary to give every woman a chance to fulfil her undoubted right of wifehood and motherhood might be urged with some show of reason in England or Massachusetts to-day; but it did not apply in the pioneer communities of the Mississippi valley. Probably Smith never lived in a settlement where there was not a surplus of men, rather than of women.
Did he put forward this revelation merely to condone and legalize his own peccadilloes? Mohammed had a matrimonial sudra after being caught in a compromising position. Did Joseph, all unconsciously, follow this august example? His life needed some such endorsement; verses 52 and 56 of the document quoted above give evidence that his practice of polygamy antedated the revelation. A "new and ever-
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lasting" marriage covenant which entitled the prophet to do as he pleased would be quite handy under such circumstances.
One suppositious explanation may be put forward for what it is worth. Like all other creeds in modern times, Mormonism was more successful in appealing to women than to men. While males outnumber females in most American communities, the proportions of the sexes are reversed in practically every church. A system of church-limited polygamy would utilize this wealth of potential motherhood, with no danger of the offspring being led astray by an heretic father. This consideration undoubtedly appealed to Brigham Young and to some of his counsellors in Utah; but there is no reason to assert that it had any weight with Smith. Most of his recorded approaches were to women already married.
The first of these was the wife of one of the Twelve Apostles, a handsome woman whom Smith seems to have coveted before her marriage. He had enjoined the Apostle against marrying her, and found that even a prophet's advice does not count for much in matrimonial affairs. In 1840 this Apostle was sent on a mission which kept him away for more than a year, and during his absence, Joseph took the woman as his " spiritual wife." This means that she was to be Joseph's wife in the next world? though the wife of another man in this.
This was Joseph's first authenticated adventure in spiritual wifery. Others followed not much later He informed John Taylor that the Lord had given Mrs. Taylor to Joseph for his spiritual wife in the next world. Taylor and his wife united in strenuous protest, and the protest, and the prophet laughingly said that he was
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only testing their faith and love. He gave a similar explanation of his pursuit of the daughter of Sidney Rigdon ---but it is not of record that he made any such advances in the household of Brigham Young.
Mormon tradition has it that Joseph was sealed to twenty-seven wives before his death in Carthage jail. How many of these sustained marital relations with him is a question. The marriage ceremony for spiritual weddings differs not at all from that for marriages to be consummated on earth; and there was nothing to keep the persons so united from anticipating the heavenly nuptials. The matter is shrouded with uncertainty now because it was covered with secrecy during the prophet's lifetime.
The reasons for this secrecy are not far to seek. The mere rumour of polygamy had been cited as a grave offence, which the prophet found it necessary to repudiate. The formal announcement of such a doctrine would have precipitated disaster. It is prob- able that even Smith was equal to that much prevision, and certainly there were men around him not wholly lost in prophetic ecstasy. Another and almost as compelling a reason is to be found in Smith's awe of his legal wife.
Emma Hale Smith was a woman of considerable intelligence, decided firmness of character, and excellent conversational powers. She had loved Joseph in his vagabond youth, and she never lost her fondness for him. She had shared his wanderings and his hardships, she had acted as his amanuensis, she knew to the last decimal the sort of clay of which her prophet was made. This did not keep her from attaching a certain importance to his revelations, but
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it did lead her to scrutinize them rather carefully. When the revelation on plural marriage was at last written down, some one said it must be shown to Emma. Joseph, with one of the few gleams of real humour displayed in his whole lifetime, said: "Hyrum, you take it to her!" Hyrum obeyed. The story is that Emma snatched the manuscript from his hand, threw it into the fire, and wrathfully declared it was a revelation from the devil, not from God.
In spite of Emma's opposition, polygamy was practised; and she must have known it. Very possibly her knowledge was moral certainty, rather than legal proof; and she was willing to have it so. There is little basis for the church claim that Emma formally gave several women to be "sealed" to her husband as his plural wives. The truth rather seems to be that she endured what she could not cure, and pretended not to see things that she could not sanction.
At one time, indeed, Emma made vigorous war on plural marriages. She forced Joseph publicly to repudiate the doctrine, and she procured the publication of a card signed by several women, alleging that there was no such thing as polygamy among Latter Day Saints. At the moment this card was published, Eliza R. Snow, one of the signers, was the plural wife of Joseph Smith.
This illustrates the practice which began probably at Kirtland, certainly as early as Nauvoo; the custom of systematic lying for the glory of God and the safety of the Saints. From that day to this, Mormons periodically have denied polygamy in the most solemn language, only to admit it the moment such admission was deemed safe, or politic, or unavoidable. In 1850, at Boulogne-sur-mer, John Taylor denounced
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as a monstrous lie the tale that the Saints practised polygamy. John Taylor at that moment was the husband of four wives, some of whom had already borne children to him. Admissions of polygamy from Mormons may be accepted as good evidence, for they have never been found to admit any cases that were not true, But denials of polygamy by Mormons mean only that the church authorities think denial good policy for the moment.
After Joseph's death, Emma declared and later taught her son that the prophet had not established, taught, or practised polygamy, that this was the invention of Brigham Young or of John C. Bennett. In view of the family tradition that the original revelation was given in 1831, of the stories in circulation at Kirtland, of the positive testimony of many women that they were married to Joseph Smith as his plural wives, and of a world of collateral testimony, Emma's denial ---however natural--- deserves no more than this passing notice.
Polygamy made the Mormon church a thing apart socially, as its despotic prophet set it apart in religious and political matters. It is perhaps one cause of the comparative failure of the church as a proselyting agency. It has brought manifold suffering on the Saints, and it was the direct occasion of the prophet's death. But it has never been abandoned. At times it has been repressed; at times it has been held in abeyance; and even a revelation was published recalling God's mistake in giving this covenant to a sinful world-but the covenant goes on. The present head of the church has at least five known plural wives and forty-three children-twelve of whom were born to him after he pledged his honour
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to abstain from plural marriage living. As despotic, as tenacious, and on occasion as secretive as its prototype of Arabia, Mormonism remains an unsolved riddle, and maintains an unassimilated polygamous principality in the heart of the American republic.
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page 75 CHAPTER NINE
GROWTH OF A SULTANATE
IN the fall of 1839, Brigham had left Nauvoo, a settlement in its raw beginning. In the summer of 1841, he returned to find it a considerable town, booming along under the weirdest government which up to that time ever afflicted an American city.
Smith and Rigdon had secured from the Illinois legislature a charter which in substance legalized the theocratic despotism of the prophet's church, and gave him a military force to execute his decrees. Save for the power of the legislature to repeal the charter it had given, Nauvoo was hardly a part of Illinois at all. The executive powers of the city were vested in a mayor; the legislative powers in a council of four aldermen and nine councillors. The mayor and the four aldermen were likewise justices of the peace and, sitting together, they constituted the municipal court.
The council had power to pass any ordinances it wished which were not contrary to the state or federal constitutions. This was a practically unlimited grant of legislative authority within the city limits. The mayor, as judge, had sole jurisdiction in all cases arising under these ordinances; but an aggrieved litigant or prisoner might appeal from the mayor to the municipal court, presided over by the mayor. The municipal court had powers to grant writs of habeas corpus in all cases arising under the ordinances; which again amounted to a practically unlimited grant of
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judicial authority within the city limits. Finally, there was a military organization, the Nauvoo Legion; a city militia subject to the sole orders of the mayor of Nauvoo, and not affiliated with the regular state militia. Within the bounds of a municipality, all powers possessed by the state of Illinois were handed over to the city of Nauvoo ---which meant to Smith and his associates.
Much ingenuity has been wasted in search of the "author" of this amazing charter. Its real "author" stands plain in view ---the doctrine and experience of the Mormon church. Adhering to a centralized despotism in religious and social affairs, why should the Mormons do other than try to mould their political organization on the same model? They had been harried and hounded by the militia of Missouri; what more natural than that they should demand an organized militia of their own? Rigdon had enjoyed and Smith had longed for the benefits of a writ of habeas corpus; it was inevitable that they should seek to get this potent instrument into their own hands. Neither at Nauvoo nor at Springfield were there persons in authority who could foresee that this grant of vast powers would rouse the jealous hostility of the state. Short-sighted experience demanded the charter, and short-sighted expediency granted it. Mormon votes were needed by the small Democratic majority then in control of the state; and until religious and social antagonism swept party distinctions aside, the prophet could have nearly everything he wanted.
No place was reserved in the political organization of Nauvoo for the ablest man among the Saints, now returned after nearly two years' absence and unex-
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ampled service to the church. This of itself would show that Sidney Rigdon made good use of Brigham's absence; and that Joseph's loyalty to his best and wisest friend depended in large measure on that friend's constant presence. Other indications pointing the same way are not wanting. Rigdon was again made one of Joseph's counsellors, William Law being the other, and the three constituting the first presidency. About this time, too, Sidney Rigdon became postmaster of Nauvoo, and hung out his sign in that city as attorney-at-law. The relation between Rigdon and Smith was a puzzling one throughout their association. Smith in a way despised, and perhaps distrusted, Rigdon; yet in the absence of stronger counsels, Rigdon seldom failed to shape the prophet's course.
But Brigham Young did not need an office to make him a power among his people. He had been confirmed in his position as president of the Twelve Apostles; and that was enough. Eight days after his return, he had re-established his influence far enough to secure the revelation commanding him to stay at home and take care of his family. His practical wisdom and mechanical knowledge and skill were in demand on the temple which was rising to be a momentary wonder of the West. Sidney Rigdon might be professor of church history in the " small university," but Brigham Young was professor of church policy in these religious conclaves which really governed the city.
There was plenty of work for a level-headed, practical man in the throng gathering at Nauvoo. The site of that latest Zion had no particular advantages. No one had built a town of any importance there be-
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fore; and no one has done it since. But converts from all points of the compass were flocking to the standard of the prophet, and human industry can build a city anywhere. Some of the converts had money, more had not. But though there were much hardship and some downright privation in the settlement of Nauvoo, the sojourn there was comparatively a placid and prosperous time in the stormy career of the Saints.
The unhealthfulness of the place has been noted. There was a heavy death-rate among the gathering converts for a season or two; especially among those from England whose systems had not acquired partial immunity to malarial poison. The clearing and draining, incident to building the city, rid the place of most of its mosquitoes, and malaria fell away in consequence. Manufactures of divers sorts were established with varying success. One of the most prosperous of these was a steam sawmill built by William and Wilson Law, two Canadian converts of much greater wealth than was usual among the immigrants to Nauvoo, and apparently of high character. We shall hear of the Laws later.
Aside from the very practical matter of getting a living, the chief industry at Nauvoo was templebuilding. The foundations of this structure were laid April 6, 1841; and the mere statement of its dimensions shows that Smith planned in this case to "astonish the natives" as he never had done before. The ground plan measured eighty-three by one hundred and twenty-eight feet; the body of the structure contained two stories and a basement, and was about sixty feet high. The steeple-never finished-to surmount this edifice was planned to be one hundred
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and twenty feet in height. Architecturally, the work was a hodge-podge, neither better nor worse than most of the half-baked, half-borrowed structures with which our land is dotted; but at least it expressed devotion, rather than mere dollars. It was built by contributions from the people in the form of tithes, by donations of labour, materials, and money in excess of tithing, by sacrifices which only a profoundly earnest people would make. In spite of the contrast in artistic and structural merit, the temple at Nauvoo was as truly a work of faith as the cathedral at Chartres; and the words Lowell spoke of one may apply to the other:
"By suffrage universal was it built,
Each vote a block of stone securely laid
Obedient to the builders' deep mused plan."
In a work like this Brigham Young was indispensable. He was the only man high in the councils of the church who had any mechanical training or aptitude; and he was easily foremost in his ability to handle men and plan large labours. In more subtle ways, his influence was soon quite as pervasive. Before Brigham came to Kirtland, Smith had a revelation with every change of the wind, and sometimes when the wind held constant. After Brigham returned to Nauvoo from England, Smith gave up " revealing" almost altogether. The plan was evolved that when the prophet had one of these spiritual visitations, he should first present it to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. If the Quorum thought well of the matter, it would be presented to the church. This remarkable scheme for saving the Lord and his prophet from the evil of hasty speaking is ascribed by
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tradition to Brigham Young ---and, indeed, it could have come from no other source. The mere fact that the revelations were to be vised by the Quorum, of which Brigham was head, would be enough to clinch the truth of the tradition. We may anticipate enough to say that in all his rule of the church, Brigham Young gave but one revelation, though the brethren were clamorous for him to take up that prophetic habit.
The first election under the new charter was held in February, 1841. A new convert to the church, Dr. John C. Bennett, was chosen mayor-in compliance with some of the political bargains made in granting the charter. Rigdon and Smith "accepted" places in the municipal council, and Smith was made commander of the Nauvoo Legion. Napoleon conquered Italy as colonel of artillery; but Joseph Smith could not endure to command the Legion with any less title than that of "Lieutenant-General." A little over a year later ---May 17, 1842,--- Bennett left the Saints after a quarrel with Smith, and made a campaign against the church with all the ardour of an apostate; but it does not appear that his philippics had much to do with the final outcome. He annoyed the faithful, angered the prophet, and drew from both an amazing flow of that kind of speech known among Gentiles as billingsgate; but told, he accomplished little more.
Other annoyances were more potent. A few days before Bennett shook the dust of Nauvoo from his feet, Governor Boggs of Missouri was shot, and it was thought mortally wounded. The Mormons hated Boggs ---with perfect justice--- and the instant thought in the mind of every Missourian vas that the shot
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was fired by some one among the Saints. Smith himself could prove an alibi; so the natural inference of his enemies was that he had sent one of his subordinates to perform the deed. On this charge of being an accessory before the fact, the state of Missouri issued a requisition on the governor of Illinois fur Joseph Smith, and the prophet was arrested at Nauvoo, August 8, 1842, on the governor's warrant. He immediately demanded to be taken before his own municipal court; and was released forthwith on a writ of habeas corpus issued by that body.
No one can blame Smith for not wanting to go back to Missouri. His experiences there warranted the suspicion that if he entered that state again, he would never leave it alive. But Smith assuredly did not have Socrates' reverence for "The Laws" when he perpetrated this grotesque travesty upon them. The clamour resulting was so great that after some weeks of hiding Smith submitted to arrest. This time his defence was made in accordance with law, and the United States district court at Springfield, Illinois, freed him on a writ of habeas corpus. His Missouri enemies had failed once before to get him across the river; they made still another attempt; and failing in that left him alone.
The actual shooting in the Boggs case was charged against "Port" Rockwell, a picturesque character of the church, long famous in a later period throughout Utah for his unshorn hair, his unrivalled skill in breeding and training horses, and the hair-raising, soul-satisfying thoroughness of his drunken sprees. He was arrested at St. Louis and tried for the crime in 1843, and was acquitted. In spite of the jury's verdict ---which seemed to show that Smith need not
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have feared a Missouri trial-there is a well-defined tradition in the church that " Port " Rockwell fired the shot at the enemy of the Saints, and never ceased to mourn that the bullet did not do its desired work.
If the Missouri enemies of Zion were discouraged, the Saints were having their usual success in raising a crop of enemies nearer home. Before they had been long at Nauvoo, charges began to circulate that they were systematically robbing their Gentile neighbours. Accusations of theft are made in all border feuds, and need not be taken seriously in the absence of corroborating evidence. Such evidence, for the most part, is absent in this case of the Mormons. There were some thieves among them, and some zealots not normally thievish had been soured by sufferings until they were ready to spoil the Egyptians at the first good chance. But generally speaking, the Mormons were as honest in financial matters as their neighbours; though, as Huckleberry Finn might say, "that ain't no flattery, neither."
In one way, however, the Saints had themselves to thank for their unsavoury reputation. In their eagerness for converts, they would baptize any one into the church; and if the newcomer remained obedient to the prophet and faithful to his religious duties, they would stand by him through thick and thin. The Mississippi bottoms in those days were haunted by regular gangs of thieves; and some of those operating near Nauvoo soon saw the advantage of a fellowship which gave them standing and helped to protect them from the outside world. Many of these joined the Mormons for strictly utilitarian purposes. They were Saints by day and horse-thieves by night; but unless their rascality became too notorious, their new asso-
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ciates would protect them. The Gentile who came to Nauvoo on a mission that might trouble the brethren "whittled out." Groups of men and boys with sticks and long knives would surround the undesirable intruder, and whittle, whittle ---occasionally letting the knife slip towards him in a harmless but unpleasant sweep. Wherever he went, the whittlers would follow; and at the end of an hour or two of this entertainment, almost any one was anxious to emigrate from the city of the whittling Saints.
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page 84 CHAPTER TEN
MURDER OF THE PROPHET
IT now becomes necessary to devote a chapter to the fortunes of Joseph Smith, rather than to those of Brigham Young. Brigham was going quietly about his business, doing whatever work came to hand, "taking care of his family"---which by this time had been increased by four plural wives--- and
supplying counsel and advice to his erratic chief. Smith, drunk with the adulation of his little world, was dreaming of limitless political power while yet scarcely through dodging Missouri sheriffs. But Smith, with all his vagaries, was head of the church; and his movements determined those of his far more
able disciple, even as the whims of the stupid Philip Second overrode the "cribbed and cabined "genius of Parma.
Under pressure of public opinion, Smith had submitted to arrest in the charge connected with the attempted murder of Governor Boggs, and had been freed by the federal court. But he did not for a moment renounce his claim of independent, judicial sovereignty for his handy little municipal court of Nauvoo. It was this municipal court which foiled the last attempt of the Missourians to drag the prophet back for trial; and belief in the right of this court to issue writs of habeas corpus became the shibboleth by which Smith tested the friendship of those non-Mormons who sought his political influence. Walker, the
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Whig candidate for congress in that district in 1843, had vehemently upheld the right of the municipal court to issue such writs, and expected to receive in return the Mormon vote and a consequent election to congress. But Governor Ford of Illinois was a Democrat who, by virtue of his office, could call out the militia, arrest Smith, and deliver him up to the Missouri authorities. A Democratic politician came to Nauvoo, and speaking in Ford's name, though not with his authorization, informed Smith that he was safe so long as his followers voted the Democratic ticket.
The result of this message was as fine a demonstration of ecclesiastical subtlety as anything that can be shown in the annals of Italy or Scotland. Joseph had bound himself to vote for Walker. But Hyrum, the prophet's brother, now announced that he had a revelation directing the Saints to vote for Hoge, Walker's Democratic opponent. William Law challenged Hyrum's claim to a revelation, and Joseph was called in to settle the dispute. " I am going to vote for Walker," said Joseph solemnly. "But Brother Hyrum is a man of truth; I have never known him to tell a lie. If he says he has a revelation from the Lord telling the Saints to vote the Democratic ticket, no doubt it is a fact; and I would advise you that in this matter, Hyrum is a safer guide than I am. When the Lord speaks, let all the earth keep silence before him!"
The congregation took the hint, and Hoge was elected by a majority of four hundred and fifty-five votes.
The trick arrayed the whole Whig party of Illinois against the Mormons and inspired the Democrats with
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apprehension of the time when a similar cross-circuit revelation would be turned against themselves. Also, it inspired Smith with an added sense of power, and set him to asking what that power might get for him. His answer to this self-questioning is rather startling. He decided to become President of the United States.
At this distance of time, Smith's ambition seems a wild and uncanny dream. To him and to his followers, it was the most serious of realities. Smith had demanded from Clay and Calhoun, the two chief candidates for Presidential nominations, what would be their course toward the Latter Day Saints if nominated and elected to this high office. Both men answered with very proper refusals to take cognizance of any church as such. Clay declined to make any pledges save those implied by his life and record. Calhoun pointed out that the federal authority could give no help to the Mormons in securing redress from Missouri for wrongs suffered while they were residents of that state.
These rebuffs roused Joseph to something as near righteous wrath as his inconsequential good-nature permitted him to feel. He answered with open letters whose windy nonsense has been equalled but rarely even in the political history of our own good and eloquent land. " Crape the heavens with weeds of woe," he exclaims in the epistle to Henry Clay; "gird the earth with sackcloth, and let hell mutter one melody in commemoration of fallen splendour! For the glory of America has departed, and God will set a flaming sword to guard the tree of liberty, while such minttithing Herods as Van Buren, Boggs, Benton, Calhoun, and Clay are thrust out of the realms of virtue
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as fit subjects for the kingdom of fallen greatness--- vox reprobi, vox Diaboli."
He opens his mouth, shines his eyes, and leaves the result to God," said Abraham Lincoln of a ranting orator some years later. The description might be dated back to apply to Joseph Smith.
Smith had not waited on the hatching of this bird of eloquence before proceeding with his quest of the White House. On January 29, 1844, he was nominated at Nauvoo for President of the United States. The exact composition of this nominating body is uncertain. May 17 of the same year ---just a few days after publishing the letters to Clay and Calhoun--- this nomination was confirmed by something which passed for a state convention, also assembled at Nauvoo. In between these two events, Smith had published his "views" on national politics. He declared for the abolition of slavery by empowering the general government to purchase and liberate the slaves; for the annexation, not merely of Texas but of Canada and Mexico when they should ask for that blessing; and for a scheme of national banking that only another Urim and Thummim can make understandable. He wanted the pay of congressmen cut to $2.00 per day and board; but he suggested no reduction in the pay accorded to the President. On the contrary, the Presidential powers were to be exalted, not by changing the Constitution so much as by merely " taking " such powers as an inspired prophet in the White House might think worth having. " Congress, with the President as executor, is as almighty in its sphere as Jehovah is in his," he had stated in his letter to Calhoun; a statement which, coupled with his other outpourings, goes far to to substantiate the claim that
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Joseph Smith was the forerunner of Populists, and the great original New Nationalist.
There was no notion on Smith's part of trusting his campaign to letters and proclamations alone. He immediately organized ---or some one organized for him--- a campaign designed to reach every part of the United States. All the most able and aggressive officers of the church were sent out to drum up votes for the prophet, as formerly they had been sent to find recruits for Zion. Brigham Young, the sane counsellor; Orson Pratt, the ready orator; John D. Lee, unthinking fighter ---all these and scores of others were sent through the nation to organize support for the prophet's ambitions at the very hour when they were most needed to temper his course and protect his life at home.
William and Wilson Law, already mentioned in this history, were two of the wealthiest and most powerful members of the Mormon church. They had establish a saw-mill and flour-mill at Nauvoo, contributed to the building of the city and temple, and loaned the prophet a large sum of money. They were high in his favour for some years. William Law was made counsellor to Joseph and a member of the First Presidency, besides being registrar of the Nauvoo University. Wilson Law was regent of the university and major-general in the Nauvoo Legion. It was this pair, of all men in Nauvoo, whom Joseph had to quarrel with at this critical moment.
The revelation establishing polygamy was written down, as we have seen, July 12, 1843. The practice of polygamy antedated the revelation by at least two years. Brigham Young was married to one of his plural wives in June, 1842, and tradition agrees that
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the spouse then taken was the second to be received into this " new and everlasting covenant." The Laws were among the select number to whom the new doctrine was imparted; and they, seem to have rejected it with indignation from the first. They pointed out that polygamy is directly reprobated in the Book of Mormon, and combated what they claimed was vicious heresy. How long their opposition would have been confined to expostulation within the church cannot be known, for Joseph seems to have made the capital error of trying to secure Mrs. William Law as one of his spiritual wives.
By this time there must have been quite a collection of husbands at Nauvoo whose wives Joseph had sought to secure as stars in his spiritual crown. Such advances are deemed cause for personal vengeance in five American communities out of seven, even to this day. Had William Law taken a shotgun and scattered the prophet's brains on the pavement of the temple, he would have done only what dozens of men similarly offended have done before and since, with no worse penalty than that of being obliged to hear their own virtues set forth to a sympathetic jury. But the Laws were Canadians, trained in that strict discipline and stern obedience to law which are the glory of the British Empire; and they took what they deemed a milder course-though it proved quite as effective a one.
Joining with Sylvester Emmons, one of the few non-Mormons in Nauvoo, and Dr. R. D. Foster, who had had a similar score to settle with the prophet, the Law brothers determined to start a newspaper to expose the misdeeds of Smith, and secure a a reform of the church. Then protested themselves firm believers in
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the Book of Mormon and the Divine mission of the prophet at the beginning of his work, but they held that he had given himself over to the devil, and was now working iniquity. They chose the name Expositor for their paper, and its first and only issue justified the title. It told the story of the revelation establishing polygamy, and the prophet's method of teaching this doctrine to women converts. It condemned Smith's political aspirations. It charged him with financial crookedness. It demanded the immediate and unconditional repeal of the Nauvoo charter; and it pleaded with Mormons in general to abandon the false teachings of a plurality of gods and wives, and return to the primitive purity of the faith.
Mormon historians speak of the Expositor's charges as "filthy lies." The phrase is not a happy one. Aside from the fact that the Expositor merely charged Smith with practising doctrines set forth in a revelations till contained in the church's official book of faith, we may point out that lies alone never stirred up such a storm as was raised by the tales in the Expositor.
The first and likewise the last number of this paper was issued June 7, 1844. The next day, Smith called the city council together, and proceeded to put the Expositor and its editors on trial before that body. Zealous souls who condemn that separation of executive, judicial, and legislative functions which is the keynote of our government may read with profit the results of having those powers joined in the same person. Smith was mayor and president of the court; the council, aldermen, and councillors alike, were his disciples, and wholly obedient to his wish. Dr. Foster. Mr. Emmons, and the Law brothers were not present
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at this "trial" affecting their property and perhaps their safety. Evidence, argument, and hearsay were jumbled together. The session of this beautiful legislative-executive-judicial body lasted all day Saturday. June 8, and was continued to the following Monday. Finally, a resolution was passed declaring the Expositor a public nuisance, and " directing" Mayor Smith to abate that nuisance in any manner he might choose!
The beggars were on horseback, and they rode as beggars have been wont to do since before the proverb was coined. The destruction of which they had justly complained when it overtook their own Millennial Star in Missouri was to be visited on a printing-office which happened to offend them instead of the Gentiles. Smith issued an order to the city marshal, commanding him to destroy the press, " pi " the type, and burn all copies of the Expositor. The marshal took an escort from the Nauvoo Legion, broke into the Expositor building, and carried out his orders with joyous thoroughness. "The within-named press and type is destroyed and 'pied' according to order on this 10th day of June, 1844, at about 8 o'clock p.m.," he wrote on his return of the order.
In only one particular was the prophet's action better than that of the mob which had driven the Mormons from Independence, Missouri. That gathering had tarred and feathered a Mormon elder. Foster and the Laws were not hurt in any way, but they did not wait to see whether this immunity would last. That same night, June 10, they fled to Carthage, the county seat of Hancock county, where they swore out a complaint charging Smith and others with riot. Smith was arrested on this charge June 12, ---and im-
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mediately released on a writ of habeas corpus issued by his own municipal court.
Had Smith surrendered himself and been tried in the ordinary way, the result might have been damaging to his political aspirations, but in all probability his life would have been safe. His efforts to escape the courts led, as might have been expected, to an appeal to the mob. Mass-meetings were held in various parts of Hancock county, and at one of these, resolutions were passed calling for a war of extermination if the prophet were not surrendered. Munchausen-like stories of Mormon outrages ran from mouth to ear through all the surrounding country, armed men gathered at various places, cannon were ordered from larger towns, and an appeal was made to Governor Ford to call out the militia.
Governor Ford was a man of considerable intelligence and fair intentions, but wholly unfitted for dealing with a crisis like that which now confronted him. He arrived at Carthage June 21, heard the tales of the more rabid Gentiles, and sent to Nauvoo for the Mormons to send some one to make him acquainted with their side of the case. Both accounts agreed in the essential facts of the destruction of the Expositor and the release of Smith in defiance of the state courts. The governor put proper officials in command of the assembled militia, harangued the men, and received from them pledges that they would obey his comtltandsand aid him in upholding the law. Upon this he sent word to Nauvoo that the prophet and those of his followers accused of riot would be protected if they surrendered, and be pursued by the whole force of the state if they did not. Smith preferred flight: but was persuaded by his followers to trust
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to the governor's promises. About midnight (June 21st), Joseph. Hyrum, and the other Mormons named in the complaint reached Carthage, and surrendered themselves to the law. All were admitted to bail the next noon, but the prophet and brother were immediately re-arrested on the charge of treason, and lodged in the county jail.
By this time the anti-Mormon sentiment of Hancock county had become so bitter that no legal prosecutions and penalties could satisfy it. A considerable number of Gentiles openly demanded the death of the prophet, and that his followers should be driven from the state by military force. The governor resisted this outrageous demand, but he took no effective measures to secure the safety of his prisoners, claiming afterwards that they were not in his custody, but in that of the sheriff. He disbanded all the militia except a company known as the "Carthage Grays" who, being residents of Hancock county and involved in the quarrel, were among the prophet's bitterest enemies. Setting this company to " guard " the jail in which the Smiths were confined, the governor, on June 27, set out to visit Nauvoo, and talk the Mormons into a right appreciation of the beauties of peace and submission to the law.
The same morning, several hundred militia from Warsaw, known as rabid Mormon haters, started to march to Carthage; from which point they expected to accompany other state troops in the occupation and. perhaps, the sack of Nauvoo. On the way, they were met by a message from the governor ordering them to return to their homes, as the Nauvoo expedition had been given up. The more moderate men of the militia obeyed the order; the more violent continued
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their march toward Carthage. A few miles from town they received a note sent by the Carthage Grays, telling them that now was the time to kill the Smith, and that the way for that killing would be made ease.
Joseph, Hyrum, and two visiting brethren (Willard Richards and John Taylor) were sitting in a large room on the second floor of the jail when the armed mob approached. Only eight men and a sergeant had been left at the jail, and these made no resistance. Climbing the stairs and firing through the door of the room, the mob killed Hyrum Smith. Joseph had a six-shooter pistol which he emptied at the assailants, wounding three of them, and, a moment or two later, he made a rush to the window, and tried to leap out. His appearance brought a volley from the mob outside, and at the same time the attacking party burst into the room, and fired at the prophet from behind. He made the Masonic sign of distress, and then pitched headlong to the ground. Whether he was dead when he fell, or was killed in the yard by a final volley is a disputed point.
If Governor Ford meant to have the Mormon prophet murdered or kidnapped, his movements on the 26th and 27th of June are intelligible. If he meant to avert such a crime, his behaviour becomes a mystery. He disbanded troops on whose loyalty he could rely, and left the prisoners in charge of the Carthage Grays, who had already mutinied at the favours shown the imprisoned prophet. He took no pains to see that the yet more violent men from Warsaw were turned back to their homes. He did not, as he might have done, send the prisoners to a distant county for safe-keeping until the excitement had subsided. He went to Nauvoo the day of the murder
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stayed long enough to establish an alibi, made a meaningless speech to the assembled Mormons, and hurried away without doing anything to justify or explain his trip. Though a pitifully weak man, Ford was by no means a fool Either he was smitten with blindness, or he had been bullied and wheedled into leaving the coast clear for the mob ---probably on the pretext that the Smiths would not be harmed, but seized and sent over to Missouri.
The death of Smith was designed to destroy the Mormon church. That crime failed of its purpose, as mob outrages always fail. It removed an indolent, dreamy visionary from the head of Mormon affairs, and put in his place a grimly practical captain, with despotic temper and a will of flint. There has been on earth no better measure of the folly of a mob than the destruction of Joseph Smith to make room for Brigham Young.
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page 96 CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE NEW PRIEST-KING
THE death of Joseph was an unspeakable shock to the anxious Mormons at Nauvoo. He was at once their prince and prophet; bearer of the Word and the sceptre of the Most High. His speech had been counsel of disaster, and his rule a kingdom of strife. Toil, hardship, exile, battle, murder, and sudden death had been the lot of his followers, and this lot had now overtaken their chief. The man who claimed to be divinely appointed ruler of the earth had fallen before a mob of lynchers in a back prairie town. But "faith, fanatic faith" was as tenacious in Illinois of the nineteenth century as in Persia of the eleventh; and for the moment, at least, the tragic death of Joseph does not seem to have cost him a disciple.
It was plain that the flock needed a new shepherd; and a shepherd was ready. The foregoing chapters of this history have been useless if it is needful at this time to make any extended presentation of the claims of Brigham Young. He occupied a strong, strategic position as president of the Quorum of Apostles. He occupied a yet stronger position in the public mind of the church because of his known loyalty and tried common sense. Of all prominent Mormons, Brigham had been most steadfast in upholding the prophet's authority, and most practical in guiding his people. He had rallied the church when when Joseph
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was in prison in Missouri; he was to rally it again now that Joseph was dead.
Brigham Young was in New Hampshire, electioneering in Smith's campaign for the Presidency, when word came of the prophet's death. Shocked but not dismayed, his practical mind leaped at once to the question of the continuance of Joseph's work. Striking his hand on his knee he exclaimed to a fellowApostle sitting by him: "The keys of the Kingdom are right here with the Church!" The language was accurate, though needlessly theological. The keys of the only kingdom with which he was really concerned were in his own strong right fist, and were to stay there till he followed Joseph across a greater Divide than the one over which he led Joseph's people.
The strong men of the church who had been sent away in furtherance of Smith's political ambition now turned toward Nauvoo. Brigham and most of the Twelve arrived on August 6. Sidney Rigdon, Brigham's only rival, was three days before him. Sidney as the only surviving member of the First Presidency, claimed rulership of the church in Joseph's place. Brigham's partisans answered that the First Presidency had ceased to exist at Joseph's death, and that the next highest body, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, succeeded to control. A special conference of the church was called for the 8th of August. Sidney presented his claims in an eloquent plea which left the people cold. Brigham swept Rigdon and his pretensions aside in a coarse, contemptuous harangue which set the congregation wild with enthusiasm. His rough confidence and overbearing assurance were proof that these masterless men had found their proper chief. When he arose to speak, a miracle of second
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sight) was vouchsafed to hundreds, who saw before them on the platform, not Brigham, but Joseph as he was before the vile mob had pierced his body with lead and spilled his sacred blood on the profane soil of an heretical state. They saw the face of Joseph, heard the voice of Joseph; and they went to their graves believing that on this occasion, the dead prophet was enabled to use the person and voice of the living, and that in some mysterious manner, Brigham and Joseph were melted and mingled until "the twain were as one." By a unanimous vote, the congregation "sustained" the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles with Brigham at their head as high senate and rulers over the desolate church.
Before Young had arrived from the East ---almost before the body of the martyred chief was cold--- the Mormons had voted to abstain from all efforts of vengeance, and leave their wrongs to be righted by the law. There was as much fear as forbearance in this resolution, but it was adhered to even after the first panic had passed; and Brigham not only sanctioned it, but did his best to abolish whatever excuse for hostility might have been afforded by the Mormon community before the catastrophe. The same meeting which made Brigham and the Twelve rulers of the church voted to complete the great temple. Missionaries were sent out as if nothing had happened. Everything showed that the Mormons meant to stay at Nauvoo, and wished to be on as good terms as possible with their more powerful neighbours.
If at this juncture the people of Illinois had been wise enough to proffer peace and friendship to the Mormons, the history of some parts of our country might have been changed. The prophet was dead
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and with him died his claim to direct and exclusive revelation which was an insurmountable barrier to fellowship with other religious bodies. His successor at first made no claim to prophetic authority; indeed, he then expressly disclaimed it. On August 15, Brigham issued his first letter to the church, warning all good Mormons that the place which Joseph Smith had occupied could never be filled by another, and that the Twelve ruled the church by right of their ordination from Joseph. With peace and friendly social intercourse, the Mormon theocracy would have dissolved before it got out of the gristle. It required persecution, multiplied wrongs, undeserved exile, and, above all, the isolation which exile brought, to harden the Mormon people into a veritable kingdom, and set the church theocracy in a mould which endures to this day.
Brigham issued his letter to the church, despatched some missionaries, organized the work on the temple, and then turned to a task that must have given him heartfelt satisfaction, the task of settling old scores with Sidney Rigdon. On September 8, a High Council was held to try Rigdon for divers churchly crimes and misdemeanours. The accused was not present but the trial went on without him, and ended, of course, in his excommunication. When this verdict was carried to the general conference for confirmation, those who dared to vote in Rigdon's favour were themselves suspended. Brigham "gavelled" through his will with as high a hand as ever was displayed by a political chairman in a " close " convention.
This is one of the many incidents which detract from Brigham's claims to greatness; yet even here, the man's courage is as sharply outlined as his tyran-
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nical temper. Sidney Rigdon had a large part in forming Mormonism. He held a host of secrets of the church, and some of them were dangerous secret
He threatened openly to tell all he knew, and bring down the Gentiles in a destroying mob if he were driven from the fold. Brigham picked up the glove on the instant, dared Rigdon to tell whatever he pleased, promised that the Saints had a few tales of their own which Sidney would not care to hear shouted from the housetops; and in the most insulting language he could command, invited his old foe to do his worst. It was scarce ten weeks since the prophet's death, his murderers were still at large, the countryside was ready to spring to new aggressions at far slighter provocation than Sidney Rigdon could furnish. Many of the Apostles were trembling in their boots ---but not Brigham.
It is worthy of note that Rigdon's threat to turn state's evidence was never carried into effect.
The same month which witnessed Brigham's final triumph over his former rival saw him increase his family by two more plural wives. One of these, Emily Partridge, was one of the polygamous widows of Joseph Smith. She was seventh or eighth of Brigham's spiritual and likewise terrestrial partners, and she bore Brigham seven children. In November of the same year, Brigham took another wife; and in February, 1845, he married another of the widows of Joseph Smith. All told, six of Joseph's widows became wives of Brigham.
It is not recorded, however, that he made any advances to the legal widow of Joseph, Emma Hale Smith. Her alliance would have been worth having in an ecclesiastical sense; but Emma
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was bitterly opposed to polygamy, and, altogether, not the kind of woman Brigham wished to add or could have won to his expanding household.
The fall and winter of 1844-45 passed with little excitement and less good-will between Mormons and Gentiles around Nauvoo. The charter of that city was repealed in January, 1845. In April, the governor wrote to Young urging him to take his people to California. In the same month, Brigham and most of the Twelve as a committee addressed a dignified though somewhat magniloquent appeal to President Polk ---an appeal which was never answered. In reality, events were waiting on the trial of the prophet's murderers. Nine men accused of this crime were put on trial May 19, 1845. The case lasted twelve days. There was not a man nor woman in the county who did not know that these accused persons had participated in killing the Smiths; but that knowledge had nothing to do with the outcome of the case. Throughout the trial, armed friends of the defendants occupied the court-room, browbeat the judge, influenced the jury, and intimidated the witnesses. The defending lawyers made as brazen a plea for mob rule as ever was heard in a meeting of Molly McGuires. The verdict of "Not guilty" was a predestined thing.
That verdict, however, was official notice that it was safe to bait and kill Mormons in Illinois, provided one took along enough friends for aids and witnesses. Friction between the two parties increased steadily through the summer, and on September 10 began a series of outrages still known as the "burnings." Armed bands of Gentiles descended on outlying Mormon farms, drove the occupants into Nau-
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voo with only the scantiest personal property, anti burned their buildings and grain-stacks. Two weeks of this work sufficed to concentrate the entire Mormon population of Hancock county in Nauvoo; while the Gentiles, fearing reprisals, remained constantly under arms. Only one Gentile seems to have suffered; Lieutenant Worrell of the Carthage Grays was killed very handily by "Port" Rockwell. Finally a committee of four prominent citizens, one of whom was Stephen A. Douglas, was sent by the governor to restore peace in Hancock county.
The committee found the Mormon leaders weary of the struggle, and willing to emigrate. Some arrangements, probably tentative in character, had been made for removal prior to the "burnings." Brigham Young promised, in behalf of the church, that at least a thousand families, numbering between five and six thousand persons, would move the following spring, without regard to whether their property was sold or not; and that the entire community would go if sales could be effected so as to raise the money. The committee transmitted this pledge to the governor and to the militant Gentile party of Hancock county; the governor stationed a militia force at Nauvoo to guard the Saints during their preparations for exile, and preparations for the Great Trek began.
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THE LAST EXILE
THE rest of autumn and the early months of winter were spent in making ready for the long march. The exact destination of the Saints was uncertain; but all knew that they were to journey beyond the Rocky Mountains. Such a trip required more preparation than had preceded the hasty jumps from county to county and from state to state which had constituted the earlier Mormon migrations. The grim leader now at their head was determined that this should be the last exile his people need endure. He meant to go so far that the new Zion would have time to grow to independent strength before Gentile hostility could again threaten it.
The great difficulty in preparing for the trek was poverty. The Mormon community was poor. Most converts were poor when they joined, and the ceaseless hostility of their neighbours had kept them so. From Ohio to Missouri, from Jackson county to Clay county, from Clay county to Caldwell county, from Missouri to Illinois-no people could gather much gear while driven from pillar to post in this fashion. The Mormons had to make three guineas do the work of much more than five. Appeals were sent to the brethren in England and the eastern states, and quite a sum was raised in this way. Farms in the country round Nauvoo, and houses, stores and lots in town, were thrown on a stagnant market for sale. The
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proceeds went to buy horses, oxen, wagons, and supplies.
The varied industry of the time made partial amends for the lack of ready money. Much that the Mormons could not buy they could make. Nauvoo was turned into a vast wagon shop and tent manufactory. Such of the brethren as had no skill in these labours were sent to other towns, to find any work that offered, and to send their wages to the emigration fund at Nauvoo.
It is at such times that the primitive theocracy or the yet more primitive tribal organization shows to greatest advantage. The Mormon church had lost many adherents in the recent schisms. But among those who remained, there was loyalty and singleness of purpose. They gave unanimous consent to the westward march, leaving their leaders to fix the date and destination. They accepted with equal solidarity the word that those who had wealth must assist those who had none to reach the new Zion. They did not bicker, they did not argue, they did not complain. They worked, obeyed, and were cheerful. The social and political order in which they were enmeshed is death to individuality and progress. But as a means of giving purpose and unity to a motley clan, and of holding it firm in defiance to a world and an age, Mormonism never has been surpassed.
In all the activities of Nauvoo, Brigham Young bore a part. He was captain, preacher, counsellor, foreman and, on occasion, skilled labourer. He worked with his own hands on the boats which were to take the people across the great river in the spring, and on the temple, which the Mormons were determined to finish though they knew it must be left to
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their enemies. He sent young men into distant part of Iowa, Illinois, and even Missouri to buy cattle and horses at cheaper prices than the neighbouring towns were trying to wrest from the needs of Nauvoo, and studied maps of the western country, which consisted chiefly of the conventional signs for mountains, with vacant spaces marked "desert" in between. Heber Kimball was Brigham's most constant companion in work and study. Brigham wanted support, not advice; a lieutenant, not a counsellor; and in Heber Kimball, the Mormon leader had a follower whose loyalty was akin to worship.
There were other and tenderer duties for the Mormon chief to perform before starting on the westward trek. Brigham was not yet sufficiently married. He had begun collecting wives shortly after his return from England in 1841. He was the humble possessor of at least five by the end of 1843. He had taken four wives, among them one of Joseph Smith's widows, in 1844; and three wives, including another Widow Smith, in 1845. But there were still at Nauvoo comely maids and matrons willing to be stars in the crown of the prophet's successor; and Brigham gathered five of these to his capacious bosom in the single month of January, 1846. One of the five was another widow of Joseph, of course; it was hardly possible to collect that many eligibles at Nauvoo without finding at least one desolate widow of the prophet in the number. Brigham consoled two more of these sad ones for their loss of the fractional currency of matrimony before the sum of his weddings was complete.
On February 4, 1846, the Mormons began their exodus from Illinois. The season was open ---for the
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moment; and the first passengers were carried across the river on boats which were kept busy day and night until stopped by the ice. On February 5, camp was formed on Sugar creek, in the then territory of Iowa, nine miles west of the point of crossing. By the middle of the month, a thousand persons had gathered at this rendezvous with wagons, cattle, and equipment for the march. The weather had changed, heavy snows were falling, the mercury dropped to twenty degrees below zero, and teams were crossing the Mississippi on ice. Camp life at such a season would have been a severe trial for seasoned soldiers; and women and children as well as men were huddled on Sugar creek. Nine babies were born in tents and wagons in this camp during this frightful weather. American pioneers have been of hardy stock from the first; and never was that hardihood better shown than in this exodus of the Mormons.
On February 15, Young arrived at Sugar creek, bringing with him several apostles, and Captain Pitt's Nauvoo band. The campers were given two days to sing and dance themselves into forgetfulness of their troubles, and then Brigham assembled them to receive information and orders. He sketched in outline part of the journey which lay ahead; reminded them that only by discipline and co-operation could they hope to accomplish such a trip; and warned them that he meant to keep good order on the march, and that those who took part in it would have to "toe the mark." After this characteristic homily, Brigham returned to Nauvoo, and held a parting service in the almost completed temple, but in a few days he was back at Sugar creek, organizing the campaign. A letter was sent to the governor of Iowa, telling the persecutions which the
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Mormons had endured, and asking for protection during the march across the territory. At last, on March 1, while snow still covered the ground and bitter nights were still the rule, that march was begun.
No people not accustomed to the emergency-filled existence of pioneers could have made that journey. There were no roads. Snows and frost gave way to torrents of spring rain and seas of mud. The emigrants had scarcely half enough cattle for their wagons. Sometimes they covered five miles in a day; sometimes ten, sometimes not even three. At Chariton river, in a tent pitched on ground covered ankle deep with water, the wife of one of the elders gave birth to a child, who carried through life the name of the stream by which he was born. The emigrants had to ford or bridge streams, and corduroy their way across soft bottom-lands. Food was scarce, and only good discipline and communistic sharing saved the expedition from disaster in the first stage of its journey.
At Chariton river, during the halt enforced by
floods, the camp was divided into companies with a semi-military organization. Fifty or sixty wagons constituted a company, each with a captain and second in command, and each provided with a commissary. This last was an indispensable officer, for the emigrants had to buy much of their supplies by the way. They had little money, and little to spare in the way of trade; but what they had was thrown into the common stock, and bartered on the best terms available. Brigham insisted on absolutely honest dealing. Counterfeit money was plentiful in those days, and one Mormon passed some of it to an Iowa farmer. Brigham descended in a hurricane of wrath on the culprit,
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and on the bishop who had pleaded for leniency in the case, and insisted on restitution. His anger was not more a matter of offended morality than of outraged common sense. He knew that if the first company of Mormons travelling through Iowa passed bad money, the following companies might count themselves lucky if left to starve.
From time to time along the road the Mormons established "travelling stakes of Zion" where some of the emigrants stopped and renting or "taking up" land, planted a crop to be harvested by those who came later on the trail. Other Mormons scattered among the pioneer settlements to work on the farms, taking their pay in flour, grain, and other provisions and supplies which went into the common treasury. Not all who thus went down among the Philistines returned safe to Israel; all across Iowa to-day may be found families whose forbears left Nauvoo with the Mormons, and stopped by the wayside. But a surprising proportion of these sorely tried men held true to the project of establishing another Zion beyond the deserts and mountains, where wicked men no more could persecute the chosen Saints of God.
It must not be thought from this tale of Mormon hardships that their march was a creeping procession of gloom. The emigration had its brighter side; and the Mormons, with their utter trust in the Lord and His regents, were of all people best fitted to gather such brightness as might be had. By the end of April, the rains had ceased. Thenceforward the journey lay across a smiling prairie country, with numerous wooded streams where game was plentiful. By this time, too, the people, grown accustomed to travelling, ordered their life by conditions of the camp, rather
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than of the home. Many of the better circumstanced families brought cows which were driven along with the teams. The cream thus afforded was hung from axles to be churned by the jolting of the wagons. Bread would be set and raised on the road, and when a halt was made for the night a little dugout in the hillside furnished an oven in which the loaves were baked. When any considerable stop was made, the whole male population of the camp engaged in work for the neighbouring farmers, or planted grain for the later companies to harvest, or made articles for sale or for use in the camp. The handicraft thus practised might not gain approval from modern aesthetes, but it served.
The leading party, with Brigham in direct command, reached the Missouri river the middle of June, camped at Council Bluffs, and began building boats for the crossing. The main body, following slowly, stopped at the "travelling stake" of Mount Pisgah, one hundred and thirty-eight miles farther east. Here, on June 26, they were overtaken by Captain Allen, of the regular army, who offered to enlist five hundred of their young men for service in the Mexican war which had begun that April. Such Mormons as volunteered were to serve for twelve months, and would form part of the expedition against California. It was believed in Washington that the Mormons intended to settle on the Pacific Coast, and Captain Allen mentioned this in his call for recruits. "Thus is offered to the Mormon people now, this year, an opportunity of sending a portion of their young and intelligent men to the ultimate destination of their whole people, and this entirely at the expense of the United States, and this advance party can thus pave
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the way and look out the land for their brethren to come after them."
Apostle Woodruff, in command at Mount Pisgah, referred the matter to Brigham Young at Council Bluffs. Brigham closed with the proposition at once, and five hundred and forty-nine young Mormons were enlisted. The fighting was ended in California long before they arrived, but they did a certain amount of garrison duty before the expiration of their term. A few remained in California, a few re-enlisted and were lost to the church; but practically all who lived to be mustered out rejoined their brethren.
Mormon writers describe this call for troops as a tyrannical demand made upon a weakened and distressed people; and at the same point to the enlistment of the battalion as proof of the unexampled loyalty of the Saints. Both tales could not be true, and it happens there is not a fraction of truth in either. Captain Allen came, not with a demand for services but with an offer of help, which was seized with eagerness by a people needing nothing so much as steady employment at cash wages. The government believed it was conferring a favour on the Mormons when it made this offer; they believed they were conferring a favor on themselves when they accepted it; and the historian, looking back on the incident, can find no reason to reverse these contemporary judgments. The talk about ardent patriotism is a peculiarly irritating bit of ecclesiastical hypocrisy, and one which could find currency only among a people singularly untrained in all that patriotism means.
Meanwhile, the Mormon exodus from Nauvoo continued unchecked. Major Warren, on guard with a small squad of militia, reported in May that the ferries
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were carrying across thirty-five teams and a proportlonate number of human beings every twenty-four hours. As fast as companies could be organized and assembled on the Iowa side, they took the trail for the unknown land of refuge in the West. An independent witness who rode from Council Bluffs to the Mississippi in July declared that 12,000 Mormons were then moving westward across Iowa. Any honourable antagonism among the Gentiles around Nauvoo would have been satisfied by this wholesale migration; but there were malcontents in the neighbourhood who had little understanding of honour, and who did not scruple to rouse mob violence against the helpless Mormons who remained behind.
Foremost of these counsellors of strife was one T. C. Sharp, editor of the Warsaw Signal. Sharp had been implicated in the murder of Joseph and Hyrum, and had not ceased his efforts to stir up further war against the Mormon community. He brought to the work an energy and perhaps a fanatical sincerity worthy of a better cause; and his credulity or imagination was equal to accepting and circulating any tale of Mormon villainy. So long as Major Warren remained at Nauvoo, his cool courage and skilful tact kept the peace. But Warren marched to Mexico that summer, and there was no one to take his place.
Sharp managed to stir up the Warsaw militia to a move against Nauvoo early in June; but the heroes found they had forgotten their powder, and returned without making an attack. Next month came a more serious disturbance. A number of Mormons harvesting some distance from Nauvoo became involved in a quarrel with a neighbouring farmer, who gathered allies, tied tip the Mormons and flogged them. The
flogged
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row spread like a prairie fire; each side seized prisoners to hold as "hostages"; the militia officer officer whom Governor Ford sent to protect Nauvoo found himself opposed by a larger force of militia commanded by the sheriff of Hancock county, who was bent on driving the Mormons across the river forthwith. A little later, the sheriff's posse, now known as "regulators," was placed under command of another militia officer, so that the visible authority of the state was seen on both sides of the controversy. The Mormons asked sixty days in which to complete their migration. This was refused. A Campbellite preacher named Brockman, a man whose unsavoury reputation gave promise of the evil deeds that followed, was placed at the head of the regulators, and the last "Mormon war" of Illinois was begun.
Brockman advanced to the attack of Nauvoo, September 12, 1846, with about 700 men. The entire Mormon population left in the town hardly exceeded this number; but many so-called "New Citizens," Gentiles from the east and south who had moved in and bought property, took part in the defense. Brockman scattered his riflemen in the adjacent cornfields, and kept up a noisy fire of artillery. The defenders had no artillery, but they made a substitute by boring out some steamboat shafts, and fired six-pound shots from these impromptu cannon. The town was wholly unfortified; a company of regulars would have entered it in fifteen minutes; but after burning powder for an hour or more, Brockman's forces retired, and settled down to a siege. The Mormons lost three men killed and several wounded in the engagement; the regulators lost ten or a dozen wounded, of whom one died.
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There was no hope of protection from Governor Ford, nor of justice from regulators commanded by Brockman and hounded to activity by T. C. Sharp. But a committee of citizens from Quincy came out to see if they could prevent further bloodshed. After some days of negotiation, a treaty was signed, providing that the Mormons should leave as soon as they could cross the river, except ten men, who were to see to the disposal of the unsold property. Brockman was to enter the city, but pledged himself not to molest the citizens or the departing Mormons. He kept his word just as long as the presence of a crowd of sight-seers from Quincy put a constraint upon him. The moment he was left in full control, he ordered all " New Citizens " who had sided with the Mormons to leave at once, and the riffraff under his command enforced the order with the usual aimless brutality of a mob.
The wretched remnant of the Mormons fled before their enemies as in older days the villagers of Italy might have fled before the Huns. Sick men and women were carried away on their beds, sick babies were clutched in their mother's arms as the whole population struggled for the ferries. No one stopped to gather his property; few even halted to seize a day's provisions. They had no tents, no money, and many of them had no horses or wagons. Still they fled; for they believed, and with some show of justice, that any exile was better than to be held prisoners by Brockman's mob. By night of September 18, some seven hundred helpless fugitives were camping on the malarial flats across the river from Nauvoo.
Of all attacks by Gentiles on the Mormon community this was the last and the least defensible. It
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stands without a shred of palliation or excuse. The Mormons were leaving 'Nauvoo; nearly all of them had already gone. Love of cruelty for its own sake, or desire to plunder the property which might otherwise be sold to the "New Citizens," were the sole rational reasons for violence at this time. Doubtless both motives were present in the leaders of the mob. But that men like Sharp and Brockman could rouse hundreds of citizens to follow them in such a senseless and conscienceless crusade shows once more how thin is the mantle of civilization that drapes the naked savagery of the primeval caves.
American citizens did this thing, and American institutions permitted it. By so much, therefore, do our citizenship and our institutions fall short of the democratic ideal of orderly freedom. The raid on Nauvoo repeats the lesson that the great and all but fatal lack in American life is discipline; not the discipline which kings and priests impose on subjects and worshippers, but which free and just-minded men impose on themselves.
Had democracy been less riotous, theocracy had been less attractive. But democracy can claim at least the negative merit that it does not train people to work together for ill. Its worst deeds are mild when set beside those of any temporal or spiritual despotism that history knows. The attack on Nauvoo was a crime which the present writers can neither palliate nor deny-but the attack on Nauvoo fades into insignificance in the shadow of Mountain Meadows.
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XIII
A LONESOME REVELATION
THE wretched victims of mob intolerance remained on the malarial flats opposite Nauvoo, from September 18, 1846, to October 9. The place of their sojourn was well named "Poor Camp." Many were sick before leaving Nauvoo; and after a few days in camp there were none who could be accounted well. Without supplies, without tents, without clothing, without cattle, without strong leaders to arouse and lead them on, they huddled in misery, and waited to see whether help or destruction would reach them first. Crazy shelters were rigged to protect the sickest of their number, and tents made of bedquilts gave some screening to women in childbirth-for such there were, even in this gathering of desolation. The elders who remained at Nauvoo to sell property did all they could; a small subscription was taken up for the Poor Camp fugitives at Quincy; but nothing effective was done until messengers who had been sent West could return with wagons and supplies.
Help arrived from the west October 9; and with it a miracle. As the Saints were preparing to take up their westward march with but the scantiest of provisions, the Lord sent great flocks of quail which fell among the wagons and boats of the refugees, so ex-
hausted that they could be knocked over with sticks or picked up alive with the hands. "Tell this to the
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nations of the earth! Tell it to the kings and nobles and great ones! " exults Brigham in recounting this instance of Divine favour. It is worthy of remark k that the leaders of the party would not permit indiscriminate slaughter of the food supply thus miraculously placed in their hands; and after enough quails had been gathered to vary and replenish their scanty larder, the rest of the birds were allowed to go free. " If we kill when we cannot eat, we shall want to eat when we cannot kill," said Brigham on another, but similar, occasion. It is regrettable that the Indian philosophy thus expressed did not become current among other white men than Mormons.
There were now nearly twelve thousand Mormons scattered across Iowa, or in camp across the Missouri river in what is now Nebraska. About four thousand Saints were at this latter place, under the direct command of Brigham Young. Nearly as many more were gathered at Mount Pisgah; and the rest of the total given were distributed at other and smaller camps, some being as far east as Garden Grove. In addition to these, some of the eastern brethren had assembled at New York, to sail for California by sea, and there join the overland migration; for there was a general though not authoritative impression that the Mormons would colonize the Pacific coast. Finally, there were hundreds of young Mormons who had gone down among the Gentiles in search of work, and whose wages, aside from the pittance needed to support their families, went into the emigration chest. Finer or more steadfast loyalty to a cause and a chieftain never was seen than these exiled, outcast men gave to Mormonism and Brigham Young.
The chief camp on the Missouri was known as
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" Winter Quarters." It was the winter home of a scant third of the Mormons on the march; but it h(-)used Brigham Young; and that was enough to make it seem a dwelling of a host. It occupied the ground where now stands the town of Florence, Nebraska. So long as the Saints remained in any region where unhealthful sites existed, they managed to find one; and Winter Quarters was no exception. The low- ground along the Missouri was christened " Misery Bottoms "; and the illness there engendered was not slow in spreading to the slightly higher ground where the camp was pitched. Stagnant pools near the stream were a choice breeding-ground for mosquitoes; and malaria greeted the travellers almost at once. Besides malaria, there was another disorder, obscure in nature though resembling scurvy, which the Mormons called " black canker." Indeed, there may have been many different infections in this unlucky camp, for descriptions of disease written by laymen are no great help in historical diagnosis.
For three centuries, it is doubtful if any English-
speaking lad has received a proper education in the
doings of his race without wishing he might have been
with Drake, or Hawkins, when they sailed to " barter
bold their English steel for Spanish gold " on the
shores of the Caribbean. Strong-hearted youth can
encounter with a laugh such dangers of those early
adventures as are commonly recounted in history.
The brave but inept Spaniards were victims, rather
than enemies. The real foe of the buccaneers was
disease. It was so with the migrating ' Mormons. The
Gentiles who bombarded them with cannon and proclamations killed, all told, barely twoscore of their
number; the Indians, whom the Mormons held in no
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118 BRIGHAM YOUNG A LONESOME REVELATION 119
small awe, did not dangle the scalp of a single Saint from their belts for years. But at Nauvoo, at Poor Camp, at Winter Quarters, disease slew them by hundreds.
Colonel Thomas L. Kane says that there were more than six hundred deaths in Winter Quarters before the beginning of winter, and that even so late as December one-tenth of the population of the camp were on the sick-list. At Papillon camp, on the Little Butterfly river, the sickness was even worse. Kane himself was ill with the fever at this point, and at one time in August a third of the people in camp were sick. There were not enough well persons to bury the dead; and not enough lumber to supply coffins. On the Missouri river, as in a few cases during the march across Iowa, the Mormons adopted the Indian plan of winding their dead in bark stripped from a tree. Before his illness at Papillon, Colonel Kane had opened an old Indian burial mound. When he recovered, he found that his Mormon host had put the mound to its ancient uses. The trench he had cut through was filled with loosely-covered bodies, and the ground around was furrowed with graves like a ploughed field.
Colonel Kane was destined to perform the classic function of a diplomat for his friends, the Saints, on more than one future occasion. His accounts of Mormon trials and virtues never suffer from lack of either rhetoric or figures. But we know from other sources that the loss and 'Suffering were frightful, and that the sickness had its way unrestrained until cold weather partially checked its ravages. Faith cure was one of the stock properties of Mormonism when it began; and some leaven of it lingers even to this day. Faith
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may may have moved mountains, and certainly has moved multitudes; but plague and cholera and yellow fever and typhoid and malaria seem still to require grosser material means for their eradication.
In the matter of safeguarding health, Brigham Young at this time was as ignorant as any of his followers. But in every other varied need and duty, he was a master. " He sleeps with one eye open and one foot out of bed," declared his admiring followers; and the description seemed true. His finger was on every move the Saints made; and nearly always, it was his finger that pointed the movement. A little city of seven hundred log and turf huts was thrown up at Winter Quarters. The impromptu town was divided into twenty-two wards, each presided over by a bishop. Schools were established-whatever their attitude towards higher learning, the Mormons have been as insistent on primary education as the old New Englanders. Missionaries were sent to England and a few-a very few-to promising points in the eastern states. Machinery for a carding-mill was ordered from Savannah, and later was carried across the plains. Materials for a flour-mill were bought at St. Louis; and when they arrived at Winter Quarters Brigham, as carpenter, superintended the mill's construction. The forty-horsepower working capacity which had won him his supremacy never was better shown than in this death-haunted camp on the banks of the Missouri.
It is as much a tribute to his watchful foresight and keen knowledge of human nature, as to the compelling power of religious zeal, that despair never seems to have visited a Mormon camp during this heart-searching winter. If there was a desertion at this time of
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Saints who had remained faithful hitherto, the fact has escaped record. Work and prayer, dancing and schooling, alternated in regular order throughout the cold season. Every camp had some sort of musical organization, and the post of musician in a Mormon community entailed steady work, then as now.
At Mount Pisgah, Lorenzo Snow was in command most of the winter, and during his term of office he gave a grand party. Snow rejoiced in the possession of a log cabin, fifteen feet by thirty, "with a dirt roof, ground floor, and sod chimney." Here he housed his family of four wives, three of whom bore him children during their stay at this place. For the party, sheets were hung to cover the walls; clean straw was strewn on the floor; and turnips, hollowed out to hold candles, furnished the required candelabra. There were music, recitations, and at the end a dance.
This tale has been told as evidence of a lack of delicacy among the Mormon exiles. The implication may be true, so far as it concerns the giving of a grand ball in such quarters at such a time-a hovel housing a husband and four wives, of whom three were about to become mothers or had just emerged from that travail. But the tale shows as well a determined courage, an habitual cheerfulness, and a serene confidence in the outcome of their adventure, despite the troubles that lay so close behind their adventure and towered visibly ahead. These qualities, on an expedition of the sort that engaged the Mormons, are worth more than even a modest reticence and a nice perception of the proper time to give parties to friends.
Ever since Brigham had taken command of the church, he had been asked to give revelations, after the manner of Joseph. He had resisted this demand
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at Nauvoo, he had resisted it during the march across Iowa. But now, in Winter Quarters, with spring approaching, in which the next stage of their migration must be undertaken, Brigham had things to say which he thought best to cast in the form of a revelation. It was the only one he gave during his life, and we present it here entire:
The word and will of the Lord, given through President Brigham Young, at the Winter Quarters of the Camp of Israel, Omaha Nation, West Bank of Missouri River, near Council Bluffs, January 14th, 1847.
1. The word and will of the Lord concerning the Camp of Israel in their journeyings to the West.
2. Let all the people of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and those who journey with them, be organized into companies, with a covenant and promise to keep all the commandments and statutes of the Lord our God.
3. Let the companies be organized with captains of hundreds, captains of fifties, and captains of tens, with a president and his two counsellors at their head, under the direction of the Twelve Apostles;
4. And this shall be our covenant, that we will walk in all the ordinances of the Lord.
5. Let each company provide themselves with all the teams, wagons, provisions, clothing, and other necessaries for the journey that they can.
6. When the companies are organized, let them go to with their might, to prepare for those who are to tarry.
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7. Let each company with their captains and presidents decide how many can go next spring; then choose out a sufficient number of able-bodied and expert men, to take teams, seeds, and farming utensils, to go as pioneers to prepare for putting in spring crops.
8. Let each company bear an equal proportion, according to the dividend of their property, in taking the poor, the widows, the fatherless, and the families of those who have gone into the army, that the cries of the widow and the fatherless come not up into the ears of the Lord against this people.
9. Let each company prepare houses, and fields for raising grain, for those who are to remain behind this season, and this is the will of the Lord concerning his people.
10. Let every man use all his influence and property to remove this people to the place where the Lord shall locate a stake of Zion.
11. And if ye do this with a pure heart, in all faithfulness, ye shall be blessed; you shall be blessed in your flocks, and in your herds, and in your fields, and in your houses, and in your families.
12. Let my servants, Ezra T. Denson and Erastus Snow, organize a company;
13. And let my servants, Orson Pratt and Wilford Woodruff, organize a company.
14. Also, let my servants, Amasa Lyman and George A. Smith, organize a company;
15. And appoint presidents, and captains of hundreds, and of fifties and of tens.
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16. And let my servants that have been appointed go and teach this my will to the Saints, that they may be ready to go to a land of peace.
17. Go thy way and do as I have told you, and fear not thine enemies; for they shall not have power to stop my work.
18. Zion shall be redeemed in mine own due time.
19. And if any man shall seek to build up himself, and seeketh not my counsel, he shall have no power, and his folly shall be made manifest.
20. Seek ye and keep all your pledges one with another, and covet not that which is thy brother's.
21. Keep yourselves from evil to take the name of the Lord in vain, for I am the Lord your God, even the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob.
22. 1 am he who led the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt, and my arm is stretched out in the last days to save my people Israel.
23. Cease to contend one with another, cease to speak evil of one another.
24. Cease drunkenness, and let your words tend to edifying one another.
25. If thou borrowest of thy neighbor, thou shalt return that which thou borrowed; and if thou canst not repay, then go straightway and tell thy neighbor, lest he condemn thee.
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26. If thou shalt find that which thy neighbor has lost, thou shalt make diligent search till thou shalt deliver it to him again.
27. Thou shalt be diligent in preserving what thou hast, that thou mayest be a wise steward; for it is the free gift of the Lord thy God, and thou art the steward.
28. If thou art merry, praise the Lord with singing, with music, with dancing, and with a prayer of praise and thanksgiving.
29. If thou art sorrowful, call on the Lord thy God with supplication, that your souls may be joyful.
30. Fear not thine enemies, for they are in mine hands, and I will do my pleasure with them.
31. My people must be tried in all things, that they may be prepared to receive the glory that I have for them, even the glory of Zion, and he that will not hear chastisement, is not worthy of my kingdom.
32. Let him that is ignorant learn wisdom by humbling himself and calling upon the Lord his God, that his eyes may be opened that he may see, and his ears opened that he may hear,
33. For my Spirit is sent forth into the world to enlighten the humble and contrite, and to the condemnation of the ungodly.
34. Thy brethren have rejected you and your testimony, even the nation has driven you out;
35. And now cometh the day of their calamity, even the days of sorrow, like a woman that is taken in travail;
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and their sorrow shall be great, unless they speedily repent, yea, very speedily;
36. For they killed the prophets, and them that were sent unto them, and they have shed innocent blood, which crieth from the ground against them
37. Therefore marvel not at these things, for ye are not pure; ye cannot yet bear my glory; but ye shall behold it if ye are faithful in keeping all my words that I have given you from the days of Adam to Abraham; from Abraham to Moses; from Moses to Jesus and his apostles; and from Jesus and his apostles to Joseph Smith, whom I did call upon by mine angels, my ministering servants; and by mine own voice out of the heavens to bring forth my work,
38. Which foundation he did lay, and was faithful and I took him to myself. `
39. Many have marvelled because of his death, but it was needful that he should seal his testimony with his blood, that he might be honored, and the wicked might be condemned.
40. Have I not delivered you from your enemies, only in that I have left a witness of my name?
41. Now, therefore, hearken, O ye people of my church; and ye elders, listen together; you have received my kingdom.
42. Be diligent in keeping all my commandments, lest judgment come upon you, and your faith fail you, and your enemies triumph over you.---so no more at present. Amen, and Amen.
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It will repay a little study, this revelation. The first eighteen verses, aside from the necessary prelude, constitute a military order; and a very wise, keen-eyed, and comprehensive one. The nineteenth verse contains a thinly veiled warning against any ambitious creatures who might seek to infringe Brigham's monopoly of communion with the Lord, and his yet more cherished monopoly of dictating to the Saints. The twentieth to thirtieth verses, inclusive, give some sound social directions, interlarded with a little wholesome grandiloquence, and closing with a counsel of good cheer. From the thirty-first verse to the end, the tone, if not the style, is Joseph's.
The explanation of this reversion to type is not far to seek. The same scribes who took down the multifarious outpourings of Joseph now sat to receive and write down the sparing sentences of Brigham. When he had finished the matters about which he really cared, they added the frills without which the document would not have looked like a revelation to them-nor, perhaps, to those for whom it was intended.
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ACROSS THE DESERT
JOHN FISKE headed his chapter on early explorations in America with the truthful and alluring title, "Strange Coasts." But even Fiske did not recognize how wide was the application of the enchanting legend. The tale he told of Balboa and the Cabots and Frobisher and Magellan was true in some degree even to his own day. For three and a half centuries, each generation of dwellers on American soil sent forth a portion of its sons to explore strange coasts; to seek for "something lost behind the ranges"; to push back a little farther the edge of the wilderness, and found new cities or find new graves as fate might decree. Each year the field of exploration dwindled, but until a generation ago something of it endured; and with it endured the spirit of romance and adventure.
The Mormons were now to take their turn at exploring strange coasts, and adventuring into new lands. Much information---most of it untrue---had been brought back by earlier travellers concerning the western country. Little of this knowledge was accessible to the Mormons, and less dealt with things they needed to know. Beyond the Missouri lay the short grass country, beyond that the mountains, farther yet were awesome deserts and still more rugged hills; and after these the coastlands and the sea. Less than nothing was known of the agricultural possibilities of the land,
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even in California; less than nothing of the chances of finding a place where the Latter Day Saints might build a new Zion, and dwell in prosperous aloofness from the world.
The first and last recorded revelation of Brigham Young ---quoted in the last chapter--- was given January 14, 1847. Therein is outlined the general plan of the expedition; a pioneer company was to go ahead to spy out the land and plant spring crops, either at the final destination or at some convenient point by the way. Other companies were to follow as they could on the trail blazed by the pioneers. Some were expected to remain at least another season at Winter Quarters, and these would be occupied in reaping the grain left planted for them by the brethren of the advance. From the time the revelation was given, more active and detailed preparations for the move went forward; and by conference time in the spring, the first company was nearly ready to start.
Brigham was to lead this pioneer company. He had made every preparation for the trip that could be made with the limited means at his command, including one oblation that was all his own. The Greeks offered sacrifice when setting out on a distant journey. The mediaeval Catholic offered vows; the Puritan offered prayers; but Brigham Young offered marriage. He had added five stars to his celestial crown before starting on the trip from Nauvoo; now, in March, 1847, he conferred on two more women the fractional joys of his husbandship. One of these ---what need to write it?--- was another widow of the martyred Joseph. She was the last of that sorrowing sisterhood to be comforted on the broad bosom of the prophet's successor.
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On April 6, 1847, the seventeenth anniversary of the founding of the church, general conference was held at Winter Quarters. The day before, Heber Kimball had taken cattle and wagons and established a camp some miles west on the Elkhorn river, whence the start was to be made. Immediately after the conference, chosen pioneers began to gather at the rendezvous; but Brigham delayed to hear news of the Saints in Britain. Parley P. Pratt was first of the returning missionaries to reach the Missouri, bringing word that some brethren whose peculations had disgraced the church were excommunicated, and that the affairs of Zion were once more prosperous in England. A couple of days later, John Taylor came in, bringing $2,250 in gold contributed by English members of the church. It arrived too late to be of use in outfitting the leading company; but at least it sent them off with good news ringing in their ears.
April 4 1847, the pioneer squadron got away. One hundred and forty-three men-three of whom were negroes ---were included in this company. They had seventy-two wagons, ninety-three horses, fifty-two mules, sixty-six oxen, nineteen cows, seventeen dogs, an indeterminate number of chickens-and a sixpound cannon. The company had been picked to include blacksmiths, carpenters, wheelwrights, and several of those handy jacks-of-all-trades whom settled industrialism professes to despise but on whom a pioneer community leans as on a staff. Brigham Young, as commander of the expedition, rejoiced in the title of lieutenant-general; and from this elevation the titles graduated down through captains of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens to the captain of artillery, who was also chief blacksmith. Two historians, Willard Rich-
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ards and William Clayton, were chosen to preserve for future generations the story of the Great Trek.
There were three women and two children in the party. Brigham, his brother Lorenzo, and his friend and lieutenant, Heber Kimball, each brought a selected spouse. Brigham, strange to say, did not choose one of his most recent acquisitions for a travelling helpmate. He took Clara Decker Young, who was No. 6 in his collection, a beautiful girl who had married him at Nauvoo three years before when only sixteen years old. Her mother, Harriet Young (formerly the Widow Decker), secured permission to accompany the leader's brother, Lorenzo; and Heber Kimball brought along one of his wives, Ellen Sanders Kimball. Not least strange among the experiences of these good women on the journey was that of being for a time an only wife. The children were the son and stepson of Lorenzo Young.
Discipline of the pioneer company was strict and practical. The bugle blew at five in the morning, when all were to rise, assemble for prayers, feed the cattle, and get breakfast. At seven o'clock the second bugle gave signal for starting. Wherever practical, two wagons moved abreast; and in case an Indian attack was threatened, they were to move five or six abreast. Each man was required to walk beside his wagon, loaded gun in hand, and never to leave the wagon nor lay down the gun without permission of his captain. If his musket had a cap-lock, he was required to remove the cap and cover the point with a leather casing to protect it from dust and the weather; if a flintlock, care of equal measure but different nature was enjoined. At half-past eight in the evening, another
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bugle sent every man to his wagon for prayers, and at nine o'clock all save the sentries were to be in bed. There were two watches each night. Early in the journey, after an exciting day, some of the unpractised sentinels slept at their posts-to have their hats and guns taken away from them by their more wakeful comrades. The ridicule thus pointed helped to tighten the reins of discipline; it was reinforced by the voice of the chief, and the offence was not repeated.
They were enlisted for no light adventure. Other pioneers had crossed the plains before, bound even on longer journeys than the Saints were destined to make. But other pioneers took time for preparation, moved when they were ready, and unless they thought their equipment was sufficient, did not move at all. The Mormons timed their journey by the law of grim necessity, and their equipment was anything which harried exiles could save from the wreck of their Nauvoo fortunes, or collect from more fortunate brethren during the sojourn at Winter Quarters. Other pioneers came as the mere, overflow of an adventurous community. The Mormons were preparing to migrate, not their surplus, but their entire population. They had no permanent base of supplies, no way open for retreat in case of disaster-save at the price of giving up the church organization which they had come to value more than their lives. They believed ---and with some show of reason--- that every man's hand was against them. They feared the Missourians who were trekking toward Oregon on the south side of the Platte. They feared the Indians who roamed over rather than occupied the plains. Both terrors were in a large measure groundless; but
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the Mormons could learn this only by experience; and until that experience was gained, the pioneer company was more heavily freighted with apprehensions than with provisions.
There was another peculiar feature of the Mormon migration. They did not know where they were going. Some had talked of California and some of Oregon, and all had recalled Smith's prophecy that his people would be driven beyond the Rocky Muntains. They meant to make that prophecy true; but further than that, their destination was sealed. Brigham gave no information; he possessed none. They were going to build a new Zion in a new land, he said; just where he did not know; but he would know the right place when he came to it.
Mormon piety has construed this to mean that Brigham had seen the destination of his people in a vision, and that he meant to travel until the place of that vision was reached. Critical history may hesitate at this pious interpretation; but it must accord Brigham a control of his people more wonderful than many clairvoyant trances. Joseph would have described the appointed place in a series of revelations; and had another series to explain the Lord's change of plan if the first visions became impracticable. Brigham engaged in no claptrap. He simply said: " Follow me, and I will lead you to a place where you will be safe "-and they followed.
They moved by slow stages at first, until men and cattle should be hardened to the trail. Camp was made by the usual plains formula of drawing up the wagons in a circle or oval, tongues pointing outward, with a hind wheel of each wagon locked to the fore wheel of its neighbour to the rear. When camp was
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male by a stream, the wagons were formed in a semicircle, resting on the water. One or two openings usually were left in the cordon to drive stock in and out.
April 21, a week after starting, the emigrants had the pleasure of feeding a visiting troop of Pawnees. Considering the capacity of the Indian commissary department and the scantiness of Mormon supplies, this was quite a task; but the Mormons were glad to come through it without bloodshed. They expected an attack that night, but it did not come. As already intimated, the Indians were a source of awe, rather than of danger. They had had little experience with the white man as yet, and did not view him with any great animosity. They coveted his horses and guns, and their socialistic ideas of property were liable to become active at night-particularly in the dark of the moon; but they had no special desire for paleface scalps. Some years later, when hoodlums en route for California gold-fields tried to prove the white man's superior civilization by shooting an inoffensive squaw, there was serious trouble.
Nine days after the visit of the Pawnees the Mormons had their first interview with buffaloes. A herd of sixty-five animals was sighted near Grand Island, and an impromptu hunting party killed eleven with little difficulty. Instead of selecting the young and tender beasts, as they learned to do later, these amateur sportsmen took anything from a sucking calf to a patriarchal bull whose flesh would test the jaws of a hyena. Some even tried to kill the old bulls by shooting them in the forehead. A modern rifle would drive a steel-jacketed ball through even a buffalo's head, but the soft lead bullets of that day, fired with a small
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charge of black powder, simply recoiled from the matted hair and iron skulls. Ever suspicious of marvels, the Mormons were inclined to look for some black magic in this, but when a bull was brought down by a shot in some more vulnerable portion of his anatomy, the explanation was clear.
The Mormons were travelling up the left, or north, bank of the Platte. The Oregon trail lay south of the river; a well-broken route for those days, on which good pasture and company for protection from the Indians were assured. But south of the river, also, were companies of their old enemies of Missouri, and Brigham feared it would not be well for the Saints of the Lord and the sinners of Governor Boggs to come together. He decided that the Mormons would keep north of the Platte, at least until they reached Fort Laramie. They were a peculiar people, seeking a place to build a peculiar Zion, and they would go by their own peculiar trail. Thus it came that Brigham broke the " Old Mormon Road "-now followed mile after mile by the Union Pacific Railroad.
For many days after their first hunt, the Mormons moved among the herds of buffalo. Often the stupid, shaggy brutes were so numerous and close that horsemen had to be sent in advance to scare them out of the path of the wagons. The men feasted in such surroundings, but Brigham forbade needless killing. Coyotes followed the buffalo herd, waiting for a chance to hamstring a calf; and on May 4, the Mormons encountered other pensioners of the bison ---the Indians. A band of four hundred was reported to be in the trail ahead, and manifesting warlike intent. The party advanced with wagons five abreast and every one on the qui vive till a good camping-place was reached.
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Double sentries were posted that night. Again their expectations of attack were disappointed, though had they been less cautious, the danger might have descended. The Indians contented themselves with setting fire to the prairie grass. Naturally, the Mormons believed this illumination was intended for their annoyance, but it was a well-known habit of both Pawnees and Sioux to burn the dry prairie in the spring, that the fresh grass which followed might attract the buffalo. A change of wind and a shower checked the flames and the party advanced next morning as usual. They met no opposition, but the wily Indians managed to steal some of their horses during the next few nights.
The party were breaking trail for those left behind at Winter Quarters, and much ingenuity was expended in conveying information to the host that should follow. Two of the pioneers had devised a cyclometer, which measured distances by the revolutions of the wheels of a wagon; and every ten miles they setup a guide post. The cyclometer was probably not very accurate, but its records were checked by solar observations. Sextants had been brought from England the winter before for this very purpose, and Orson Pratt attended to "taking the sun." Later, when the mountains were reached, he made many measurements of altitude. A large packet of letters was sent back to Winter Quarters by Charles Beaumont, a French furtrader who forded the Platte to visit the Mormon camp. Buffalo skulls were common along the route, and messages were marked on these, and left conspicuously on the trail. On May 10, the company went still farther in this line, and established the first of the "Mormon post-offices"; leaving a letter in a
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box fastened to a stout pole. This " post-office" was about three hundred miles from Winter Quarters.
They had experienced no serious danger, and the human members of the party were well fed, though on more of a meat diet than would be recommended by starvation specialists to-day. But draught animal, cannot eat game, and during this month of May, it seemed as if there were little else to eat. The Indian had continued their prairie-burning tactics. Whether this was done to call the buffalo or to drive away the white man, its results were the same. What grass was left by the flames was eaten by buffaloes. Increased rations of grain were given the animals, than a part of the slender supply of crackers and breadstuffs; and still the oxen and horses lost flesh, and often the night would find them only five or six miles from their starting place. On June 1, when they lumbered into camp opposite Fort Laramie, it was clear that they would have to find a better trail, or their cattle would never carry them to the Rocky Mountains. Brigham and some elders ferried the river in a skin boat brought along for such uses, and were told by the commander of the fort that to travel farther on the north side of the Platte was well-nigh impossible. They were ready now to listen to the word. A ferryboat was procured, and the entire party crossed to the south side.
Even before crossing, however, they had received a band of reinforcements. A party of Mormons from Mississippi had gone west on the Santa Fe trail to Pueblo, where they passed the winter along with the invalids who had been left behind from the Mormon battalion. Seventeen of these Mississippians, most of them belonging to two families, had come to Fort
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Laramie, to intercept and join the general westward and emigration of the Saints. They brought word that members of the battalion expected to be ordered to California, though their term of enlistment would expire before they could reach the coast. As it happened, the order was not given. The invalided members of the Mormon battalion were already marching north to join their brethren.
Fort Laramie was a trading-post maintained by the American Fur Company; and naturally was commanded by a Frenchman. Fur companies must deal with natives on friendly terms, and that is an art the French learned from their coureurs de bois while our Puritan ancestors were burning Pequods in their camp in New England. Captain Bordeaux complimented the Mormons on the good behaviour of their party, and gave them information of the difficult route ahead. A halt was made to mend the wagons; but while this was going on, Brigham did a shrewd stroke of business for the necessitous Saints.
A party of Missourians, among them no less a person than former Governor Boggs, had just passed Fort Laramie, on the Oregon trail. One hundred and twenty-four miles west of the fort, the trail crossed the river once more; and the stream was much too high to be forded. Since he must needs travel by the same route as the Gentiles, Brigham determined to turn the fact to account, and sent on a trusty party with the skin boat to the next crossing. Going light, the boat crew reached the crossing ahead of the Missouri party, and the Gentiles were glad to be ferried across. They paid for this service in provisions flour, sugar, and bacon-and at Missouri prices. Flour was worth $10 per hundred at Fort Laramie;
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but the ferrymen were paid in, flour rated at $2.30 per hundred, with other provisions marked down on a similar scale.
"These supplies were as timely as they were totally unexpected," says the church historian, Whitney. "Their [the Mormons'] provisions were well-nigh exhausted, and to have their flour and meal bags replenished in this far-off region, and at the hands of their old enemies, the Missourians, was regarded by them as little less than a miracle. Apostle Woodruff compared it to the feeding of Israel with manna in the wilderness." With the usual partiality of zealots, the Mormons thanked the Lord for this windfall, rather than the Missourians.
Amasa Lyman and three companions were sent on horseback to Pueblo to bring on the main body of the Mississippi Mormons, while the seventeen at Fort Laramie went forward with Brigham and his company. They started again June 4, and went by easy stages to allow their famished cattle to graze and pick up a little strength before reaching the mountains. It was June 19 before they had again crossed the Platte. The ferry had done such good work that nine men were left to keep it going until the next company of Saints came along, when the ferrymen were to leave their boat in other hands, and continue the march. It proved a profitable venture.
Now began the final climb up the Continental Divide to South Pass. The nights grew cool, and the trail was steep; but the tales which had been told them of deep snows proved untrue, and for days after leaving the Platte they had plenty of grass. On June 26, they crossed South Pass, and seemed surprised to find that instead of a steep, walled cleft,
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the famous pass was no more than a "quietly undulating plain, or prairie." Two days later, they reached the point where the Oregon and California trails separated, and taking the left-hand trail, they once more parted company with the road travelled by the migrating Missourians. That evening they met Colonel Tames Bridger, who maintained a "fort," or tradingpost, of his own on Black's Fork, some hundred miles or more east of Salt Lake.
Brigham questioned the colonel about the Salt Lake country with a persistence indicating that he had already formed some notion of settling there. Bridger gave emphatic judgment that the region was of no agricultural use. Farther south, the country was snore promising, he said; and if they would make slaves of the Indians instead of killing them, they might rub along somehow; but he would give $1,000 for the first ear of corn they raised in the Salt Lake valley.
Colonel Bridger was not much happier as a geographical prophet and agricultural surveyor than Daniel Webster.
Travelling was hard, and sickness had begun to show in the company; but few days passed without some enlivening event. On July 1, they met Elder Samuel Brannan, who in February of the year before had led a party of two hundred and thirty-eight Mormons to California by sea. Things had not gone altogether well with these Saints on the Coast, Brannan reported, but he believed that California was the right place in which to build the new Zion, and had come eastward with a few companions to convert Brigham to the same opinion. That he did not succeed is perhaps due as much to the impossibility of moving the
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whole church across the continent to California as to Brigham's prophetic disinclination to go there.
July 4, the advance guard of thirteen members the Mormon battalion from Pueblo came into cam; . reporting that the rest of the party, one hundred and forty in number, were not far behind. Three day later, the pioneers reached Fort Bridger. The post, famous across a continent, consisted of two incomparably dirty log-houses on one of the islands of Black's Fork. The Mormons camped a half mile beyond Bridger, and that night ice formed at them camp. They must have recalled the colonel's dismal prophecies as they gazed on this token of midsummer frosts.
Making slow progress when in motion and stopping frequently to shoe horses, repair wagons, and rest the sick, the party struggled forward. Bad as the roads were, sickness had now become their chief difficulty. They were in the grip of " mountain fever "; an unidentified malady whose name has since been applied to mild cases of typhoid occurring in those high altitudes. July 12, Young, who had been ailing for some days, was too sick to travel, and an advance guard of forty-three men and twenty-two wagons was sent ahead to break trail. Orson Pratt was put in command of this scouting party-if the term scout can be applied to an explorer who travels with ox-teams.
They were now fairly engaged in the country of deep-cut canons and tumbled mountains. They crossed one creek thirteen times in going eight miles. Some days, though travelling light, they rested at night only four miles from their starting place. Orson Pratt and Erastus Snow climbed several elevations and explored in vain for a more promising trail.
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At last, on July 19, Pratt and Snow caught a glimpse of the valley; and three days later their party was camped where now stands Salt Lake City. While still entangled in the mountains, a messenger from Brigham overtook them, telling them to halt and begin putting in a crop as soon as they reached the valley. When the sick chief joined them, July 24, quite a field had been irrigated, ploughed, and planted.
"This is the right place," he said when they halted on a summit to give him his first glimpse of the valley. "Drive on!"
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page 142 XV
FOUNDING OF ZION
"It was no Garden of the Hesperides upon which the Pioneers gazed upon that memorable July morning," remarks the church historian, Whitney, in a burst of pious rhapsody which Mark Twain would have hailed with delight. The remark contained rather more sound than sense, but such meaning as it does hold is true. Brigham might declare this the right place to stop-for the obvious reason that he could lead his people no farther; Erastus Snow might indulge in wild hurrahs as he looked down from the hills. But the plain fact was that the Salt Lake Valley, viewed with eyes which had been accustomed to the verdure of Illinois, seemed a gray, desolate waste, parching under a midsummer sun. At the foothills was rich grass; on the banks of the few and slender streams was a promising growth of trees. The sky above was that deep, glorious, vital, shimmering blue which only the western mountain-lands can show; a blue varying from palest turquoise to deepest azure, and always with a warm, living quality which the skies of moister lands never possess. The mountains that rimmed this basin were as splendid then as now; and then as now the great lake lay like a changeful mirror in the sun. But instead of the fertile fields, prosperous farms, rich orchards, and avenues of trees that the valley holds to-day, the chief feature was the sombre sage growing out of an ashen soil.
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"Weak and weary as I am, I would rather go a thousand miles farther than remain in such a forsaken place as this," declared Harriet Young, wife of Brigham's brother Lorenzo, and mother of his own present spouse. She saw the place as it was. Her brother-in-law-son-in-law-relationships are apt to be a bit complicated in Mormon households---saw the place as he hoped to make it; and he knew, moreover, that Mormon resources were not equal to moving on to the next place where settlement was known to be possible.
Brigham arrived in the valley to find several acres already planted to crops. The pioneers began ploughing on City Creek July 23, the day after their arrival, but they found the work very different from what they had known it on the moist prairies of the Mississippi valley. Several ploughs were broken in the hard, sun-baked soil, and then some genius suggested flooding it with water from the creek. A rude dam, such as boys use to make a "swimming-hole," was thrown across City creek, and several acres of the low-lying bottoms were drenched. After that, ploughing went better.
Such were the humble beginnings of American irrigation. So far as known, the Mormons were the first men of English speech to carry water to the soil. They did it in a crude awkward way at first, for such is the manner of early greatness. But they started a system of agriculture which has grown until, to-day, fifteen million acres in the United States are under irrigation. Rivers have been turned from their courses, streams have been carried across the Continental Divide, artificial lakes have been created back of clams so gigantic as to seem rather like works of
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nature than upbuildings of man, to bring the life-giving waters to the thirsty earth. Cities are fed from lands whose natural rainfall would scarcely raise a fair crop of sage brush; and thousands of miles of railroads derive their revenue from the products of irrigated fields. When the Mormon of to-day boasts that his ancestors turned a desert into a garden, and pointed the way in which the aching desolation of the American Sahara might be made to yield sustenance for man, he is treading on safe ground. The boast is true.
The honour of having turned the first furrow in the Salt Lake valley is claimed by several. The honour of planting the first potatoes seems to belong to Wilford Woodruff, already one of the Twelve Apostles, and destined to become president of the church. He had some potatoes which he was saving for seed; and though hungry and thirsty when he reached the newly ploughed field, vowed that he would neither eat nor drink until he had started a crop. Wheat and buckwheat were planted that day, as well as potatoes.
The first company of pioneer Mormons, as already stated, reached the valley on Thursday, July 22, 1847. Brigham did not arrive until Saturday, but Pioneers' Day in Utah falls on the twenty-fourth of the month, rather than on the twenty-second. Not the arrival of the leading company, not even the planting of the first crop, is so significant in the eyes of the Mormon people as the arrival of the pioneer prince and priest, who ruled them with a rod of iron for their good and his own satisfaction.
At religious services next day, Orson Pratt was preacher. His text was from Isaiah
"How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet
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of him that bringeth good tidings, that pulisheth peace; that bright good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reagents !
"Thy watchman shall lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing; for they shall see eye to eye when the Lord shall bring again Zion."
Difficult as it may be for the reader to-day to grasp the fact, this learned man and sunburned pioneer held that the words of his text were a prophecy, applying directly and exclusively to the company assembled before him, and their followers who should join in the building of the new City of God.
When Pratt had finished expounding his theme, Brigham addressed a few words to the congregation. He was too weak to stand, and spoke from his armchair, but his words were those of a master. Wilford Woodruff reports that speech as follows
"He told the brethren that they must not work on Sunday; that they would lose five times as much as they. would gain by doing it. None were to hunt or fish on that day, and there should not any man dwell among us who would not observe these rules. They might go and dwell where they pleased, but should not dwell with us. He also said that no man who came here should buy any land; that he had none to sell; but every man should have his land measured out to hint for city and farming purposes. He might till it as he pleased, but he must be industrious and take care of it."
The italics are ours, and we think they are deserved. The confident, complacent despotism of those italicised words has never been surpassed. Brigham's assurance is too great to be called impudence, too
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great even to be classified under the irregular but expressive title of "nerve." It approaches the sublime. This sick exile at the head of a band of expatriated ragamuffins proceeds to lay down a law for them and for all who should come after them. He does not ask their advice nor seek their consent. He tells them what the law is. He serves notice that he is the czar of the region in which their tents are pitched; and that any who question his authority or break his rules must leave. He assumes not merely rulership of the valley but ownership of its soil, declares himself ready to share that ownership on terms and conditions, but not for money; and announces that he will distribute acres as seemeth good in his sight, and that those who receive land of his favour must till it in such manner as to win his approval.
If anything is more amazing than the colossal assurance of this speech, it is the fact that to all intents and purposes Brigham made it good.
It is worth while, also, to notice Brigham's insistence on Sabbath observance and the utilitarian reason he gave for the same-that Sunday work could not prosper. The essential Calvinism of the man's nature never showed more clearly than here. Brigham Young was a son of New England, albeit a son whom New England only mentions in a whisper when calling the roll of her great ones. He built an empire and sustained a faith on which New England looks with abhorrence; he extended and perpetuated, though he did not originate, a marriage system of which New England deems it almost a sin to speak. But deep down in his heart, Brigham Young remained a New England Puritan to the day of his death. His was the Puritan's domineering temper, the Puritan's self-
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righteousness, the Puritan's impatience with other people's sins; and his, likewise, the Puritan's abiding faith in the virtue of work, the advantage of thrift, and the necessity of keeping on the good side of a testy-tempered Providence.
On Monday, July 26, three exploring parties were organized to spy out the land. Brigham told them to search diligently, warning them that they would not find any place so good as the one where the camp was pitched. He was well enough to accompany one of these parties, resting in a carriage. His little prophecy proved correct. On July 28, this party returned, Brigham left his carriage, struck his cane on the ground, and said: " Here will be the temple of our God. Here are the forty acres for the temple. The city can be laid out perfectly square, north and south, east and west." This was not a prophecy, it was an order; and the order was obeyed. The forty acres originally spoken of for the temple block were cut down to ten; but the temple stands where Brigham struck with his cane; and north, south, east, and west, the regular squares of Salt Lake City offer perhaps the most perfect example of checkerboard city architecture in America.
Other parties came in later; but all agreed that the site selected by Brigham was the proper one for their city. They would have yielded to his will in any event; but, as was usually the case, Brigham had made the right decision. While exploring was going on, other pioneers were ploughing and planting, and all in all, eighty-three acres of grain and potatoes were planted within a few days. The season was too late, and the cultivators were too unskilled in the new science of irrigation, to allow any crops to be a suc-
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cess; but at leapt they raised potatoes that made splendid seed for the neat season.
July 29, Captain James Brown came into camp, bringing with him that part of the Mormon battalion which had been left at Pueblo and the Mississippi Mormons who had camped there through the previous winter. Men, women, and children, the newcomers numbered two hundred and forty persons, and brought with them sixty wagons, a hundred horses and mules, and some three hundred head of cattle. The term for which the battalion had enlisted had now expired, and after a stay of some days in camp, Captain Brown event on to California with a small guard, to collect the pay due his soldiers. The men themselves remained in the valley, or took the backward trail to join their families on the road or in Winter (quarters.
Brigham had already decided that a fort was necessary for protection. Indians of the Ute and Shoshone tribes had come to the Mormon camp. Though they seemed good-natured enough, they showed the same thieving propensities as their brethren on the plains, and Brigham had all a New Englander's distrust of the red man. The fort, he decided, should be built in the form of a quadrangle-in reality a succession of log or adobe cabins, joined end to end, and built around a square. Elder Brannan, who had been for a season in California, advocated adobe, or sun-dried bricks, for construction; but the men from the east preferred logs. Both materials were used. Several members of the company reported themselves as brickmakers; and every full-grown man those days could wing an axe and notch a log for building. August 2. Orson Pratt began surveying the "city foursquare."
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while Heber Kimball's team were sent to the canyons to haul down logs for the "fort."
The same day, Ezra T. Benson and "Port " Rockwell, were sent east on horseback to meet the Saints who were following on the pioneer trail. They carried a letter, of which the following is part:
PIONEER CAMP, VALLEY OF THE GREAT SALT LAKE,
August 2, 1847.
To GEN. CHARLES C. RICH AND THE PRESIDENT AND
OFFICERS OF THE EMIGRATING COMPANY.
Dear Brethren: We have delegated our beloved brother, Ezra T. Benson, and escort, to communicate to you by express the cheering intelligence that we have arrived in the most beautiful valley of the Great Salt
Lake; that every soul who left Winter Quarters with us is alive, and almost every one in good health. That portion of the Battalion that was at Pueblo are here with us, together with the Mississippi company that accompanied them, and they are generally well. We number about four hundred souls, and we know of no one but is pleased with the situation. We have commenced the survey of
a city this morning . . . . Let all the brethren and sisters cheer up their hearts and know assuredly that God has heard and has answered their prayers and ours, and led us to a goodly land, and our souls are satisfied therewith . . . . In behalf of the council,
(Signed) BRIGHAM YOUNG, President.
WILLARD RICHARDS, Clerk.
Either Harriet Young and Ellen Kimball had been converted to a more joyful mood, or their forebodings were disregarded in this message of cheer.
On August 6, Brigham and all Apostles who were with him "renewed their covenants by baptism." Brigham baptised his brethren, confirming them and
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"resealing upon each his apostleship"; and Heber Kimball, second in authority to Brigham in the Quorum of the Twelve, performed the same office for his chief. Their persons, and therefore their deeds, being resanctified in this manner, they spent the next day in "selecting their inheritances"; or picking out their blocks in the newly surveyed "city." Brigham took two blocks east of the temple, Heber Kimball chose a block north of one of Brigham's, and the other Apostles present picked their locations or had such assigned to them at the will of their omnipotent chief. Further inheritances of farming lands were selected later.
For some days following, there was much earnest work, but little of a character to be noted by the historian. The fort was pushed as fast as the means at the disposal of the pioneers would permit. Men were sent to the lake to boil salt, and returned with a wagonload of the precious stuff which they had shovelled up as from a sand-beach. Orson Pratt took observations to determine the altitude, and computed the temple block to be 4,309 feet above sea-level. August 16, forty-six members of the battalion and twenty-four pioneers set out on the return journey to Winter Quarters, to join their families. They remeasured the distance with an improved cyclometer, and reckoned it one thousand and thirty-two miles from Winter Quarters on the Missouri to the camp in the valley-. The distance by the Union Pacific Railroad from Omaha to Salt Lake City is one thousand and thirty-seven miles.
Finally, on August 26, Brigham himself with his Apostles and a company totalling one hundred and eight men, started on the return journey. He felt
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that he was more needed in Winter Quarters than in tile Salt Lake valley. He had seen the city "laid out," one hundred and thirty-five ten-acre blocks, with streets one hundred and thirty-two feet wide between. He had bestowed on this embryo metropolis the name of Great Salt Lake City, and only one of these many syllables has been dropped from the present title. He left the fort partly done, twenty-nine houses of the quadrangle being completed. Lastly he left advice, and one bit of that advice is worth quoting here: "Build your houses so that you will have plenty of fresh air in them, or some of you will get sick after sleeping in wagons so long."
Such parts of the homeward journey as deal with meetings with the emigrating brethren belong to another chapter. Brigham and his followers reached Winter Quarters October 31. There, five weeks later, December 5, 1847, the First Presidency of the church, discontinued since the murder of Joseph, was reestablished. Brigham Young was made president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and Heber C. Kimball and Willard Richards were "sustained" as his counsellors.
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page 152 XVI
SIGNS AND MIRACLES
LESS than two hundred persons were left at the little fort in Salt Lake valley, among them the three women who had accompanied the pioneers on their outward march. The little garrison was not wholly dependent on immigration for reinforcements. One white child was born in the valley August 9, daughter of a member of the Mormon battalion and his devoted wife, who had accompanied him on his soldiering, wintered with him at Pueblo, made the long march from that camp to Salt Lake, and arrived in the valley only a few days before her confinement. For some unknown reason, this child's parents wished to honour the Virgin Queen of England as well as the polygamous emperor of the Mormon church; and the unlucky infant was christened "Young Elizabeth Steele." It survived, in spite of such a handicap. Harriet Young, wife of Brigham's brother Lorenzo, presented her husband with another heir shortly after he left the valley on his trip back to Winter Quarters. Other births were chronicled in the camp that winter.
Immigration, however, was the main source of increase; and a party nearly eight times as numerous as the little garrison was already nearing the valley from Winter Quarters. As soon as Brigham and the pioneer squadron had left in April, the remaining leader; began to organize a second and larger troop, which is known n in Mormon records as the "first emigra-
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tion." Like the pioneers, the first emigration formed a gathering camp on the Elkhorn. The leading company of this new emigration left this rendezvous June 18, 1847; the rearguard got away July 4. It was a rather odd coincidence that the death of an empire and the birth of a republic should be recalled in the dates of this one expedition, but no one seems to have noticed it. The rearguard doubtless thought it was setting out for a land of freedom; but assuredly the vanguard had no expectation of meeting a Waterloo.
John Young, brother of Brigham, was commanderin-chief of this expedition. There were five hundred and sixty-six wagons on the march and one thousand five hundred and fifty-three men, women, and children. They had three thousand one hundred oxen and other cattle, and a considerable band of horses, besides sheep, hogs, and chickens. The emigration was divided into four companies of "hundreds," each with a captain at its head. Under each captain of a hundred were two " captains over fifties," and ten or twelve "captains over tens." The naming might be antiquated and biblical; but the organization was practical to the last degree, and proved its value more than once.
There were no great obstacles to surmount in this emigration, though there was a long season of weary toil and considerable hardship. Their road la` plainly before them, with a guide-post planted every ten miles by the brethren who had gone before. The leading company was commanded by Daniel Spencer, a man whose fidelity had been tested in many ways during his membership in the Mormon community. His company, though more exposed than most of the
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others, had little trouble. Jedediah M. Grant, a comparative newcomer in the church, was in command of the third hundred. He had attained this elevation rather by his fiery zeal for the cause than through any respect for his judgment; and he showed at once the peculiar capacity to attract ill fortune that followed him through his short life. His child died early on the journey; his wife died somewhat later, and her body was carried into the Salt Lake valley for burial; Indians stole twenty or more of his company's horses, and a number of their oxen died on the Sweetwater, either from alkali or through eating the "loco" weed.
There was another cause of disturbance in camp. Parley P. Pratt, an Apostle just returned from a successful mission in England, was supposed to exercise a vague overlordship in the emigration. Pratt promptly got into disputes with the actual commanders, his advice was pretty thoroughly ignored, and matters were proceeding in a sort of armed neutrality when the advance party met Brigham and the Apostles on the Big Sandy, September 3. Brigham heard the story of the march, made up his mind on the matter, and the next day took Pratt in hand, and reduced him to proper submission in short order. There is a strong probability that Brigham's judgment was right and his reprimand fully deserved. But so absolute was his authority, so iron was his rule that not even Pratt has recorded the other side of the case. In his autobiography he tells us: "I was severely reproved and chastened. I no doubt deserved this chastisement; and I humbled myself; acknowledged my faults and errors and begged for forgiveness . . . . This school of experience made me more humble and
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careful in the future, and I think it was the means of making me a wiser and better man ever after."
There can be no doubt as to Pratt's humbleness. As to hip improvement in wisdom and other desirable qualities, he was murdered some ten years later as a result of inducing a woman to elope from her husband-by whom she had three children ---and to become Mrs. Pratt No. 9.
The leading company of the first emigration reached the pioneer fort late in September, 1847. The last company trailed in early the following month. October 16, most of the Mormon battalion which had been serving in California arrived in camp. Thirty-two of these, in spite of the late season, continued their march east to Winter Quarters to join their wives and children.
Before starting their return trip, Brigham had organized a "stake of Zion" in the Salt Lake valley, appointing "Father John Smith," uncle of the murdered prophet, as president of the stake. At a conference held October 3, the newcomers "sustained" this selection of the now absent prince, and chose Charles C. Rich and John Young as Father John's advisers. Of civil government, there was as yet no trace; but the ecclesiastical organization, for which Mormonism is now justly famous, was already well developed and rigorously applied.
The pioneers had planted eighty-three acres to divers kinds of fall crops. None of these had matured, though the potatoes thus raised were invaluable fur seed. The returning battalion members from California had brought with them considerable quantities of seed grain, and the first emigration now proceeded to break ground and put in winter crops. Part of the
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time, according to Pratt, they ploughed and seeded in the snow. This work finished, some of the party trade exploring trips. Captain Brown, coming back with the government pay for members of his battalion, bought an old land grant, forty miles north of Salt Lake City, and started a separate colony of his own. The entire party, except those who followed Captain Brown and another founder of outside settlements, were living in the fort which had been started by the pioneers. The houses now extended clear around the ten-acre block, and connecting stockades had been constructed. A census the next spring showed one thousand six hundred and seventy-one persons on the site of the fort, and four hundred and twenty-three cabins built.
It was a winter of much hardship and more discomfort. The settlers had enough provisions to keep them through the season-and they had little more. Trade had been opened with Fort Hall; but the Mormons were too poor to be ready purchasers and Fort Hall prices were all but prohibitive. Sugar and coffee retailed at a dollar per pint; calico ran from fifty to seventy-five cents per yard. Unable to pay such prices, the Mormons parched barley to serve as coffee, and made their bread of home-ground, unbolted flour, containing all the bran of the grain. The health fads of a luxurious generation were anticipated by the makeshifts of poverty.
One little incident of the winter does more than pages of statistics to make the privations of these pioneers seem real. Grown people might be content to escape starvation; but even in the pioneer camp of the Salt Lake valley, children retained their just and proper appetite for "goodies." A little girl of eight
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years had crossed the plains with her parents as hart of the first emigration; a little girl who could recall more prosperious times, and who mourned for the tasty sweetmeats that were gone. Out of some store which mothers always retain to the edge of utter starvation,
this child's mother baked her a "sweet cake"---the very name being significant of a cookery in which cakes were not always sweet. It was set in the window to cool, and the girl's mouth watered as she looked at it. But that window opened, not on the sheltered inner corral, but on the plains outside, and a thieving Indian annexed the precious "sweet cake." The little girl of 1848 is well passed her threescore
years and ten; but the loss of that cake remains one of the tragedies of her lifetime.
By spring, grave and reverend elders were going barefooted to the fields and digging thistle roots to eke out the supply of provisions. Men, women, and children were toiling to get in a crop; and in the houses, warm weather had brought discomforts from which the mild winter had been free. Confident in the dryness of the climate, the settlers had built their houses with flat roofs, and spring rains and melting snows came through in torrents. Indeed, some adobe houses made by these inexperienced workmen dissolved in the short season of wet weather; and even in the best cabins many a woman held a home-made umbrella over the stove as she cooked, or over the bed as she put the baby to sleep.
Eight hundred and seventy-five acres of grain had been planted, partly in the fall, partly in early spring; and the Saints began to feel that their chief task was to endure till the reaping, when another trial menaced them with utter destruction. Crickets appeared in
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countless numbers, eating the grain fields bare. They advanced like a devouring army, crossing ditches filled with water, stopping for no obstacle that the pioneers could devise. And then, just when utter despair filled their hearts, the Lord sent another miracle to save the afflicted worshippers. Gulls by thousands came up from the great lake, and fell upon the devouring crickets. They gorged themselves with the insects till their stomachs could hold no more; then vomited the half-digested pests and returned for a fresh meal. To this day, the gull is a sacred bird in Utah, and the story of the foiling of the crickets is one of the most precious legends of the settling of Zion.
Trouble did not cease with the coming of the gulls, but such difficulties as followed were endurable. Grasshoppers devoured a portion of the crop, and Mormon inexperience with irrigation kept them from reaping as full a harvest from the rest of their ground as they would have gained a dozen years later. But on August 10, 1848, the people kept a harvest festival, and made merry in the knowledge that they had wrung a year's living from the desert.
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page 159 XVII
THE CHURCH POLITICAL
BRIGHAM was chosen president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, December 5, 1847. Heber C. Kimball and Willard Richards were made counsellors to the president, the three constituting the old First Presidency, which had been suspended since the murder of Joseph. Brigham's election was made by the quorum of the
Twelve Apostles. It was "sustained" by the congregation December 27. The formal choice merely a fact which had been clear to every one for three years ---that Brigham Young was brain and hand, king, pope, business-manager and chief-of-police to the entire Mormon organization. Why he should have valued so greatly this recognition of an established fact is one of the mysteries of human nature; but he wrote to a friend that the day of his elevation to the seat of Joseph was the happiest day of his life.
He had been moving towards this goal far fifteen years-ever since he spoke in tongues before the prophet at their first meeting, that summer day in 1832. The earlier stages of his advancement were unconscious and unintentional; he rose because he had qualities that could not be kept down. Later ---the exact moment must have been hidden, even from himself--- he began to covet power; and whatsoever Brigham coveted, that he moved to obtain. His course
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was straightforward. Sidney Rigdon might scheme and plot; Joseph might vacillate and change; but Brigham went on, doing the work that lay nearest to his hand, and trusting some one, something ---prophet, Providence, or lucky star-to bring him the reward of his labours. His friendship for Joseph was loyal and sincere. His reverence for Joseph ---strange as this may seem--- never failed, and perhaps never seriously diminished. But though he loved and revered his chosen prophet, and saved him again and again from enemies without and the worse enemy of folly within, Brigham never allowed reverence to become fulsome adulation. He never forfeited his self-respect, and he compelled the respect of his prophet chief. There is no record, we may remark again, that the polygamous fancies of Joseph ever turned toward the family of Brigham Young.
Brigham had ruled the church more than three years as chief of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. He had triumphed over Sidney Rigdon, nominally on the ground that the Twelve were second to the president alone, and that the president's counsellors were mere advisers, whose rank ended with the death of the chief who appointed them. But Brigham's first act on being made head of the church was to elevate and consolidate the First Presidency, and by consequence to depress the Twelve. He chose for his counsellors his cousin, Willard Richards, and his adulator, Heber C. Kimball. Both could be relied on for absolute devotion to the interest and even the whims of their chief. Their appointment to this position was reckoned a promotion from the Twelve, and the places thus left vacant in that body were filled by men whose influence was comparatively small. It is the old story
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of antagonism between the king and the crown prince.
If Brigham's new title had any effect on his energies, it was to spur him to greater activity. He had climbed to the top of the church. If he wished to go higher, he must build his church higher. Two days before Christmas, 1847, and five days before the congregation had formally ratified his new dignity, Brigham addressed a general epistle to the church. Like his lone revelation, this epistle bears marks of having been edited by church scribes after the main outlines were dictated by Brigham. The grandiloquence which was a national vice in that day, and which Joseph Smith had in ten times triple measure, appears to some slight extent in the language of this epistle ---but not in its ideas. Brigham gives an account of his trip to the Salt Lake valley, and of the further emigration which followed on the trail broken by his pioneers. He describes the valley in terms which at least do no injustice to its merits. He urges all Saints to come as soon as possible to the neighbourhood of Winter Quarters, where they may be outfitted for the journey across the plains to Salt Lake. He gives a list of things which the Saints should bring with them ---stock, trees, vines, grains, fruits, tools, and weapons. The intention to found a self-sufficing little empire in the mountains is fairly apparent, even in this church letter.
All that winter, Brigham and his aids laboured to make ready for the grand emigration in the spring. In May, 1848, camp was formed on the Elkhorn as in previous movements. The leading company, under direct command of Brigham, moved west from this rendezvous June 5 ; the last of the rearguard started July 5. All told, there were two thousand four hun-
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dred and seventeen persons and seven hundred and and ninety-two wagons on the trail. Rather more than half the total-one thousand two hundred and twenty-nine persons and three hundred and ninety-seven wagons-were in the leading division under Brigham; six hundred and sixty-two persons and two hundred and twenty-six wagons came in the middle division under Heber Kimball; and five hundred and twentysix persons with one hundred and sixty-nine wagons formed the rearguard under Willard Richards. The animal census of the companies under Brigham and Heber Kimball wad taken by some of their clerks, and reads as follows
"Oxen, two thousand and twelve; cows, nine hundred and eighty-three; loose cattle, three hundred and thirty-four; horses, one hundred and thirty-two; mules, one hundred and sixteen; sheep, six hundred and fifty-four; pigs, two hundred and thirty-seven; chickens, nine hundred and four; dogs, one hundred and thirty-four; cats, fifty-four; goats, three; geese, ten; ducks, eleven; hives of bees, five; one crow and one squirrel."
The cats were not the least important members of the migration, as the settlers had been troubled with mice. The number of sheep driven across the plains shows that Brigham meant to have business for the carding-machine stowed so carefully in one of his wagons.
The emigrating Mormons were on the road three and one-half months, yet only four of their number died. This is truly a remarkable record, but their trip was not so smooth as to be monotonous. Richards, in particular, fared badly. It was inevitable that the president of the church and his first counsellor
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should attract around themselves more than a due proportion of the stronger and more successful men of the community; and not even military communism could keep equipment equal where abilities were diverse.
Richards had to yoke every milch cow and nearly every yearling heifer to his carts before the end of the journey. Some of his families, men, women, and children, walked all the way from the Missouri river to the Salt Lake valley. On the Sweetwater ---that misnamed stream of ill omen for the Mormons--- a number of Richards' scanty supply of cattle were poisoned and messengers had to be sent to bring back help from the companies ahead. Yet he did not lose a human being on the trip, and finished with all his command in good health. It is an eloquent testimony to the enduring qualities of the human frame when put to a test.
Brigham reached Salt Lake City with part of his company on September 20, 1848, the other companies following in the order and at about the rate of their departure. There were now nearly five thousand persons in the valley, and the first thought of their practical leader was how this considerable colony would manage to live through the winter. The crop, though saved from utter destruction by the gulls, was still a partial failure, and the incoming immigrants had brought but a fraction of the supplies needed to sustain them until another harvest. The outlook was not encouraging; but Brigham faced it cheerfully, and made careful preparation for the next season. Grounds in the city were distributed to the newcomers by lot. A field of eight thousand acres was fenced, divided into small parcels of five, ten, and
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forty-acre tracts, and apportioned in the same manner. Work was begun on roads, and a one per cent property tax was levied for bridge building. Schools were opened, and a council house was started. But the chief care of every one was first to get in a crop, and next to provide some sort of shelter for the coming winter.
That winter proved a time of trial worse than any had anticipated. Expecting a repetition of the milk season a year before, the newcomers had failed to provide themselves with fuel from the canons. Many of them had not built houses, expecting to camp the winter through in their prairie schooners or covered wagons. Instead of the gentle weather they expected, there came a series of storms which piled the canons full of snow; and then followed a season of bitter cold that pinched the half-fed settlers like a breath from Siberia. Stock died by hundreds. Food supplies threatened to give out. On February 8, 1849, an inventory was taken, which showed that there was in the valley only three-quarters of a pound of breadstuffs per capita per day if the supply were to last till July 5. It was believed that some persons had concealed stores; but even so, the condition was little short of desperate. A hunting party was organized, but it brought in little game. Several efforts to reach Fort Bridger were baffled by the snow-filled canon. Some of the poorer families were stewing hides for food before the snow melted and all were digging roots as soon as the spring permitted. The iron rule of their leader was all that saved the colony from shipwreck.
In spite of the gnawing pinch of hunger, Brigham's preparations for empire went steadily forward.
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printing-press and outfit of type had been carried across the plains in this latest emigration. In most American communities, the first use of this resource of civilization would have been the printing of a newspaper, or perhaps a prospectus of lands or mines. But Brigham's practical mind had already set its impress on the exiled Saints; and the printing-press in Utah was baptized in another manner. It was used for the printing of fifty-cent and dollar bills, to provide a circulating medium in the almost complete absence of "United States money." At the time, this was a just and proper proceeding, though perhaps a bit unconventional. But the historian, taking his place with the exiled Mormons, and looking down the years to the present, when the head of the church is likewise president of nearly a dozen commercial corporations, will find something prophetic in this initial use of a printing-press.
The paper "shin-plasters" issued in this manner were countersigned by Brigham as president of the church, and by Heber C. Kimball as " councillor." A little later, the settlers issued gold coins, made from the dust brought east from the new California mines by returning members of the Mormon battalion. Brigham doubtless usurped authority in this action; but it was usurpation, not robbery. He had too much sense to repeat the follies of the "Kirtland Antibanking Society." The paper money was in reality little more than a sort of negotiable order on the tithing house; and the coins struck were later turned into the United States mints as bullion. They were made of pure gold, mostly in $a and $5 denominations. There is no record of any loss to any one
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by reason of Brigham's unauthorized assumption of the right to coin money.
The issuance of money, however, was but one step in Brigham's governmental organization. That organization at first was of a purely ecclesiastical character. Salt Lake City was divided into nineteen wards, with a bishop appointed over each. In reality, the wards were little municipalities, united by the supreme authority of the church head. Later in the spring, the political organization was begun.
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MANNA FROM THE GOLD-SEEKERS
Brigham turned the faces of his persecuted Saints from Nauvoo towards the western mountains, he did so in the hope of getting beyond the reach of Gentile power to a land where the church-state of Mormonism could grow and thrive in peace. In the same hope, at the same time, a band of Mormons from the eastern states took passage for California by sea. These last arrived after a weary voyage, to find that the republic they had fled from had outpaced their laggard colony. The Mexican war had begun, and so far as California was concerned, had ended; and Commodore Stockton was master of the Golden Gate. It is told that one of the elders of the Mormon colony gave a despairing look at the Stars and Stripes fluttering from Telegraph Hill, and exclaimed in heartfelt affliction:
"There's that damned flag again! "
True or not, this tale sets forth the Mormon viewpoint better than many a learned thesis. The Saints had learned by bitter experience that to develop the theocracy they so greatly prized, they must get beyond the reach of their Gentile countrymen. But by the time this lesson was learned, its application way impossible. Brigham did not find "that damned flag" physically present when he entered the Salt Lake valley, but in essentials it was there. Even while he was toiling through the mud of Iowa and the
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sands of the Platte, Taylor and Wool and Scott were drawing a new boundary line so distant that Mormon resources were unequal to crossing it. The nation had grown faster than the church could emigrate.
This fact and its implications must be kept in mind when measuring the character and achievements of Brigham Young. Seldom has an ecclesiastical leader played against more consistent ill fortune than he. The Fates seemed conspiring to keep the word of promise to his ear and break it to his hope. A thousand circumstances combined to make easy the gaining of converts to a creed like Mormonism ---but the stars in their courses forbade the effort to weld these converts into an independent theocratic state.
Looking back from this vantage point of time, one sees that nothing but a succession of miracles could have realized the dreams of Joseph and Brigham. Had the church leaders in 1830 been as clear-sighted as Brigham became fifteen years later; had they possessed wide knowledge and vast financial means-two things which no founder of a new faith ever did possess-they might have taken the infant church forthwith to the fertile and practically vacant valleys of California. With an unbroken run of luck for the next sixteen years, they might have been able to break away from Mexico without falling into the lap of the United States. Then, if no one had discovered gold in the Sacramento valley, if the Civil war had ended in victory for the Confederacy, if a series of complications had kept the power and ambition of the United States on the Pacific coast nicely balanced by that of England, the successors of Joseph Smith might now be rulers of an independent nation in California.
Not one of these essentials to the success of a church-
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empire has been present. Yet, to-day, the successor of Joseph ---and of Brigham--- is in most things an independent and despotic sovereign, a sovereign whose power is growing year by year. He levies and collects taxes. He issues and enforces decrees which have all the effect of laws. He exercises a profound influence on the government within the limits of whose authority he resides, and he believes with a deep and moving faith that his spiritual or physical descendants are destined to overthrow that government and break it in pieces. That so large a measure of church monarchy lives and grows in defiance of historical probability is the work of Brigham Young.
He said on entering the valley: "Now if the Gentiles will let us alone for ten years, I'll ask no odds of them." He needed thirty years, rather than ten; but it soon became clear that he was not to have even the shorter period of grace. The treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo told him that, little as they liked it, the Mormons henceforth must deal with the United States, rather than with Mexico. This necessitated a sharp change of plan. Mexico could be ignored or defied at this distance from the seat of her power; but the United States must be "managed." In the spring of 1849, Brigham took the first direct step toward this management. A convention was called to form a constitution for a new state, which would ask admission to the Union.
That Brigham waited so long before making any move to organize a civil government shows how reluctant he was to abandon his hope of independence. The treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo was signed February 2, 1848. The Salt Lake "convention" met thirteen months later, March 4, 1849. Its deliberations
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lasted about a week. It drew up a constitution of the usual stock pattern which Americans carried in their heads for a hundred years, till the attempt to engraft a Prussian bureaucracy on our historic government made it necessary to expand the fundamental law of a state to the dimensions of an eighteenth century novel. There was the usual triple division of governmental powers, the usual double-barrelled legislature, the usual bill of rights; though this last was rather more emphatic than common in insisting on religious liberty. Nearly all the Mormons were from the northern states or from Europe; but they restricted suffrage and office-holding to "free white male inhabitants." The name chosen for the new commonwealth was "Deseret"; a word derived from the Book of Mormon. The average Gentile, hearing or seeing this word for the first time, usually supposes that it bears some reference to "desert"; but the orthodox meaning of the term is a honey-bee.
The constitution was presented to the people, and adopted unanimously. It would have received the same support had it been written in Chinese; all the Mormons needed to know was that Brigham Young favoured the document. Next in order was the election of officers. This took place March 12, and six hundred and seventy-four votes were polled-rather a small number for a community that aspired to call itself a state. Brigham was the choice for governor, and rightly; the existence of the colony depended on him. The organization of the "supreme court" was less consistent. John Taylor, one of the "associate justices," was not yet a citizen of the United States; and in any community with a sense of humour, the nomination of Heber C. Kimball for a legal position
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would have been treated as a joke. Heber was a capable fellow in many ways; but he knew as much of law as he did of Sanscrit, and cared rather less than he knew. His sole qualification ---an all-sufficient one, however--- was his unquestioning, unreckoning, idolatrous devotion to Brigham Young.
The "legislature" of Deseret was elected later in the season, and its only action that year was to send a delegate to Washington, asking for the admission of Deseret as a state, with an alternative request for formal organization as a territory. Thus began the long-drawn effort of the Mormon church to gain admission to the Union in order to escape the Union's authority. How that application was received will be told in detail later, but its general fate is known to the reader in advance. For forty-six years the church-kingdom was kept cooling its heels in the territorial anteroom of the nation. It was admitted at last only after the church authorities had set their hands to a solemn agreement-which many of them broke the moment they had received the boon of statehood, and which the church as a church has been breaking ever since.
This, however, was on the knees of the .gods; and for the time, Brigham was content to leave it there. He had plenty to occupy his mind without borrowing trouble as to the fate of the petition for statehood. All through the spring and summer, until harvest began, the entire colony was on rations, and very short rations they were. In some families there was an allowance of four ounces of bread per capita per day. Others, who were considered opulent, counted on a half-pound each; but it is doubtful if this latter provision was realized by any one. A little game was
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killed, roots were dug as before, and the rich grasses of a Utah spring fattened cattle so that beef was fairly abundant, but practically all the grain in the valley had to be reserved for planting. In the spring 1849, corn was quoted at $2 and $3 per bushel, wheat at $4 to $5, and potatoes were rated as high as $20 per bushel. Such figures do not express the true scarcity, for none of these supplies were on the market. But the first load of new barley hauled into the city from the harvest of 1849 sold for $2 per bushel; and this at a time when the purchasing power of money was far greater than to-day.
Had there been only a local market for their grain, prices would have dropped to a low level immediately after the harvest; for the crop of 1849 was an excellent one. In point of fact, prices rose. The gold rush to California, the most picturesque and unique migration in history, was already streaming through the secluded valley of the Saints.
On January 24, 1848, Thomas Marshall found in the newly dug tail-race of Sutter's mill in the Sacramento valley some yellow particles which proved to be gold. For a time, an effort was made to keep the discovery secret, but the very birds of the air seemed to carry the news. They carried it to a gold-hungry world; and from nearly every part of the world, from Europe, from China, and the islands of the sea, and most of all from the restless hive of the United States, the human current began flowing to the new El Dorado.
Perhaps the nearest parallel to this California emigration is the one movement with which it has never been compared-the epidemic of pilgrimage to Jerusalem which led to the first Crusade. In each case,
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an age responded to the call of its master passion by hurling itself bodily toward the land where that passion might be gratified. Each rush was prodigal of heroism, of endurance, of meanness, of suffering, of triumph and despair. Each was the first and truly the last of its kind; each had forerunners, but no models; echoes but no successors. Certainly there is little likeness between the "days of forty-nine," and the adventures of Pizarro and Cortez. The Spaniards found gold and silver in Mexico and Peru. But these precious metals were in pagan hands, and could be applied to Christian uses only after a season of strife with their original but unhallowed owners. In California, nature left her treasure house unlocked, and the world raced headlong to share in the spoil. The gold-diggers of California were the first men of English speech under whose laws the ownership of land depended on its use. It is interesting to note that Brigham had taken the same position in his first sermon in the Salt Lake valley.
The rush for gold in the nineteenth century ---like the race for salvation in the eleventh--- touched all classes and upset all plans. Farmers, sailors, mechanics, lawyers, doctors, clergymen, scholars-all were present in the parties which hurried toward the sunset, fearful lest the half-mythical metal of which they heard should be gone before they arrived. Some rushed to the nearest port and engaged passage by sea; others turned their possessions into horses or oxen and wagons, and started overland. These had to pass through the valley of the Great Salt Lake.
Mormon writers always have assumed some mysterious merit in the fact that some members of their battalion were working at Sutter's mill when the gold
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discovery was made. They had as much to do with that event as with the discovery of the planet Neptune; but their presence had large consequences for their distant brethren. Being first on the ground, they had abundant choice of locations, and some of them washed out considerable quantities of gold-dust. Then they set the excited settlement an example it could little appreciate by turning their backs on the " diggings," and joining their families and co-religionists in the Salt Lake valley; of course carrying their newfound riches with them. The first trickle of goldseekers passed through the valley in June, 1849; but found only a half-starved population keeping jealous watch on their fields and herds. By the middle of July the trickle had become a considerable current, and the Mormons were threshing and grinding their new grain, and selling it to the emigrants at famine prices. By August, the emigration was in full tide. The Argonauts, arriving in the valley with jaded teams and impatient hearts, saw the gold brought back by returning members of the Mormon battalion -and the second and more valuable harvest of the Mormons for that year was on.
A Salt Lake letter to the Frontier Guardian tells a part of the story:
"When they saw the bags and kegs of gold-dust brought in by our boys, it made them completely enthusiastic. Pack mules and horses that were worth $25 in ordinary times would readily bring $200 in the most valuable property at the lowest price. Goods and other property were daily offered at auction in all parts of the city. For a light Yankee wagon, sometimes three or four great heavy ones would be offered in exchange, and a yoke of
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oxen thrown in at that. Common domestic sheeting sold from five to ten cents per yard by the bolt. The best of spades and shovels for fifty cents each. Vests that cost in St. Louis one dollar and fifty cents each were sold at Salt Lake for thirty-seven and one-half cents. Full chests of joiners' tools that would cost $150 in the east were sold at Salt Lake for $25. Indeed, almost every article, except sugar and coffee, were selling on an average fifty per cent below wholesale prices in the eastern states."
Many of the articles mentioned in this list are not such as emigrants commonly carry. But the first gold rush for California was more than an ordinary emigration. Hundreds of comparatively wealthy men joined in the movement, buying full stocks of merchandise which they thought would be in demand in the new land, and starting to carry these cargoes across the plains. By the time they reached Salt Lake, word came that "state's goods" were arriving in California by sea; and the disappointed speculators sacrificed their stock on the spot. Besides, only the trail can teach men how little they really need. Many things that seemed necessities at the start, even to that simple generation, had become burdensome impedimenta long before they reached the settlement of the Saints.
The deluge of cheap mercantile stocks was of short duration; but for the rest, the harvest from the emigrants continued for full three years. It reached its height in 1850. Before grain was cut that year, flour was selling at a dollar a pound in Salt Lake City; and after the harvest it still held at $25 per hundred pounds. Fresh horses and oxen, though of inferior weight and breed, could be traded to the hurrying
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emigrants for three or four times their number of better but tired cattle that had made the journey the plains. It became a regular practice in the valley to buy or trade for this jaded stock one year, and sell it back, at four or five times the price, to the next year's band of gold-seekers. As in all lands much frequented by tourists and travellers, there were two prices at Salt Lake, one for natives and one for strangers. Brigham countenanced this, and indeed helped it along by forbidding the emigrants to take unground wheat from the valley; but at the same time, he insisted that men, even Gentiles, must not be turned away hungry from the doors of the Saints. Besides, these prices did not apply to all things. For some unexplained reason, beef remained cheap through the whole period of overland emigration; and Mormon households took Gentile boarders at reasonable rates when the ostensible price of flour was twenty-five cents per pound.
Brigham had too keen a commercial instinct not to appreciate the advantages which this gold rush had brought to his people; but he was wise enough by this time to know that the Fates are apt to wrap a serpent in their gifts. His people were getting supplies which they sadly needed, and were disposing of their surplus grain at undreamed-of profits, but the account was not all on one side of the ledger. They were selling so short that the threat of famine was never far from the settlement. The isolation for which he had hoped was gone; and for the moment, at least, his colony was on one of the world's highways. Then, too, the Saints had begun to get the gold-fever. Men set up fences of colour and caste and creed; but infections, whether mental or physical, leap all barriers; and the
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Mormons of Salt Lake remembered how Brannan had urged them to come on to California. Why not go now, they asked, and claim our share of the gold before the greedy Gentile world gathers it all?
With any other community-or under any other leader which this community ever had-the suction of the gold-fields would have been irresistible. But Brigham knew what he wanted, and he had his people well in hand. He set his face like flint against the gold-craze. "I hope the gold-mines will be no nearer than eight hundred miles!" he declared in one of the scolding sermons which Gentile historians have never been able to understand, but which did more than all fabled "Danite bands" to keep the people in line. "There is more delusion, and the people are more perfectly crazy on this continent than ever before. If you elders of Israel want to go to the gold-mines, go and be damned . . . . I would not give a picayune to keep you from damnation . . . . If the people were united, I would send men to get the gold who would care no more about it than the dust under their feet, and then we would gather millions into the church."
"When the musing spider steps on a red-hot shovel," wrote Mark Twain, "he first exhibits a wild surprise: then he shrivels." Passing Mark's error as to the sex of the average spider, the description may be applied to the Mormons whose desire for the goldfields brought them against the iron purpose and blistering tongue of Brigham. A few of the more venturesome persisted in going, and most of these were cut off from the church. But practically the entire population of the valley remained. Nearest of all settlements to the enchanted land, they contributed least to the gold rush.
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But while holding back the Saints from an indiscriminate rush to the gold-fields, Brigham did something which ---more than almost any other event in the history of Mormonism--- shows the mastery of this man over his people, and the implicit, unquestioning obedience on which he could rely in any emergency. A group of young men were selected by Brigham and his apostles to go to California, and dig gold for the church. They went; and what is much more remarkable, they returned. Some of them were highly successful. They washed gold, not for themselves, but for Zion; they sent back to Utah all their "dust" beyond the cost of a frugal subsistence; and they came back themselves at the call of their churchemperor. There are few more noteworthy things in modern religious history than the spectacle of these young men toiling in the placer mines, not for their own advancement, but that their church might have means with which to upbuild her glory.
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THE WAY OF A SULTAN
BRIGHAM was now established as ruler of a compact little principality. He believed his realm capable of almost indefinite expansion; he had proved its ability to support his colony, and leave a substantial surplus for export. The crop of 1849 gave him and his people their first glimpse of the possibilities of irrigated farming; and Brigham was not slow to grasp the political significance of this economic fact. Trade with gold-seekers was a passing incident, and not an essential part of his programme. He was glad to get needed supplies for his people, sorry that contact with Gentiles had become unavoidable, hopeful that the rush across the plains would cease and leave Zion to herself. But neither the profits nor the dangers of overland traffic made much change in the basic features of his plan.
He had two purposes in life; two purposes so fused together that his unanalytic mind doubtless thought them one. He would build the Mormon colony into a strong, self-supporting, self-sufficing church-state; and he would keep that state absolutely subject to his rule. In pursuit of the first purpose, he laboured to encourage immigration, to spread settlements that would preempt the whole Rocky Mountain region for the church's own, to direct and diversify industry. In furtherance of the second and no less vital aim, he kept every thread of community affairs in his own
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hands, formed what was substantially a church aristocracy, whose fortunes were linked with his own, and perfected the most inescapable system of discipline and espionage ever applied to the entire body of either church or state in modern times.
At the conference held in October, 1849, several important measures were taken to hasten immigration. Foremost of these was the beginning of the "Perpetual Immigration Fund." Five thousand dollar were raised to make a start in this work. The money was used to assist in the immigration of poor but desirable converts, particularly from the British Isles. It was not given them, but loaned; and they were required to pay back the loan either in cash or by labour at the earliest opportunity. This, to be sure, put the immigrant to some extent in the power of the church which had advanced his passage-money; and there were cases in which this power was used in a needlessly harsh manner. But broadly speaking, the assisted immigration of the Mormon church was at that period as free from abuses of this particular kind as any similar movement ever devised.
Besides raising money for immigration, there was a new outburst of missionary activity. Proselyting had not been neglected, even during the darkest hour of the church; and the troubles of the peripatetic Zion did not seem to discourage converts. In 1849, it was estimated that there were 30,000 Mormons in Britain alone. But Mormon missionaries were required be colonization agents as well as evangelists, and this part of the work had lagged. Nine dignitaries of the church were despatched by this October conference of 1849, to labour in the Lord's vineyard in Britain; three went to France, two to Italy, two to Denmark,
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and one to Sweden. Brigham's partiality for the British mission never showed more strongly than in thus assigning more missionaries to England than to the entire continent; but he would have been justified in still greater concentration of effort.
While making preparations to gather the faithful into the fold, Brigham was equally concerned that the fold should be ready to receive them. It was his intention to "stake out" every desirable location in the inter-mountain country, to get it in possession and under control of the Saints before intruding Gentiles should come to disturb the chosen of the Lord. In the spring of 1849, while crops were still uncertain and the colonists were on short rations, a settlement had been made at Provo. In November, 1849, after the conference referred to, the Sanpete and Toole valleys were settled. Ogden was founded the next summer, and soon stakes were planted in every desirable valley of Utah. In the winter of 1849-50, Parley P. Pratt was sent with an exploring party to spy out the land toward the south; and in the course of his march, he passed through the valley of Mountain Meadows. John D. Lee or even Bishop Klingensmith would have been a more appropriate discoverer of this site, in view of what happened there some years later. But Fate writes her dramas in her own discursive fashion, and seldom tries to stage all the characters in the first scene.
The manner in which these settlements were made shows the controlled, directed life of the Mormon community. Utah was peopled by a planned colonization like that of early French Canada, rather than by haphazard overflow like that which settled the rest of the United States. No solitary dreamer followed
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a whisper of a fairer valley further on; no restless pioneer pushed out from the settlements to venture lone-handed into the wilds. In two or three cases a prominent man of the church led his feudal retainers on a colonizing expedition; but that was the nearest approach to individualism. When a new settlement was desired, Brigham would proclaim that fact, and call for volunteers. If volunteers were slow in coming forward, a scolding sermon or perhaps a more personal word of authority would hasten the movement. If men offered for distant settlements who were not wanted, they were told to stay at homeand they stayed. Brigham prescribed the numbers and equipment of each new colony, saw that the required trades were represented among "volunteers," and gave detailed instructions to the head of each expedition concerning location, colony government, intercourse with Indians, and even about crops.
In the matter of Indian management, Brigham scored a decided success. The red men of Utah were not so warlike as those who occupied the Atlantic coast and the Mississippi valley at the coming of the white man. But the nature of the country, its wide deserts and narrow oases, made it difficult for the Indians to retreat before advancing settlements, and tended to bring matters to a sharp issue while the whites were still few in numbers. Brigham met this difficulty in direct, practical fashion. His standing motto, adopted early and retained to the end of his life, was that it is cheaper to feed Indians than to fight them. He had difficulty in getting all his lieutenants to take the same view, and there were some clashes between red men and white; clashes not at all remarkable either for the skill of the combatants
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or the number of the corpses. But few settlements made in regions where Indians were numerous had as little trouble as those of the Mormons.
Nor did Brigham's supervision of affairs end with such broad matters as directing settlements and outlining Indian policy. He was no believer in the plan of letting people follow their natural bent. In his political gospel, all men were born free to join the
Latter Day Saints, and equal in obligation to serve that terrestrial Zion. From the time he entered the valley until the settlement had grown too large for any one to keep in touch with all its activities, Brigham ordered, altered, directed, supervised, and took toll
from every work of any importance in his little empire. Practically every industry of the valley was directed by him, and established at his order; and the men who engaged in it were chosen by him. In many of these industries, he was chief owner, either for himself or for the church. The distinction was doubtless clear in his mind when these partnerships were formed; but it did not remain so. Long before his death, there had ceased to be any definite line between the properties which Brigham held for himself, and those which he held for God Almighty; and in such cases
of uncertainty, he usually gave himself the benefit of the doubt.
It is not easy to see why Brigham thought the manufacture of liquor a necessary branch of industry; but that he did so reckon it is clear. The church discipline, as explained before, frowns on the use of liquors; and Brigham's personal habits were abstemious;---far more so than those of some of his followers. In later life, when weakened by illness, he used occasionally to take a glass of sweetened wine
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and water. That was about the extent of his drinking. Yet as early as the winter of 1849-50, the manufacture of whiskey known as "valley tan" was begun; and Brigham had an interest in the distillery. The stuff turned out by this establishment was no worse than the usual "moonshine," and the canny church authorities used to lessen the likelihood of drunkenness and increase church profits at a stroke by mixing the precious brew with water. Gentiles who bought this stuff used to wax eloquent on the amount one had to swallow to arrive at the "glorious refects thereafter," though a few bibulous-minded Saints appeared to have no such difficulty. When the community was short of seed after the crop failure some years later, Brigham proclaimed severe penalties for any one who should use either grain or potatoes to make whiskey.
The first effort to establish a wine industry in Utah is more excusable. A colony of Swiss vineyardists came to Utah, and settled in the southern part of the territory---the part still known as "Dixie." Winemaking was the only industry they knew; they wished to continue it, and Brigham encouraged and helped them. "Dixie wine" and "valley tan" were at one time among the chief articles of export. Like those ancient Jews who sold to the stranger meat which it was unlawful for them to eat themselves, the Saints had no scruples about contributing to the drunkenness of the Gentile world.
While building up divers forms of simpler manufactures, Brigham never forgot that the chief reliance of his people must be on agriculture. Within a comparatively short time, the Mormons had learned the science and art of irrigation; and they practised
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it with increasing success. In the epistle sent out from Winter Quarters in 1847, Brigham had called on the gathering faithful to bring with them trees and shrubs; and this command was obeyed almost from the first. At least as early as 1849, the Mormons began planting orchards. The planting had little in common with the scientific, commercial orchard business of some irrigated regions to-day; but it served the needs of its time. Utah had thriving apple, peach, and pear orchards thirty years before any other arid state, except California; and in some lines of horticulture, even California was left behind. Every American settler of that day deemed it necessary to his salvation to become a landowner. The Mormons accepted this wise gospel, and demanded that every landowner should in addition be a tree-planter. Not only orchard, but shade and ornamental trees, were brought into the valley. Conspicuous among these last was, and is, the Lombardy poplar. This tree flourishes in northern Utah even more luxuriantly than in northern France, and has become as essential a part of landscapes in the Salt Lake valley as it has been for centuries in the valley of the Seine.
In agriculture, too, Brigham's insistent domination was felt. When he travelled from his palace in Salt Lake City to one of the outlying provinces, he was always expected to preach from the local pulpit. Half the time ---or more--- his sermon would consist of a round scolding on the bad fences of the community, or the choked-up character of their irrigation ditches, or the poor quality of bulls and rams kept for breeding. Brigham had that faculty so vital to a dictator, an incessant and minute though not always accurate observation. In the march across the plains it was
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said that lie could hear the squeak of an ungreased wagon wheel and note a badly fitted ox-yoke twice as far as any other man in the party; and this same instant notice was manifest in his management of his people. To him, it was an economic crime for men to buy anything they could grow or make. The soundness of this view of things is open to dispute; but Brigham held it religiously, and the community followed his will. Each man must raise his vegetables, his wheat, his potatoes, and, if possible, his wool. Macaulay has said that while we may make shift to live under the rule of a tyrant, to be governed by a busybody is more than human nature could bear. Macaulay is a sound historian ---so sound that the half-educated generation which followed on his own deemed him ignorant--- but he failed to make one necessary qualification of his dogma. Human nature can bear anything that is imposed upon it in the name of religion, and upheld by a vigorous and interested priesthood.
There were advantages in this centralized control of industry, especially while the system was new. The diversified experience and quick intelligence which can be bred only under a regime of individualism were at Young's command; and he managed these qualities in a manner that for a season seemed to the advantage of all concerned. The entire weight of church authority was put behind any industry which he wished to establish in the valley. The tithing fund usually furnished a part of the necessary capital, and church command brought the custom. There was no industrial quarrelling, no slip between cup and lip. Brigham saw that the wool-clip was ready when needed by the woollen mills; and that the tannery
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started by church order was supplied with hides. Not even a despotic authority can entirely control the mercantile activities of men, but the church's constant hectoring kept the people buying home products wherever the difference between these and the "Babylonish" things imported from outside was not too great.
The personal element likewise helped for a time in the success of church-managed industry. Brigham was a splendid judge of men-though his prejudices led him into some blunders; and he could shift and alter the directing force of local industry at will. He allowed no misfits in the community, so far as his education and intellect enabled him to recognize misfits. If a man were pursuing a vocation for which he was not adapted, Brigham found something else for him to do. If the manager of a mill were unsatisfactory, Brigham called him on a mission, and put another man in his place. To be called on a mission was a compliment that kept the deposed superintendent from feeling injured, and work better suited to his qualities was found for him when he returned.
So far as one-man management of communities can succeed, the Brighamized industry of the Salt Lake valley was successful. It enforced industry, it lessened friction, it diversified occupations. More important still, it went far toward abolishing the curse of poverty. As soon as starvation ceased to menace the entire community, it ceased to threaten any one in that community. The moment prosperity arrived in the valley, it was distributed, in some measure, to all.
But the effect of this paternal system soon showed itself in a uniform, self-satisfied mediocrity. The little kingdom did not utterly crystallize, because the
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wicked world kept intruding upon it, and compelling it to reshape itself in newer and better forms. But it came as near to crystallization as this outside pressure and infiltration would permit. There was little invention, and less experiment. The grist-mill in Cache valley or Sanpete valley was merely a smaller or larger replica of the grist-mill at Salt Lake City. The orchard of one farm showed only accidental differences from the orchard of the rest. Manufactures were developed to a point where they satisfied the crude wishes of a frontier community, and could undersell merchandise that had to bear the long wagonhaul across the plains. Having reached this point, manufacturing development stopped almost altogether; and when the railroad, a score of years later, brought genuine competition to the valley of the Saints, the product of these church-nourished industries was deserted for the better and cheaper goods from the "shops of Babylon."
Had Brigham's successors been endowed with the same abilities and inspired by the same motives as his own, many evils now grossly apparent in the Mormon church-state might have been minimized or averted. But the fundamental evil of blind submission of the many to arbitrary control by the few would have remained the same.
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A PATRON OF ART
EARLY in the history of the settlement, there appeared in Utah people who were of little use in the production of material wealth ---musicians, painters, actors, dancing- and fencing-masters. If these obtained the favour of King Brigham, they were assisted to make a living in their own way. A teacher of music or dancing was encouraged to open a school, and royal edict went forth that this school must be patronized. It was as much a matter of course that a boy belonging to the "first families" should take regular lessons in music and dancing as that he should be able to repeat his catechism. The first fencing-school opened in Salt Lake City failed, or at least did not prosper; Brigham was not sufficiently interested in this exotic form of physical culture to dragoon his followers into supporting it. But the dancing-schools grew and throve year by year. Even before the Great Trek, the Mormons had been famed as inveterate dancers; and in the new Zion, going to the dances became almost a matter of religion. Brigham himself was an excellent dancer; and he and his apostles were frequent attendants at balls. It was a mark of great favour when Brigham led out some woman on the floor for a cotillion. In fact, when Brigham-or any of his lieutenants of the church,-danced twice at any one ball with an unmarried lady, the gossip was as unctuous and conclu-
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sive as when Louis le Grand paid especial attention to some new favourite. Every one assumed that in the near future, there would be a new polygamous marriage.
As illustrating the grotesque mingling of this rather laboured culture with the hardships of frontier life, we may note that for years throughout the outlying settlements of Utah, the standard price of a ticket to a dance was an order on the tithing-house for a bushel of wheat.
Music was held in at least equal honour with dancing. We have seen how Brigham, on coming out from Nauvoo to cheer the pilgrims, camped on Sugar creek, brought the Nauvoo band with him, and played and danced the people into good humour before assembling them to "lay down the law" that should rule them during their westward march. Choral singing was developed very early in the Utah settlement; and to this day, there is probably no other community of equal numbers in America that has half so many trained part-singers as Salt Lake City.
Music ---at least in its choral and orchestral forms--- is the one art which demands discipline rather than individuality. Yet one of the most individual of all arts was highly honoured in Brigham's empire; the art of the drama. Brigham loved the theatre, and very soon established dramatic performances in Salt Lake City. The actor was a person even more highly considered in the community than the singer or dancing-master. As a rule, the actor had some other vocation, nominally, at least. He was usually a priest, and often a polygamist. Two of Brigham's favourite clerks were actors in his stock company. And it has been said that Brigham himself did not disdain to
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take part in a performance. Several of Brigham's daughters became actresses; and at least three of these became plural wives in prominent families, continuing their work on the stage in the intervals of child-bearing.
Several notable additions to the American stage have come from the Mormon community.
This frank and genuine recognition of dramatic art by the "powers" made Salt Lake City a very pleasant port of call for even the most celebrated actors. Several men and women of international reputation on the stage were induced by Brigham to spend a season in Salt Lake City, playing in his stock company, George Paunceforte,* James A. Herne, and Julia Dean Hayne were some of these, and the last has the honour of having interposed a successful barrier to Brigham's matrimonial ambitions. He fell in love with this ex-
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* In 1897, while travelling along a country road in Japan, at the top of a hill I saw a tea-house and beautiful garden, enclosed within a wall somewhat after English fashion. The swinging sign in front read: " Shakespeare Tavern. George Paunceforte." I could not conceive that any Japanese had such a name. On the other hand it would be more surprising if there were an English tavern in Japan, where foreigners, at that time, were not allowed to own land except within city concessions. And this place carried with it an air of permanency and ownership. At the gate I paused for a moment and studied. " Shakespeare." " George Paunceforte." The conclusion was obvious.
I went in and was greeted by a courtly old Englishman of sixty-five or seventy years of age. He was tall, splendid looking, graceful-his hair and moustaches snow white. His Japanese wife came into the room and bowed her head to the floor as a mark of welcome. He introduced her as Mrs. Paunceforte. While we were taking tea I glanced about and saw a copy of the Mormon Church Deseret News lying on a table. Then I said to Mr. Paunceforte: "Do you remember standing in the lane between Brigham's theatre and one of his houses one afternoon, talking with ' Punk' Young, one of one of Brigham's beautiful and favourite favorite daughters?" He glanced at me quiz
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cellent actress, and pressed his suit with all the ardour of a boy of eighteen, but was firmly if gently rejected. This is the only publicly known instance when Brigham wooed in vain.
But while Brigham countenanced and encouraged such departures from narrow utilitarianism as provided entertainment for himself and contentment for his people, he set his face against other professions which most people do not class as useless. Like the pious colonist of early Pennsylvania, Brigham wanted no "beggars nor olds maydes, neither lawyers nor doctours, with licence to kill and make mischief."
The opposition to doctors, indeed, came near being ingrained in Mormonism. There are few religions which in the first callow confidence of youth have sense enough to keep from taking a fling at the practice of medicine; and the creed of Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon is not among these exceptionally gifted
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zically and replied: "I remember talking to `Punk' Young there whenever I could, which was seldom, for the Lion of the Lord kept a close watch over his daughters, and he had many eyes to help him." Then I interrogated: " Do you remember reaching up and pulling over Brigham's garden wall a branch of an apricot-tree and giving some of the fruit to a little boy who stood in the lane watching you and ` Punk' with rapt admiration? Do you remember urging him to run away with the fruit as a reward?" He laughed and said: " I remember it very well, as it was the last time I had an opportunity to talk with the beautiful ` Punk. "' " Well," I said, " I was that little boy." He seized me in warm embrace and said: " So you are from among my old friends, the Mormons." Then he continued: " I was coming on magnificently in my art in Salt Lake; but I made two inevitable mistakes. I danced once too often at a party with the lovely Amelia Folsom, who was Brigham's favourite wife; and I fell in love, also, with his charming daughter. The meeting in the lane between the theatre and one of Brigham's houses was a tryst. But it was the last. Not even my art, to which Brigham was devoted, was sanctified enough to entitle me to a marriage union with a member of his family." F. J. C,
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faiths. Joseph "healed" Brigham of malarial fever at Nauvoo ---though the exorcised devils came back so promptly that the cured man had to be carried on a mattress to the house of his friend; and there he lay four days before even his iron will and magnificent strength enabled him to continue his journey. Brigham " ministered to" a sick Indian child not long after his arrival in Utah; and got much credit-at least from church historians-from the miracle of cure which he worked. The fact that Brigham's cousin, Willard Richards, was himself a physician doubtless helped modify the original hostility to medicine; but it is not entirely gone, even yet. During early days in Utah, the ordinary rule in dealing with sickness was reversed. When a man was ill, the elders came first to anoint and "administer" to him, and pray over him, and urge him to exert his faith for recovery. If these measures failed, and the Lord did not see fit to heal the patient, the doctors were given a chance. It is worth noting that Brigham did not allow his own illness to progress very far before calling in a physician to relieve Providence from further worry about so important a case.
Brigham's dislike for the legal profession was rather a business-manager's abhorrence of waste, than a tyrant's jealousy of the restraints of law. Restraint touched him so seldom that he had little chance to develop this form of antagonism. He felt that time and money spent in litigation were time and money wasted. It never occurred to his direct and forthright intelligence that the forms which consumed time might on occasion preserve liberty-nor did he think of liberty as a thing in itself worth preserving. Every religious community has practised some form of ar-
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bitration in the settlement of its internal disputes; but the Mormons worked it out in greater detail than any others, and applied it to far more complicated affairs.
On February 14, 1849, Salt Lake City was divided into nineteen wards, each presided over by a bishop. This bishop was not merely an ecclesiastical officer, but a civil one as well. He was a sort of mayor over a little municipality, and also a judge or kadi who was charged with the punishment of minor offences and the settlement of all ordinary disputes. If two of the brethren could not agree, the case was brought before the bishop, who heard both sides and gave judgment. A sort of indefinite appeal to higher church powers was permitted, but was not often exercised. So long as society was simple, and all disputants belonged to the same church, there was little injustice, and a vast saving of time and expense by this method. Brigham used often to score these bishops' courts in unsparing terms; but in this as in all things when checking or trying to guide his people, Brigham's barb was far worse than his bite. In the main he was a just man; his position forced him to desire justice in the vast majority of cases; he had power at any time to end these bishops' courts with a wordand he did not speak that word.
This is as good a place as any to note one error into which nearly every Gentile writer on Mormon institutions has fallen. Every one has taken Brigham's scolding sermons as proof of the awful iniquity of the people who were addressed in such terms. The folly of this is surely obvious, yet it has somehow escaped attention. The outsider who took literally the terms of a domestic curtain lecture would be laughed
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at; yet grave and sober historians have made a similar mistake, and quoted Brigham's scathing rebukes of sin as proof that his people were peculiarly sinful. They prove the speaker's vehemence, and little more. To hear Brigham lecture his people on their shortcomings, one would have thought them all villains; and to hear him praise his people when they were threatened by Gentiles, one would have thought them all saints.
The truth is that Brigham was a sort of scolding housewife to the whole Mormon community. He jawed it into order. We shall have something to say later about the remarkable ecclesiastical machinery by which he maintained his power and authority; but the mechanics of the system were after all of less moment than the dynamics of the man. He was anything rather than a polished orator. He was a good, direct, forceful speaker, charged to the brim with that untranslatable thing known as personality. He was rather coarse, though seldom offensively so. He assumed the right to scold and lecture and berate his people on every imaginable topic, and they granted the claim. He scolded polygamous wives for quarrelling-his own wives among the number. He scolded women for their fondness for ornaments, a favourite topic with church orators from the days of Chrysostom, at least. He "roasted" the sheepmen of Utah for their bad luck in raising lambs; jawed men by name for laziness, for slackness in tithe-paying, for failure to keep discipline in their families. All these topics were threshed out in public, at the tabernacle; and incredible as it may seem, all were written down and printed by church authority. The man who will take the trouble to read fifty pages of the Journal
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of Discourses may not find his respect for Mormonism increased. But if he has any knowledge of evidence, or sense of proportion, he will not take these frank jawings from the pulpit as proof of any unusual wickedness in the congregation.
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THE CHURCH DUKES
WHILE Brigham was thus mindful of the
prosperity and happiness of his people, it
must not be imagined that he forgot the
word of the Lord which came to him through the mouth of Joseph on his return from the British mission in 1842. In that revelation, Brigham was expressly commanded to stay at home and care for his family. Divers misfortunes and upheavals had compelled him to give a liberal construction to that part
of the mandate dealing with his stay at home; but the care of his multifarious family never lacked Brigham's earnest attention.
Even while his people were experimenting with the novel agriculture, Brigham was "selecting his inheritance" with as keen an eye to the main chance as any worldly-minded Gentile ever displayed. Land, water, and timber were the only visible values in Utah at that time. Brigham had forbidden the speculative holding of land in his first sermon in the valley. But in the same sermon he had claimed ownership of the entire region for the Lord and His Saints. As administrator for the Lord's part of the estate, perhaps it was natural for Brigham to take his pay in kind; and certainly at his death, some of the best land in the valley passed to his heirs by will.
Water and timber could be had by securing control of the canons in the nearby mountain ranges.
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At the October conference of 1852----a conference of the church, please note, not a meeting of the law making body---Brigham proposed to turn these canon over to individuals who should build roads into them and collect toll. In effect, this gave the city's sole supply of wood and the settlement's chief supply of irrigating water into private hands, with no restrictions as to the duration of this control, or the charge that might be exacted. The meekest Gentile community would hesitate before putting itself so unreservedly into the grip of a corporation. But the Mormon empire gloried in a meekness ---toward it spiritual lords--- compared to which the most docile gathering of American Gentiles is stiff rebellious. Young's proposition was carried by unanimous vote; and when the canons were assigned to favoured individuals, it was found that he had one of the best.*
This is a fair illustration of Brigham's keen moneymaking instinct at work. As the shepherd of his people, he deemed it his duty to protect them from wolves -and his right to gather their fleeces. To the bet o f his knowledge and ability, he did both. It would b, unfair to charge him with unusual greed. The private fortune which he amassed---almost wholly from his position as head of the church---is not so
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* This is by no means the first grant of the sort. City Creek's canon had been assigned to Brigham by the "Deseret Legislature" in 1850, and the same body apportioned divers choice portions of wood and water to favoured church dignitaries. Buthe case of 1852 shows at once Brigham's frank claim to emollu- his absolute mastery of the church, and the church's undisguised control of political and economic affairs. It is much as if the Archbishop of Canterbury should come before the Anglican church with a claim for dock privileges at Southampton, or if the college of cardinals should grant to pPrivate parties the privilege of charging tolls on the canals of Venice.
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large as many a captain of industry has taken from a smaller community for less valuable services. It was not so large a fortune as some "brave and selfsacrificing missionaries" of other churches ---and their sons--- have gathered in the Hawaiian Islands. But that the prophet, seer, and revelator of God on earth, the one direct link between the world and the heavens, should concern himself with money-making at all is a shock to the religious sense of the devout, and to the sense of fair play by which, in the absence of more authentic guides, the heretic must set his course. As head of the church, Brigham made merchandise of the gospel; as ruler of his people, he gave no account of the moneys placed in his hands for community use. At no other point in his varied career does Brigham so far fall short of the required stature of greatness as in this, his money-changing in the temple where he ruled as high priest.
Considered as a bit of practical statecraft, however, Brigham's care to put money into his purse is easily understood. He meant to rule his people as long as he lived, and that his sons, if possible, should rule after him; and he had no notion of being a king in rags. Neither did he imagine that he could be king without a supporting aristocracy. His first act, after his formal elevation to headship of the church, was to surround himself with relatives and friends as bulwarks against possible disaffection. His first care on being settled in Utah was to tie the chief men of the church to himself with bands of self-interest; to create a group of ducal families whose dignity and riches should be derived from the favour of himself as king.
At the head of this ducal aristocracy was Heber
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C. Kimball. Aside from the diffuseness of his marital relations and the singular concentration of his religious and political allegiance, Kimball was a typical New England Yankee; austere of look, deliberate of voice, piercing of eye. He was highly esteemed as a prophet, not in the sense of having an especial license to speak the Lord's will to His people, for that was Brigham's monopoly; but in the sense of being a foreteller of events. He promised Parley P. Pratt an heir by his first wife, who was already a consumptive of some years' standing, at a time when the devout couple had quite given up hope. The prophecy was fulfilled, though the mother died almost as soon as the child was born. During the pinching poverty of early days, before the crop of 1849 had banished for a season the threat of famine, Kimball prophesied that within three years, "state's goods" would be sold in Salt Lake valley cheaper than in the cities of the east. This prediction was fulfilled in the most unexpected way by the harvest from the overland gold-seekers, as recounted in a previous chapter.
Heber's own estimate of the accuracy of his prophecies may be judged from his statement that if he hit the truth once in ten times, he was still doing better than most soothsayers. In that comment, his dry, Yankee sense shone through the trappings of zealotry and pretence.
But the distinguishing characteristic of Heber Kimball was not his gift of prophecy. It was rather his incredible coarseness of speech; a coarseness which would have banished him from any society, save one which obeyed him as prince or revered him as prophet. He did not stop with shocking conventional modesty; he must needs use speech which roused a physiological
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disgust in his hearers. He discussed the most intimate personal matters in the most public way. In all things a worshipper rather than a mere admirer of Brigham, Heber seems to have tried to imitate the scolding sermons of his idol. But while Brigham, like Shakespeare, dealt in filth only as he found it mixed with life; Heber, like Swift, reveled in filth for filth's sake. The comparison does both saints too much literary honour; but it serves to mark a distinction which cannot be explained in more specific fashion.
With Heber, as with Brigham, a fondness for incendiary speech was joined to a reluctance for violent action. During the "reformation" a few years later, Heber's sermons, like those of his chief, were a direct incitement to riot and murder; but Kimball seems to have borne no direct part in the deeds which his unbridled tirades helped to precipitate. He preached the doctrine of blood atonement; but he seems never to have taken this method of atoning for any one's sin:. His coarseness and lack of reticence made him useful to Brigham. He said the things which Brigham wanted said, and did not care to utter himself. I n public and private discourse for year on year, Heber C. Kimball bore witness to his faith that-to all intents and purposes-Brigham was God incarnate (n earth. And with all his coarseness, with all his almost sickening adulation of his chief, Heber Kimball was a man cast in a good-sized mould. He had 1 twenty or more wives and a swarm of children, an I seems to have been loved by all of them. He was always ready to share his last sack of flour in time of distress-or to exact the last sack in time of plenty from a recalcitrant tithe-payer.
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On the left of Brigham, as Kimball stood on the right, was William Richards, third member of the First Presidency. A large, stout man, with kindly, Franklinesque face, and gentle manner, Richards brought to the councils of the church an element of refinement sorely needed, and ofttimes sadly insufficient. He was a physician and, for the times, a good one; and through his familiarity with Joseph the prophet, Willard Richards wrote some of his medical ideas into holy writ by inspiring Joseph to dictate the "Word of Wisdom." Richards was entirely devoted to his chief and cousin, Brigham; but the services he was asked to perform were gentler in character than those demanded of some others. It was his part to edit the Deseret News, then as now the official organ of the Mormon empire-and bring the power of the press to Brigham's support; to serve as postmaster, and make the United States mails subject to Brigham's orders; to " comb the whiskers " of Brigham's rough language, and put it into shape for more fastidious company.
Of a directly opposite character was Jedediah M. Grant, first mayor of Salt Lake City, founder, or at least chief preacher, of the "reformation" whose blood-stained annals we are approaching; and proponent of the doctrine of "blood atonement," which has done more than any other thing save polygamy to bring Mormonism into disrepute. Grant became counsellor to Brigham upon the death of Willard Richards. Grant was a tall, thin, cadaverous-looking man, whose utterly undisciplined nature was inspired by an utterly unquestioning zeal. He was an ignorant Cotton Mather, a polygamous du Chayla. His church biographer paints him as striding over the fields of
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the South, preaching with flaming appeal and threat his favourite gospel. And the picture is symbolic. He seemed to delight in the ferocities of his religion; to welcome opposition that he might feed the fires of his fanaticism. He was incapable of doubt and insensible to fear. That he was sincere is beyond question. He has been called the "sledge-hammer of Brigham," but in truth he was the one man in the valley whom Brigham could not manage. He was described by a contemporary as "the most essential blackguard in the pulpit," but blackguardism ---even if this charge were true--- is a mild offence compared to his thirsty teaching of blood atonement.
George A. Smith, a cousin of the murdered prophet, owed his elevation to the fact that Brigham needed some members of the Smith family in his train. As an Apostle, George A. Smith made an imposing figure; and was content with that statuesque part. He was perhaps the ablest member of his family, intellectually speaking, though that is not extravagant praise. At one time, when Brigham wished a legal dummy, George A. Smith was made trustee in trust for the church. He assumed the dignities of the office-and then Brigham, George, and the Mormon people promptly forgot the whole matter; and church business was transacted with Brigham once more.
John Taylor, who succeeded Brigham as president of the church; was an Englishman of good stock, a well-educated, dignified man. Normally, he was a straightforward and truthful man also, though apt to wax a bit too enthusiastic in picturing the glories of Zion. . Yet his name is linked with a piece of the most unblushing falsehood that even ecclesiastical history can show. In the summer of 1850, at Boulogne-sur-
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mer, John Taylor denied that his church taught or practised polygamy. He protested that the charge of polygamy was too outrageous for belief, and in every way strove to give the impression that he and his fellow Saints regarded such a doctrine with horror and aversion. At that very moment, John Taylor was the husband of at least four wives. He must have known that his falsehood for his church would find him out; yet he denied the truth, because he was ordered to deny it. He would have sworn that Utah was a level plain had he been ordered to do so. The blighting nature of theocratic absolutism is not often better illustrated than in the case of John Taylor, a decent gentleman by instinct, a brave, chivalrous gentleman by nature, who never discredited himself in any act or word of his own volition and yet deemed it an honour to discredit himself by prophetic command.
Taylor's native integrity was demonstrated later when he himself succeeded Brigham. One of his first acts was to separate church properties from personal holdings; to institute strict accountings; to limit the access of priests to community, funds. But after all, he merely changed temporarily the method of the despotism-not the despotism itself.
It is needless to give extended portraits of other members of the church aristocracy which Brigham was gathering around him. One man, however, must be noticed; not because he came within the charmed circle, but because he did not. This man was Orson Pratt. A deep student, a devout Mormon, an able, handsome, dignified man, Orson Pratt suffered all the later years of his life from one of Brigham's few personal prejudices. The cause of that prejudice must remain uncertain; but the present writers believe it
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due primarily to Brigham's jealousy of Pratt's attainments. Brigham was fond of sneering at learning, but he was too much of a New Englander not to covet it. His loudly voiced contempt concealed a great wistfulness. He never hesitated to use Pratt. It was Orson Pratt who was assigned to conduct the argument with Newman as to whether the Bible sanctions polygamy. It was Orson Pratt who invented the weird "Deseret alphabet" which was to mark off the printing-presses of the Lord's chosen from those given over to the ungodliness of Gentiles. But Orson Pratt was left poor when far less able men were assisted to wealth, and was pushed down in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to keep him from succeeding to the presidency on Brigham's death.
All these church dukes were polygamous. Willard Richards was deemed rather scantily married, and he had about eleven wives. Heber Kimball was reputed to have more than twenty. All were reputed to be "good family men," nor was this quality due solely to their large experience in that line. And all owed their prominence in the church, their success in finance, and their esteem by the community to the favour of Brigham Young. Not even Jedediah Grant need be excepted from this last classification. Grant's ferocious zeal and utter fearlessness would have made him a marked man in any community; but there never was a moment when Brigham could not have crushed him with a word. Brigham's embarrassment in this case was that he did not want to crush Grant, only to manage him; and with the best will in the world to be managed by the chief whom he revered as the visible regent of God, Jedediah Grant was about as bridlewise as the classic pony of Mazeppa.
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In these men, Brigham had what polite Europe calls an aristocracy, and what blunt America dubs a political machine. In the tithing system he had a financial power which carried the church through troubles that would have wrecked any organization depending on voluntary contributions.
The tithing law, as noted before, was established at Far West, Missouri, on July 8, 1838. We have given reasons for believing Brigham Young the author of this first practical financial plan in the annals of the church. By the terms of this rule, every convert, on coming into the fold of the Saints, had to give ten per cent of his property to the church. When he had tithed his principal once, he was not required to do so again; but ten per cent of his income each year belonged to the church. In early days, tithes were paid in kind. The church always has struggled to collect tithes on gross income as far as possible, and tithe-payers have sought to restrict the payment to net returns. Mormons in business pay on their net profits-any other method would ruin them. Mormons working on salary pay ten per cent of their entire income to the church; and if they are working for a church institution, the tithe is deducted from their pay-check. Farmers struggle along in hit-or-miss fashion; some probably cheating the church and others certainly cheating their families. The duty of tithe-paying still forms one of the chief staples of Mormon pulpit eloquence; for it is as true of Latter Day Saints as of other folk that where the treasure is there also will be the devoted attention of the riling powers.
At no time in Mormon history have the heads of the church given any regular public accounting of the
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moneys thus received. For more than a generation, they have given no public accounting at all. Whoever is church emperor for the time being has absolute and irresponsible control of this vast supply of liquid wealth, now amounting to not less than $4,000,000 per year---with yet other millions of accumulations. He may use it for the church, or in schemes which promote his personal profit and that of his favourites; he may spend it wisely or fritter it away on some adult substitute for toy balloons. The devout toilers whose work and faith have produced this wealth have nothing to say about the matter.
During the reign of Brigham, while tithes were unquestionably used to support church officials and even on occasion to enable them to build personal fortunes, the general management of this fund was good. It supplied a part of the capital for new community industries. It financed the church in its long legal battle with the United States government. It gave a fresh start in life to the poor who were young enough to make such a start; and it provided support for the poor whose working days were over. The aged and devout Mormon could accept help from the tithing fund with no loss of self-respect. All through his working life, he had paid money into that fund; and he was only getting back what he had given. Much can be said against the management of tithing, even in Brigham's day; but it showed nothing like the disgrace now seen in the Mormon empire, when men anal women who have paid tithes all through their producing lives are sent to the poorhouse in their old age; and when people in receipt of public outdoor relief pay back to the church ten per cent of the pitiful dole they receive from the state.
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It was during these early years in Utah that the ecclesiastical or rather political organization of the Mormon church received its present shape and efficiency. Joseph Smith had dreamed into existence almost countless priestly offices. Brigham Young, even while Smith was yet alive, had gradually brought coherence and discipline into this much-betitled church militia. But the Great Trek with its pressing need of martial discipline, and the new settlement with its isolation, were needed to complete the structure of religious imperialism. As it stands to-day-as it has stood since Brigham Young was firmly settled in his place-there are twenty-six persons in the Mormon hierarchy. The presence of twenty-five of them is an act of grace on the part of the one.
At the head of the hierarchy stood the president of the church and regent of the Most High God. He alone was authorized to speak the word of the Lord to the children of men. He alone was authorized to receive revelations. As stated before, Brigham put forth but one revelation during his entire term of office-and that while he was in name no more than chief of the Twelve Apostles. But in the absence of formal revelation, wisdom was supposed to be his by direct inspiration of God, and few indeed were the Mormons in good standing who had any doubt that to resist Brigham was to resist the Lord.
Associated with Brigham in his office were his two counsellors; at first, Heber Kimball and Willard Richards. One was his relative and the other was his worshipper; and both owed their elevation to the will of Brigham alone.
Next below the First Presidency came the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, for three years after Smith's
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death the supreme governing body-in theory-of the church. It had been the ladder by which Brigham had climbed to power, and now, emulating many a royal example, he pushed it down as far as he dared. He reorganized this Quorum in such wise as to deprive Orson Pratt of any chance to succeed to the presidency, and put John Taylor in his place. All vacancies in the Quorum during Brigham's life were filled by him-and all vacancies in the Quorum ever since have been filled by the reigning sultan of the church. To refuse to " sustain " the president's choice would be a direct rebellion against God Himself.
At one side in this hierarchy stands the patriarch. This is an office hereditary in the family from which Joseph Smith sprang, and seems to have been created to provide a title for one of that race. The patriarch has no real power. He has visions of a somewhat lower order than the authorized revelations which come to the president. He pronounces blessings-for a consideration; and in general deports himself as ecclesiastical .supernumeraries have done since the days of Amen Ra.
Next below the Quorum of the Twelve in direct line of power are the seven presidents of seventies. These seven in a way are subordinate apostles, and are supposed to have a particular interest in missionary work. Finally-again in a side line-are the presiding bishop and his counsellors, who have immediate charge of church properties. The importance of this last office dates from Brigham's declining years, and it has increased in partial ratio with the vast increase of wealth since his death.
Following the example set by Brigham, the chief
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of the Twelve Apostles is heir-apparent to the presidency of the church.
Below this hierarchy there was organized ---and there still subsists--- a myriad and close-knit body of local church rulers. There were presidents of "stakes of Zion." There were bishops over wards ---a ward being a smaller division than a stake. There were elders, teachers, priests. From highest to lowest, every capable man in Mormon ranks was given something to do for the church ---and kept busy doing it.
All this large and intricate organization was in Brigham's hands. He filled vacancies in the Quorum. He named the presidents of seventies. He created bishops. He promoted, deposed, shifted, supported, or left struggling whomsoever he would ---and in this irresponsible despotism he has been followed unto this day. Never since the Mormon church was founded has the congregation of the people nominated a ruler of the church, nor even a member of the hierarchy. The congregation is always asked to "sustain" ---and always does so. And the manner of that "sustaining" is a pitiful absurdity. At the general conference of the church, one of the hierarchy announces: "It is moved and seconded that we sustain [giving the name] as prophet, seer, and revelator to all the world." And so on, through the list. "All who are in favour of this motion signify it by raising the right hand." A wave of hands comes from the vast assemblage. But no "motion" has been made. Neither nomination nor opposition is permitted. The decree of God has been uttered. The people are allowed to ratify but not to refuse God's irrevocable choice. On one occasion when Brigham was installing his favourite and erratic son, John W., as assistant prophet, seer, and
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revelator, a murmur of shocked surprise went through the congregation; but every right hand was raised. Recently, when Joseph F. Smith, present ruler, was crowding the hierarchy with his sons-in order to give each of his many wives a representation-one of the congregation muttered, "Too much Smith!" Near neighbours in the tabernacle tittered their approval. And then mutterers and titterers raised their right hands to "sustain."
Symonds remarks that the Jesuits seem to have discovered the precise point to which intellectual culture can be carried without intellectual emancipation. One might say with yet more truth that the Mormon church had learned the precise point to which the appearance of popular government can be carried without the reality.
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THE STATE OF "DESERET"
"HOW quiet, how still, how free from excitement we live!" wrote Parley P. Pratt in
a private letter of September, 1848. "The
legislature of our high council, the decision of some judge of court of the church, a meeting, a dance, a visit, an exploring tour, the arrival of a party of trappers and traders, a Mexican caravan, a party arrived from the Pacific, from the States, from Fort Bridger, a visit of Indians, or perhaps a mail from the distant
world, once or twice a year, is all that breaks the monotony of our busy and peaceful life . . . Here, too, we are all rich---there is no real poverty; all men have access to the soil, the pasture, the timber, the water-power, and all the elements of wealth, without money and without price."
Parley was trying to be poetic when he penned these lines; and such efforts on his part always were disastrous to language or to facts. In this case, both suffer a little; but the author manages to convey one important bit of information. The church authorities were courts, legislatures, and executive council in the early days of the colony; and they were these things without disguise; that is, they did not put on civil titles when they assumed to perform civil functions.
At first those functions were not very important. A few persons who violated the rather hazy church
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code of decorum were "severely reprimanded," and two or three more serious offenders were publicly whipped. "President Young," says George Q. Cannon, "was decidedly opposed to whipping, but matters arose which we considered required punishment at the time." There being no jail, the most natural substitute for this emblem of civilization was the whipping post.
In March, 1849, the church began to put on the disguise of civil government. A convention was held, a constitution adopted, and a governor and judges of the "state of Deseret" were elected by unanimous vote of all "citizens" of the alleged commonwealth. The omission of a legislature is significant. The Mormons were seeking, not a government, which they had, but a means of getting that government recognized by the republic they had tried to escape. Somewhat later in the spring, a legislature was chosen. It met July 2, 1849, and adopted a memorial to Congress. The interval between March and July had not been wholly barren of reflection, and the church leaders appreciated the fact that their population was a bit small to aspire to the dignity of statehood. Therefore, the memorial asked Congress either to admit "Deseret" as a state, or to grant "such other form of civil government as your wisdom and magnanimity may award." Almon W. Babbitt was chosen to carry this message to Washington, and to represent the new commonwealth so far as he might be allowed to do.
Nothing more is heard of the "Deseret legislature'' until January, 1850; but if one may be permitted to paraphrase, "had it stayed for weeks away, the people ne'er had missed it." The gold rush that passed
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through the Salt Lake valley in 1849, found a fully organized government, and one which was keenly alive to its new opportunities. Without troubling to call any sort of legislative assembly, and taking no account of the provision of the federal constitution which forbids the levying of tariffs inside the national boundary line, Brigham and his church associates imposed a two per cent duty on all property sold in Salt Lake City by gold-seekers, and on all property which remained in the valley during the winter. Evidence is pretty strong that they imposed this tax likewise on the property of many emigrants who were merely passing through; but this the Mormons deny. The point need not be pressed. No trifle like that would add anything to Brigham's calm assumption of independent and imperial authority.
The memorial to Congress was presented in the Senate December 27, 1849, by no less a person than Stephen A. Douglas, who had befriended the Mormons on several occasions during their experiences in Illinois. He had no leaning toward their religious principles or political habits; but he was too intelligent a man, in most ways too just a man, not to resent the injustice of the mob that attacked them. It is natural, however, to feel a vested right in one who has done us a kindness; and to this day, Mormon writers cannot forgive Stephen A. Douglas for refusing to link his political fortunes absolutely and unhesitatingly with their own.
Four days later, on the last day of the year, a counter-memorial was presented in the House of Representatives by Mr. Underwood, a Whig from Kentucky. This document was signed by William Smith, brother of the murdered prophet, and thirteen others. It protested against the admission of "Deseret." alleging that not only were the Mormons of the Salt Lake valley practising polygamy, but that they were actively disloyal to the Union. Going into particulars, this second memorial stated that before leaving Nauvoo, 1,500 exiles took the following oath in the great temple
"You do solemnly swear, in the presence of Almighty God, His holy angels, and these witnesses, that you will avenge the blood of Joseph Smith upon this nation, and so teach your children; and that you will from this day henceforth begin and carry out hostility against this nation, and keep the same a profound secret, now and ever. So help you God!"
This is the first appearance of the famous oath of blood vengeance which has troubled the Mormon hierarchy from that day to this. It has been denied, denounced, explained, ridiculed; cursed by bell, book, and candle; but it still persists. It persists, because, in substance, it is true. The present writers do not vouch for the exact language of this vow of vengeance, nor for the number who repeated it in the temple at Nauvoo. But that some such vendetta has been handed down from 1844 even unto this day does not admit of reasonable doubt. In 1905, the committee on privileges and elections of the United States Senate declared it proven that Apostle Reed Smoot, then and now senator from Utah, had taken a similar oath.
Indeed, such an oath would be no more than a formal and emphatic statement of the attitude and teachings of the Mormon hierarchy ever since the
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emigration to Utah. Brigham Young thought he had found a place where, in ten years, he need "ask no odds of the Gentiles." Parley P. Pratt summoned the powers of his awful muse to bear witness that,
"Lo! The Gentile chain is broken,
Freedom's banner waves on high!"
Heber C. Kimball made boasting prophecy in the heat of the Civil war that the men of the North and the South would kill each other, and that the Saints could then go down from their holy mountains, gather to their bosoms the war-widowed women of the Gentiles, and breed up a new nation. Joseph F. Smith, present president of the church, still speaks of the American people as his "enemies," and he means enemies in a literal, physical sense. From the beginning, all church leaders have claimed that the theocracy established by Joseph Smith and continued by Brigham Young and his successors, is the only just and legitimate government on earth; and that all other governments are illegal usurpations which the Lord will overthrow to make room for the spread of His Saints and their dominion.
It would be all but impossible for a hierarchy to cherish and proclaim such sentiments through seventy eventful years without putting them in some such form as the often quoted vow of vengeance. Such a vow might be deduced from events without any direct evidence-and the direct evidence is abundant.
At that time, however, nothing but the slavery issue had any real or lasting importance at Washington. After divers parliamentary moves and delays, the
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Mormons got a part of what they wanted. A bill creating the territory of Utah was signed September 9, 1850. The boundaries of the new commonwealth, while somewhat more modest than those proposed for "Deseret," were still sufficiently liberal. Utah as organized included everything from Oregon to New Mexico, and from the crest of the Rockies to the crest of the Sierra Nevadas. More important than the extent of the new territory was the personnel of its government. Here the Mormons were favoured by fortune to a degree which they may be pardoned for believing miraculous. If there be a miracle in the matter, however, it is the oft-recurring miracle of duplicity which a naturally honest man can display in behalf of a chosen creed.
Colonel Thomas L. Kane belonged to one of the oldest and most upright families of Philadelphia. He was a man of independent means, chivalrous temper, enthusiastic mind. He was a born champion of the under-dog; and he was quite unable to see that the under-dog sometimes deserves his position. He had been a friend of the Mormons for years. He had denounced, and justly, the brutality with which they were driven from Nauvoo. He had shared their tents at Winter Quarters, suffered there from the fever which was decimating their ranks, acted as their confidential friend and adviser. There is reason to believe that he joined the Mormon church during his stay on the Missouri; but if so, his conversion was not made public. Doubtless it was seen that he could be more useful to the Saints in the character of a sympathetic friend than in that of an adherent. He came forward now as a friend, and succeeded in convincing President Fillmore that the Mormons were
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a patriotic and much-maligned people, who could be trusted with absolute control of the territory they had settled. He denounced as false the stories of Mormon polygamy, vouched personally for the character, attainments, and "patriotism and devotion to the Union" of Brigham Young. As an amazing result of Kane's skill in diplomacy, four of the seven territorial officers appointed by President Fillmore were Mormons; and at their head was Brigham Young as governor, commander of the militia, and superintendent of Indian affairs!
These appointments caused some pleasure when reported in Utah, but no gratitude ---save perhaps to Colonel Kane. The Mormons held themselves a peculiar and exalted people; they believed in their sole and perpetual right to rule as Mormons over the region they had been first to settle; and instead of being thankful that so many of their people had received the recognition of federal appointment, they rather resented the notion that any Gentiles should be sent into their happy valley. Also, there were some matters which Brigham wished to get settled and out of the way before an unsympathetic judge, or secretary, should arrive to scan with hostile eye the perquisites of the Lord's anointed. In December, 1850, the still existing "legislature of the state of Deseret" passed an ordinance "providing that Brigham Young had sole control of City creek and canon; and that he pay into the public treasury the sum of five hundred dollars therefor." The Dutchmen who bought Manhattan Island of the Indians for $14 did not get a much better bargain in their generation than Brigham did in thus gaining this creek and gorge.
This ordinance was signed December 9 ---by Brig-
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ham, of course. The same day he signed a grant conveying to Apostle Ezra T. Benson the waters of some springs in the Tooele valley. Three weeks later, Heber C. Kimball got the waters of a couple of canons, though his grant was limited to the use of water for power purposes. Willard Richards got
North Cottonwood canon. George A. Smith and Ezra T. Benson got sizable grants of timber in the mountains. The Lord's chosen were setting their house in order against the coming of the Philistine; and the equal access to natural resources which Parley P. Pratt had boasted was becoming a "dim remembered story of the old-time entombed." When the territorial legislature met in the early fall of 1851, it needed only to pass an innocent-seeming act validating the "ordinances" of its predecessors. We have heard much these latter days about dummy entrymen, but a dummy legislature makes entrymen needless.
Brigham was sworn in as territorial governor February 3, 1851 ; the oath being witnessed by Daniel H. Wells, "Chief Justice, Deseret." On March 28, the "Deseret legislature" passed a resolution accepting the territorial government created by Congress, and fixing April 5 as the date of their final adjournment. A few days before this legislature was dissolved, a census was completed, which credited Utah with possessing 11,354 inhabitants. It is an eloquent commentary on arguments about the necessity and righteousness of polygamy that even the Mormon census-taker found nearly 700 more males than females in the territory.
The census being finished, Governor Young called an election to choose a legislature and a delegate to
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Congress. The fact that only 1,259 votes were cast at this election seems to show that the census-taker had not overlooked any citizens. Dr. John M. Bernhisel, a native of Pennsylvania, was elected delegate to Congress by a unanimous vote, and twenty-four of the twenty-five members of the legislature were selected by the same sweet accord. Truly, the bickering and strife which characterize political contests in less
favoured lands were far removed from the happy valley of Salt Lake.
A teapot tempest was on the way toward that valley, however, that was destined to upset the tempers and perhaps the digestions of many good Saints. The president had appointed only three Gentiles to territorial office. One of these was territorial secretary, and the other two were justices of the supreme court. The chief justice and secretary arrived in Utah the early part of July. The Gentile associate justice, Perry E. Brocchus, did not arrive till some time in August. None of the three officials found Utah to their liking. This, perhaps, was natural enough; but it is idle and unfair to lay all the blame for the ensuing difficulty on Brigham and the Mormons.
Judge Brocchus was invited to speak at the general conference held September 7. He had been in the territory where he was expected to administer justice rather less than a month. He could have only the most superficial knowledge of its population and its problems. He was justly offended and indignant at the theocratic despotism which even that short sojourn enabled him to see, and at the open disloyalty of many of the church leaders. Probably he was honestly indignant, likewise, at the practice of polygamy. But he had not hesitated to accept the services of these dis-
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loyal and polygamous men in an effort to get an increase of salary; and the most common courtesy would seem to demand that such censures as he felt it necessary to pass on the people among whom he moved as a judge should be made at a meeting assembled for that specific purpose, and should be guarded in the most careful manner from needless offensiveness.
Even in that cheap time, however, it was not easy to employ courtesy, cool-headedness, and ability to meet a crisis for $1,900 per year-the salary of a territorial judge. Certainly no such bargain had been secured in Perry E. Brocchus. The reports of speeches at that notable meeting are not very reliable, since the best of them were committed to paper some days or weeks after the event. But it is fairly certain that after criticising Young sharply for uncomplimentary remarks about General Zachary Taylor, Judge Brocchus used words substantially as follows:
"I have a commission from the Washington Monument Association to ask of you a block of marble, as a test of your citizenship and loyalty to the government of the United States. But in order for you to do it acceptably, you must become virtuous, and teach your daughters to become virtuous, or your offering had better remain in the bosom of your native mountains."
The bitterest opponent of polygamy to-day would not-if he retained any sense of propriety-imply that women who entered polygamy from sincere conviction that it was a direct command of God, were a whit less virtuous than those in monogamous homes. If Brocchus used these words-and it seems certain
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that they do not greatly misrepresent him-he had no right to be surprised at the hisses of his audience. But the bad taste of Brocchus' remarks was quite overshadowed by the violence of Brigham's reply. "Are you a judge," he roared at Brocchus, "and can't even talk like a lawyer or a politician, and haven't read an American school history? Be ashamed, you illiterate ranter, not to know your Washington better than to praise him for being a mere brutal warrior. George Washington was called first in war; but he was first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen . . . . Of course he could fight. But Lord! what man can't ? . . . I can handle a sword as well as George Washington. I would be ashamed to say I couldn't. But you, standing there, white and shaking now at the hornet's nest you have stirred up yourself-you are a coward, and that is why you have cause to praise men that are not (cowards), and why you praise old Zachary Taylor . . . . If you or any one else is such a baby-calf, we must sugar your soap to coax you to wash yourself Saturday nights! Go home to your mammy straight away, and the sooner the better!"
The literature of abuse will be searched a long time for a mate to this tirade, especially when we bear in mind that it was said in a church assemblage by the governor of the territory to his fellow appointee, as associate justice of the same commonwealth. A correspondence followed between the two men, marked by a stubborn boldness, which one cannot help but admire, on Brocchus' part; and by intentional gasconading on Brigham's. BNrocchus in a private letter expressed doubts of ever coming out of the Salt Lake valley alive. There was better ground for
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his apprehensions than he realized; but on September 28, 1851 ---only thre ewekes after the conference address--- Brocchus and his two fellow Gentile teritorial officers left for Washington. they took with them $24,000 which "congress had appropriated for the pay and mileage of the utah legislature.
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POLYGAMY UNVEILS ITSELF
THE "runaway officials," as the Mormons
love to style judge Brocchus and his associates, found cold comfort awaiting them at Washington. The Mormon version of the story was ahead of them. Colonel Kane, with his invaluable and unblushing partisanship, had been called to the aid of his distressed friends, or co-religionists; and the retreating officials were not of a calibre to cope with his smooth falsehoods. Their report of the despotism they found in the distant valley was no less incredible for being true. They laboured besides under the odium of having quit the fight; and there are no people more unthinkingly, instinctively intolerant of
failure, or retreat, than those of America. After a season of unprofitable discussion, the three Gentile officer received a curt order to resume their posts or resign. They wisely chose the latter alternative, and others were appointed to their place.
It is plain from the letter he wrote to President Fillmore that Young was very uneasy over the situation for a time. Doubtless he wished he had been less violent in denouncing Brocchus-but having taken the
plunge, it was not in his nature to draw back. He soon saw that drawing back was needless. Fate had given him the inestimable advantage of an unearned victory in the first clash between the new kingdom of the Saints and the govenment of the United State;
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page 225 POLYGAMY UNVEILS ITSELF
and Brigham made the most of it. In the remotest hamlet where two or three Latter Day Saints were gathered together was told the story of how Brigham, "The Lion of the Lord," had defied the power of the United States, and driven an unjust judge from Zion. When real peril approached, a few years later, the memory of this initial triumph was an inspiration to Mormon courage and endurance.
The new judges and secretary were not appointed until August, 1852. They served without any friction with the Mormon population, and two of them died in office. By an odd coincidence, the month of their appointment was likewise the month when the doctrine most closely identified with Mormonism in the public mind was proclaimed to the world.
We have seen that Mormon polygamy began in clandestine fashion in the early days at nauvoo ---if indeed it did not date from Kirtland. Joseph Smith first taught the doctrine to a select few of his followers; then growing bolder, he issued his revelation establishing polygamy as the crown and capstone of his marriage system. As noted before, that revelation bears witness that Joseph had anticipated precept by performance; he had taken plural wives before writing down the heavenly mandate authorizing him to do so. Verse fifty-two of that revelation reads
"And let mine handmaid, Emma Smith, receive all those THAT HAVE BEEN GIVEN unto my servant Joseph." This phrase could be used only to refer to polygamous marriages already accomplished.
How large a harem Joseph collected before his death is uncertain; but six of his widows were afterwards married to Brigham Young alone. The murder of Joseph was a direct result, in part, of his ef-
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forts to secure as his "spiritual wives" women who were already married to members of his church. Before his death, polygamy had become so ingrained in the Mormon faith and practice that of the four branches into which the church divided after that catastrophe, three believed and exemplified the doctrine of plural marriage.
The "Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints," with headquarters in Missouri, alone has always maintained that Joseph Smith had nothing to do with polygamy, and has laid the blame for the doctrine on other persons, particularly on Brighani Young. This piece of religious casuistry is too absurd to call for extended refutation; but though Brigham did not invent polygamy, he was an early and enthusiastic convert to it. He had five or six wives at the time of Joseph's death. He had sixteen or seventeen at the expulsion from Nauvoo; and perhaps twenty at the first settlement of the Salt Lake valley. The faithful had followed his example. In 1852, probably there was not an Apostle whose death would not have widowed from six to twenty good women. The most casual visitor to Salt Lake knew of polygamy. Yet officially the doctrine and practice remained a secret; and multifariously married missionaries did not scruple to declare, with uplifted hands and tearful voices, that the charge of polygamy yeas a base and cruel slander on the Lord's longsuffering Saints.
In 1852, however, Brigham determined on a change of policy. He saw that the pretence of secrecy had become too threadbare to be worth mending. On August 29. 18;2. Orson Pratt ascended the pulpit at a conference, and formally poclaimed the gospel of
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plural marriage. Apparently, Brigham had consulted no one in deciding on the new course, for Pratt declared that the order to speak on this subject came to him as a surprise. The revelation given to Joseph the Seer at Nauvoo was read and expounded, the Mormon doctrine of marriage, with polygamy as its crowning feature, was uncovered to the world. It has had at least a due share of the world's attention ever since.
The new proclamation caused little surprise among the faithful, and aroused no resistance. It was merely a public announcement of a well-known fact. Persons who could be driven from the church by this doctrine were already gone. During the regime of real and pretended secrecy, polygamy had so permeated Mormon society that then, as now, there was no way in which that society, by its own strength, could rid itelf of the custom.
It must not be thought from this remark that the Mormon church-state of 1852 had any wish to be rid of polygamy. The church accepted the doctrine of plural marriage, not merely with submission, but with enthusiasm. The whole body of Mormon theology had been shaped to converge on this point with a force which only flat disbelief could resist. To recur once more to a point which cannot be overemphasized, Mormonism is ancestor worship. According to that gospel, each person owes reverence and obedience to his progenitors, and is entitled to exact the same from his descendants. Each man is a god unto the fruit of his loins; and the number of leis offspring is the measure of his godship. Brigham once declared that the only God whom mankind need worship. or consider, was their first father,
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Adam. This bold statement startled even the faithful, and has been allowed to sink into the background; but it remains the just and logical summing up of Mormon theology.
The effect of such a doctrine, actively believed, is to make every ambitious man a potential polygamist. The appeal to women is less direct, but quite as effective. Women, in the Mormon scheme, can be saved without marriage---but it is a salvation scarcely worth having. To be exalted, to reach any worthy degree in the Grand Lodge which forms the Mormon ideal of heaven, a woman must be a wife and mother. She shines by the reflected light of her husband. If he has but one wife and a paltry half-dozen offspring, his radiance is dull, he is a hopeless plebeian in the next world, and his wife shares his humble estate. But if he be a polygamist, a man with many wives and swarming children, he becomes an aristocrat of the heavens, and his wives partake of his exaltation.
Nor is the religious appeal of polygamy confined to selfish grounds. It speaks with the voice of philanthropy. The Mormons believe that countless spirits are eagerly waiting to take upon themselves a tabernacle of flesh. They have risen in the chain of existence until they have come to the plane of physical life. They can go no farther in the celestial progression till they pass the portals of earthly birth and death. They are willing to accept illegitimacy, disease, or the stigma of an inferior race, rather than not to be born at all. Polygamy, according to the doctrine as preached to the Saints, is a sanctified method for the emergence of these imprisoned spirits into the life of this world. Viewed in the light of this faith, marriage with a polygamist seemed a re-
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ligious duty to thousands of Mormon women; and from the days of Nauvoo till now, there has been an ever-sufficient supply of women ready to sacrifice themselves on the altar of plural marriage.
The doctrine did not confine itself to religious arguments. It has a whisper as well for the world and the flesh. Polygamy, like despotism, represents the unrestrained working of a single impulse or desire; just as monogamy and democracy are the result of a council of emotions and wills. In the Mormon kingdom, as in older polygamous lands, social stratification came to the aid of plural marriage. As a rule, the polygamous families were the wealthy and highly placed families; and the prestige of their social position was transferred to their habits of marriage. And finally, there was the singularity of the doctrine, and the price that even then had been paid for it. The Lord's chosen were already marked off from the Gentiles, not only in faith, but in works.
Plural marriage in the Mormon kingdom never reached the sordid plane of barter and sale which prevails in most polygamous parts of the Old World. Generally speaking, the polygamist woos his many wives in much the same manner that the more modest lover woos one. The Apostle has the advantage that comes from experience, and he is able to bring religious considerations to support his courting; but the essentials of the process are usually much the same. From the beginning, however, Mormon parents have had more to say about the marriage of their childrenespecially about the marriage of their girls-than parents in any other English-speaking community.
There were many instances in which the first wife said to the husband: "If your going into polygamy
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is essential to our exaltation, I consent, provided I may choose the other wife." This was rather a common occurrence, and usually the husband accepted the proposition. Wives then would propose to women for their husbands. While this was not the rule, it occurred frequently enough to be a large factor in the workings of polygamy. It was a common practice, too, for a man to marry two or even three sisters, on the ground that they would be less likely to quarrel than women from different families. Some doughty elders, like Dionysius of Syracuse, did not hesitate to be married to two wives at the same time. Besides being something of a test of self-confidence, this likewise was a measure of peace, because neither could claim precedence as the first wife.
The women involved in polygamy nearly always became its staunchest defenders. They had accepted it as a divine doctrine; and only by maintaining it as such could they justify their choice. In a few cases, doubt or despair caused women to break away from the relation, but only in those marriages where a child was yet lacking. When children came, the mother's honour in the eyes of her offspring depended on the truth and divinity of the doctrine of polygamy; and she had no choice but to uphold it as the first and most excellent law of God. Four the same reason, the plural wife, though secretly hating the practice, was often driven into giving her daughter to be the polygamous mate of an elder or Apostle. That daughter had been born of a plural marriage. Either the system was holy or the birth was illegitimate. There were few women brave enough to meet the issue when presented in this form.
When the Manifesto of 1880 was issued, forbid-
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ding further practice of polygamy, it was the Mormon women who were most pained and most resentful. But here and there was one who saw deeper, beyond the temporary disrupting of home ties to the peace and confidence that lay ahead. One Apostle, whose first wife was of this calibre, asked her what she thought of it. Her answer was
"Well, Edward, I've always thought that sometime God would get as tired of polygamy as I am!"
That woman was an exception, however. Even now, when plural marriage has been renewed under circumstances of secrecy and deceit that would ruin the most righteous institution, Mormon women resent the faintest challenge of polygamous faith or practice; and they would perjure themselves before courts and investigating committees to clear their husbands, even at the cost of bastardizing their children.
There are still other ways of managing a polygamous courtship. Men employed as teachers in coeducational schools found their position singularly helpful in collecting wives; and this is as true now as in the days of Brigham.. Men belonging to what may be called the burgher class went about the matter in a more economical manner but quite as effective fashion. They strove to pick out good-looking immigrant girls for servants. If the young woman were docile and industrious as well as pleasing in appearance, she soon graduated from the rank of housemaid or dairymaid to that of wife. Her duties might not be lightened, but her dignity and standing in the community were increased; and if she "bore my lord " a goodly company of sons, she might become his favourite spouse. Indeed, so openly was immigration used as a feeder for polygamy that Heber C.
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Kimball, in an address to departing missionaries August 28, 1852-the day before the public announcement of polygamy-used these words
"You are sent out as shepherds to gather sheep together; and remember that they are not your sheep; they belong to Him that sends you. Then do not make a choice of any of those sheep; do not make any selections before they are brought home and put in the fold. You understand that. Amen!"
The life of the average plural wife was not the desolate, woe-begone existence which zealots and romancers have pictured it. The standards o f affection were necessarily lower than in monogamy; but among the wealthier classes, at least, standards of marital comfort and consideration were high. Each wife of one of the church dukes usually had her separate establishment, to which she owned legal as well as moral title. This, no doubt, was a concession due to the influence of a monogamous ancestry; it is quite different from the serfdom of women which prevails in most polygamous countries. Rivalry among the plural wives was usually generous. Each was anxious that her children should be at least equal in attainments and advantages to the children of any other spouse, but the family bond was strong. The children of one wife called each other wife of their father, " Aunt " or " Aunty." If the only son were called on a mission, one of his half-brothers would assume the absent one's duties. For many years, one of Brigham's wives acted as schoolmistress for all the children of the family.
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In a polygamous society where child-bearing was a duty, it was inevitable that later wives should be younger than the first wife, and that the younger should supersede the elder. When a wife of one of the polygamous dukes passed her child-bearing days, she graduated into a sort of dowager duchess. She was her husband's friend, adviser, counsellor. Her influence over him might be greater than that of any younger charmer, but he lived in conjugal relations with those who still might bring him children, and the spouse of his own age was a wife in name, rather than in fact.
This inevitably led to heartburnings and jealousy. Even in families of the highest type, presided over by men of uncommon kindliness, justice, arid dignity, the inevitable tendency of the younger wife to crowd out the elder caused a world of trouble. Brigham's skill in the management of his household was proverbial; yet on one occasion he publicly served notice that his wives and those of the Apostles had until a given date to stop their quarrelling and end their jealousies; and that, failing submission to duty on their part, he would divorce them all. With men of coarser type, these evils were multiplied. Polygamy showed at its worst in families of ignorant, ambitious imitators of the church aristocracy; men who lacked the financial ability to support a polygamous household, and the moral character to fit them for marriage of any sort. Under such a husband, a polygamous home was hell. Coarseness of speech and act, brutality, tyranny, and privation formed the life of more than one family; while the loutish lord and master encouraged jealousy among his female chattels as a means of insuring his own supremacy. Yet even in
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homes like this, the paternal despotism of the church was a partial check on cruelty. Tyranny seldom took the form of physical violence, and wife-murder was practically unknown.
In polygamy, as everywhere, personal character made its way. Strange as it may seem to those who think of all polygamous husbands as ogres and all polygamous wives as patient Griseldas, there was more than one compound household in the Mormon kingdom whose real ruler was a woman. It was uncommon, to be sure; but it was not unknown. An amusing incident illustrating this point may be cited here. One of the prominent women of the church, whose husband had been dead for several years, said to some of her visiting relatives
"I'll not stay here much longer. John has been over on the other side quite a while, now, with a dozen of his wives that went before him-and I think it's about time I went over, too, and took charge of things! "
She went not long after; and if affairs on the "other side" may be judged from occurrences on this, she "took charge," gently but completely.
The conscientious polygamous husband soon found that the celestial system imposed duties as well as conferred rights. Polygamy gratified the common masculine desire to be head of a clan, and ministered to that yet more universal feeling which Swedenborg calls the "lust of varieties." But this last was sharply circumscribed. The average polygamist of the old days, at least was a continent man. Each wife was supposed to be free from the conjugal embrace during pregnancy, and in some cases during the nursing period as well. His multiplication of wives gave the
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polygamist no license outside of the marriage relation. One man well up in the councils of the church was sent as a missionary to England. He spent several years there in successful proselyting before returning to Utah. Twenty years afterward, a woman convert came from England who, in a burst of confessional zeal at receiving her endowments, told that this former missionary had seduced her. The man was deprived of all his dignities, was visited with the severest humiliation, was excommunicated, and only readmitted in time to die in the bosom of the church.
This is an extreme case; and very likely the authorities had some other reason than outraged virtue which impelled them to inflict so drastic a punishment for so old an offence. But it may be said at once that adultery was regarded as a serious offence in the early days of the Mormon kingdom-indeed, it is so regarded there now. Probably there was and is more of it than would be found in a monogamous society under similar control and discipline and in a similar state of industrial development. There was far less than is found in the alleged monogamic society of many large cities. Except during the outburst of fanaticism known as the "reformation," Mormon husbands seldom seemed to apprehend unfaithfulness on the part of their wives, and in the enormous majority of cases, their confidence was justified. During the first murder trial in Utah, Apostle George A. Smith, counsel for the defence, announced as an "unwritten law "of Mormon society that the man who seduced his neighbour's wife must die, and her nearest relative must kill him. That savage code has not often been invoked by those whose Apostle laid it down.
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Brigham doubtless was the most married man of his little empire; but no one at this day can say with certainty how many wives Brigham had. Probably he could not have told himself. There were women sealed to him for time and eternity, with whom he sustained marital relations. These numbered about twenty-five. There were other women sealed to him for eternity, some of whom he had never seen. Still others were sealed to him for time, and to some departed great one of history for a celestial spouse. All were in some sense his wives; and according to the interpretation that was uppermost in his mind for the moment, he might answer with no intent to deceive that he had twenty wives, or a hundred.
Brigham insisted on three qualifications in his favoured lieutenants: obedience, energy, and plurality of wives. With two or three exceptions, Brigham never raised a man to favour who was not a polygamist. The reason for this preference, especially in the later days of his rule, is not far to seek. Once a man was entrapped in polygamy, he had to be loyal to the Mormon kingdom, for there alone could he find countenance and protection from the vengeance of the Gentiles. This is one of the policies of Brigham which has endured unchanged to the present day. The haphazard zealot speaks of polygamy as an institution which enslaves women. The student of Mormonism knows polygamy to-day chiefly as a device for the enslavement of men.
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page 237 XXIV
STUDY OF POLYGAMY
POLYGAMY traverses the customs and ideals of all European peoples for at least twenty-five centuries. It is associated in the public mind with sensuous Orientalism, or with that transplanted Orientalism which rears its defiant head in America. It shocks the moral sense of millions. It has been de-
nounced as a relic of barbarism, as legalized sensuality, as the enslavement of a sex. Yet it keeps on its clandestine way, defying or evading law and public sentiment, celebrating its forbidden banns under the very noses of judges and in the shadow of orthodox churches. Probably there are more plural wives in the Mormon kingdom to-day than at any previous time in its history.
A doctrine which has proved immune to society's cursing is at least worthy of society's study. That study must take no account of prejudice, habit, or sentiment. Good and bad are terms used to distinguish that which helps from that which hinders the progress of the human race. All codes, all customs must be tried at last by this standard; and polygamy is no exception. If it can show itself helpful to mankind, polygamy will make its way despite laws and anathemas. And unless an unprejudiced examination shows that polygamy tends to lower the standards and retard the progress of humanity, any objection to it is open to the suspicion of ignorance or preju-
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dice, and any effort to suppress it will be branded as religious persecution.
Mormon apologists for polygamy claim for it four points of superiority over monogamy. These are:
That polygamy tends to a more rapid increase of population.
That polygamy gives the only chance of wifehood and honourable motherhood to millions of women.
That polygamy prevents prostitution.
That polygamy secures better safeguards for mother and child during pregnancy and the nursing period.
The claim that polygamy tends to a more rapid increase of population than monogamy is disproved by the most casual acquaintance with history. Without exception, countries which have shown a great and steady growth of population for long periods are monogamous countries. Monogamous Europe has distanced North Africa and western Asia. Monogamous China is more populous and more stable in its numbers than partially polygamous India. Monogamous Japan-the exceptions to monogamy in the Island Empire are hardly worth mentioning-has been increasing in numbers while polygamous Turkey and Persia have declined. These differences cannot be laid to the superior civilization of countries where population is mounting, and if they could, the association of a higher type of civilization with monogamous marriage would be sufficient.
Only once in the world's history has there been a great and rapid increase of polygamous peoples, as compared to those practising monogamy. This was when the Saracens came out of their deserts to con-
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quer and people the world. Even in this case, the shifting balance was due to conquest, rather than to growth. The women of Syria, Egypt, and northern Africa were swept by hundreds of thousands into the harems of the conquerors, and their children were accounted Arabs and Moslems. In this case, polygamy combined with successful war to change the blood, language, and religion of vast regions. It exalted Islam, and depressed Christendom. But there is nothing to show that it added a single member to the total population of the world.
Turning from the study of rations to that of individual cases, it is easy to see the fallacy in this first of Mormon claims for plural marriage. The man of many wives has more children than the man of one wife. But as a shrewd observer noted long ago, the increase of population depends on mothers; and the average plural wife bears fewer children than her monogamous sister. Brigham Young was a man of amazing vigour. His wives were fine examples of physical womanhood. A biography authorized by his eldest son and by several of his widows credits him with twenty-five wives. The list is incomplete; but it will do for the purpose of this inquiry. Eleven of those twenty-five women were childless. Six of them bore one child each. One had two children, one had three, and the remaining six had four or more children apiece. All told, the twenty-five wives had only forty-four children. In a simple, healthy society, where child-bearing was reckoned the first of duties, is it thinkable that as many wives, each with a separate husband, would have borne so few children?
Similar households records are familiar to every student of Eastern history. Mohammed had eleven
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wives, and his line is extinct. Rameses Second was perhaps the most married monarch of ancient times. The census of his palace is not very authentic, but it seems certain that he had more wives than children. Theoretically, the procreative powers of a healthy man seem almost limitless; practically, masculine fertility is not very remarkable. Here and there is a shining exception. Augustus the Strong had 365 children by no one knows how many mistresses. John D. Lee, whom we shall meet again at Mountain Meadows, had sixty-four children by eighteen wives, and fifty-four of his offspring were living at the time of his execution. Joseph F. Smith, present head of the church, is more economical of potential motherhood than almost any other polygamist on record; he has forty-three children by six wives. But in practically every case, it may be predicted that the woman who becomes a plural wife will bear fewer children than she would bear in monogamy.
The claim that polygamy is necessary to give every woman her undoubted right to honourable motherhood might be urged with some show of reason in England or Scandinavia. Put forward in America, it is laughable. The census of 1910 showed 2,692,288 more males than females in the population of the United States---and 20,375 more males than females in Utah, the heart of the Mormon empire. In the nation at large, there are 106 males to every hundred females. In Utah, there were 111.5 males to every hundred females. If such a census indicates any change in our present form of marriage, that change points to polyandry, rather than to polygamy.
It has been said that the excess of males in this country is due to immigration, and also that there is
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no such excess among persons of marriageable age. The first of these statements is only half true; the second is not true at all. Detailed figures from the census of 1910 are not available at this writing; but in 1900, among the native whites of native parents in the United States, there were 322,579 more men than women between the ages of 20 and 45 years.
In point of fact, in all countries occupied by white men, there is a considerable excess of male children at birth. In England, 104.5 boys are born to every 100 girls. In France, the proportion is 105.5 to 100; in Germany, about 106 to 100; and in Roumania, it rises to 109 to 100. In all countries, to be sure, the death-rate of males is higher than that of females; and this fact, coupled with war, colonization, and emigration, has left a very slight excess of females over males in most European countries. If this excess became very marked, polygamy might perhaps be adopted as a
temporary expedient, as seems to have been the case in Germany following the Thirty Years' War. But the present disparity between the sexes is too slight to warrant any proposal of change in marriage customs. It would cost less money and effort, to put the matter on no more debatable ground, to provide for an assisted emigration of women to lands where men are in the majority.
The claim that polygamy prevents prostitution is a typical case of reasoning from isolated facts. There was no prostitution in Utah before the "Winter Mormon" and the Gentile traveller came to the Happy Valley; and Utah was polygamous. Neither was there any prostitution in the Boer republics until the countrymen of Cecil Rhodes introduced it, along with other evidences of progress; and the Boers were and
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are monogamous. A simple, undifferentiated society. where there is little luxury and little want, and where every one in the neighbourhood knows every one else, seldom or never produces or supports any considerable extent of prostitution. Such societies often have a high percentage of illegitimate births, but they are free from commercialized vice.
It should be added that the polygamous elders of Utah thought it necessary to permit the introduction of prostitution as a means of safeguarding their multiplied households from invading Gentiles.
Finally we come to the claim that polygamy guards the rights and person of the pregnant and nursing mother, and thus produces a better offspring than can be expected of monogamy. Whatever advantages there may be in abstinence from conjugal relations during this period undoubtedly were secured to three generations of Mormon children born in polygamy. But it is not yet apparent that children thus "safeguarded" before their birth outstrip in either health or intelligence the offspring of monogamous marriages. Besides, the same rule of abstinence has been enforced among countless peoples where polygamy did not prevail; and can be secured anywhere by education, if the theory back of the rule is provably sound. In spite of certain eloquent reformers and zealous missionaries, few men are satyrs.
At the risk of interrupting the logical order of this discussion, we would point out here that monogamy has at least one valuable advantage. It gives a wife the undivided care of her husband when she needs it most. The first experience in maternity is a beautiful, a sacred, but usually an anxious time for a woman. The nervous disturbances of her state are
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considerable; and are magnified by the brooding mind of the expectant mother. Then, if ever, she needs the loving attention of a stronger and untroubled mate. We believe there are few men of experience who will say that their care would have been sufficient if divided among a dozen or more wives.
The superior virtues claimed for polygamy by its loudest champions do not exist. Even this brief and we believe unbiassed examination has sufficed to dispose of them all. But the zealot is not always the wisest advocate; and polygamy may have virtues which Mormon missionaries have failed to appreciate. Casting about for such overlooked blessings, we may ask whether polygamy would not be a help to natural selection, or to that substitute for natural selection known as eugenics.
Eugenics, as its foremost advocate has pointed out, proceeds by two methods, the negative and the positive. Negative eugenics seeks merely to prevent the marriage of the unfit. There is no evidence to show that the number of men unfit to be fathers is greater than the number of women unfit to be mothers;
though the pauses of unfitness may differ in the two sexes. Unless it can be shown that men show a far higher percentage of unfitness for parenthood than women, there is nothing in the theory of negative eugenics to suggest a change in the present marriage customs.
Positive eugenics seeks to encourage marriage and child-bearing among the fit. If the breeding and rearing of a child were as simple a matter as the breeding and rearing of a colt, polygamy would score at once.
But it is not so simple. How would the proper sires of the next generation be selected? Who would com-
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pel the marriageable hoi polloi who showed no deterring taint to stand back and give the supermen supreme charge of propagation? The moment one descends from theory to practice, one perceives the absurdity of expecting to organize any system of polygamy as a means of improving the human race.
One thing somewhat allied to improving the race polygamy can do and has done. It is a potent aid to assimilating a whole population to the ideals, language, and in part to the race of the master caste. The Arab conquest already cited is a case in point; and the settlement of Utah is another. A little clique of American sires dominated the entire mass of immigrants; and to-day, the names of those men are the names of the master clans of Utah.
But is this power of polygamy one which society needs in the ordinary and usual course of events; the common course for which laws and customs are shaped? Manifestly not. The public school is far cheaper and less disruptive of present ideals than polygamy; but the public school has done marvels in assimilating immigrants. We may say with little fear of contradiction that no country should tolerate the coming of immigrants who need to be crossed with the native stock to make good citizens. As for the help of polygamy in assimilating a conquered people, modern sociology does not look with much favour on violent conquests, or on crosses between sharply divergent races. The one case where polygamy was used on a large scale in this way brought a higher people down to the standards of a lower. Arab civilization in Syria and North Africa to-day is lower than the Byzantine civilization of more than twelve centuries ago.
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After so earnest and vain a search for good things to say about polygamy, it is surely fair to set forth a few criticisms. This is a terribly easy thing to do.
Polygamy tends to subordinate one sex to another. This has been its effect in all lands where it has endured for any considerable length of time-as time is counted in history; and this will be its effect wherever it comes. Equality between the sexes is impossible when one man is deemed a sufficient mate for six, ten, or thirty women. Mormon polygamy had the splendid advantage of a clean start among American people, where respect for women is perhaps higher than anywhere else in the world; yet even among the Mormons, the tendency of the system to exalt one sex and depress the other was plain. Heber C. Kimball used often to refer to his wives as his "cows." Horace Greeley states that he never heard a Mormon church dignitary quote the opinion of his wife on any subject. The sermons in the Journal of Discourses are filled with scolding advice to women to modify their love for ornament, to busy themselves in domestic industries, to be more economical in the household. It seemed as if any man were thought qualified to lecture any woman on any subject.
As polygamy depresses the standing of women, so does it tend to prevent cordial companionship and deep affection between the sexes. An incident which occurred when Mormon polygamy was at its best will illustrate this better than any amount of argument. A family party was given at the country-place of an Apostle who shall be called Jones. There was present at this party another elder who may be known as Smith, who seemed to be enjoying himself as much as any one there. During general conversation, the
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fact was casually mentioned that one of Elder Smith's wives had died the day before, and was to be buried the next day. A monogamous Mormon present in the company flamed up in wrath at Smith's presence under such circumstances; but Mrs. Jones interposed. "Never mind," she said with sarcasm that quite passed over the head of the offending elder. "When a man has so many wives, he could not be expected to let the death of one of them distract his attention from anything so important as a party!"
It is needless to dwell at length on further objections to polygamy, but a few may be cited in passing. It tends to cause too early marriage, especially of girls. Heber C. Kimball, gave it as his august decision that girls should be married at the age of fourteen and boys at least by the time they were fifteen years old. Polygamy tends to the production of strong family clans, whose ambitions and quarrels are dangerous to the state. It tends to give an undue proportion of the women of a community in marriage to elderly men, and to men whose abilities are chiefly of a financial order. Plural marriage is an expensive luxury for any civilized husband; and men who have had time to accumulate a store of this world's goods, or who have a money-making disposition, will be much more likely to acquire a well-filled harem than the gallant youngsters whose adventurous idealism might be so much more valuable to the world.
In this case, at least, the verdict of science coincides with the verdict of instinct. Polygamy is exactly what it was named in a political catch-phrase fifty years ago. It is a relic of barbarism, or, at least, of a lower order of civilization. In the Mormon kingdom, polygamy is linked with a yet more vicious and
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barbaric thing, the despotic rule of a political priesthood. If a plural marriage were good in itselfwhich it is not-its alliance with theocracy would condemn it.
The harem is no more foreign to American ideals of home than a prophet in politics is to American ideals of liberty.
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page 249 XXV
THE KING CAN ADMIT NO WRONG
FOR a season after the adventure of the run-
away officials and the open proclamation of
polygamy, there was peace in Brigham's king-
dom. The new judges were careful not to collide with his imperial will, and took no notice of the now-avowed practice of plural marriage. On his side, Brigham was at some pains to be cordial---and no man could be more so when it suited his purpose. He took no pains whatever to conceal his mastership
of Utah, and his intent to remain master. In a sermon June 19, 1853, he said: "I am and will be governor, and no power can hinder it, until the Lord Almighty says: 'Brigham, you need not be governor any longer.' "
In a frontier community, however, peace seldom lasts long enough to be monotonous; but the interruption did not come from the defied and outraged federal authority. It came from a quarter where Brigham had a right to look for quiet. He had pursued a more uniformly conciliatory policy toward the Indians than any frontier governor since the days of William Penn; he was never tired of repeating that it is cheaper to feed Indians than to fight them. But nothing could reconcile the Indians to the loss of their
scanty oases in the central deserts and the rapid destruction of game at the hands of white hunters; and not even Brigham's despotism could make all of his
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followers as careful of Indian feelings as himself. In July, 1853, some Mormon settlers interfered to stop an Indian's beating of his squaw; and with an ardent humanity characteristic of a certain class of reformers, they inflicted fatal injuries on the Indian. The brave thus cut off in his sins was a Ute belonging to the band of Chief Walker, who was already on bad terms with the whites, and hostilities followed with deadly promptness. Walker's band took up arms, harried the settlers of southern Utah, killed some twenty persons, drove away cattle, burned houses, destroyed crops, and otherwise enjoyed themselves. In actual fighting, they had all the best of it-a result not uncommon in border wars, though one carefully concealed by most histories. But the commissariat of the red men was by no means equal to their strategy. By the next spring, most of them were ready to quit. Brigham had kept the olive branch extended all through the trouble, and in May, 1854, secured a meeting with Chief Walker which ended hostilities.
Like Mark Tapley, the ecclesiastical government of the Mormon kingdom came out strong in time of trouble. At a council of bishops in August, 1853, it was decided to enclose Salt Lake City with a wall, like Zion of old. The work was begun but never finished, the generous scale on which the city was planned making a wall impossible to Mormon resources. The church conference in October of the same year took a more important decision, and ordered forth colonizing parties to strengthen the settlements most exposed to Indian attack. The church historian's account of this measure is well worth quoting
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"During the Mormon conference at Salt Lake City, men and families were called to strengthen the settlements north, south and east of Salt Lake Valley. Among those sent on these missions were George A. Smith and Erastus Snow, with fifty families to Iron county; Wilford Woodruff and Ezra T. Benson with fifty families to Tooele Valley, and Lyman Stevens and Reuben W. Allred with fifty families for each of the Sanpete settlements. Lorenzo Snow was directed to select another fifty and go with them to Box Elder county, and Joseph L. Heywood was to lead an equal number to Juab county. Orson Hyde was given a mission to raise a company and found a new settlement on Green River." (Whitney, "History of Utah," Vol. I, page 529.)
According to this record, three hundred families left their homes to reinforce distant settlements, not because they wanted to go, but because the churchthat is to say, Brigham Young-ordered them to go. This despotic control excites no surprise in the breast of the church historian, and stirs his ever dribbly pen to no comment. Like the colonists themselves, the church writer accepts it as part of the natural order of the universe that a good Mormon should go wherever he is sent by his ecclesiastical superiors.
During the war with the Walker Utes, an emeute occurred among the Pauvantes. Captain J. W. Gunnison of the United States Army was in Utah at that time, exploring a route for a transcontinental railroad. On the morning of October 26, 1853, Gunnison and his party were attacked in their camp on the Sevier river, and eight of the twelve, including Gunnison himself, were killed.
This incident belongs in a history of Brigham
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Young, only because he has been accused of instigating the massacre. The present writers have given proof of their readiness to hold Brigham to account for his sins; but we cannot find a shred of evidence to connect him with the murder of Gunnison. All probabilities point the other way. Brigham had no reason to wish for Gunnison's death, and many reasons to wish him alive. The Saints had come to the conclusion that Zion would grow faster with the help of a railroad; and Gunnison was seeking out a route far a railroad. He had always been on good terms with the Mormons, and Brigham had troubles enough without looking for war with the United States. We have no hesitation in pronouncing Brigham wholly innocent of this crime.
Yet it is easy to see how the charge came to be made. Brigham's anxiety to be on good terms with the Indians was itself a suspicious circumstance to jaundiced eyes. Also, while he collected as much as possible of Gunnison's effects from the Indians, he made no immediate effort to punish the murderers; and some who were finally brought to trial escaped with petty sentences. The explanation is that Brigham did not punish Indian murderers of his own people, when to do so would have precipitated or continued a racial war. Rightly or wrongly, he took the view that the Indian was a dangerous but easily managed child, a creature whom no one should hold strictly responsible, and from whom no white man should take offence. Dignity, as the term is used by war lords and their admirers, did not interest Brigham when he was engaged with Indian affairs. Perhaps Brigham was moved to this policy by a desire to enlist Indian help in case of a quarrel with the federal gov-
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ernment; more likely it sprung from his abhorrence of wasted effort, and his half-contemptuous, half-philanthropic feeling for the Indians themselves. In either case, his handling of the Gunnison affair was a piece of his whole Indian policy.
Early in 1855, Brigham was reappointed territorial governor of Utah; not, however, until President Pierce had tried to secure a Gentile for that position. In December, 1854, the president offered the place to Lieutenant-Colonel Steptoe, then in Salt Lake City on his way to California with a detachment of about two hundred soldiers. Colonel Steptoe declined the offer and signed a petition asking that Brigham be confirmed in his position for another term. For an army officer sojourning a few months in a given spot to take part in territorial politics is almost as uncommon as for a good American to refuse an office. There is a circumstantial story to account for this double strangeness. According to this story, Colonel Steptoe wished to accept the governorship; but Brigham laid a trap, caught the gallant colonel in a compromising position with a couple of ladies, and soon convinced him that ruling Utah was no job for an amorous soldier. In the nature of things, such a story is incapable of exact proof. But it was believed by most well-informed persons in Utah at that time, and has been handed down since as a characteristic tale of the "Lion of the Lord." Our personal judgment is that, in essentials, the story is true.
All this time the Mormon kingdom was growing; more slowly, indeed, than Brigham and his counsellors had hoped; but more rapidly than they had any right to expect. Part of the increase came from the natural surplus of births veer deaths. In a community with
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an unusual proportion of young and middle-aged persons, all of whom believed that the way to magnify their glory in heaven was to multiply their offspring on earth, this surplus was large. Part consisted of converts from the eastern and southern states. But mostly the new blocks in Zion's wall were brought from Europe, and especially from Great Britain-the quarry opened by Brigham himself, when he went forth from Nauvoo.
It is the fashion of Gentile writers to sneer at the Mormon converts as belonging to the " lower classes." So they did. So did a certain group of fishermen collected on the shores of Lake Tiberias nineteen centuries ago. The slur has this much of justice, that few persons of education, few persons even who had what may be called the educational habit of mind, were gathered in by the zealous missionaries of the Mormon Zion. But neither did these missionaries appeal to paupers, criminals, or ne'er-do-wells. They wanted sturdy farmers, skilled mechanics, faithful labourers-and these they secured; and with them, occasionally a family or an individual of high worldly standard. Charles Dickens, who visited a shipload of Mormon emigrants on the eve of their departure, pronounced them the cream of England, of their class. With all due allowance for Dickens's tendency to exaggerate, this is high praise. The success of the British mission may be judged from the fact that from 1849 to 1855, inclusive, 16,537 persons sailed from Liverpool to join the Saints. About one thousand of this number were Scandinavians and Germans who came by way of England.
The method of handling the emigrants was excellent throughout. They were sent in solid cargoes,
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instead of being shipped indiscriminately with other passengers for the New World. The Mormon agent at Liverpool would wait until assured of a load of Saints and then charter a ship for them. On board, the passengers were under the care-and likewise under the control-of two or three church dignitaries who had crossed the ocean before, and who maintained order and stimulated religious enthusiasm. If the passengers came by way of New Orleans, another experienced man attended to getting their river transportation; and usually, teams and supplies were engaged for them at the point where their journey across the plains began.
Nor did this care cease when they reached their destination. Instead of being allowed to huddle in Salt Lake City and shift for themselves as best they could, the newly arrived Saints were taken in hand at once. When word came that a band of immigrants was expected, the Mormon leaders came to Emigration Square, or the Tithing Yard, to do their part in distributing the new arrivals where they would do themselves and the community most good. Work was found for all; and nearly all were helped to become landholders. The precise nature of land allotments varied from time to time, but the insistence on landowning was almost religious in its intensity.
Without doubt, some of the new arrivals were unjustly treated; and in such case, the poorest ones suffered most, as is the unfortunate rule of the ages. Those indebted to the Perpetual Emigration Fund were required to pay back their obligations as soon as possible; either in cash or-more commonly-in labour. Wages paid these new emigrants were not always up to the standard of the new land. Polyg-
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amous elders, of course, haunted the arriving immigrant trains, looking for likely spouses. But from 1852, onward, there was at least no deceit in the matter, and no one came from Europe to Salt Lake City without having some notion that he or she was turning from a monogamous country to one where plural marriage was customary. Polygamy does not square with our ideals; and peonage, even in its mildest form, is an abhorrent thing; but truth compels the statement that, with one conspicuous exception, Mormon emigrants were watched more carefully en route, and established in their new surroundings at far less cost to themselves than is the case with immigrants arriving at Ellis Island to-day.
That exception came at the close of the year 1856, a year filled with hardships and calamities. Grasshoppers had inflicted much damage on the crops in 1854, and in 1855, there was almost complete crop failure. To make matters worse, winter set in early and hard that year, with unusually deep snows, burying the pasturage, and starving the cattle. Lulled to security by several good harvests, the Mormons had disregarded Brigham's repeated warnings and had laid up little store against disaster. Now, disaster was at hand, and the absence of railway communication put the whole settlement face to face with famine.
In this emergency, as always in times of bitter trial, the half-military and wholly ecclesiastical organization of Mormonism showed at its best. Some little grain was on hand in the tithing-house, and Brigham and a few of his Apostles had well-filled bins. They shared their store with the community. Such as had money were required to pay for their supplies; but those who had no money did not starve. A letter
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from Heber Kimball to his son in England gives a picture of the situation
"I have been under the necessity of rationing my family, and also yours, to two-thirds of a pound of breadstuff per day each; as the last week is up to-day, we shall commence on half a pound each. Brother Brigham told me to-day that he had put his family on half a pound each. We do this for the purpose of feeding hundreds that have none.
"My family at this time consists of about one hundred souls, and I suppose I feed about as many as one hundred besides . . . . I had about seven thousand bushels of wheat, and it is now reduced to about one hundred and twenty-five bushels . . . . Heber has been to the mill to-day, and has brought some unbolted flour . . . We have some meat, and perhaps seventy bushels of potatoes, also a very few beets and carrots, so you can judge whether or not we can get through till harvest without digging roots."
With a community in these straits, it was obviously impossible to carry out the church's plan of immigration on the scale and in the manner desired. Neither could Brigham bring himself to stop immigration for a year, and wait until the settlement was in better shape. As a compromise measure, he wrote that he was " thrown back upon my old plan " of providing hand-carts and letting the immigrants walk across the plains from the outfitting point in Iowa to Salt Lake City.
The mere mention of such a march would halt any purely economic emigration, always excepting one that way betided fur a gold-field. But it did not stop the
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gathering of the British Saints to their mountain Zion. On the contrary, it offered a chance to some of the poorer but thrifty converts, who did not wish to obligate themselves to the Perpetual Emigration Fund. Nearly two thousand persons sailed from England, prepared to undertake a tramp of twelve hundred miles, pushing their supplies before them on handcarts.
Iowa City was then the outfitting point for Mormon emigration across the plains; and trouble began at the very start. The hand-carts were not ready. The delay thus caused made little difference to the earlier companies, but it counted terribly to those who came later. When the carts were ready, they were made of green timber, and kept breaking down on the journey.
The first two companies left Iowa City on the 9th and 11th of June, 1856, and arrived at Florence, the old Winter (quarters, July 17. Both at Iowa City and Florence they were warned not to go on; but in spite of these discouragements, they persisted, and reached Salt Lake City September 26. They were met in Emigration canon by a band and a military company, escorting the church dignitaries, and conducted into the city like conquering heroes. On October s, the third company arrived, which had left Iowa City June 23. These bands had experienced little suffering though much hardship, and the handcart route to Zion seemed a success.
Two other companies, however, were still on the way, and winter was closing in. The foremost of these, commanded by James G. Willie, had left Iowa City July 15 and did not reach Florence until August ii. After a week to refit, Willie started on August
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18, in spite of repeated warnings that winter would catch him on the mountain passes. Still later, August 22, the last company, under command of Edward Martin, arrived at Florence, and, after a briefer stay, straggled westward from the 25th to the 27th.
The march of these last companies was a longdrawn tragedy. At first, their troubles were the minor ones of hard work and short rations. Willie's company allowed ten ounces of flour per day per adult, and four ounces to children under eight years, in the march from Iowa City to Florence. In addition there was an irregular distribution of tiny quantities of rice and bacon. When they left Florence, this ration was at first increased to a pound of flour per day per adult, with a corresponding increase for the children; but other troubles were not long in showing themselves. The carts were made with wooden hubs, which the dry dust and sand of the farther prairies cut and roughened. No axle grease had been provided, and part of the precious bacon had to be used to grease the wheels. One wagon to draw heavier supplies was allotted to each hundred persons; but a stampede cost the company many of their oxen, and each cart had to be loaded with a ninety-eight pound sack of flour. When they reached the higher altitudes, winter was close at hand. Wading icy streams on the march by day and sleeping with insufficient shelter at night, the underfed cart pullers began to droop-and then to die. The Sweetwater took toll of them as in some form it had taken toll of nearly every Mormon party; and at last it came to be thought a strange thing if they left a campingplace without stopping to bury one of their number.
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There was no lack of devotion and courage. "Many a father," says one of the men who made that march, "pulled his cart with his little children upon it until the day before his death." But neither courage nor religious zeal can long take the place of food.
At last, just when their condition was desperate, came help. Some returning missionaries had passed them on the way, and carried word of their plight to Salt Lake City. Seeing that the situation was serious -though little guessing how serious-Brigham sent a party post-haste with provisions and blankets to meet the hand-carts. Encountering a storm, and not realizing the desperate need of the emigrants, the relief party camped to await better weather. There it was found by Captain Willie. His starving company were too weak to pull a cart, and he had left them in camp and come on in search of help. The relief party pushed on at once through the storm. Had it been delayed much longer, few of that hand-cart migration would have been found alive.
Four hundred persons set out from Florence with Captain Willie for this march across the plains. Of these, sixty-seven died en route, and several others died after reaching Salt Lake City. Martin's company, following still later, fared even worse, though reliable figures for losses of this party are lacking. Even after relief reached them, both parties had a long and bitter journey, a journey that the coddled traveller to-day would shudder to think of. Willie's company reached Salt Lake City November 9, 1856. Martin's people were straggling in through the snow till the middle of December. On the 26th of November, in the camp in Echo Canon, one of the women in Martin's company gave birth to a child. In spite of
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the frightful hardships of the preceding month, both mother and child survived.
It was characteristic of Brigham to take prompt measures for relieving the distressed immigrants. We regret to add that it was also characteristic of him to take equally prompt measures to relieve himself of blame for the disaster. Perhaps we should say that it was characteristic of his position; the king-especially if he be a priest-king-can acknowledge no wrong. Every wise prince provides himself with a stock of scapegoats, and Brigham was no exception. In this case, he picked out Franklin D. Richards, the Apostle in charge of the British mission at the time the hand-cart emigrants set sail, and blamed Richards for letting them start too late.
Brigham's course in this respect was bitterly unjust. He and no other devised the hand-cart project; he and no other must bear the blame of its partial but terribly costly failure. In spite of his experience, he underrated all the difficulties of such an emigration, and neglected to make proper provision even for the difficulties which he recognized. Frederick the Great ran away from Mollwitz; Lincoln put seven useless "heres" into his matchless Gettysburg address; and Brigham would have been better advised to join genius in making blunders rather than to join mediocrity in disavowing them.
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page 261 XXI
BLOOD ATONEMENT
THE year 1856 was a bad period for the material interests of the Mormon kingdom. It was yet more disastrous in a moral sense; for 1856-57 saw the culmination of a rising tide of fanaticism that long had been creeping on the land; a tide that at its flood submerged not only reason but common sense and common humanity. The stains of that flood are on the walls of Zion, even unto this day.
All theocracies, all governments managed by ecclesiastical authority, have two unfailing characteristics. They seek to make the legal code co-extensive with the moral code; that is to say, they draw no distinction between deeds which the fashion of their time and place regards as sins, and other deeds which the world for ages has agreed to regard as crimes. Next, however tolerant they may be of the opinions of neighbours and visitors, they consider heresy among their own people the most dangerous of offences. This, indeed, is inevitable. Rebellion is something which no government can countenance; and when a government is directly ordained and established by God, heresy and rebellion become interchangeable terms. Jedediah Grant was not an educated man nor a thoughtful one; but his unblushing, unhesitating fanaticism gripped this truth at once. and in a discourse in the Tabernacle he declared
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"I wish we were in a situation favourable to our doing that which is justifiable before God, without any contaminating influence of Gentile amalgamation, laws, and traditions, that the people of God might lay the ax to the root of the tree, and every tree that brigeth not forth good fruit might be hewn down . . . . Putting to death the transgressor would exhibit the law of God, no matter by whom it was done."
The start of the movement in the Mormon kingdom known as the " reformation " was innocent enough. It began as an effort on the part of Brigham and his aids to check license and tighten the bands of discipline. As the cheapest, easiest, most direct, and likewise most humane method at hand, Brigham began his hectoring sermons, lashing the brethren with the rough edge of his tongue, jawing Zion into order. He had a natural tendency to that sort of eloquence, and it grew by exercise. Had he been among his equals, had he even been subject to the restraints of neighbouring Gentiles, he would have bridled his too effusive tongue, and tamed it to civilized discourse. Living in a little world of his own, a world in which he was not only czar and pope, but well-nigh creator as well, Brigham soon lost all measure of the speech proper to one whose words were law unto his people.
Left to himself, Brigham's wrath had a way of evaporating in words. His " bark was far worse than his bite." He would rage at his congregation as though they were all defaulters and horse-thieves; and then, having stormed himself into a good humour, sit down and begin courteous discourse with those he had been berating. He had forgiven them for the tonguelashing he had just bestowed, and he thought it the
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height of uncharitableness for the recipients of the castigation to be resentful.
Unfortunately, there were those at hand who were ready to practise what Brigham was willing only to preach. Foremost of these was Jedediah M. Grant, whose portrait has been sketched in an earlier chapter. Grant would have been a marked man in any community, and in a society where faith and zeal were passports to promotion he was sure to rise to power. Willard Richards, counsellor of Brigham and member of the first presidency, died March 11, 1854, and Jedediah Grant shortly afterwards was appointed to the vacant place.
Grant's sermon from which quotation was made was preached the day after Willard Richards' death-before Jedediah's formal promotion, but doubtless not before he knew that promotion was coming. In the same sermon, speaking, as in the former quotation, of those who break their covenants, he said
"Then what ought this meek people who keep the commandments of God to do unto them (the covenantbreakers) ? ` Why,' says one, ` they ought to pray to the Lord to kill them.' I want to know if you would wish the Lord to come down and do all your dirty work?
When a man prays for a thing, he ought to be willing to perform it himself."
In other words, the person who prays for the death of a sinner ought to be willing to cut that sinner's throat. Jedediah Grant had the fatal gift of consistency which marks the born inquisitor.
This was March 12, 1854. A year before, Brigham had crushed an incipient apostasy by a storming ser-
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mon, in which he threatened to "unsheath his bowie knife, and conquer or die!" This, however, was a frank declaration of war, rather than the announcement of a new law of persecution; and it was some time before Jedediah Grant's ravings of blood had company. October 6, 1855, Brigham made a tentative venture on this path. "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, and the time of thieves -is short in this community." Five months later, March 2, 1856, Brigham went a step farther, and declared
"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."
It will be noticed here that Brigham forecasts the Lord's intentions, intimating that the order to " lay judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet " is not issued yet, but soon will be.
Weaving in and out of these hair-raising threats we get a glimpse of a doctrine soon to be published to the world as " blood atonement." This doctrine was based on the words of Paul-Hebrews ix, 22" Without the shedding of blood there is no remission." Stripped of ecclesiastical verbiage, the doctrine of blood atonement was that some sins could be expiated only by spilling the blood of the sinner; and that in such cases, it was the duty of all true believers
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to cut a man's throat for the saving of his soul. Whisperings of this theory reached the ears of Lieutenant Gunnison as early as 1852, but it was not publicly proclaimed as church gospel until September 21, 1856, when Jedediah Grant and Brigham Young did their best, or worst, to make the ghastly obsession clear to all. Grant spoke first
"I say there are men and women here that I would advise to go to the president (Young) immediately, and ask him to appoint a committee to attend to their case; and let a place be selected, and let that committee shed their blood . . . . I would ask how many covenantbreakers there are in this city and in this kingdom? I believe there are a great many, and if there are covenantbreakers, we need a place designated where we can shed their blood . . . . We have been trying long enough with this people, and I go in for letting the sword of the Almighty be unsheathed, not only in word, but in deed."
With less of savage enjoyment in his words, Brigham on the same day from the same platform went on to explain
"There are sins that can be atoned for by an offering upon an altar as in ancient days; and there are sins that the blood of a lamb, of a calf, or of turtledoves cannot remit, but they must be atoned for by the blood of man!"
With this enunciation of the spiritual uses of throatcutting, the "reformation" may be considered fairly begun.
It was a season of community madness, like that which afflicted Salem in the witch excitement of 1692,
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or that which raged against the "anointers" of Milan in 1631, or the numberless mental epidemics which marked the course of the Middle Ages. Hardship and isolation had combined to give the minds of the people a gloomy and merciless cast, and the savage preaching of their chief and his aids aroused them well-nigh to frenzy. Innocent amusements, always before sanctioned and encouraged by the church, were now discountenanced or suppressed. Self-accusation became almost as common as the accusation of one's neighbours. Whoever escaped infection by the prevailing mania was marked as a son of Belial, and an enemy to the kingdom. Elders went to and fro, exhorting the people to repent, confess their sins, and "renew their covenants " by baptism. That no sins might be overlooked, a printed catechism was furnished these amateur inquisitors; a catechism so indecent that it was suppressed when the kingdom recovered its senses. Through the whole insane time, Jedediah Grant stormed to and fro, and the burden of his raving was blood, blood, blood. He preached, quizzed, exhorted, baptized almost day and night; and literally gave his life to the unworthy cause. When Jedediah Grant died December 1, 1856, the recording angel must have heaved a sigh of relief.
When it comes to citing specific cases of the practices of blood atonement, one must admit that the evidence is faulty. It could not be otherwise. The Mormons, who preserved records of most things, had too much good sense, once the period of communal lunacy was past, to keep detailed evidences of their madness. One case given in the doubtful confessions of John D. Lee, is that of Rasmus Anderson, who was charged with adultery. According to the account, Anderson
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made no remonstrance when notified that his blood was to be made a sacrifice for the cleansing of his soul, but asked only half a day for prayer and preparation. His executioners dug his grave, then called for him at midnight, found him dressed in clean clothes for the occasion. They conducted him to the grave and, after further prayer, cut his throat.
Another story, cited by Stenhouse, is that of the wife of an elder. During her husband's absence, she broke her marriage-covenants, and was so remorseful that she confessed her fault on his return. That return coincided with the height of the " reformation," and it was decided that the woman die, in order to regain her place among the gods and goddesses, and the forfeited motherhood of the children she had borne her husband. In this case, the husband performed the sacrifice, and cut his wife's throat as she sat on his knee.
These stories are cited for what they are worth. It is impossible to verify them, and the present writers believe the account of the elder's wife to be particularly doubtful. But in a sermon delivered in the Tabernacle February 8, 1857, a sermon devoted to expounding this very doctrine of blood atonement, Brigham said
"I could refer you to plenty of instances where men have been righteously slain in order to atone for their sins . . . . I have known a great many men who have left this church for whom there is no chance whatever for exaltation, but if their blood had been spilled it would have been better for them."
Making all possible allowance for Brigham's pulpit
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exaggeration, it seems certain that this modern gospel of human sacrifice had borne some fruit.
Whatever question may exist about individual cases of blood atonement, there is none about many plain murders resulting from the fierce intolerance fanned by the " reformation." Perhaps the best attested caseuntil we come to the crowning horror of Mountain Meadows-is the one known as the Parrish murders.
In the spring of 1857, William R. Parrish, an old man, and a Mormon of high and long standing, was reported to have grown cold in the faith, and to be planning to emigrate to California. For a man of Parrish's standing to carry his discontent and his inside knowledge to the Gentiles was clearly dangerous to the kingdom. His horses were stolen, thus delaying his escape; and then the bishop of the ward and some humbler church retainers planned to murder the reputed backslider. Pretending to sympathize with his desire to get away, the deputed assassins decoyed Parrish from the village, and killed him with a knife. Two of his sons were lured after their father. One was shot dead, the other escaped-and was arrested for the double murder! Brigham has been charged with directly ordering this crime. The evidence to support this charge is not of the best, but it is certain that he made no effort to punish the murderers, not even when one of them turned state's evidence, and made formal confession before a federal judge. It is some satisfaction to know that one of the precious cut-throats shot his partner by mistake.
The Parrish case illustrates a condition much overworked in romance and polemics, but which, nevertheless, was at one time a large and vital fact in the life of the Mormon kingdom. The apostate was not
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allowed to leave the community. In some cases he escaped, in a few cases the authorities may have permitted his escape; but the general rule was as stated. The reason is obvious: Brigham did not want men with inside knowledge telling evil tales of his empire in the eager ears of Gentiles. Prior to 1853, his efforts at dissuading such emigration were confined to scolding sermons, and these usually were successful. But as time passed on, and the arbitrary power wielded by himself and his followers grew into a vested right, threats succeeded scoldings; and the "reformation" brought executions in place of threats.
In "Ninety-Three," Victor Hugo speaks of a type of civil war which begins by defying the lightning, and ends by robbing a diligence. The phrase applies to the reactionaries of the Mormon kingdom as well as to the reactionaries of the Vendee. There is something grand, even though repulsive, in the Mormon effort to turn back the clock of the age, and plant a theocratic despotism in the bosom of the world's most radical democracy. But the intolerance, and the contempt of human life and human rights engendered by this effort soon found -expression in deeds whose brutality is lightened by no gleam of mistaken enthusiasm.
Such was the crime known as the San Pete outrage. Bishop Warren Snow wished to add a girl of Manti to his collection of wives; but she was engaged to a man who refused to yield her to his ecclesiastical superior. After remonstrances and threats had failed to shake the young man's resolution, he was seized, tied to a bench, and mutilated by Bishop Snow and his followers. The unfortunate man regained his health but lost his mind; Bishop Snow married the
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girl, Brigham stormed furiously when lie heard the news, but, as always in such cases, he inflicted no punishment. The San Pete case became a standing reference in the mouths of coarse ecclesiastical authorities on the rare occasions when they encountered any opposition to their will. It was a threat, not uncommon, "to make eunuchs of men who had the spirit of apostasy."
It is useless to give extended accounts of other outrages in the kingdom, where the motive was greed, instead of sexual desire. The murder of the Aiken party-six Gentiles who passed through Utah on their way to California-seems to have belonged to this class, inasmuch as no other fault could be found with them, and their outfit was reputed to be worth $25,000. Minor cases of bullyings and floggings are hardly worth citing at all. But before closing this unpleasant chapter, it is necessary to consider the defence which Mormon writers make for these crimes, and the legend prevailing in the Gentile world as to the means by which church murders were perpetrated.
The Mormon defence is that there were no more murders in Utah than in other frontier communities. This is true. We will go farther; there probably were fewer murders in the Mormon kingdom than in any other frontier settlement of equal numbers in the history of the United States. But such murders as were committed in the Mormon kingdom grew directly out of the wild sermons and intolerant teachings of Brigham Young, and of his aids and followers. There is the fact which makes the history of Utah a thin apart. In no other frontier settlement were throats cut for the glory of God and the benefit of a church. In no other frontier settlement were then taught that human sacrifice was necessary for the salvation of sinners. In no other frontier settlement did religious teachers and civil authorities join in proclaiming that human blood smoking on the ground was an acceptable offering to the Most High. There was not a moment when Brigham did not have as much power and as good machinery for enforcing law in his empire as is possessed by the authorities of England or Prussia to-day in their own realm. Murders were committed in the Mormon kingdom, not to defy Brigham's authority, but to maintain it. In many cases, perhaps in most cases, Brigham knew nothing of the deed until it was done. In many cases, perhaps in most cases, he regretted the over-violent acts of his followers. But those acts grew directly out of his own teachings and ambitions, and Brigham recognized this fact when he failed to punish or even to condemn those criminals who had served him too well. One sermon denouncing murder and upholding the sanctity of human life, as Brigham often denounced apostasy and upheld the sanctity of the priesthood, would have gone far to check the outrages of the " reformation." No such sermon was delivered.
The Gentile legend is that all these crimes were committed by a weird organization known as the " Danites," a society whose members were at once murderers, missionaries, and mounted police; latterday knights riding abroad " upon a mission, to cut throats and spread religion, pure and undefiled."
The legend is a legend and no more. It has a basis of fact. There was an organization called " Danites " during a part of the sojourn in Missouri and at Nauvoo. It seems to have been formed as a sort of bodyguard to Prophet Joseph Smith, and to have degen-
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erated into an association of strictly undesirable citizens. The name was carried to Utah, but there is no reliable evidence that the organization itself lasted until that day. Like the famous "Black Hand," it was a name, a symbol, and nothing more. A single reading of the sketch of church organization given in a previous chapter will show that Brigham had no need of "Danites" specially sworn to carry out his will. The whole church was bound to do that, bound by the most perfect discipline and the most terrific oaths. No matter what he wanted, a new hymn, a new wife, or a new murder, Brigham had only to signify his will to the proper person. A separate organization, like the legendary "Danites," would have been both superfluous and dangerous.
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page 273 XXVII
AT MOUNTAIN MEADOWS.
By the summer of 1857, that first sputtering of the cauldron of intolerance and fanaticism known as the "reformation" had ceased. But the cauldron was still boiling, and the flames at its base were hotter than ever. To all other causes for excitement had now been added that of a definite break between the Mormon kingdom and the federal government. In August of 1857, the new president, James Buchanan, had appointed a Gentile governor of Utah, and even before that date had begun preparing a military force to uphold federal authority in that territory. In the eyes of the Mormons, this was an invasion of their kingdom and their rights. They considered themselves fairly at war with the United States; and some of them were ready to commit any manner of atrocity in prosecuting that war.
Earlier in the summer, a party had been organized in Arkansas to make the overland journey to California. They numbered something more than one hundred and thirty persons, and belonged to about thirty families. The value of their outfit has been exaggerated in most anti-Mormon accounts of their fate; but it seems certain that these emigrants were a little above the average in means. They are credited with having thirty horses and six hundred cattle on their arrival in Utah.
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There is no evidence that the emigrants knew of the tension between the Mormon kingdom and the federal government before setting out on their journey, though doubtless they had heard of it during their trip across the plains. They reached the neighbourhood of Salt Lake City early in August, with provisions low and animals weary from the long march. They had planned to buy supplies and rest their stock in Utah, as other California-bound emigrants had done for the past eight years; but to their surprise, this privilege was denied them. They were ordered to break camp and continue their march, and when they sought to buy provisions no one had any to sell.
The Arkansans were going to California by the southern route, and marched almost directly southward through Utah. For more than 300 miles they kept on, through a sullenly but passively hostile population that refused to sell them grain or to trade cattle or horses. The emigrants bought thirty bushels of corn from some Indians on Corn creek; but they could not get get it ground at any mill. At Cedar City, the last large settlement they were destined to pass through, they were permitted to buy fifty bushels of wheat, which was ground for them at the mill of John Doyle Lee. Fate was in a mood to be dramatic.
Lee was a coarse, violent man, a born fighter, fearless and lawless toward the world at large, but submissive and obedient in all things to his church superiors. He had been one of the active followers of Prophet Joseph Smith, and had gone as a political missionary in Smith's campaign for the presidency of the United States. It was generally understood that when there was a rough piece of work to be done for the kingdom, Lee was a good man to do it. Asso-
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ciated with him in the work which was to follow were Isaac Haight, president of the Cedar City stake of Zion; Philip Klingensmith, a bishop in the same place; John M. Higbee, William H. Dame, and many persons of less prominence. Dame was president of the stake of Zion at Parowan, and colonel of the militia of Iron county; Higbee was a lieutenant-colonel and Lee a major in the same regiment. They were birds of a feather; narrow, fanatical, violent, and " red hot for the gospel under the influence of the late reformation." Klingensmith is credited with being the man who so kindly cut Rasmus Anderson's throat to save his soul, in the case of blood atonement cited in the last chapter.
From Cedar City, the emigrants moved southwest past Iron creek and Pinto creek, and on Sunday, September 6, 1857, they were camped in the little grassy valley known as Mountain Meadows. Their condition was little short of desperate. They were facing a march of seventy days across some of the worst deserts of North America, with a supply of provisions that would have been scanty for two weeks. Their cattle were so weary that they had consumed five days in coming the last thirty-five miles. It is doubtful if they could have won through to their destination, even if left alone, but the chance was not offered them.
The zealous agents of the kingdom in southern Utah knew of the approaching emigrant train long before it arrived, and seem early to have discussed the advisability of smiting the Gentiles. No final arrangements were made until after the Arkansans had passed Cedar City. Then it was decided to rouse the Indians, and set them to butcher the emigrants. Among those involved in the plot at this stage were Lee, Haight,
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Klingensmith, Higbee, and, in all probability, William H. Dame. Haight claimed to have Dame's authority for all he did, and Dame's presence at Mountain Meadows immediately after the massacre supports this claim.
The emigrants were camped in an open valley, near a large spring. They anticipated no trouble with the Indians, their wagons were not corralled, and their camp was commanded by the surrounding heights. From these heights, on Monday morning, September 7, 1857, the Indians opened fire. Seven emigrants were killed and sixteen wounded in this first attack. With a steadiness under surprise which argues good discipline in the camp, the Arkansans returned the fire, gathered their wagons in a ring, and dug a rifle pit in the centre of the corral. The spring, unfortunately, was a hundred yards away, and water for the besieged party could be brought only at night, or secured in dangerous dashes by day. There were not more than fifty fighting men in the emigrant party at the start, and nearly half of these had been killed or wounded at the first onset; but they held that pitiable makeshift fort for four days against not less than three hundred Indians.
For the moment, all three parties involved had misunderstood the situation. The Mormon officials who had instigated the attack expected the Indians to make short work of the emigrant party. Zion's enemies would thus be cut off, without loss or blame to Zion. The Indians likewise looked for an easy prey, and when disappointed in that particular, called confidently on the Mormons for assistance. The emigrants supposed their assailants were Indians alone, and in spite of the sullen looks and surly refusals to trade which
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they had encountered in the Utah settlements, believed the Mormons would come to the rescue of their fellow countrymen. In this faith, two men slipped out of the beleaguered camp Wednesday night, and started to Cedar City to summon help. They got safely past the Indians, but encountered some Mormon fanatics gathering for the massacre. One of the young men was murdered outright. The other, though wounded, is said to have escaped back to the besieged camp.
When word came of the gallant and successful defence of the emigrants, the more violent Mormon leaders saw that they must bear the odium and dangers of failure, or carry through the plot by aid of Mormon militia. They chose the latter alternative. Armed men were called out and sent to Mountain Meadows. No general levy was made, but the selected ruffians were members of the local militia, and were acting under orders of their regimental officers. Meantime a plot was devised which it was hoped would avoid the risks of fighting. The Mormons were to come in as if in protection of the emigrants from the Indians. The emigrants were to be decoyed from their little fort under promise of a safe conduct to Cedar City, and their arms were to be taken away. Thus disarmed and helpless, they were to be attacked and murdered. Men, women, and all children "old enough to talk" were to be slain; and the returning Mormons were to report that the emigrants had been massacred by Indians before help arrived.
The plot was a masterpiece of treachery, and like a masterpiece it worked. Friday morning, September 11, William Bateman was sent with a flag of truce to tell the emigrants that rescue was coming. A little later, John D. Lee entered the camp, and completed
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arrangements. The Arkansans were told that they would be taken in safety to Cedar City, and kept there until there was a chance to send them on their journey; but that they must give up their arms, so as to avoid exciting the Indians. This order must have roused suspicion, but the ammunition of the emigrants was nearly gone, and they yielded. Two wagons were provided. In one, driven by a man named McMurdy, were placed the arms, and the smaller children. The other wagon, whose driver was named Knight, was loaded with the wounded, and a start was made for Cedar City. The women and older children walked immediately behind the wagons. Last came the men, in single file, with the foremost man about fifty yards behind the women. An armed Mormon walked at the side of each unarmed emigrant, as if in strenuous protection.
The Indians had been withdrawn from the siege of the camp, and placed in ambush among some low cedars. The wagons led the way straight towards this ambush. At a given signal: "Do your duty!" each guard turned and shot the unarmed man at his side; the Indians leaped from hiding and fell upon the women; and Lee, Knight, and McMurdy, with some assistance from the Indians, butchered the wounded men in the wagon. Scouts had been placed on horseback to run down any who might escape; but as Higbee reported: " The boys acted admirably, they took good aim, and all but three of the Gentiles fell at the first fire." Of the entire party, only seventeen children were spared. The oldest of these was seven years of age.
It was one of the most monstrous massacres that ever stained the annals of North America. Other
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butcheries have numbered more victims, and been distinguished by greater refinements of cruelty; but none can surpass Mountain Meadows for consummate treachery. The details of guilt, the infamy of the plot, the savagery of the murder, may be apportioned as one likes among Lee, Haight, Dame, Klingensmith, and their fellows. The historic responsibility for this horror must be placed squarely on the shoulders of Brigham Young.
The historic responsibility, not the legal. Brigham did not order this massacre. He did not want it to take place. When a messenger arrived to tell him of the threatening destruction, he sent word to stop, and let the emigrants go unharmed. When another despatch brought word that this order had come too late, and that the butchery was accomplished, Brigham, according to the testimony of an eye-witness, wept like a child. These facts clear Brigham of direct complicity in the slaughter; but do not lighten by the weight of a hair his moral accountability.
For the massacre at Mountain Meadows was the logical culmination of that "reformation" which Brigham had first permitted, then sanctioned and sustained. It was the legitimate result of the doctrine of blood atonement. It was no more than the translation into deeds of sermons which Brigham and his aids had preached for years. Brigham and Jedediah Grant and Heber Kimball and others had risen in the pulpit Sunday after Sunday, and raved and ranted about "unsheathing the bowie knife," "laying judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet," "shedding blood," "hewing down the evil tree," and a thousand other such criminal follies. Was it to be expected that simple savages like Lee or covetous sav-
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ages like Haight or Klingensmith would hold their hands when thus told of the righteousness of murder? Were they to quibble and evade and tone down the words of the Lord's anointed prophet and revelattor If the sermons of the "reformation" meant anything, the Mountain Meadows massacre was justified. If they meant nothing, why were they uttered?
But there is no need to rest the claim of Brigham's responsibility on even so clear an argument as this. It is proved by his subsequent actions. There is good evidence that Brigham had every detail of the tragedy from the mouth of John D. Lee as soon as Lee could get from Mountain Meadows to Salt Lake City. There is absolute certainty that whether from Lee or from another, Brigham knew the whole ghastly story within a few days. His mastership of the territory in those days has never been questioned. Yet to the day of his death, Brigham never lifted a finger to bring to justice the perpetrators of this massacre. Lee was a bishop of the church when engaged in cutting throats at Mountain Meadows, and a bishop of the church he remained for years afterwards. Brigham reserved to himself the right to grant permissions for plural marriage, and Lee took a new plural wife after the massacre. As long as he could, with safety to himself, Brigham gave Lee every countenance that could be given to a man of Lee's type and attainments; and when finally brought to trial, Lee could not be convicted until the United States prosecutor had declared in court that the government was trying to convict this one man, not any of his church associates or superiors! Then, and not till then, were the tong-ties of witnesses loosened, and the consciences of jurymen
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satisfied that Lee had done murder at Mountain Meadows, nearly twenty years before.
Horrible as was the crime itself, the excuses offered fur it by Mormon historians add a touch of infamy not often achieved. The Arkansans, being safely dead, are maligned. The story is told at length o f how Parley P. Pratt had been murdered in Arkansas some years before, and a host of impossible charges are laid to the emigrants themselves. They are charged with having poisoned a spring, and boasted of it, with having poisoned an ox, and fed it to the Indians, with bragging that they took part in the mur- der of Prophet Joseph Smith, with insulting women, and indulging in boisterous conduct in the towns through which they passed.
The case of Parley P. Pratt need not detain us. He induced a woman whom he had converted to elope from her husband, and become Mrs. Parley P. Pratt, No. 9. Later, she came back, and took the children whom she had previously left behind. Pratt's connection with this kidnapping was not proved, and Mr. McLean, the injured husband, committed a crime when he killed the Apostle ---but was it a crime properly punishable by the murder of one hundred and twenty persons who had no part in it, merely because they came from the same state?
The charges against the emigrants themselves are quite as idle. Had they been guilty of any such disturbance, they would have been laid by the heels within forty-eight hours after they entered the Mormon kingdom. In one point, the absurdity of the charges becomes grotesque. Since no Arkansans were present at the murder of Joseph Smith, it became necessary to invent a party of "Missouri wildcats" who were
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travelling in company with the party from Arkansas. These Missourians are as mythical as the poisoned spring. It is passing strange that intelligent men, such as some of the Mormon historians are, cannot see that by repeating these absurd slanders, they are
making themselves apologists for the most atrocious massacre that has stained American annals.
When describing the wicked and unjust expulsion of the Mormons from Nauvoo, the present writers pointed out that democracy is so illy organized for violence that the worst men, accustomed to democratic methods of government and work, make botches of their attempt of wholesale wickedness. Democracy
must be submerged by the mob or superseded by a semi-feudal political machine before cruelty or thievery can thrive on a large scale on the soil of freedom. We may here point the converse of that moral. The machinery of a theocratic despotism is ready for any crime, when grasped by the hand of a scoundrel. The
men who engineered the massacre at Mountain Meadows were both sacerdotal and military officers of the Mormon kingdom. They were knit together in the bonds of martial and ecclesiastical discipline. The
very signal for murder was an appeal to their misguided loyalty-"Do your duty!" Lee and Haight and Dame and Higbee and Klingensmith did not need to alter a single detail in the organization of Zion's empire. They needed only to assign it the task which their villainy had conceived.
John Doyle Lee was finally convicted, and was executed on the scene of his crime, March 23, 1877. His execution was just; and a goodly company might have been kneeling beside him on their coffins with no loss to the world, and no miscarriage of justice. But
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the greatest criminal of the Mountain Meadows horror cannot be disposed of in so summary a fashion. That criminal is the evil doctrine that any man can absolve himself from responsibility to and for his fellows by yielding blind obedience to some prophet, prince, or priest.
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IT is necessary now to leave the regular course of events in Utah and bring together the threads from which were woven that web of shamed authority and lost opportunity known as the "Mormon war." This "war" was but one more clash between democracy and theocracy, between free government and despotism. The growing nation had come once more in contact with the Mormon kingdom, and as before, contact meant conflict. But this time, aggression as well as provocation was commenced by the kingdom; and the nation failed to use its overwhelming might to end in fitting fashion the quarrel which Brigham and his aids had begun.
The experience of judge Brocchus had been prophetic. He was but the first of a considerable line of retreating federal officials who proclaimed that there was no law in Utah save the will of Brigham Young. Steptoe was caught in an intrigue as cleverly managed as if Brigham had been trained at the court of Louis XV, instead of in the backwoods and prairies of America. Judge Drummond was balked and baffled when he undertook to resist some of the legal predilections of the territory. Judge Stiles was defied to his face, told that if he decided against the Mormon contention, he would be taken from the bench, " damned quick "-and Brigham refused to give the court protection. David H. Burr, surveyor-general
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of Utah, made a report to the federal government, adverse to some claims of Brigham Young. A few days later, Burr was visited by three Mormon officials, the clerk of the supreme court, the territorial marshal, and the acting district attorney. They showed him a copy of his report, warned him that they would know every word he sent to Washington, and intimated that he would better cease criticising the land titles of the "Lion of the Lord."
Insults like these could not be endured forever, even by the complaisant federal government of the decade prior to the Civil war. Matters were made more serious by the persistent efforts to get Utah admitted as a state. One such attempt was made in 1854, another in 1856; and though these efforts failed, they gave earnest of a settled purpose, most skilfully ;prosecuted. Even in our day, when the theory of absolute state sovereignty lies buried at Appomattox, Utah's stateship has enabled the Mormon hierarchy to violate its pledges with impunity, and to seat its ambassador in the senate of the United States. Fifty years ago, statehood was almost priceless. Federal control of territories was substantially as great then as now; while federal control of states had been lessening since the days of Jackson, till it well-nigh had reached the vanishing point. Sooner or later, a political bargain would give the Mormons this boon at the hands of Congress, as a political bargain had secured them the Nauvoo charter from the legislature of Illinois. With the slave state problem of the South complicated by a polygamy state problem in the West, the Union might become scarce worth preserving. Every patriotic statesman, whose attention was not monopolized by slavery, recognized with
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irritation and alarm the growing arrogance of the Mormon kingdom.
But as often happens in our country, the people were taking fire faster than their officials. All over the land was rising a slow but mighty tide of anger against the polygamous despotism of Brigham Young. It was an anger resting on instinct and suspicion, rather than on knowledge; but for the moment it was little less dangerous on that account. In June of 1856, the first Republican national convention classed polygamy with slavery as "twin relics of barbarism." In the same month, as if to warn the Mormons that they could not longer play off one party against the other, Stephen A. Douglas, leader of the Democratic party, made a speech at Springfield, Illinois. He recited the charges made against the Mormon kingdom, and declared that if those charges were proven true, it would be the duty of Congress to "apply the knife, and cut out this loathsome and disgusting ulcer."
As in most disputes, there is something to be said on both sides. The Mormon view was not entirely without merit. They misused and bullied federal officials; but many of those officials were of a breed to invite such treatment. Judge Drummond, for example, left his wife in the "States," to travel openly about Utah with his mistress; and he was in the habit of trying cases with her sitting beside him. There was also a healthy impatience with "carpet-bag government," which all Americans can understand and respect. But when all other allowances are made, the fact remains that then, as now, the Mormon kingdom was set in sullen opposition to every principle and practice of American government. The only question at any time was whether the nation would accept the ***************************************page 287 THE MORMON WAR
provocation which the kingdom never ceased to offer. Brigham's one declaration: "I am and will be governor, and no power can hinder it," was enough to justify his summary removal, and the use of any power or punishments necessary to make that removal effective.
Mormon writers have tried to find the cause of the "war" in the disappointment of a mail contractor, and the subtle scheming of Southern statesmen, who wished to disperse the regular army to make ready for secession. As for the last, it was hardly a powerful motive so early as 1857, and if it had been the determining factor of the "war," the number of troops first ordered to Utah would have been much larger than was the case. As for the mail contract, Heber C. Kimball did underbid W. M. F. Magraw, and Magraw did write to the president a letter denouncing the Mormons in severe though general terms. But Magraw did not write the first national Republican platform, nor make the Springfield speech of Stephen A. Douglas, nor seize the papers of a United States judge, nor open the mail of a surveyorgeneral, nor presume, to name the perpetual and irremovable governor of Utah, nor do any of the thousand things which made it clear that a clash between Mormonism and Americanism was inevitable.
May 28, 1857---less than three months after President Buchanan took office---Winfield Scott, general-in-chief of the regular army, sent a circular to heads of departments, reminding them of the orders already issued to assemble troops at Fort Leavenworth for the Mormon expedition, and giving in some detail the equipment to be provided. The force was to consist of 2,500 men. In addition to ordinary supplies,
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2,000 beef cattle were to be bought, and driven forward with the army. One month later, June 29, a letter of instructions, prepared after consultation with the War Department and doubtless with the President, was despatched to General W. S. Harney, then proposed for commander of the expedition. He was to accompany the new civil governor to Utah, and to use his force as a posse comitatus to enforce the orders of the governor, or the decrees of judges. He was to avoid all conflict with the inhabitants of Utah, so far as it was possible to do so; and particularly he was to attack no one, except in carrying out his orders from the civil authorities, or in sheer self-defence. At the same time, he was warned to expect armed and organized resistance on the very threshold of the rebellious territory and was counselled not to divide his forces. This letter contained some remarks about the trouble that might ensue, owing to the lateness of the start. This halting prophecy was fulfilled, as thoroughly as if it had been one of Heber Kimball's.
Most of the troops got away from Fort Leavenworth late in July. Partly by good luck-which favoured him throughout this episode-arid partly through the shrewd intelligence and devotion of two of his subordinates, Brigham knew of the expedition almost as soon as it had started. Abraham O. Smoot, father of the present Apostle, Senator Reed Smoot, and at that time mayor of Salt Lake City, left that city June a, 1857, with the monthly mail for the East. He met soldiers on the plains, who said they were scouting for Indians-and Smoot had seen no Indians. Some distance west of Independence, the eastern end of his mail route, Smoot began to meet
heavy freight team, whose drivers would say only
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that they had government freight, and were boundas was self-evident-for some western post. Two days later, he reached Kansas City, where his suspicions were well confirmed, and he learned of the proposed "invasion." The postmaster at Independence refused to deliver any more mail for Salt Lake City. Turning westward, Smoot and his associates began to gather up their horses and supplies which had been used in transporting the mails. They met "Port" Rockwell with the July mail, too miles east of Fort Laramie, and he turned back with them. On July 18, Smoot and Rockwell left Fort Laramie with four of their best horses, and a light spring wagon. Five days and three hours later, they drove into Salt Lake City, a distance of 513 miles.
The 24th of July is the day kept memorable by Mormons as the anniversary of their entrance to the Happy Valley. This being the tenth year since that event, unusual preparations were made for the celebration, which was to take place at Cottonwood Lake. According to most Mormon accounts, Brigham was already at the lake when Smoot and Rockwell arrived in the city on the evening of July 23, and they followed him thither next morning with the news. When the people gathered round him for the speech without which no great occasion was deemed complete, Brigham told them that a federal army was marching against Zion. He reminded them of his own declaration on entering the valley, that in ten years' time he would ask no odds of Uncle Sam or the devil; and added with whimsical humour that the devil had taken him at his word. He promised his people that if they would live their religion, God
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would see them through their trials, and strike down the legions coming against them.
Notwithstanding this reliance on the Lord, Brigham did not neglect his part of the prophesied deliverance. Messengers were sent to England, the Continent, and the Pacific states to call home the missionaries who were in those parts labouring for Zion. The Western Standard, a church paper published in San Francisco, was ordered discontinued, and its editor and his assistants returned home to defend the kingdom. A prosperous colony had been started in southern California, and this also was sacrificed. The abandonment of Nevada, then known as Carson county, was only in part the result of the approaching peril; but perhaps this was the deciding factor. No one hesitated, no one rebelled. With a courage worthy of greater enlightenment and a better cause, the Mormon people gathered around their prophet, prepared to do his will, even unto the uttermost, in resisting a nation amply capable of wiping them from the face of the earth.
Indeed, this was the fate which they believed had been prepared for them; and Brigham was not slow to encourage that notion. Even more than the British authorities whom Mulvaney describes, Americans on each new movement of troops act "like a girls' school meeting a big red bull in the road." Wild talk ran from tongue to ear in the eastern states and on the Pacific coast, that the troops had been sent to disperse the Mormon community and to hang Brigham Young. In spite of the absence of a mail service, these rumours quickly found their way to Utah, and they grew on the road. The experience of the Saints in Missouri and Illinois gave colour to these tales of
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destruction, and the man whose cool judgment ---had he suffered it to prevail--- would have known at once the absurdity of the stories and the impossibility of resistance, was storming to and fro in the pulpit, increasing the excitement.
"We have borne enough of their oppression and abuse," urged Brigham, "and we will not bear any more of it . . . I am not going to permit troops here for the protection of the priests and the rabble in their efforts to drive us from the land we possess. You might as well tell me that you can make hell into a powder-house as to tell me that they intend to keep an army here and have peace. I have told you that if there is any man or woman who is not willing to destroy everything of their property which would be of use to an enemy if left, I would advise them to leave the territory. And I again say so today; for when the time comes to burn and lay waste our improvements, if any man undertakes to shield his he will be treated as a traitor, for judgment will be laid to the line and righteousness to the plummet. . . . Now, the faint-hearted can go in peace; but should that time come, they must not interfere. Before I will again suffer as I have in times gone by, there shall not be one building, nor one foot of lumber, nor a fence, nor a tree, nor a particle of grass or hay that will burn left within reach of enemies, I am sworn, if driven to extremity, to utterly lay waste this land, in the name of Israel's God, and our enemies shall find it as barren as when we came here."
Whether Brigham would have kept his oath if driven to extremity can be but a matter of opinion. The present writers believe he would. At any rate,
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he went on making plans for resistance. On August 1, the Nauvoo Legion was ordered to hold itself in readiness. On August 13, a party was sent out to reconnoitre, and get in touch with the advancing force. The last of the same month, Captain Van Vliet, of General Harney's staff, arrived in Salt Lake City as a sort of avant courier, to learn what disposition the church leaders really bore toward the federal government. He was not long in learning. Brigham received him courteously, but declared over and over that the approaching troops never should enter the valley. The Mormons had suffered enough, Brigham declared, arid henceforth they meant to meet persecution on the threshhold ; and he dwelt at length on his determination to make the valley a desert before the federal troops should enter it. "If they [the government] dare to force the issue," declared Young, "I shall not hold the Indians by the wrist any longer for white men to shoot at. They shall go ahead and do as they please."
Two days before this remark was made, the Indians-with the aid of some fifty-four Mormonshad " done as they pleased "at Mountain Meadows. Brigham did not know this as yet; but his statement shows that he had considered using the Indians as allies against the United States. It speaks volumes for his personality that in spite of his utter repudiation of the nation which his visitor served, he sent Captain Van Vliet away more than half convinced of the justice of the Mormon cause.
Van Vliet left Salt Lake City September 14. The next day, Brigham issued a proclamation declaring martial law in the territory, and breathing forth threatenings on all enemies of the Saints.
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"For the last twenty-five years we have trusted officials of this government, from constables and justices to judges, governors and presidents, only to be scorned, held in derision, insulted and betrayed. Our houses have been plundered, and then burned, our fields laid waste, our principal men butchered, while under the pledged faith of the government for their safety, and our families driven from their homes to find that shelter in the barren wilderness and that protection among hostile savages, which were denied them in the boastful abodes of Christianity and civilization.
"We are condemned unheard, and forced to an issue with an armed mercenary mob, which has been sent against us at the instigation of anonymous letter writers, ashamed to father the base, slanderous falsehoods they have given to the public; of corrupt officials who have brought false accusations against us to screen themselves in their own infamy; and of hireling priests and howling editors who prostitute the truth for filthy lucre's sake."
It is needless at this day to do more than indicate the chief absurdities of this proclamation. It assumes two things: First, that the federal government had no right to send troops to a territory, arid second, that the mission of these troops was to destroy the Mormons, instead of to insure obedience to law. Both of these assumptions were false. Brigham's proclamations at this time, like his sermons during the "reformation," show how even a cool, calm judgment can be unsettled by the strong wine of irresponsible power.
But it was only in his rhetoric that this error of judgment was made manifest; and when we remember that his proclamations and letters were in-
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tended for the home market, which he understood better than any one else, it may be there was no great blunder there. His preparations for the "war" and conduct of it were as perfect as possible in such a conflict. On September 22, a scouting party camped within half a mile of the slow-moving regular troops, and never lost touch with them till the beginning of winter. When the soldiers crossed the boundary of the territory of Utah, Brigham sent a letter to Colonel E. B. Alexander, commander of the advance guard. This letter informed the colonel that he had transgressed the orders of the august governor of Utah, who had forbidden armed troops to enter that sacred territory. The army must retreat immediately, declared Brigham; but if this should be impossible, owing to the lateness of the season, they might remain during the winter, provided they surrendered their arms to the Utah authorities! Instead of hanging the messenger who brought such an epistle, Colonel Alexander returned a courteous if somewhat curt rejoinder. With this exchange of missives, hostilities may be said to have begun.
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THE little federal army was formidable in outward seeming; but in reality, it was helpless as the babes in the wood. At close quarters, it could have crushed several times its number of Mormon or any other militia-but it could not get to close quarters. There were two infantry regiments, the Fifth and the Tenth, and two batteries. But there was no cavalry, and cavalry was the one arm imperatively needed. The Second Dragoons had been assigned to this expedition, but were held back, owing to troubles in Kansas. Almost as bad as this misjudgment was the series of changes in command of the army. General Harney was first scheduled for this post, but, like the horsemen, was retained to deal with Free-soilers and Border Ruffians. The man appointed as Harney's successor died before he could assume command. Finally, Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston was put at the head of the expedition. No better man could have been found for the task, but he came too late to save the force from the humiliations prepared for it.
The slow-creeping infantry regiments with their huge supply trains sprawled across hill arid plain were a standing invitation to attack; and at last the invitation was accepted. As soon as he had received Colonel Alexander's reply to Brigham, Daniel H. Wells, commander of the Mormon forces, issued his
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orders. His mounted scouting parties were to burn the grass in front of the advancing soldiers, cut off their supplies, steal their cattle, burn their wagons, and keep them from sleeping. One strong injunction was laid on the Mormon militia in carrying out these orders. They were not to take life if they could by any means avoid it. This was a measure, less of humanity than of foresight. With all his raving and ranting in the pulpit, Brigham knew that negotiation, rather than fighting, must bring him through this crisis, and he wanted no bloodshed to make slippery the steps of diplomacy.
The Mormon plans were absurdly easy to put into effect. Lot Smith, with forty-four men, was first among the Saints to spoil the Gentiles. On October 4, 1857, Smith came upon an unarmed supply train, and ordered the commander of it to turn round, and go east till he reached the States. The captain obeyed as long as the Mormons were in sight, then headed for the West again. At this, Smith returned, unloaded the wagons, left the drivers to their own devices, and divided his little force for further raiding. Twenty men were sent to stampede the mules of one of the regiments. The rest, under Smith, performed an exploit of which Mormon writers are still boasting. At midnight of October 5, they held up-there is no other word for it-another supply train consisting of seventy-five wagons, and burned them all. These wagons were loaded with bacon, ham, coffee, flour, hard-tack, and desiccated vegetables; and their loss was an expensive mishap for the government. The next day, Smith burned some more wagons about twenty miles away.
Colonel Alexander was helpless. Well mounted,
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and knowing the country as if it were their dooryard, the Mormons had the federal infantry netted. Alexander had no instructions as to the government's wishes, and he does not seem to have been a man who could go ahead and take his chances without instructions. He called a council of war, at which it was decided to turn northward, avoiding the canons which were known to be fortified, and trying to reach the Salt Lake valley by a side door. It might have been a good plan for a cavalry force in June; but for a heavy, slow-moving, overloaded expedition, on the very edge of winter, it was a scheme of destruction. Trails had to be cut through the heavy brush, the endless wagon trains had to receive some sort of protection; and the march was so slow that often the advance guard was making camp for the night before the rearmost wagons had begun to move. Mormon scouts hung on the flanks of the floundering column, and one night cut out eight hundred oxen, which were driven in triumph to Salt Lake City. Alexander mounted some infantry on mules; but the Mormons only laughed at the " jackass cavalry "; and continued their depredations unchecked. After persisting for nine days and covering only thirty-five miles, Colonel Alexander called a new council of war, turned back to the south, and made for Fort Bridger.
He reached that place November 2, 1857, to find that the Mormons had burned all the buildings, all the wood, and all the trees that would take fire. The next day Colonel Johnston arrived, after a march which gave the troops a foretaste of winter campaigning in the Rocky Mountains. The presence of this able commander quickly restored the morale of the force, but the passes were already blocked with snow,
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the army was nearly destitute of horses, and there was nothing to do but go into winter quarters. Accordingly, Camp Scott was laid out near the ruins of Fort Bridger, one hundred and fifteen miles from Salt Lake City, and the troops soon made themselves fairly comfortable. It was November i9 before the cavalry joined them, bringing the new governor in their train. These troops had had a terrific struggle with storms, and the journal of their commander, Colonel Philip St. George Cooke, reads more like the story of an expedition in Siberia than the record of a military advance in the soldier's own country.
This was the crisis of the "war." The only honourable course, the only safe course for the government, was to finish the task it had begun, no matter what the cost in treasure or suffering. The nation had been flouted and defied, its property destroyed or carried off as plunder, its troops resisted, its officials denied access to its own territory. To draw back at this time was to offer direct encouragement to rebellion, to announce in plain terms that any one might defy federal authority with safety, provided the defiance were couched in loud enough tones. On the other hand, a prompt and uncompromising suppression of the Utah outbreak would have strengthened the hands of the national government in any future stress, and would have done something, at least, to lessen the growing popularity of secession.
Unfortunately, President Buchanan was not the man to strike strong blows in a brave cause. He understood the situation perfectly. He spoke of the need so to assert federal authority that this first rebellion should likewise be the last. He sent a message to Congress, explaining hip action in sending an
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armed force to the Rocky Mountains, and demanding support, which was rather grudgingly given. Troops were ordered to prepare for the front, General Scott was instructed to sail for California, and despatch a force to Utah from that direction. There was brave talk of a decisive advance in the spring. But it was only talk. Even while the President was writing his message, Brigham was undermining his purpose, stealing away his confidence, and preparing for him a cup of unmixed humiliation.*
It is hardly necessary to say that Brigham's agent in the negotiations now begun was Colonel Thomas L. Kane. Kane alone had the duplicity, the diplomacy, the social standing, and the absolute devotion to the Mormon cause which were required to bring the kingdom through this crisis without disaster. Kane had vouched for Brigham's purity and patriotism to President Fillmore. President Buchanan now paid this official debt by vouching for Kane. He wrote letters, describing the wily colonel as an unselfish philanthropist, who was about to visit Utah from a stern sense of duty, and commending him to all federal officials whom he might meet. With these documents in his pocket, Kane sailed for San Francisco in January, 1858, under the name of " Dr. Osborne," and from California made his way to Salt Lake City. There he had an extended conference with the Twelve, and a short but absolutely private one with Brigham. This over, after a short rest, Kane set out for Camp Scott, to meet Alfred Cumming, the new governor of Utah.
Cumming was a good-natured, bustling individual;
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* The President's letters were dated December 3, 1857. His message was sent to Congress December 8.
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pompous without being dignified and intelligent without being sensible. He was exactly the sort of man to be wrapped around the finger of a skilled diplomat, and doubtless his character was considered in shaping the Mormon plot. Kane's mission in Camp Scott was twofold. First, he was to stir up trouble between Governor Cumming and General Johnston, so that hearty co-operation between them should be impossible. Next, he was to persuade Cumming to trust to the "loyalty" of the Mormons, whom Kane represented as willing to accept any governor the President might send, but who feared persecution from the troops. If the governor would first show his confidence in the Mormons, then Brigham, without too obvious a backdown, might consent to take the governor's word for it that the troops would be put to no tyrannical uses; and it was even possible that representations from Governor Cumming might secure the recall of the army altogether.
Kane performed his work with a smooth assurance which baffles comprehension now as it baffled interference then. He reached Camp Scott March 10. Within forty-eight hours he had established an understanding with Governor Cumming, and picked a quarrel-not too serious a one-with General Johnston. From that time forward, events in camp moved with the regularity of a text-book game of chess. April 3-just twenty-four days after Kane's arrival-Cumming announced that he was going to Salt Lake City without waiting for the troops, and intimated his confidence that he could bring the dispute to a satisfactory ending.
Two days later, the governor started-of course in company with Kane. The 'Mormons provided a
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"guard of honour" for the official whom they had kept cooling his heels in a winter camp for five months ---and Cumming accepted the attention. Mormon talent for amateur dramatics never showed to better advantage than in this journey and the events immediately following it. Echo canon had been provided with the usual style of militia fortifications; walls and rocks and ditches; things which look impregnable to the unprofessional eye, but which disciplined troops are accustomed to take to pieces with neatness and despatch. It was desired to give Cumming the impression that this canon was garrisoned in force, and the trip through it was made by night. Fires were built at various points to give the impression of a large army-an old trick, but one which still works. Every little distance the governor was challenged by a group of Argus-eyed sentries. It was the same group each time; for while he was being taken aside and quizzed, and Kane was whispering the countersign in the most approved style of a comic-opera conspirator's chorus, the hard-working sentinels would hasten ahead, and get ready to challenge the incoming Gentile again. Probably there were less than two hundred men in the canon, but to the governor they seemed at least as many thousands.
Cumming arrived at Salt Lake City April 12, 1858, and was taken to the home of a prominent Mormon elder. Brigham at once called on the Gentile governor, and delivered to him the territorial seal. The plot was working beautifully. Three days after his arrival, Gumming wrote a self-congratulatory letter to Johnston, but made no mention of a forward move of troops. His second Sunday in Salt Lake City, Governor Cumming was asked to speak in the Tabernacle,
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where another bit of theatricals had been arranged for his benefit. The governor made a most conciliatory-not to say abject speech; but as soon as he stopped, a large number of the audience began to berate and abuse him, calling him an office-seeker and -worst insult in Mormon vocabulary-a Missourian. They harangued each other in fiery phrases on the wickedness of the federal government, and the sufferings of Zion in the past; and testified to their readiness to fight for their rights and their religion. Over all presided Brigham, soothing the tumult with a word when it grew too loud, deprecating the grossness of his people's language, and generally showing himself master of the situation. The obvious result of this performance was to convince Cumming that no one could govern Utah without the aid of Brigham Young.*
Thus far, the scheme had worked admirably, but the kingdom and especially the chiefs of the kingdom were not yet out of danger. The federal force was not composed entirely of Alfred Cummings. Judge D. R. Eckles, new chief justice of the territory, had called a grand jury at Camp Scott during the winter, and this inquisitorial body had indicted Brigham Young for treason. Similar true bills were found against Heber C. Kimball, General Wells, "Port" Rockwell, "Bill" Hickman, and a number of others.
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* Linn and other writers speak of this performance in the Tabernacle as designed by Brigham to show his flock that he was not surrendering. Just why he needed such a demonstration at this time, or how the Tabernacle meeting could have provided one if he did need it, the present writers are unable to see. It was the governor who needed impressing on this occasion, not the people; and a better way of showing Cumming what would happen to him if he quarrelled with Brigham is not easy to not easy to imagine.
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Such indictments were embarassing to the Saints, the more so since judge Eckles was standing on his dignity and refusing to enter Salt Lake City till the flag of his country was flying there. General Johnston, too, was contumacious; he plainly had no faith in the patriotism, loyalty, or good intentions in any way of Brigham and his aids; and at this time, General Johnston was still free to use his troops in support of the judge, without asking consent of the governor.
Under such circumstances, the natural strategy would be for Young and his fellows in trouble to keep out of the way until representations could be made at Washington which would get them a pardon, or until the troops could be recalled. But Brigham had no notion of playing the part of a lone fugitive, nor of pleading for mercy from the government he had insulted and defied. Whatever one may think of his general character, however one may reprobate his undisguised treason, the candid student must admit that Brigham's nerve and daring at this juncture approach the sublime. Instead of drawing his stake and quitting the game, now that fate had favoured him for the moment, he pushed his winnings back on the board to play for all or nothing. He had captured the Gentile governor without a fight. Very well; he would now disarm the federal judiciary and tie the hands of the federal commander; or he would carry out his threat to make the valley a desert.
Practically the whole population of Salt Lake City and the northern settlements deserted their homes at Brigham's counsel, and moved southward to camp by the shores of Utah lake. They took with them arms and provisions, and such household furniture as could be of use in camp life; but their heavier property
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was left behind. Each man on leaving his house fixed it so as to burn as rapidly as possible. Shavings and kindling were placed handy, and a squad of determined men were assigned to the task of applying the torch when Brigham should give the word.
It was a deliberate and superb defiance; but it was never carried out. Had President Buchanan owned a tithe of Brigham's daring stubbornness, there would be no Mormon problem in America to-day, and the history of the Civil war might have read somewhat differently. Even while Governor Cumming was being treated to carefully arranged theatricals in Echo canon, President Buchanan was making a practical surrender of federal authority over Utah. April 6, 1858-on the anniversary of the founding of the church-he issued a proclamation on Utah affairs. After a blustering prelude which merely emphasized the weakness of the document, the President continued:
"Being anxious to save the effusion of blood, and to avoid the indiscriminate punishment of a whole people for crimes of which it is not probable that all are equally guilty, I offer now a free and full pardon to all who will submit themselves to the just authority of the federal government."
Senator-elect L. W. Powell of Kentucky and Major Ben McCullough, a Texas veteran of the Mexican war, were appointed peace commission to carry this amnesty to the Mormons, and "bring those misguided people to their senses." These commissioners reached Salt Lake City June 7, 1858. Four days later, they held a conference in the Tabernacle with Brigham
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and his aids, who had come back from their camp on Utah lake for this purpose. A considerable number of their followers had accompanied them, and with these and the population remaining in the city, the building was crowded. While the conference as in progress, "Port" Rockwell rode up to the building on a foaming horse, and entering, informed Brigham that the troops were marching toward the city. Brigham stepped to the front of the platform and called out
"Is Brother Dunbar present?"
Brother Dunbar, a Scotchman and precentor of the Mormon congregation, was present. On receiving this assurance, Brigham gave the order:
"Brother Dunbar, sing Zion!"
" Zion" was the chief military hymn, the Marillaise, of the Mormons, if the bones of Rouget de isle do not resent the comparison. Brother Dunbar immediately led off in the hymn, and the whole congregation joined in singing:
"Here our voices we'll raise and we'll sing to thy praise,
Sacred home of the prophets of God;
Thy deliverance is nigh,
Thy oppressors shall die
And the Gentiles shall bow 'neath thy rod!"
Tullidge, pro-Mormon historian, is kind enough to plain that this lapse into poetry meant: "Stop that army or our peace conference is ended!" The army could not be stopped, for it had not yet started; Major
McCullough of the peace commission remained quite impressed; but the singing and the subsequent harangues were not without their value. They en-
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abled Brigham to consent to the presence of the Soldiers without seeming to back down, and that was the only difficulty remaining. President Buchanan had conceded everything else. The next day, June 12, Brigham delivered another harangue. He denied that the Mormons had done anything which required the President's pardon, except, perhaps, to burn a few wagon trains. This was a justifiable act under the circumstances; but if the President wanted to pardon them for it, he was welcome to do so. Warming to his subject, Brigham went on:
"We have the God of Israel ---the God of battles--- on our side; and let me tell you, gentlemen, we fear not your armies. I can take a few of the boys here, and with the help of the Lord, can whip the whole United States.
. . . . The United States are going to destruction as fast as they can go. If you do not believe it, gentlemen, you will soon see it to your sorrow. It will be with them like a broken potsherd. Yes, it will be like water spilled on the ground no more to be picked up.
" Now, let me say to you peace commissioners, we are willing those troops should come into our country, but not to stay in our city. They may pass through, if needs be, but they must not us!"
The commissioners were there under express orders to make peace, not to punish impudence; therefore this statement was all they required. The "war" was practically over.
Meanwhile, General Johnston had been waiting the arrival of horses and supplies, not for the report of the peace commissioners. These reached him sooner
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than he expected, and on June 13, 1858, he broke camp, and began the march to Salt Lake City. It is a fair inference that this clear-headed, soldierly man hoped against hope that he might come into some collision with the Nauvoo Legion which would justify him in putting his soldiers to work; but if so, he was disappointed. On June 14, word of the "peace" reached him. He sent ahead a dignified statement, that no citizen of Utah who obeyed the laws had anything to fear from the federal soldiery. On June 26, he entered Salt Lake City. It was like a city of the dead. Not a flag waved from any public building, not a citizen was out of doors, not a window was open. Mrs. Cumming, wife of the governor, was literally the only woman in the city. The troops marched in perfect order through the town, and camped on the Jordan, still within the city limits. After a couple of days in this camp, they moved west and south, and on July 6, formed Camp Floyd in Cedar Valley, at almost the prescribed distance of forty miles from Salt Lake City.
Thus closed the "Mormon war"; in unmitigated humiliation for the federal government, in almost unmixed triumph for the Mormon kingdom. Brigham Young and Colonel Kane had tricked, outwitted, and brought to naught the overwhelming might of the United States. Them are few more astonishing and fewer more disgraceful chapters in our history. A clique of polygamous priests, holding despotic sway over a handful of people, were allowed to insult, defy, and make war upon the nation; and then, without retracting their insults, without apologizing for their rebellion, without being beaten or punished in ay way, they were given a pardon which they con-***************************************
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tell, temptuously denied needing, and left in complete though informal mastery of one of the most important territories in the United States.
The daring, the adroitness, the resourcefulness of Brigham and of Bane, and the unreckoning devotion of the Mormon people are worthy of all praise; but the weakness and inefficiency of the federal administration can scarcely receive too great a measure of contempt.
For the Mormon war, as even Buchanan recognized, was the knock of opportunity at the gate of the federal union. Here was the chance, at little comparative cost of life and treasure, to assert the supreme authority of the nation, to rouse the latent Americanism in every community where national sentiment was yielding before the propaganda of secession. Had Buchanan dealt with rebellion in Utah as President Cleveland dealt with anarchy in Chicago, the rally of national feeling might have begun three years before it was waked at Fort Sumter. No single administration, perhaps no succession of administrations could have averted the Civil war altogether. But a very slight shift of sentiment would have kept Virginia in the Union; and had Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson stayed with their state instead of going out with her, there would have been a different tale to tell of the days of '61.
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IN spite of the governor's friendship, the President's pardon, and the reassuring despatch of General Johnston, the Mormons camped by Utah Lake did not immediately return to their homes. Brigham was still suspicious, both of the army and of its commander; and he knew that the federal
judges bore him no good will. Governor Cumming bustled about, swearing that the amnesty should be kept, that no one need fear anything-saying "No,sir! By God, sir! "-and generally making himself a model of pompous incompetence. No one paid any attention to him ---a fact which does not seem to have lessened his good humour in the least. Brigham waited until satisfied that the troops were under perfect discipline, and that General Johnston had no night-riding tendencies. Then, on July 5, the uncrowned emperor climbed on his wagon at the camp by the lake, and told his people that he was going home. The return began at once.
But it was not a return to the care-free, irresponsible dominion he had enjoyed before. Brigham's power was almost as great as ever; but he was obliged to be more circumspect in the use of it. He remained ruler of the kingdom, but now he found it necessary to rule with some slight regard for "foreign" public opinion. Even so slight a restraint was
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irksome to the free-spoken despot, and for a time he ---or his people--- had some apprehensions for his personal safety. Wherever he went, a small but devoted bodyguard attended him, and a watch was kept over the house where he passed the night.
This fear was not wholly without foundation. The new federal judges appointed to Utah were of higher character than most of their predecessors. But they were endowed with long memories, and they did not grasp the necessity of ignoring past political offences. At the November term of court in 1858, judge Sinclair tried to secure the arrest of Brigham and his aids on the indictments for treason found against them the previous winter. He admitted that the President's pardon covered these offences, but insisted that this pardon must be pleaded in court; that it was a bar to punishment, but not to arrest. This may have been good law, but in the existing condition of Utah affairs, it was bad sense. The president had chosen to forgive the Mormon leaders. There was nothing to do but accept that pardon as a fact, close accounts, open a new set of books, and start afresh. To fail in this, to seek to humiliate Brigham and Heber Kimball was to repeat the blunder of the Mormon chiefs, who, by their everlasting harping on their trials in Missouri and Illinois, were giving to their followers an almost incurable case of political jaundice. The United States district attorney, wiser than judge Sinclair, refused to take any action in the matter, and this first clash passed harmlessly.
There were offences not covered by any mantle of forgiveness, however; and with such judge Cradlebaugh came in contact when he held court in southern Utah. The story of Mountain Meadows had
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leaked out. Some doings of the "reformation" had come to light. Cradlebaugh made a personal investigation of these crimes, and ---not unnaturally--- seemed to lose his sense of judicial propriety in anger at the ecclesiastical tyranny which could permit or promote such atrocities. Cradlebaugh became convinced that Brigham and his aids were not only morally but legally responsible for Mountain Meadows. In the full belief that he had found a way to break up the Mormon hierarchy, the judge called a grand jury at Provo in March, 1859. He laid before them the facts he had collected and the opinions he had formed, and practically ordered them to return indictments, not only against actual participants in the various outrages, but against the heads of the church. In order to protect the court and witnesses from Mormon vengeance, judge Cradlebaugh had a detachment of soldiers from Camp Floyd stationed at Provo.
It was a bad move in a good cause; but if it had no other effect, it at least showed the marvellous solidarity of Brigham's empire. Judge Cradlebaugh had supposed that the Mormons were held in ecclesiastical bondage through terror, that they would break away gladly the moment they were assured of protection. The Spartan king who thought to rouse the people of Alexandria by the cry of "Liberty!" was not more grievously disappointed. The whole Mormon community blazed forth in indignation at the judge who dared accuse their holy priests of crime, and who proclaimed that the law of the land was higher than the law of God, as revealed through the mouth of His prophet. The grand jury refused to return indictments. Judge Cradlebaugh issued bench warrants, but they could not be served. The whole
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community closed ranks and acted as one man in protection of their hierarchy. Governor Cumming ordered the troops at Provo to return to Camp Floyd. General Johnston replied that Cradlebaugh had asked for protection and should have it. In spite of the soldiers, in spite of his own unjudicial zeal, Cradlebaugh's efforts came to nothing. At last, he entered on the docket a minute that the whole population seemed leagued to defeat justice, and adjourned court without day in a bitter speech, whose unseemly phrases are kept alive by Mormon historians even yet.
The matter of military protection for the courts was appealed to Washington, and decided against judge Cradlebaugh. President Buchanan held that the governor alone had a right to make requisition for troops, and that the judges must prefer their requests through him. It was a proper, indeed, an inevitable decision; but it completed the triumph of Brigham, and showed that in stirring up strife between Governor Cumming and General Johnston, Colonel Kane had builded better than he knew. The governor hated the commander with all the venom that pompous inefficiency feels for haughty competency. The soldiers could scarcely have had less effect on the administration of Utah if they had been camped on the Missouri river.
Hardly had Cradlebaugh's scheme of redemption come to an inglorious end at Provo than a yet sharper excitement broke out at Salt Lake City. A Gentile named Brewer had conceived the plan of counterfeiting the notes drawn by the quartermaster at Camp Floyd on the assistant treasurer of the United States. A counterfeit plate was engraved by a young Mormon artist, who is said not to have known the purpose for
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which his work was required. The fraud was detected, Brewer was arrested, and immediately tried to clear himself by confessing and offering to turn state's evidence. He implicated Brigham in the plot. A writ was issued for Brigham's arrest, and officers from Camp Floyd asked Governor Cumming to deputize them to seize the Mormon king. Cumming indignantly refused to have any part in the plan. A few days later, word was brought to Salt Lake City that General Johnston was preparing to make a night march on the city for the purpose of arresting the heads of the church. The story was false; but without waiting for confirmation, Governor Cumming ordered General Wells to call out the Nauvoo Legion, and prepare to repel the threatened "invasion!" In a few hours, five thousand armed Mormons had gathered for the fight.
The charge against Brigham of counterfeiting was both malignant and absurd; though whether Cumming was wise in refusing to permit a judicial examination of that charge may well be doubted. The point worth noting in this episode is the completeness with which Brigham controlled the official head of the territory. Little more than a year had-passed since Cumming was cooling his heels in a mountain camp, waiting for federal troops to disperse the rebellious Nauvoo Legion, and seat him in the governor's chair. Now, from that very chair, he was calling on these same rebels to resist the troops who had brought him to the city. The federal governor had become a mere cog in Brigham's political machine. American history holds few, if any, more striking instances of the triumph of personal ascendency over official power.
With the military arm thus effectually bound, the
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army soon became a source of revenue, rather than of fear. Brigham at first preached strict non-intercourse between the Saints of Zion and the sinners of Camp Floyd; but his practice did not square with his precepts and the doctrine of quarantine was soon abandoned altogether. A number of Gentile merchants with Mormon connections established tradinghouses at the camp; and supplied-for a consideration -goods for Uncle Sam's soldiers, and for the numerous camp followers who trail after an army. The Walker brothers, whom we shall soon find in open and not unsuccessful opposition to Brigham, got their real start in merchandising at Camp Floyd. But Brigham, as might have been expected, took a larger profit than any of his followers. On representations that no flour could be had in Utah, a contract had been let by the government to bring this article from the Missouri valley to Camp Floyd at the outrageous price of $28.40 per hundred pounds. The price of flour in Utah was $6 per hundred. Brigham and the contractors got together, the troops were fed on flour from the Mormon tithing-house, the contractors made a tremendous profit, and it is fair to believe that they made an equitable division of their plunder with the "Lion of the Lord." Many faults have been laid to his charge, but Brigham Young was never accused of the profitless weakness of being easy to cheat.
The presence of federal troops and judges could not even save the lives of persons whom the kingdom wished to execute. Such matters had to be handled more circumspectly than in the days of the "reformation," and minor church officials no longer dared assume to dispense the high justice, the middle, and the low. But the man who incurred the serious
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enmity of the hierarchy, unless protected by high character and corresponding influence, had shurt shrift. For example, Brewer, the man who had accused Brigham of complicity in counterfeiting. was shot one night while walking in company with a gambler. The coroner's jury next day declared that the two men had shot each other. No one in Utah believed the ridiculous verdict, but it stood. Brewer had sought to defile the Lord's anointed, and death was his only possible punishment. The killing of the gambler was a by-product, so to speak. No one had any especial reason for wishing him dead; but he was in the way; and the life of a gambler never has been esteemed very highly in western communities. The soldiers were not allowed to come to the city; but camp followers could not be put under the same restraint. A considerable street was given over to saloons and disorderly houses designed to cater to this new class of custom-though it is not to be supposed that Gentiles alone visited this quarter. Killings in this neighbourhood were frequent and excited little attention. If perchance any one was arrested for a "Whiskey Street" offence, the odds were against his being brought to trial. The "ley fuga" was as well established in Utah at this time as in the Mexico of the Diaz regime; and seriously undesirable citizens who got into the Salt Lake City jail ---especially if under guard of "Port" Rockwell--- acquired the habit of being "killed while attempting to escape."
The only cloud that menaced Brigham's supremacy during this period was a design to remove Governor Cumming. General Johnston and other officers haqd not been slow in reporting the governor's subservience
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to the Mormon hierarchy; and President Buchanan determined to replace the compliant official with some one more nearly capable of asserting federal authority. From this danger, Brigham was saved once more by Colonel Kane. Rising from the bed where he was confined with pleurisy, when every word and movement cost him a pang, Colonel Kane delivered a lecture on "the situation in Utah" before the Historical Society of New York. He declared that the Mormons were divided into two parties: one of fire-eaters, who wanted war with the federal government; and one, headed by Brigham, who were determined to keep the peace. He praised Governor Cumming in the highest degree, as the ideal man to cope with the difficult situation. Mormon officials in New York saw to it that this lecture was reported in the press throughout the East; and Buchanan was forced to halt. He had himself praised Kane's exalted patriotism, and attested his superior knowledge of all Utah affairs; and now he was powerless before the reputation he had helped to build.
This is the last time we shall meet Colonel Kane in this history and it may not be amiss to pause a moment in contemplation of his character. That character was one which Richelieu or Charles Second would have appraised more correctly than did President Buchanan or General Johnston. It is one of the conventions of English-speaking lands that the brave man is ever truthful; that the untruthful man is ever cowardly; that false-speaking is so corrosive a poison that it destroys the whole moral nature, and leaves the liar a whited sepulchre, filled with all uncleanness, and empty of all all soundness or virtue. The persistence of this theory is due to the Anglo-Saxon's skill in de-
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ceiving himself, rather than to his reluctance in deceiving others; and the single case of Colonel Kane upsets the notion altogether.
Kane was a man of unblushing mendacity and unfaltering courage; and both qualities were used for the advantage of others, rather than of himself. In his zeal for the Mormon cause, he stopped at no falsehood and hesitated at no danger. He believed it his task to save the Mormon church from the destruction which Gentiles were plotting against it; and nothing was allowed to interfere with that sacred mission. In a letter to President Fillmore, Kane denounced the "spiritual wife story" as an unmixed outrage ---when he must have had personal acquaintance with at least half a dozen of Brigham's plural wives. When so weak from illness that most men in like condition would have deemed it an act of courage to go to a well-warmed office, Kane wallowed through snowfilled canons to Camp Scott, to turn aside the threatened blow at the Mormon hierarchy. Reaching camp, he dared the fire of the sentry, broke the astonished soldier's head with his own musket, and challenged the commanding officer to a duel. He did these things, not from passion, but deliberately to secure attention, to show his contempt for General Johnston, and give point to his subtle flattery of Governor Cumming. The event proved the correctness of his reasoning.
Such a man never fails to win unsparing curses from enemies, and unmeasured praise from friends. Praises and curses alike are deserved; but neither, standing alone, give a picture of the man. Kane earned condemnation from the United States government; and escaped it. He earned canonization from
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the Mormon hierarchy; and received it. He deserves from history only the just and unprejudiced estimate which belongs to every man; and this the present writers have tried to accord. Had Kane done for himself what he did for others, he would have been an unmitigated scoundrel. Had his honour been equal to his unselfish devotion, he would have been wellnigh a saint. The combination left him a strange, baffling man, a figure that at once attracts and repels; an ecclesiastical diplomat, with the mien of a soldier, a warrior in the habit of a priest.
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RELIEVED of the danger of a new and less pliable governor by Colonel Kane's final bit of diplomacy, Brigham and his people could now rest in peace and enjoy the troubles of the nation which had "persecuted" the Saints. Their enjoyment was the keener because these troubles came as the fulfilment of prophecy. Joseph Smith had foretold in 1832 that civil war would come to the American republic, beginning with the revolt of South Carolina. If Joseph had been wise enough to hang up the receiver at this point, his fame would be more lasting among those contumacious Gentiles who insist on looking into the machinery of miracles. But he must needs go on to predict an uprising of negro slaves, and a devastating war with Great Britain; and lack of accuracy in these small matters has distracted attention from the prophecy which came true.
Indeed, it required no seer to foretell something of the storm about to break on the too-confident nation. President Buchanan had shown his fear of such a misfortune and recognized the best way to avert it, when he spoke in his message to Congress of the necessity of treating the Utah uprising in such a way that this first rebellion should likewise be the last. Instead of carrying out his own sound recommendation, the President had so behaved as to encourage treason and stimulate secession.
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Most of the troops at Camp Floyd were sent to New Mexico early in 1860. In March of the same year, General Johnston returned to the "States" by way of California, leaving Colonel Philip St. George Cooke in command. That fall brought the triumph of the Republican party, with its doctrine that polygamy and slavery were twin relics of barbarism; the election of Abraham Lincoln, and the certainty of civil war. In May, 1861, Governor Cumming went back to his beloved Georgia, leaving the territory so quietly that few knew of his departure till they saw it mentioned in the local paper. Then came orders from Washington for Colonel Cooke to abandon the post, sell all stores which could not with profit be carried back across the plains, and bring the soldiers east to fight for the very life of the nation.
Up to this time, the Saints had received only a sentimental satisfaction from the troubles of the ungodly. Now, they were to reap a pecuniary reward as well. Thanks to the activity of contractors and the complaisance ----to use no harsher word---- of former Secretary of War Floyd, there were some $4,000,000 worth of government property at Camp Floyd, aside from weapons, ammunition, and rations needed on the march. These were now thrown on the market at forced sale ---and there were none but Mormons to buy. The result may be guessed. Four million dollars' worth of goods changed hands for not more than $100,000. Flour for which the government had paid $28.40 per sack was bought for 52 cents per sack; though the standard tithing price at that time was $6. Surplus uniforms and clothing were sold for about the price of the wool required to make the cloth. Army bacon was sold at a cent a pound. Tools and
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materials of all sorts were sacrificed at similar rates. It was the harvest of the gold rush over again ---with the added pleasure of spoiling the Egyptians.
Brigham was the chief buyer on this occasion. He invested nearly $50,000 ---practically as much as all other buyers put together--- and his bargains were the choicest of the lot. The thrifty Yankee soul of him must have rejoiced especially over the repurchase of the flour. He had taken it from the tithing-house at $6, got his share of the profits of selling it to the government for $28.40, and now bought it back again for fifty-two cents, to sell once more to the faithful for $6.
To this day, the Civil war is regarded by the Mormons as an incident of that miracle by which God replenished the storehouses of the Prophet and the Saints at the expense of an unrighteous nation. They were collecting a part of the debt which was due to them for the pillaging to which they had been subjected in Missouri and Illinois.
The Mormon attitude was one of frank rejoicing at the troubles of the Federal government. Brigham's feelings were more nearly loyal than any of his followers who went on record at this time-and surely Brigham's discourses are the reverse of patriotic in tone. "I feel disgraced at having been born under such a government!" he raged at the church conference on April 6, 1861. "I do not think there is a more corrupt government on the face of the earth," chimed in Daniel H. Wells, chief of the nauvoo Legion. Other speakers took a similar tone. It was left to Apostle George A. Smith, however, to vindicate the supremacy of his family in imaginative discourse. At this same conference, George A.
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solemnly informed the assembled Saints that unless they South kept Lincoln busy, he would be forced by the "priestly influences" around him to "put to death every man who believes in the divine mission of Joseph Smith."
This attitude was modified at times, especially if Brigham happened to want something from the government; but it never was permanently changed during the early half of the war. In October, 1861, when the telegraph line was completed into Salt Lake City, Brigham sent a telegram in which were the words: "Utah has not seceded, but is firm for the constitution and the laws of our once happy country." Mormon writers speak of this formal telegram as evidence of exalted patriotism. Perhaps it is such ---by comparison with the sentiments habitually nourished and expressed by the Mormon hierarchy--- but it would not take high rank in a broader collection of patriotic literature. Brigham's theory of the constitution was that this instrument gave the central government supreme authority to protect the Mormons, and no authority to govern them; and it required no great accession of loyalty to commend an instrument interpreted in this wise. In this as in other matters, actions speak more decisively than words. The Mormon kingdom probably had the best organized militia in the United States; but not a company, not a squad, not a man enrolled in the Nauvoo Legion crossed the plains to fight for the Union and the flag. Brigham on more than one occasion declared that he would see the federal government in hell before he would allow a single Saint to enlist in its defence, and so far as he was brought to the test, he kept his word.
Here, as in the story of the of the Mormon battalion, the
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student is struck with the singular obtuseness of Mormon writers and hierarchs on this important matter. They literally do not know what patriotism is. They have given to their church kingdom all the loyalty which the Gentile citizen bestows on country and state. A few men of high intellectual and emotional character among them have been able to rise above ecclesiastical prejudice, and really love their country. A few who have been much in contact with the outside world have absorbed the patriotic sentiment of their neighbours. Aside from these chance exceptions, patriotism has scarcely had an existence among the rulers of the Mormon kingdom.
The season of 1861 was well advanced before President Lincoln appointed new federal officers in Utah. Then he sent John W. Dawson as governor, and John F. Kinney as chief justice, besides other executive and judicial officers. Both Kinney and Dawson were thoroughly bad appointments; but the blame for them rests on the congressmen who did not scruple to recommend them, rather than on the President who was carrying the salvation of a nation on his shoulders. While nearly equal in unworthiness, the two men were widely separated in the fate which overtook them. Kinney pandered to the Mormon empire at every turn, and was removed at last only when the scandal of his subserviency became too great to endure. Governor Dawson antagonized the hierarchy ---and provoked private vengeance by his evil conduct.
In spite of their virulent comment on the American government, Brigham and his aids were anxious as ever to secure admission of Utah as a state. Governor Dawson reached Salt Lake City early in December. The legislature passed a bill calling
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adoption of a constitution and the election of state officers ---and representatives at Washington. Dawson vetoed this bill, on the ground that it gave neither time nor heed to learn whether Congress would grant the statehood desired. Almost immediately, Dawson found himself in trouble. He made improper advances to a woman employed in his office, she told of his offending, and the governor received word that the sooner he got out of the territory the better. He left on the evening of December 31, 1861, taking along a guard specially hired to protect him till beyond the borders of the kingdom. In spite of this guard ---or perhaps by their collusion--- Dawson was set upon by a gang of bullies, beaten, kicked, and according to one account, emasculated.
This was another case in which the rude interpreters of the law of blood atonement went farther than the emperor desired; and on this occasion, Brigham thought best to punish such inopportune exhibition of religious zeal. One of the fellows concerned in the outrage was shot by "Port" Rockwell, January 16, 1862, "while attempting to escape from the officers." Two others were killed by the police of Salt Lake City the next day, and their taking off was explained in a similar manner.
Neither the veto nor the departure of Governor Dawson was allowed to halt the effort to gain statehood for Utah. On January 20, 1862, a convention met in Salt Lake City to frame a state constitution, nominate officials, and ask for admission to the Union. On March 3, without any authorization from Congress, an election of state officers was held, Brigham was chosen governor, Heber C. Kimball lieutenantgovernor, and John M. Bernhisel member of Con-
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gress by unanimous vote. A legislature was elected at the same time. Six weeks later, this legislature met, and chose George Q. Cannon and William H. Hooper as United States senators.
This attempt to rush Congress into granting statehood came to nothing ---unless, perchance, it helped forward the passage of the first of federal laws dealing with polygamy in the territories. President Lincoln signed this anti-polygamy bill July 2, 1862. But for a season, the hopes of the hierarchy ran high. Indians were troubling the telegraph line; and Brigham was authorized to raise a company of militia for the protection of the wires until federal troops could be sent to the threatened spot. The required company was on its way in forty-eight hours under command of the same Lot Smith who had burned government trains five years before. But though Lincoln was willing to avoid trouble with the kingdom until more weighty matters were off his hands, he had already appointed a new territorial governor, and had no thought of yielding the federal authority to disloyal hierarchs.
In the absence of Dawson, Secretary Fuller was acting governor of Utah; and during his not very vigorous administration occurred one of the most pathetic tragedies of Mormon history. Joseph Morris was an ignorant and fervid Welshman, a convert to the Mormon church, who for years had eked out the halting processes of his reason by frequent and voluble communication with "spirits." Some months before the events now to be chronicled, the "spirits." Some months before the evetns now to be chronicled, the "spirits" had given Morris the task of delivering a rebuke to Brigham Young. Brigham answered only by a coarse jest. Thereupon Morris, who by this time undoubt-
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edly had crossed the wavering line which separated his fanaticism from insanity, withdrew to Kington Fort, thirty-five miles north of Salt Lake City, and began to put forth full-fledged revelations. Several scribes were kept busy writing down the communications which Morris received from the Lord; and quite a number of Mormons, who had felt cheated at Brigham's refusal to deal in this sort of literature, flocked to the new fountain of inspiration. Brigham sagaciously sat back, and allowed the delusion to run its course. Morris had insisted on a scheme of communism, and also had told his followers that there was no need for them to plant or harvest any more, since they had food enough on hand to last them till the second coming of Christ. A few weeks of close contact with this voluble madman sufficed for the more worldly-minded of his converts, who returned to the orthodox fold, and tried to get back from Morris their "consecrated" property. It is claimed that these recusants attempted to cheat the community by withdrawing more and better cattle and horses than they had brought. At any rate, the Morrisites seized two of the apostates and held them prisoners in Kington Fort.
Judge Kinney issued writs of habeas corpus, demanding that Morris produce his prisoners in court. When the unfortunate lunatic failed to do this, a posse was sent to arrest him. Morris refused to surrender. With what seems at best unseemly haste, General Burton, in command of the posse under authority of the United States marshal, opened fire on the Morrisite camp with a cannon, killing two women at the first shot. The Morrisites returned the fire with such weapons as were at their disposal, and killed two of Burton's posse. They kept up the fight three days,
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until their ammunition was gone, and then, June 16, raised the white flag. Burton and his followers at once entered camp.
The usual account of what followed is that Burton called on Morris to surrender, that the lunatic turned to address his people, and that Burton thereupon shot him dead. Immediately after ---still continuing the
accustomed tale--- Burton shot and seriously wounded a Morrisite elder named Banks. A woman, Mrs. Bowman, ran up to Burton, calling him a bloodthirsty wretch; and remarking, "No one shall call me that and live!" Burton killed her. A Danish woman approached him crying, and Burton ended his work by shooting her, likewise.
This account cannot be accepted. Sixteen years afterwards, in 1879, Burton was tried for the murder of Mrs. Bowman, and acquitted by a jury composed of equal numbers of Mormons and Gentiles. Making all due allowance for the difficulty of securing a conviction after this lapse of time, and for the degree of evidence required ---and properly--- to secure a verdict of "Guilty" in a capital case, it is fair to conclude that Burton was innocent of this most heinous crime. His innocence of the murder of the Danish woman is still more certain, since it may be presumed that the district attorney elected the strongest case for trial.
The women were killed, however; Morris was
killed; Elder Banks was wounded and died suddenly the same evening. There is nothing to show that a single one of these killings was necessary, yet they were done; and with the exception of Burton, no one was ever brought to trial for the multiplied slaughter. Neither has any just excuse been offered for Burton's
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act in suddenly firing with cannon on a camp known to contain women and children. This cannon fire cost at least two lives, again the lives of women; and for this, Burton was both morally and legally responsible. The simple fact was that Burton and Brigham, for that matter, were as careless of the lives of "apostates" as some bad types of union men are of the lives of "scabs," or as the average strike-breaking gunman is of the lives of strikers. It would be wrong to find any peculiar demerit in Mormonism because of a callousness which is as well known in industrial centres as in Utah. But if the new religion did not originate human intolerance, neither did it help that failing.
In July, 1862, the new federal appointees reached Utah. They were Stephen S. Harding, governor; and Thomas J. Drake and Charles B. Waite, associate judges. These last were appointed to take the places left vacant by the resignations of Flenniken and Crosby, who had been sent to Utah along with Governor Dawson, and had left only a month later than their distinguished executive. In the interim, Chief Justice John F. Kinney represented the federal judicial power in the territory, in odd moments spared from running his boarding-house. His decisions, like his menus, were shaped to please the tastes of his patrons.
No immediate clash took place between representatives of the Republic and heads of the kingdom, though it would have needed no great exercise of Brigham's prophetic faculty to see such conflicts approaching. For the time, the hierarchy was more concerned with another prospective "invasion." Colonel P. E. Connor, a veteran of the Mexican war and a superb soldier, had been ordered to Utah at the head of the Third California infantry. The service was unpleasant both
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to officers and men, who had enlisted for fighting, and were much disgusted at being set the task of watching Brigham. Colonel Connor begged to be ordered to the front. His men offered the government $30,000 for the privilege of being sent to the thick of the fighting in Virginia. The administration, however, considered that the Mormon kingdom would be the better for a little watching; and the Californians took up their march to Salt Lake City.
Connor had only 700 men ---a force which Brigham's Nauvoo Legion could have crushed in a few hours; but the colonel was a fair-sized army in himself. It had been supposed that he would go into quarters at Fort Crittenden, and those who had bought property at the fort were already counting the profits of a re-sale to the government. But Colonel Connor conceived that if he were to watch the Mormon kingdom, he needed to be as near the centre of that institution as possible, and flatly declined to be marooned forty miles away.
The moment this decision became known, rumours were heard that the federal troops would not be permitted to cross the Jordan, that they would be annihilated if they tried to enter the city. To these stories, Connor returned the answer that he would cross the Jordan, though hell yawned beneath him. On October 19, 1862, his little force passed this sacred river quite unopposed. When two miles from the city, he halted, formed his men in column with loaded muskets and shotted cannon, threw his few horsemen forward as an advance guard, and in this order, with bands playing and colours flying, entered the principal street of the city, marched to Emigration Square. and thence to the residence of Governor Harding. The
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whole population was out, but they gave the soldiers neither insult nor cheer. The only flag waving over a building in the city was that raised by Governor Harding The governor made a short speech to the soldiers. who responded with three cheers, led by their colonel; then they resumed their march to the high ground under the Wasatch Mountains, where they proceeded to form Camp Douglas. Brigham's residence was directly in range of their guns.
It was the first time Brigham had encountered a thoroughbred soldier, who was free to act as a soldier, without waiting on civilian "negotiations." It cannot be supposed that the "Lion of the Lord" found the experience a pleasant one. He was as little of a coward as Connor's self; but he had not and could not have the readiness for combat which marks the professional fighter; and the prophet had many things to consider which troubled the bold colonel not a whit. A few months later, Colonel Connor earned the gratitude of the northern Utah settlements by his victory over the Indians at Bear River; and the startling completeness of this campaign did not lessen the respect for his military prowess. Brigham bitterly hated heing under the guns of federal soldiers; but he took the sensible course of ignoring an annoyance which it was unsafe to try to abate.
The territorial legislature met in December, 1862, and on the eighth of that month, Governor Hardin read his message to the joint assembly. He tried to be both complimentary and conciliatory. But he also tried to speak the truth, to warn his hearers against ertain practices and tendencies; and he had not learned that a community which claims to be under Divine guidance and inspiration accepts the most ex-
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travagant praise as no more than its due, and resents the mildest criticism as both insult and injury. Early in his message occur the following paragraphs:
"I am sorry to say that since my sojourn among you I have heard no sentiments, either publicly or privately expressed, that would lead me to believe that much sympathy is felt by any considerable number of your people in favour of the Government of the United States, now struggling for its very existence in the 'valley and the shadow' through which it has been called to pass. If I am mistaken in this opinion, no one will rejoice more than myself in acknowledging my error. I would, in the name of my bleeding country, that you, as representatives of public sentiment here, would speedily pass such resolution as will extort from me, if necessary, a public acknowledgment of my error ---if error I have committed.
"I have said this in no unkind spirit; I would much rather learn that the fault has been on my part than on yours."
Further on in his message, Governor Harding referred to the new federal law against polygamy in the territories, and warned the people that this law must be obeyed until repealed, or until declared unconstitutional.
The legislature heard this message with suppressed indignation, and refused to order it printed. They adjourned January 16, 1863, without having passed a single appropriation bill. The next day, the so-called legislature of the "State of Deseret" met; and Brigham, as "governor," sent in a message which was most respectfully received.
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This was one of the most impolitic acts of Brigham's life. Considering that the application for statehood was still before Congress, it was an utterly absurd piece of impertinence. The only visible explanation is that both Brigham and the legislature were boiling with fury at Harding, and were more anxious to show their contempt for the governor than careful to trim their course with reference to its effect on Congress.
Governor Harding did not long remain in lonesome dignity on Brigham's black books. He was soon joined by the new associate justices. Judge Waite had been quick to notice the conflict of authority between local and federal courts, and the martial and legal weapons which were left in the hands of the kingdom through its control of the militia and of juries. He drew a bill providing that the United States marshal should select juries in the federal courts, limiting the power of the probate courts of the territory, and reorganizing the militia under the federal governor. This bill was sent to Washington, introduced in Congress; and immediately its chief provisions were wired back to Utah by "senator-elect" W. H. Hooper. To make matters worse, it was found that Governor Harding had endorsed the bill with the words: "This act should be passed."
The recall of judges is quite an issue in American politics at present; but the present writers believe Brigham Young was nearly or quite the first American who tried to put this doctrine into practice. A mass-meeting was called, which packed the Tabernacle March 3, 1863. Governor Harding's message to the legislature was read, and pronounced an " insult " to the community. John Taylor made a fiery address,
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and Brigham indulged to the full his rhetoric of invective. "Man, did I say?" he shouted. "Thing, I mean---a nigger-worshipper, a black-hearted abolitionist, is what he is, and what he represents; and that I do naturally despise . . . . Do you acknowledge this man Harding for your governor? (Voices all through the audience responded, 'No, you are our governor!') Yes, I am your governor; and I will let him know that I am governor; and if he attempts to interfere in my affairs, woe, woe unto him!
"Will you allow such a man to remain in the territory? ( Voices, 'No; put him out!') Yes, I say put him out. Judges Waite and Drake are perfect fools, and the tools of Governor Harding, and they, too, must leave. If all three do not resign, or if the President does not remove them, the people must attend to it!"
Resolutions were adopted, denouncing Governor Harding and Judges Waite and Drake. A petition was drawn up and circulated, asking President Lincoln to recall them. A committee was appointed to visit the three officials, and demand that they resign their offices and leave the territory forthwith.
These representatives of kingly and ecclesiastical arrogance were met in unfaltering fashion. Governor Harding received the committee courteously, and frankly told them that their charges against him were self-convicted lies. He declined to resign, declined to modify in any way his official actions, and promised his visitors that while it was well within their power to kill him, it was not within their power to escape retribution. Judge Waite answered that for him to resign would be to admit that he was guilty or afraid. "I am not conscious of either guilt or fear,"
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he added. "I must therefore respectfully decline to accede to your request."
But it was from judge Drake that the "committee on recall of judges" received a baptism of pepper which still tingles the skins of church historians as they write. The staunch old man lacked something of the temper of a judge-but nothing of the spirit of a citizen. "Go back to Brigham Young, your master, that embodiment of sin and shame and disgust, and tell him that I neither fear him nor love him nor hate him-that I utterly despise him. Tell him, whose tools and tricksters you are, that I did not come here by his permission, and that I will not go away at his desire nor by his directions . . . . I am no skulk from the punishment of crimes. I tell you if you, or the man whom you so faithfully serve, attempt to interfere with my lawful business, you will meet with trouble of a character you do not expect.
"A horse-thief or a murderer has, when arrested, the right to speak in court; and unless in such capacity, or under such circumstances, don't you ever dare to speak to me again."
This flat and triply repeated defiance of kingly authority was uttered March 4, 1863. Four days later, the officers at Camp Douglas forwarded to President Lincoln a statement, denying in toto Mormon charges against the three officials, and protesting against their removal. Events were moving with unaccustomed rapidity in the Mormon kingdom. Before the month was out, the Gentile governor had defied Zion again, and in most practical fashion. Ninety three Morrisites, arrested after the death of their leader, had been bound over for trial before the boarding-house judge, John F. Kinney. At the March term
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of court, this eminent jurist sentenced seven of these Morrisites to terms in prison for murder in the second degree, and imposed fares on sixty-eight others for resisting an officer." The fact of resistance was unquestionable, and death caused in this manner is doubtless to be classed as manslaughter or murder. But every extenuating circumstance which the Mormons have ever claimed for themselves in their conflicts with their "enemies," could be pleaded in behalf of the Morrisites; and no person can read the evidence to-day without being convinced that the prisoners were far more sinned against than sinning. On March 31, Governor Harding pardoned the entire seventy-five.
If it had not been for the presence of the indomitable Connor and his small but ready army, it is very unlikely that Harding would have escaped vengeance. The fortunes of the Union were not high, and a little later, between Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, they sunk so low that no threat from Washington could have given pause to the outraged lord of the Mormon kingdom. But Patrick Edward Connor was a very present deterrent of strife. The bravest man, if unaccustomed to soldiering, shrinks from attack on even a small force, when that force is known to be enthusiastically devoted to a commander of the sort who will die rather than yield. Connor had to the full the vanity of the native-born fighting man, and his Indian campaigns show a mercilessness closely bordering on cruelty. But many a man won glory and renown on eastern battlefields whose real services to the nation were ten times surpassed by those of the gallant brigadier marooned in the inter-mountain deserts. His presence averted trouble until news came of Gettys-
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burg and Vicksburg; and after that, the danger of armed strife was over.
Still Brigham's campaign for the recall of federal officials bore fruit. He enlisted the help of the telegraph and express companies; they called in friendly senators; and Lincoln, who had enough of fighting on hand in the East, gave partial compliance. He removed Harding from the governorship of Utah to
make him chief justice of Colorado territory. At the same time, however, judge Kinney's official head dropped into the basket; and Dr. Fuller, territorial secretary, was likewise removed. The kingdom had little to boast of in the encounter, after all, though Brigham relieved his feelings and emphasized his con-
tempt for eastern opinion by sending judge Kinney to Congress as territorial delegate.* Judge Waiteheld a term of court at which not a single case was presented, and resigned in disgust. Judge Drake remained, but there was nothing for him to do. The tone of ecclesiastical comment seems to show that
Brigham respected the old judge's courage.
Meanwhile the Civil war was drawing to its close, and the kingdom began making overtures to the now dominating power of the nation. General Connor was taken into favour at Salt Lake City ---despite the fact
that he was encouraging miners to dig among the hills of Utah. Members of the hierarchy joined with officers from Camp Douglas in celebrating the late Union victories, and the second inauguration of Lin-
*That was the beginning of high political rewards to "Jack-Mormons" ---as sycophantic Gentiles are called. The policy has enlarged with the growth of the kingdom: and to-day the Mormon ruler showers senatorships, governorships, judgeships, and
seats in the lower house at Washington, upon Jack-Mormons of the states which are under his dominion.
coln. When Lincoln was murdered, memorial services were held in the tabernacle. When General Connor left to assume command of the military department of the Platte, a ball was given in his honour in the city ---but Brigham was not present. As he had been alone in expressing regret when the republic seemed rushing to destruction, so Brigham was the last to stand out against paying homage to her new fortune. The Sunday before Appomattox, he declared from the pulpit that there were still four years of war ahead. One may smile at this unconscious comment on the pretension to prophecy; but one must recognize the staunchness of the prophet.
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BRIGHAM doubtless expected the federal government to celebrate its triumph over slavery by moving with resistless force on slavery's twin relic, polygamy. It was the logical thing to look for, and direct evidence on the point is not lacking. Schuyler Colfax, Speaker of the House of Representatives, visited Utah in June, 1865, on what closely resembled a tour of inspection. He was accompanied by Samuel Bowles, editor of the Springfield Republican ---then, as now, a power in the wiser councils of the Republican party. In a conversation with Young, Colfax suggested that the Lord might be induced to send a new "revelation," abolishing polygamy. Bowles reports Brigham's answer as follows: "Mr. Young responded quietly and frankly that he should readily welcome such a revelation; that polygamy was not in the original Book of the Mormons; that it was not an essential practice of the church, but only a privilege and a duty, under special command of God."
To Linn, one of the most painstaking but hardly the most impartial historian who has dealt with Mormon matters, this story serves only as a text for a sermon on the absurdities of Editor Bowles. The present writers, however they may be inclined to laugh at the phrase, "Book of the Mormons," believe that Brigham spoke seriously and was quoted correctly. That he would have given up the practice of polygamy
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in good faith we do mot for a moment believe. But we have not a doubt that he was prepared to issue such a revelation stopping polygamy as the price of statehood for Utah, if such a step had seemed necessary. Brigham was a fighter, not a martyr; and he was ready to use any strategem that seemed promising in a fight against such overwhelming odds.
As it turned out, however, Brigham was not long in learning that so far as the efficiency of the federal government was concerned, the death of Lincoln had more than counterbalanced the surrender at Appomattox. The assassin's pistol had hardly cooled before the murdered President's successor was locked in a futile quarrel with Congress, a quarrel which brought credit to neither party, and which left the Mormon kingdom for years undisturbed save by troubles which came from within.
First of these in point of time were a series of crimes in which Gentiles were the victims, and whose perpetrators usually escaped discovery. The earliest of these was the Brassfield case. Newton Brassfield, a Gentile, married the plural wife of a Mormon elder named Hill, who was then absent in Europe on a mission. Holding that the marriage of Mrs. Hill was not properly a marriage at all, the parties did not even apply for a church divorce, and the woman's maiden name was used in the ceremony which united her to Brassfield. She attempted to secure possession of her children by Hill through a write of habeas corpus; but before the matter could be decided, Brassfield was shot.
The murder was at once laid to the Mormon hierarchy. There is nothing to show that Brigham or any of his aids planned or ordered the killing; but
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their complete approval of it was not disguised. Brassfield was murdered the night of April 2, 1866. At the opening of the church conference four days later, Brigham declared from the pulpit that in a similar case in his own family, he would lay justice to the line and righteousness to the plummet. "I say that for myself, not for another," he went on. "Were I absent from my home, I would rejoice to know that I had friends there to protect and guard the virtue of my household; and I would thank God for such friends."
This is nothing but the Mohammedan harem law over again. The Oriental marriage system had brought all sorts of Asiatic notions in its train. Brigham stuck to his guns, even when serious trouble threatened as the result of the murder. General W. T. Sherman, commander of the military department of the plains, telegraphed that he hoped to hear of no more murders of Gentiles in Utah, and intimated that it would be easy to re-enlist some of the volunteers recently disbanded. Brigham answered by wire that Brassfield was a seducer, who merited his fate; and procured another telegram signed by some Gentiles, to the effect that non-Mormons who minded their own business were not troubled in Utah. The affair blew over; but the soldiers then stationed at Camp Douglas were not disbanded.
Without endorsing either the Mohammedan harem law unconsciously imported by Brigham or the American plea of the "unwritten law," the present writers feel bound to say that there were many extenuating circumstances about the Brassfield killing. Brassfield's marriage to Mrs. Hill was conducted in a manner which combined offence to the whole community
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with unfair advantage taken of an absent man. If Brassfield wished to challenge the system of plural marriage, he should have waited till Hill came home. If he did not wish to make such a challenge, he should have conformed to the customs and regarded the feelings of Hill's co-religionists. The attempt to get control of the children during their father's absence was peculiarly unfair, and the whole business was conducted with lack of taste and lack of sense. This does not justify the murder; if bad taste were a capital offence in the Mormon kingdom, there would have been a terrific mortality among elders and Apostles. But people who take pains to attack community sanctities in the most offensive way are walking in danger. The historian may say of Brassfield, as the coroner's jury said of the tenderfoot who called a gun-fighter a liar, that the man committed suicide.
In October of the same year came another killing devoid of all mitigating circumstances. Dr. J. King Robinson, formerly assistant surgeon at Camp Douglas, laid claim to some warm springs in the northern part of the city. He was ordered off by the city marshal, took his case to the courts, and judge Titus decided in favour of the city. Then, when all possible excuse for violence had passed, Dr. Robinson was decoyed out one night on a pretended professional call, and murdered. There is good reason to believe that the original intention was to beat him; but a young and courageous athlete is not lightly handled in this fashion. The shot which killed the doctor was fired, either by a phenomenally short man, or more probably, by a man lying on the ground, whither the physician's fist had sent him. Brigham felt it necessary to offer a reward for the apprehension of Robinson's mur-
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derers; but they never were found. It is hardly necessary to say that Brigham could have laid hands on them in three hours had be wished to do so. But however angry he may have been at the embarrassing and useless outrage, Brigham had no notion of allowing reputable Saints to suffer at the hands of Gentiles for upholding the kingdom too zealously.
The Gentile population ---horrified at Robinson's fate, and alarmed for themselves--- turned out en masse to the funeral, and conducted the best inquiry possible into the circumstances of his death. But their investigation came to nothing, and for the moment, at least, their courage faltered. General Connor, whose unhesitating nerve had been a tower of strength during the dark days of the Civil war, was gone; and there was none to take his place. Brave men, in the sense that the average soldier is brave, are common enough; but men whose nerve snaps into action automatically, and is disconcerted neither by odds nor surprise, are rather rarer than true poets. The Gentile merchants took counsel together, and drew up a statement to Brigham, offering to leave the territory. They asked only that he would guarantee their outstanding accounts, and take their goods off their hands at a 25 per cent reduction from appraised cash values.
Brigham answered curtly that he had not asked them to come and did not intend to bribe them to go. He was too shrewd to entertain such a proposal for a second. To have the Gentile merchants of Utah emigrate en masse would be sure to bring down upon the territory the heavy hand of the federal government; and Brigham knew by this time that open resistance to that government was totally out of the question.
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A season of comparative quiet followed; or rather, none of the troubles threatening the Mormon kingdom came to a head. The new attempt to secure statehood failed; but on the other hand, the new and more drastic anti-polygamy hill did not pass. Indian troubles continued to bother frontier settlements, but this annoyance was not sufficient to check the growth of the territory. That growth was substantial, though perhaps too largely expressed in public works, and in the prosperity of the heads, of the church. A telegraph line between Salt Lake City and Ogden was finished in the fall of 1866; and early in 1867, the wires were carried into the southern settlements. Brigham was one of the incorporators of this "Deseret Telegraph Company," as well as its first president. Crickets ruined crops in several counties this year, but in spite of this loss, the new Tabernacle, seating nearly ten thousand persons, was ready for the general conference in October.
We may pause, too, to chronicle the death of Heber C. Kimball, June 22, 1868. Perhaps the loss of any of his wives would not have affected Brigham so nearly. Brigham had little trouble in getting married, but he paid the despot's price in the uncertainty of new-found friends. Heber's friendship was not open to question. He had followed Brigham into baptismal waters, and he continued this devoted adherence all through life. Coarse, uneducated, but loyal to the core, Heber had made a place for himself in the rather cold heart of his master; and that place was never filled. George A. Smith was chosen counsellor in Heber's place; and some time later, the list of counsellors was enlarged to enable Brigham to include the only one of the younger generation who
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ever won his entire confidence ---George Q. Cannon. That confidence was not mistaken. George Q. Cannon was as loyal as Heber had been, and brought far more intelligence and infinitely more knowledge and independence of thought to the churchly cabinet. But the ancient association was not to be replaced.
All this time, the Union Pacific Railroad was creeping westward across the plains, and the Central Pacific was working eastward toward a junction of which no man knew more than that it must occur in some part of Utah. Brigham once had said that he wished he could build a wall around the territory so high that no Gentile could enter; and perhaps that would have been his choice to the last hour of his life. But he knew how to accept facts; and since isolation was impossible, the sooner the railroad arrived the better. To some of the faithful who expressed doubts as to the effect of this new enterprise on the church, Brigham had answered roughly, "Damn a religion that can't stand one railroad!" He became a director in the company, and secured contracts for grading a considerable extent of the track-contracts which he immediately sublet at a profit. That he made a tidy sum of money in this way is certain; but it was a petty fraction of what the eastern and western syndicates concerned in that enterprise managed to squeeze out of stockholders and government.
The approaching railroad focussed and brought to a head the long-drawn mercantile problem of the kingdom. In the beginning, as the Mormon historian Tulledge points out, " to become a merchant was to antagonize the church." This first antipathy had passed; but even yet, an undue proportion of Utah
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trade was in the hands of Gentiles, or ---worse yet--- of apostates.
Foremost of these were four Englishmen, the Walker brothers. Their parents had joined the Mormon faith while the lads were yet minors, and all had come to America together. The father died of cholera, but the mother and her sons made the journey to Utah, and shared in all the hardships of the early days. When Camp Floyd was established, the Walkers started a store to supply soldiers and camp followers. Brigham could not well object to this, while he was making a fortune by supplying wood and flour to the army, but he did not look on the new enterprise with any enthusiasm. When the camp was abandoned, the Walkers bought a considerable share of the goods thrown on the market, and moved their store to Salt Lake City. Here they came more directly under the espionage of the prophet; and soon found themselves in trouble over tithes. They refused to let the bishop of the ward see their books. When a rather pressing demand for their tithes was made upon them, they gave a check for $500 as a contribution to "the poor." Brigham sent back the check with a high-handed message, and a demand for a tenth of their profits, on pain of cutting them off from the church. Joseph Robert Walker, who though not the oldest was clearly the leader of the four brothers, took the check, tore it up, and told the bishop-messenger boy to "cut away."
Had the clash come before the Civil war, the defiant merchants must have been beaten. Even now they had a hard struggle. But they were natural traders and business men, they had the merit of absolute loyalty within their own ranks, and the soldiers
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at Camp Douglas relieved them of any fear of summary proceedings. The Walkers sold goods cheaper than any one else in the valley; and women, even though they be Saints, and stars in the crown of a coming deity, cannot resist a bargain. Brigham stationed "pickets" before the apostate door to warn away trade-and trade went around to the back door. He resorted to the expedient of placing an "all-seeing eye," and the words "holiness to the Lord" over the doors of Mormon storekeepers; but even this did not suffice. If the Walker brothers could thus defy the church when it still had considerable control over means of transportation, what would happen when the new railroad arrived, and the great Gentle world was brought to the kingdom's very door?
Brigham saw the danger, and prepared to meet it. Where he got the notion for his great plan cannot be told. It may have grown naturally out of the other co-operative enterprises of the Mormons. It may have been a sudden thought of his own. The important point is that late in 1868, Brigham assembled a few of the chief men of the church, and announced his scheme of a co-operative store, "Zion's Co-operative Mercantile Institution," quickly abbreviated to Z. C. M. I.
The scheme was nothing less than the forming of a trust. All Mormon merchants were required to go into this one grand undertaking. The tithing power and reserve of the church were to be put behind it. Shares of the new institution were to be offered to all the faithful, and in this way a large body of interested patrons would be secured. Instead of competing with each other, the Saints were to join forces to crush Gentile and apostate traders.
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At first, every one balked at the new idea; and Mormon merchants whose business was doing well were particularly loud in denunciation. But Brigham's savage will and imperial power overrode all opposition. To the plea of one man that the scheme would ruin him, since he had debts that would more than cover the bare value of his stock, Brigham replied brutally that it would serve him right, as he had no business to be in debt. "If Henry W. Lawrence doesn't look out, I'll send him on a mission, and W. S. Godbe I'll cut off from the church!" he roared in answer to the protests of another pair. William Jennings, richest of the Mormon traders, had to face a yet more galling kind of treatment; for on Sunday Brigham would rise in the pulpit, and denounce by name those who, while pretending to be Saints, yet were "grinding the faces of the poor!" Jennings' name led all the rest. After a short course of this kind of ecclesiastical discipline, Jennings succumbed, joined the new corporation, turned in his stock at a good figure, and rented his store to the new enterprise for three years. Z. C. M. I. was launched early in 1869, and has been the chief mercantile factor in Utah ever since.
No event in Brigham's life shows more clearly his strength and resourcefulness than the founding of Z. C. M. I. None gives a better view of his utter ruthlessness toward those who crossed his path. None illustrates more concisely the money-making instinct which was so basic an element of his nature. Tullidge does not exaggerate when he says that the vending of this trading trust saved the temporal power of the church; and he might have added that without this temporal power, Mormonism would soon
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sink to the position of a rather interesting, and very unimportant sect. From this "innocuous desuetude," the church was saved by Brigham. He gathered its scattered resources, combined them in a financial fighting institution which is to-day a power from coast to coast; beat back the threatened inroad of Gentile merchandising; made the railroad pay toll to the kingdom, instead of wrecking it. The conception at that day was great in its novelty and its daring; the domineering will which carried the conception to reality is worthy of the same praise we accord to a stubborn soldier.
And for this priceless service to the church, Brigham took pay. He was the first president of the new corporation. As would be said of a new trust flotation, he came in on the ground floor. Having fought for his people like a crusader, he proceeded to charge them full price for his brains and energy.
The financial peril against which Brigham guarded so ably was not the only one which menaced his supremacy at this time. There was also a determined effort at doctrinal and disciplinary reform of the church from within. A considerable group of well educated and well-placed Mormons had been growing gradually away from the simple gospel of paying tithes and taking orders, which had come to be the orthodox confession of faith in the kingdom. They did not wish to leave the church. They only desired to reform it, to rescue it from the despotic control of Brigham, and from the narrow exclusiveness which had inevitably grown up in a religious body so thoroughly isolated from the world.
Foremost in this "New Movement"---at least in point of time--- were W. S. Godbe and E. L. T. Har-
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rison. Both were men of independent means, Godbe was widely travelled, and Harrison was an architect by profession, besides having some claims to prominence as a writer. With them were soon associated Edward W. Tullidge, doubtless the leading literary light of the kingdom; Henry W. Lawrence, like Godbe a merchant and a wealthy man; and a number of others of similar standing. All things are comparative. It is probable that the New Movement included a larger proportion of the available brains and education of Utah than the Encylopedists did of the brains and learning of France. Certainly, there were few in the orthodox ranks who could meet the New Movement men far a moment in debate.
Their attack on the despotism to which they objected was conducted with remarkable skill. Harrison and Godbe owned the Utah Magazine, which was dying of inanition as a purely literary periodical. This magazine was now put to work as a journal of reform. It did not directly attack the church policies of Brigham, but it antagonized him in many ways. It encouraged the development of Utah mining, something which Brigham had always avoided. It declared openly that the greatest of all religious errors was to imagine "that God intended the priesthood to do our thinking." It sought to familiarize Mormon youth with the careers of great men in the outside world, fully trusting that the inevitable comparison would not redound to the advantage of the high-handed despot who ruled the church in Zion.
A little circumstance helped for a time the propaganda of the New Movement leaders, and then hurried their downfall. Alexander and David Hyrum
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Smith, two sons of the prophet Joseph, and leaders of the "Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints," came to Salt Lake City. Apparently, they brought with them some charming dream that the house of Zion, which Brigham had builded with toil and bloody sweat, would be handed over to them on the mere presentation of their cards. They were not long in learning their error. Having been reared by their mother, Emma Smith, who had always abhorred the doctrine of polygamy, these young men accused Brigham of having engrafted this cult on the pure religion left by their father. Brigham answered that they possessed the spirit of their mother, not of their father; and added that the aforesaid mother, Emma Hale Smith, was "the damnedest liar that ever lived." Instead of terminating the interview with a pistol, as most men would have been tempted to do under like circumstances, the young men argued the matter, and failing with Brigham, tried to hold meetings through the city, and preach the superior merits of the " Reorganized " church.
Their efforts came to nothing, as might have been anticipated. Brigham's aids saw to it that each meeting was attended by persons familiar with church history in Missouri and Nauvoo, and each meeting degenerated into a wrangle. Joseph F. Smith, present president of the church, was especially useful in this regard, because he was a nephew of the prophet. But the New Movement leaders noted the struggle in the Utah Magazine, and managed to take a shot at both sides. "If we know the true feelings of our brethren," they declared, "it is that they never intend Joseph Smith's son nor any other man's son to preside over them, simple because of their sonship."
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This was a thrust at Brigham's well-known wish to secure the prophetic succession to his son, John W., as well as the pretensions of the resuscitated Smiths from Missouri. Brigham retorted by ordering Godbe and Harrison to go on missions. They refused. Not long after, timing his movements so as to do the most good, Brigham summoned the two men before the high council, which promptly excommunicated them. Eli B. Kelsey, who objected to this summary proceeding, was instantly dealt with in the same manner. A manifesto was issued, signed by Brigham and several others high in church counsels, denouncing the Utah Magazine as a pernicious work, and forbidding the faithful to read it. The "reformers" had a clear-cut issue sooner than they expected it.
Writers on Mormonism, unconsciously copying the estimate which the literary leaders of the New Movement placed on their own work, have assured the world for a generation that this revolt did serious damage to Brigham's rule, and threatened for a time to overthrow his sway altogether. The present writers regret to dissent from so amiable and unanimous a conclusion, but are quite unable to reconcile that opinion with the facts. The reformers had courage, devotion, steadfastness, and high intelligence; but their movement went to wreck the moment it was launched. With all their wit, they found themselves unable to reach the people whom Brigham held as in the hollow of his hand, and a single raging sermon from him made the term "Godbeite" hated and feared throughout the kingdom. And with all their resentment of Mormon autocracy, its capital was the only place where the ablest of the New Movement leaders felt secure. Godbe and several of his co-
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workers were polygamists, whose hands were tied by plural wives, and children born in plural marriage.
The New Movement cost the Mormon kingdom the cession of not a single dogma, and the loss of scarcely a hundred members. Seldom, if ever, has so formidable seeming an attack on ecclesiastical ramparts been so quickly and finally repelled.
And all this time Brigham was colonizing throughout the inter-mountain region and some other parts of the world with his usual energy and skill. Neither trouble nor triumph at home deterred him. His ablest pioneers were directed into the choicest valleys of southern Idaho, western Wyoming, Arizona, and New Mexico to establish the Lord's possession and Brigham's rule. Any man who made a notable success in the kingdom proper, either as a tiller of the soil or as a governor of tillers of the soil, was likely to be called to open new provinces. Such a man was usually sent as a leader after the land had been carefully and shrewdly observed by himself, or a predecessor; and a body of faithful young men with their families was selected to accompany him. There was neither rebellion nor delay in fulfilling this mission. To leave the Salt Lake and other valleys of Utah with their plenitude and their ties may have been a hardship, but it was invariably endured without murmur.
Brigham had said that all this land was Zion, to be ruled by the prophet of Zion; and, beginning with 1855 and continuing to the time of his death, Brigham was establishing his claim as a fact. Nor did he pause with colonization in the United States. His missionaries had gained a strong foothold in the Hawaiian Islands, where one-fifth of the native pop-
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ulation had accepted his gospel; and there he secured profitable plantations. In Mexico on the south and Canada on the north, his pioneers located their towns, built their meeting-houses, and reached out for all the valuable land that joined them. It was the exercise of imperial ambition, as well as wisdom. Brigham wanted rich provinces to feed with unfailing stream the growing capital of his kingdom. He wanted land-owning and the work attendant thereupon for the oncoming generation of his people. He saw without any dimness the political and commercial splendour of a kingdom which should hold the backbone of the continent.
Idaho was the most promising of the provinces and here he established an Apostle ----the only place outside of Utah itself which has had a resident governor of this high ecclesiastical dignity. To the other states
he sent elders of proved valour and executive capacity. His orders to all of these representatives were direct and sufficient: "Get choice land; till it intelligently; get water-power for your mills; file on coalmines and quarries; build good meeting-houses and
comfortable homes; pay your tithes ---pay your tithes. Make no unnecessary political conflict with your Gentile neighbours; but hold our own ----and our own is all that comes within your reach."
From the hour when the kingdom was self-sustaining at home this work of colonization went on definitely without intermission; but it reached its intensity always in any period of trouble. Brigham had found in the days of Nauvoo the superlative value of work for his people when they were assailed by dangers from without or doubts from within. He continued to magnify the hope and courage of his
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followers, and quell nearly all questioning of his Divine authority by finding prodigious tasks for his people to perform.
To all these new colonies ---wherever situated--- he was the law-giver-supreme. The man who went to Idaho, Arizona, Canada, or Mexico, owed and paid his allegiance to Brigham Young. And the circumstances as well as the inclination of the adventuring colonist compelled this deference. The Mormon ---no matter what his wealth---carried very little with him from Utah to the new settlement. He was dependent upon community industry for the building of a new home, surrounded by the comforts and the sustenances of civilization. He was dependent upon Brigham's favour to finance any large enterprise in the new land. He was dependent upon Brigham's recognition of incipient success for the sending of colonists in larger body to build towns and to diversify profitable occupation.
Almost without exception every attempted settlement became a fixture; almost immediately in every case the new colony began to send in its stream of tithes.
After Brigham had been ten years in the valley of Salt Lake, when he travelled from the southern boundary of Utah to the southernmost settlement, in every halting-place he could see some mill or granary or other edifice ---usually built of adobe, bearing the hammered iron letters "B. Y." He did not extend this definite mark of ownership into his provinces; but if Brigham had chosen to use a flag, and if he had chosen to plant it wherever his power was supreme, it could have floated in an almost unbroken line through the Rocky Mountain region, from Alberta to Sonora.
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WHlLE Brigham was guarding his kingdom from financial subjugation, suppressing temporal and spiritual insurrection among his people, and planting his tithing offices from Canada to Mexico, there was maturing a campaign which was intended to level against him the whole overwhelming might of the United States. Vice-President Colfax, on his second visit to Salt Lake City in 1869, had intimated that such a campaign was imminent. He was urged to stay the government's hand, and wait for the New Movement to reform the church from within. But it was early apparent to all save the Godbeite leaders that this movement was hopeless almost from its beginning, and no more than amusing long before its close. If the "Lion of the Lord" were to be driven from his ecclesiastical jungle, it was clear that the federal government must furnish beaters and station marksmen to bring down the game.
The initial attempt to do this was made by Congress ---it being a standing superstition in our good land that the first thing to do in any emergency is to pass a new law. Drastic bills applying to the Mormon situation were introduced in both houses: in the Senate by Cragin of New Hampshire, in December, 1869; and in the House by Cullom of Illinois a few days later. Cullom's bill passed the House by a de-
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cisive vote, which was not influenced in the least by Delegate Hooper's genuinely eloquent plea against it. It was accepted in the Senate by Cragin as a substitute for his own measure, and the fight was thus transferred to that body.
Fortunately for the overmatched Mormon emperor, the Cullom bill lent itself to attack by Brigham's eastern sympathizers. It swept aside nearly every element of local self-government in Utah. It reduced the safeguards of trial by jury very, nearly to the vanishing point. In a word, it treated Utah as a conquered but rebellious-minded province, rather than as an embryonic state; and the country was not prepared for such radical measures.
Brigham had no trouble in organizing at home a resistance to the Cullom bill, in which Gentiles, Godbeites, and orthodox Mormons stood side by side. The women of Utah made a special and particular protest. The fact that the territorial legislature had conferred the franchise on women in an act approved February 12, 1870, gave this action extra weight. The influence of railroad and telegraph friends was also called upon. Whether more tangible means of persuasion were used cannot be affirmed-though some of Brigham's allies and protectors of that day were no more above susceptibility to financial influence than Brigham was above using it. At any rate, the Cullom bill died of wilful neglect, and the kingdom was free from this direct and dangerous menace to its independence.
Little time was allowed for jubilation, however. Before the Cullom bill was formally dead, plans were begun to conquer the defiant Mormon theocracy by the aid of laws already in existence. Like the hu-
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mourist who cared little who cast the votes so long as he might count them, the government concluded that by appointing the right sort of men to positions in Utah, it might crush Brigham's empire without waiting on legal changes.
Pursuant to this plan, J. Wilson Shaffer was appointed governor of Utah in February, 1870. On June 17 of the same year, James B. McKean was made chief justice of the territory. Both were men of high personal character, and ---what was more important in the present crisis--- both were men of unusual courage and steadfastness. Shaffer was dying of consumption at the time of his appointment, but expressed himself willing to devote the remaining fraction of his life to crushing what he considered the treasonable hierarchy headed by Brigham Young. That hierarchy took a deal more crushing than Governor Shaffer had. anticipated; but before his death he had struck one blow at its power. He forbade the assembling of the Nauvoo Legion. The victory was sentimental, rather than practical, since the Legion no longer was able to inflict even serious annoyance on an army of the United States. But it ended a long and tenaciously held tradition, and compelled the dullest zealot to recognize that in a test of physical force his kingdom was helpless in the grasp of the encompassing Republic.
Judge McKean's career in Utah lasted years, instead of the months allotted to Governor Shaffer. Indeed, the history of the territory during those years is composed in large measure of the unceasing struggle between the Mormon monarch and the Methodist chief justice. McKean was brave, earnest, and zealous. His private character was above reproach. His
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intelligence was high. His learning was by no means slight. But the Mormon wag who first dubbed McKean the "mission jurist" hit the mark with impish accuracy. McKean was in truth a missionary on the bench, a judge who used the law to magnify the gospel. His gospel was one of patriotism, of high civic and domestic ideals; but this does not alter the fact, obvious to the most casual student of the time with which we deal, that McKean stretched his authority to cover every act which he conceived might work an injury to the Mormon kingdom.
By this time the non-Mormon element in the kingdom had grown to appreciable proportions-approximately it was twenty per cent of Utah's population. It comprised some apostates; many families whose heads had come as federal office-holders; daring merchants, and traders; preachers; professional men, and a small army of railroad builders and operators. It was strengthened, too, and animated by an ever-moving, aggressive host of prospectors and miners, who had smilingly and yet grimly braved Brigham's anathema in order to tap Zion's hills for their treasures of gold and silver. Above the capital still frowned Camp Douglas, a warning to the kingdom and an encourageinent to the invaders. All these were contemptuously classed as "Gentiles," "Outsiders," "Enemies"---except the handful of seceders from the church, and these were usually called "Damned Apostates" by Brigham's court and subjects.
All these otherwise incongruous elements cohered in a sympathetic fraternity. They learned an enforced solidarity from their dangers as well as the example of the kingdom.
Best of all, these Outsiders soon had a great news-
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paper, the Salt Lake Tribune. Started by liberal Mormons and apostates as a protest from within the ranks of Mormons, it soon passed under the control of Gentiles ---talented and trained newspaper men who took a fierce joy in baiting the "Lion of the Lord." Nowhere in the world has a more brilliant battle been made for freedom of speech. It was too late and Brigham did not feel inclined-to copy Joseph's fatal mistake of suppressing an American newspaper "by order of the king." So the Tribune fought, and flourished by fighting. It was an act of faith for Gentiles to support it; and thousands of Mormons read it on the sly, "just to see what the damned thing said."
In resisting the crusade now launched against them, the Mormons had three important breastworks. Comprising an immense majority of the population of Utah, they were sure of controlling any jury drawn in ordinary fashion. The probate courts of the territory---of course entirely subject to the kingdomhad been vested with extensive ;civil and criminal jurisdiction, conflicting, in many cases, with that assumed by the district courts whose judges were named by the President. To clinch this control of judicial machinery, there was a territorial marshal, who made out the venire from which jurymen were drawn; and an attorney-general, who was held the proper officer to prosecute all cases arising under territorial law. So long as these defences remained intact, the kingdom was safe.
The first care of the crusaders ---if we may borrow this term which the Mormons applied to judge McKean, his associates, and their supporters--- was to beat down the judicial bulwarks of the kingdom. The
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earliest movement in this direction was begun before McKean reached the territory, but it did not reach final adjudication until he was present. In September, 1870, judge Strickland, associate judge with McKean and Hawley, denied the jurisdiction of probate courts in criminal cases; and the next month judge Hawley, in a more sweeping decision, practically restricted these local courts to the proving of wills and the administering of estates. The first defence of the Mormon kingdom was down.
The other barriers did not last long. On August 27, 1870, a saloon belonging to one Englebrecht was raided by the territorial marshal and the Salt Lake City chief of police, and its stock of liquors poured into the gutter. The proceeding was a regular one according to territorial law; but the marshal and his aids were arrested, and bound over to await action by the grand jury. At the term of court beginning September i9, 1870, judge McKean decided that courts presided over by federal judges were not subject to territorial law in the drawing of juries, that they were in effect United States courts, rather than territorial courts. The grand jury thus drawn in defiance of Utah law indicted the Mormon officials concerned in raiding the saloon; and on November 4 of the same year a trial jury drawn in the same fashion gave a verdict in favour of the saloon owners and against the marshal and his aids for $59,063.25. The case was promptly appealed to the higher federal courts. We shall meet it again later.
Judge McKean's decision in this case practically superseded the territorial marshal and attorney-general by the United States marshal and district attorney. If any shred of doubt had remained, however,
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it was set at rest the following spring. Two quo warranto suits had been brought to settle this point. In March, 1871, judge McKean and his associates ruled that the territorial marshal and attorney-general had no place in the district courts of the territorythe only courts left having any jurisdiction worth naming. Juries in these courts were to be drawn by the United States marshal, in blissful disregard of territorial law, and cases were to be prosecuted by the United States district attorney.
With federal appointees holding the sole power to empanel juries, prosecute cases, and render decisions, the crusade had at least a favourable start. But it was checked for a time by an unexpected obstacle. The Mormon legislature of Utah took the very human view that if the district courts of the territory were United States courts, as judge McKean had affirmed, then the United States might pay for their maintenance. Acting on this theory, the legislature failed to make an appropriation to carry on the work in these courts. When the grand jury and petit jurors were drawn for the March term, 1871, judge McKean explained to them that he was obliged to send them home, because no money had been provided for their per diem allowance, not even for their board. He commented on this as a proof of the disloyalty of the legislature. Some of his language is worthy of quotation
"Gentlemen of the grand and petit juries, I am a federal official in Utah. I apologize to nobody for being here; I shall stay here as long as I choose, or so long as the government at Washington shall choose to have me here; and I venture the prediction that the day is not
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far in the future when the disloyal high priesthood of the so-called Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints shall bow to and obey the laws that are elsewhere respected, or else those laws will grind them to powder."
One may grant the accuracy of McKean's description of the Mormon high priesthood without admitting his judicial right to so characterize them at such a time. The whole point and purpose of the crusade thus momentarily halted was to bring Brigham and his aids into court. Even if it had been fair for the judge before whom they must come to brand them in advance as disloyal and traitorous, it certainly was not sagacious to deliver such premature judgment from the bench to men who had been drawn as jurors once, and might be so drawn again.
But the check thus given the crusaders was temporary ---as McKean had predicted it would be. After some delay and a fruitless application to Washington, funds for such prosecutions as were deemed desirable were advanced by the United States marshal, Colonel Patrick, and the business of "using up Brigham" went forward once more.
One small barricade, however, remained to the afflicted Saints; and this was now to be stormed. The warden of the territorial penitentiary was a Mormon ---of course. On August 2, 1871, Colonel Patrick, as United States marshal, took possession of this penal institution under authority of a law passed the preceding January, which perhaps applied to the case, and perhaps did not. The Mormon warden yielded under protest, but he yielded. Preparations for the grand attack on the citadel of theocracy were now complete. From the serving of a warrant to the in-
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diction of capital punishment, every process of law was in the hands of men who deemed it a duty and a pleasure to humble the Mormon monarch, and scatter his adoring court.
There was no delay in making the assault. At the September term of court, 1871, only seven Mormons were included in the jury list. Each of these declared that he believed that plural marriage was practised in accordance with a revelation from God, and that if he had to choose between sustaining the revelation and upholding the law, the law would have to fall. They were excused from service. A grand jury composed entirely of Gentiles indicted Brigham for "lewd and lascivious cohabitation." The warrant was served on him October 2, 1871.
The law under which these indictments were found was a territorial one, passed by the Mormons themselves. It never was intended to apply to plural marriage, but was designed to check irregular unions which had no sanction of either church or state. However illegal, a polygamous marriage was still a marriage; it was a union recognized by society, and one which in general was faithfully observed by both parties to the contract. Yet it was now proposed to define Brigham's plural marriages as "lewd and lascivious cohabitation," and punish him under a law which he as governor had signed. Such legal construction is permissible in comic opera and historical fiction, but hardly in sober fact in a country where the manifest intent of the law-makers is of vital import in determining the application of a statute.
Even more objectionable to the Mormons than this effort to punish polygamy without naming it, was the language hell lm Judge McKean. When the warrant
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was served Brigham was confined at home by illness. A week later he appeared in court, and his attorney moved to quash the indictment, pointing out that it had been returned by a jury summoned in defiance of Utah law, and making other objections. McKean denied this motion in an address of which the following is a part.
"Let the counsel on both sides, and the court also keep constantly in mind the uncommon character of this case. The supreme court of California has well said: 'Courts are bound to take notice of the political and social condition of the country which they judicially rule.' It is therefore proper to say that while the case at bar is called, `The People versus Brigham Young,' its other and real title is `Federal Authority versus Polygamic Theocracy.' The government of the United States, founded upon a written constitution, finds within its jurisdiction another government claiming to come from God ---imperium in imperio--- whose policy and practices are, in grave particulars, at variance with its own. The one government arrests the other, in the person of its chief, and arraigns it at this bar. A system is on trial in the person of Brigham Young. Let all concerned keep this fact constantly in view; and let that government rule without a rival which shall prove to be in the right."
Unjudicial zeal has seldom scaled loftier heights than that reached in these words of judge McKean. As the case stood after the judge's ruling, Brigham was indicted for lewd cohabitation that he might be tried for polygamy and punished for treason; yet the prisoner and his counsel were gravely bidden to observe and admire the "un-
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common" character of the net in which they found themselves entangled. As well might Luther, after nailing his theses to the church door, have been cited before the Pope on a charge of disorderly conduct, tried for defacing church property ---and sentenced as a heretic. Brigham's lawyers filed an exception to the judge's language, but that was the most they were permitted to do.
This was only the initial stroke. Several of Brigham's most devoted followers were indicted for the same offence. Indictments were found against Brigham, Daniel H. Wells, and several others for murder, in connection with the killing of Richard Yates during the "Mormon war." Still further indictments were returned against another group of Saints ---always including Brigham, however--- for the murder of the Aiken party in the spring of 1857. Thomas Hawkins was tried for, adultery ---this being another of judge McKean's definitions of plural marriage convicted, and sentenced to three years' imprisonment on October 20. Informers multiplied in the land, telling tales which always found ready credence if they were sufficiently bloody and applied to persons sufficiently high in the kingdom. It seemed as if the "mission jurist" were in a fair way to crush those whom he could not convert.
Brigham met these multiplied attacks with a steady courage which must have aroused the admiration of his enemies. His bluff and bluster dropped from him like a discarded cloak; and he faced his prosecutors, cool, watchful, determined ---more of a king in his hour of distress than in all the years of his unchallenged supremacy. Not for an instant did he lose his head. Not for a moment did he allow the fer-
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your of his people to escape bounds. It would have been easy for him to arouse an emeute among his devoted followers; doubtless also it would have been easy for him to escape from the country, and live a life of ease outside the "persecuting" Republic. Brigham would have none of either riot or flight. He would neither retreat before the overwhelming might of the nation, nor suffer his worshipping followers to fling themselves against its bayonets.
Up to this time, the crusaders had carried everything before them; but now, in an hour, the weapons were struck from their hands. It will be remembered that in the Engelbrecht case, judge McKean had declared his court a United States tribunal, rather than a territorial one; had disregarded local law in drawing a jury; and had rendered a heavy judgment against the Mormon officials who had poured Engelbrecht's liquors into the gutter. The officials thus mulcted carried their case to the Supreme Court of the United States ---doubtless with money supplied from the tithing fund. On April 15, 1872, the Supreme Court rendered a decision freeing the officials of the judgment against them, and wrecking McKean's carefully planned campaign. For the supreme justices unanimously agreed that the district courts of Utah were territorial courts; that juries must be drawn in accordance with territorial law, and that the district attorney and United States marshal appointed by the President must confine their activities to cases arising under the laws and constitution of the United States.
It was a crushing defeat for the crusaders. In their zeal to end a regime which they believed both reasonable and immoral, they had made the world-
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old blunder of straining the law; and they were dealing with an antagonist strong enough and clever enough to take advantage of every such slip. All indictments found by what may be called the McKean process were quashed at once; and the Mormon kingdom regained at a stroke nearly everything which a two years' crusade had cost.
Most men in Brigham's position would have celebrated such a triumph by offers of conciliation, would have avoided giving further offence to the all-powerful Republic. Not so the "Lion of the Lord." He had been hounded for polygamy. Very well, he would let the nation know that he held fast to that distasteful doctrine. At the election of 1872, William H. Hooper was notified that he need no longer serve as delegate in Congress, and George Q. Cannon was sent in his place. Hooper was a monogamist. Cannon was a polygamist; an Apostle, a hierarch, and a special counsellor to Brigham. Of all the younger generation then coming forward, Cannon was foremost in the regard of both people and prophet in the Mormon kingdom. His selection as delegate was a flat defiance of the United States government to do its worst; a notification that the kingdom would treat with the Republic only on terms of substantial equality. There was a time, we believe, when Brigham might have been induced to trade polygamy for statehood. There never was a moment when he was ready to surrender polygamy to a crusade. He was always willing to barter-and few indeed were the objects excluded from his list of trading stock. But surrender he would not.
Not yet, however, was ended the long duel between Brigham and Judge McKean. Chance for a time
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gave the jurist new weapons in place of those he had lost. Some years earlier, the father of Ann Eliza Webb, a dashing divorcee, urged her in marriage upon Brigham Young. Neither Brigham nor the young woman at first inclined to the arrangement. The prophet was approaching old age, he was burdened with imperial cares, he had already unnumbered consorts, several of whom were young and beautiful; and Sister Webb had no devout leanings to polygamy. But the duty to see that every lovely woman shall get to heaven was too much for Brigham's reluctance; and "Ann Eliza'' ---as she was called throughout the realm--- was induced to yield under paternal persuasion and the hint that her fascinations would soon win the place of favourite in the prophet's harem. The marriage was solemnized April 6, 1868 ---celebrating the anniversary of the founding of the church; and all Zion stood agape with respectful curiosity to see whether "Ann Eliza" could supplant "Amelia (Folsom) ---the statuesque, cold, childless beauty--- who had reigned as the prophet's favourite for six years. Brigham had been multifarious, but not usually fickle in his loves; and to Amelia he continued his unwavering devotion. Ann Eliza soon dropped from the role of ordinary wife to that of neglected wife; and finally, July 28, 1873, she sued Brigham for divorce, and demanded a substantial share of his fortune.
It is necessary to pause here for a moment to repeat a caution given several times before. Ann Eliza Webb posed as Brigham's nineteenth wife, and custom has fixed that as her number. There is just as good warrant for calling her the twenty-ninth, or the hundred and nineteenth. At the time of her mar-
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riage there were known to be eighteen other women with whom Brigham had sustained or was sustaining marital relations. Careful search probably would have doubled the number, and not even Brigham could have told to hove many women he had been "sealed." The marriage ceremony was sufficient to cover cohabitation in every case; and no domestic census-taker could have drawn the line between the three sorts of spouses.
Brigham's answer to this divorce suit was a bit startling. He pleaded that there was no marriage between himself and the plaintiff which the laws of the United States recognized; and therefore, there was no occasion for divorce. Judge McKean was plainly embarrassed by the situation, yet quite as plainly determined to use it to the injury of the Mormon emperor. On February 25, 1875, McKean ordered Brigham to pay Ann Eliza $3,000 for attorney's fees and $500 per month alimony pending a final decision. Brigham's attorneys took an exception, and prepared to appeal to the supreme court of the territory. The delay thus occasioned did not suit judge McKean. On March 8, he cited Brigham to appear before him, and show cause why he should not be punished for contempt of court in not having paid the required money. Brigham appeared in court three days later, and after a short argument by his attorneys, was sentenced to pay a fine of $25 and to be confined one day in the penitentiary. He was taken to his home by the deputy marshal, and after dining and being supplied with some clothing, was driven to the jail. Here, he was locked for a short time in a cell, and then allowed to pass the night in a room opening off the warden's office. The follow-
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ing day, March 12, 1875, he walked out free, into the arms of a worshipping crowd who had assembled to do him homage.
McKean had made a fatal blunder at last. The animus of his sentence for contempt was too clear to be doubted or disguised, and almost as bad was the sanction he had given to polygamy by his award of alimony. The Poland bill, signed by President Grant nearly a year before, permitted a judge to grant alimony to a woman who sued to have a marriage declared void because of a previous marriage. But Ann Eliza was suing, not to have a marriage annulled, but to get a divorce; she made no plea of ignorance to gloze her relations with Brigham, and the grant of alimony was practically a recognition of polygamous marriages as legal unions, to be dissolved only by formal divorce. Four days after Brigham left the prison, a telegram arrived in Salt Lake City, stating that McKean had been removed from the bench,
and that a successor was on the way.
The removal of judge McKean was perhaps the greatest of Brigham's later victories. Certainly it was the one which gave him most unalloyed pleasure, and his people the strongest assurance of Divine protection for their prophet and his rule. The Ann Eliza suit still dragged on without coming to trial, but no one doubted how it would end. Brigham was for some time in the custody of the United States marshal, but never again was he required to spend a night in jail. The "Lion of the Lord" had once more baffled the wiles of the hunters, and those who annoyed him had been removed from his path. No faithful Mormon questioned that the Divine guardianship thus made manifest would endure to the end.
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Brigham's mastery had not lessened during the years when he was so closely assailed. In 1874, his fortunes were perhaps at the lowest ebb they had reached since the Supreme Court had freed him from a criminal prosecution for polygamy. On June 23d of that year, President Grant signed the Poland bill, a measure which did by congressional act much that judge McKean had sought to do by judicial construction. It deprived the probate courts of Utah of their extensive jurisdiction, and gave large powers to federal officials in pursuing polygamy. Such a law, interpreted by judge McKean, was calculated to make almost any man doubt the temporal benefits of plural marriage; and meantime, that implacable Puritan, McKean, had control of the divorce suit against the Mormon emperor. But even under such circumstances, Brigham would not yield an inch. Apostle George Q. Cannon was once more named for delegate to Congress. Election riots in Salt Lake City that year were of a serious character; and in the Tooele district, some Gentile miners introduced the latest devices in ballot-box stuffing, but all in vain. Delegate Cannon went back to Congress, to represent, not a territory, but a kingdom; not a constituency, but a prince; and to stand as a living example of that prince's defiance of the laws and customs of the Republic.
Brigham came out from his single day of imprisonment March 12, 1875. Exactly four months later, John D. Lee was brought to trial for the first time for the Mountain Meadows horror. The federal officials had worked up their case until they felt certain, not only of convicting Lee, but of implicating the higher officials of the church, including Brigham him-
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self. They presented their case with skill and energy ---and the jury promptly disagreed. The word of the "brethren" had been passed to all prospective jurors, and it reached those who sat in the box. Lee was not to be convicted until the federal authorities should abandon their effort to connect the head of the church with the massacre at Mountain Meadows.
By this time, Gentile officials were learning something of the tenacity of Brigham's control. When Lee's second trial came in September, 1876, the United States district attorney took pains to make it clear that he was prosecuting only the man before him in the dock, and had no wish, desire, or expectation of obtaining evidence against the high and holy men whom Providence had put in control of Utah affairs ---and whom all efforts of the United States government had failed to put out of control. The result of this frank offer of compromise was gratifying. Lee was convicted, as he deserved to be; and on March 23, 1877, under direction of Colonel William Nelson, the United States marshal, he was shot at the scene of his frightful crime. Lee maintained, and with some justice, that he was thrown to the wolves as a sacrifice; but assuredly, no sacrifice was ever less deserving of sympathy.
On April 20, 1877, the long-drawn divorce case came to a sudden ending. Judge Schaeffer, before whom the trial was joined, ruled that Ann Eliza Webb never had been legally married to Brigham Young, and therefore did not need and could not get a divorce from him. All orders for alimony were cancelled, but the judge rather illogically assessed the costs against the defendant. The cause celebre had dragged on for four years; it had sold many books, piled up large
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lecture receipts, inspired countless editorials and sermons, and broken a United States judge. But it had not broken the man it was designed to ruin. Its ending, taken in connection with the failure of prosecutions for polygamy, was virtually a confession that the federal government could neither protect the plural wife nor punish the polygamous husband. Brigham might consider the time and money well spent which procured such a certificate from such a source.
His kingdom seemed to be acknowledged of man as well as "ordained of God."
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BRIGHAM was now at the zenith of his worldly fortunes. Thirty years had passed since the creaking wagon that was his sick-bed had lumbered down the half-broken trail of Emigration canon, to the valley of his vision and his hope. His handful of heroic followers had become a myriad. The poverty of a little band had changed to the wealth of a mighty community; and their devotion to their chief had grown with their numbers and his triumphs. The seeming desert had uncovered its fertility. There was no want. There was no serious schism within, and no imminent menace from without.
The outcasts of Illinois had made an empire; an empire not only in the assurance of Brigham and the faith of his subjects, but in the scarcely veiled recognition of the Republic and the world. Brigham's ambassador sat in the halls of Congress. Brigham's agents made treaties with foreign governments for the protection and profit of Mormon residents abroad; and every large interest (with the bare exception of mining) which desired security and advantage within his realm negotiated with Brigham, in full knowledge that the word of the king was at once contract and fulfilment, the law, the judgment, and the execution.
Here again we must pause to emphasize a fact little understood, and where understood, too lightly esteemed: the fact that Brigham's assumption of a Divine
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right to rule was vindicated to his people by the marvellous success of that rule. Many men have won lands from savagery to civilization, to be rewarded only with placid gratitude or dismissed in quick forgetfulness by their successors. But they were only men, while Brigham was ---so he claimed--- the prophet of God. Each victory of his career piled itself on each preceding victory as cumulative proof that he was the king anointed of God, and that the empire he had founded in the wilderness was to be the everlasting inheritance of his people. It was impossible to shake the faith of the ordinary Mormon in Brigham Young. He had been a witness of Brigham's triumphs in contests with man and Nature; he had seen Brigham's courage and strategy win a score of times in struggles with earthly powers; he had seen the will of the great Republic bow before the rod of Zion's ruler ---and that ruler never failed to teach that his success was proof of Divine authority. That teaching remains to this day the mainspring of Mormon solidarity and discipline. Now, as then, the survival of the kingdom is cited as the only necessary evidence of God's promise and purpose that it should survive. Now, as then, the increasing wealth and power of the kingdom are proclaimed as proof that it must eventually overthrow all other governments on the face of the earth. And now, as then, the assurance of the Mormon kingdomits victories, its persistence, its almost sublime selfsatisfaction ---commands a thousand allies in the unbelieving but profit-hungry world. Gentiles in Zion paraphrase Brigham's old aphorism about the Indians, and say: "It is cheaper to feed the Mormon church than to fight it"; and captains of industry
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finance, and politics in the nation at large take it at its own valuation.
In the early summer of 1877, the point which this history has now reached, Brigham himself paused in gratified contemplation of the peace which had come to his power. With no apparent premonition of his death, which was hovering near, he remarked in conversation: "Now the kingdom can spread. The machinations of our enemies have all been overthrown. For the first time since I heard the gospel I feel that we are free from tribulation by the wicked."
He was soon to find the rest for himself which he had erroneously predicted for the church. With the cessation of legal troubles at home and apparent peace abroad Brigham set himself the task of putting the Lord's house in order. He organized new stakes of Zion. He projected new missionary and colonizing labours. He selected vigorous personalities to take the place of men who had fallen into inutile routine. Some of his aggressive men had grown away from him in their financial operations. He planned the consolidation of their interests into institutions which should take their license to live from the ruler of the kingdom and should therefore pay deference to his will. But all this activity and all these plans to further solidify his power at the capital, and to push back the horizon of his empire, were to be but the last flash of his creative genius and his autocratic and monopolistic will.
On August 19, 1877, he spoke at the organization of a new stake of Zion. Four days later, he was taken with cholera-morbus. The difficulty quickly developed into inflammation of the bowels ---,a disorder to which he had been subject at intervals since the
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time of his severe trials in the exodus from Nauvoo. Word of his serious condition went by wire throughout the kingdom and all the Saints joined in prayer for his recovery. His elders administered to him and promised in the name of Israel's God that he should be raised up to continue his divine work in the world. But Brigham had notions of his own. Administration by the elders ---the laying on of hands for the healing of the body--- was a doctrine for a child with membranous croup, or a barren woman, or a man with pneumonia; but a royal case of bowel complaint demanded something more. The physicians were called in and they used all their Babylonish skill and drugs; the Prophet steadily failed; and on August 29, at four
o'clock in the afternoon at his home in the "Beehive House" in Salt Lake City, Brigham Young passed away. He had been wavering on the borderland of consciousness for hours, and his last words, uttered shortly before he died, were: "Joseph! Joseph! Joseph!" Brigham Young had passed a thousand dangers. He had been threatened by an army and prosecuted by the law. For more than twenty years the mass of the people in the United States had expected to see him imprisoned or executed as a traitor. And he died at a good old age in his bed, surrounded by a worshipping court, in the capital of an empire which he had built and which he maintained to the hour of his death in the heart of a republic.
Thus closed the career of one of the most remarkable men ever born on the western continent. We will not here say one of the greatest; though many a hero occupies a seemingly permanent place in the hall of fame whose abilities and achievements are not a tithe of those of the "Lion of the Lord." Perhaps the
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physiological historian of the future will find a proof for Brigham's greatness in the high abilities of many of his descendants, and this often in lines wherein their sire's mastership helped them not a whit.
Tens of thousands of mourners came from all parts of Zion to attend Brigham Young's funeral, which was held in the vast tabernacle which he had designed and built. There was deep mourning among the Saints, but, strange to say, no fear. Brigham himself had shown to the Mormons, by his leadership upon the death of Joseph, how the passing of one founder only made room for another ruler of equal or greater genius. At the services, George Q. Cannon expressed the pathos of personal and public feeling; and John Taylor, President of the Quorum of Apostles, who was to succeed Brigham in the presidency of the church, expressed the calm unemotional certainty that Brigham's death left no gap which could not be filled in the rulership of the kingdom, that God would endow his prophets with wisdom, and that Zion would advance with accelerated momentum to its place of sovereignty in the world.
Brigham Young's body was buried in the heart of one of the blocks which he had selected as his inheritance when he first came to the Salt Lake valley. His grave is covered by a slab of granite weighing many tons, and surrounded by a wrought-iron fence. About a half acre of space surrounding is given to lawn and flowers. To this place Saints and travellers alike pay pilgrimage of devotion and curiosity.
For a little time an amusing error was circulated among the Gentiles of the kingdom, and it gained hopeful credence among the faithful: that Brigham was not dead and that a wax figure had been sub-
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stituted for the funeral ceremonies; that he intended to show a miracle to the world by his resurrection. For some time the Saints hoped, as some of the Gentiles feared, that this might be true. But both hope and fear were soon dissipated by the assertive way in which John Taylor took charge of the affairs of the kingdom, and the attitude which Taylor assumed toward the estate of Brigham Young.
Brigham left a fortune well above two million dollars in the valuations of that time ---potentially it was worth tens of millions. This fortune he divided by will among nineteen "classes" of wives and offspring. The division into classes did not mean any particular difference in the valuation of inheritance to each; it was made to give practically equal recognition to nineteen parts of his large family. The only notable favouritism which was shown in his will was in his bequest to his favourite wife, Amelia Folsom Young. To her he devised the famous Gardo house, then just completed, in which he had intended to install her as a royal consort in royal splendour. The Gardo house was called and is called to this day "The Amelia Palace," though Amelia never occupied it. John Taylor demanded and received it for the church from the executors of Brigham's will in a settlement of the estate, and it has since passed to other ownership.
Brigham said in public not long before his death that he had grown rich in finding work for the poor and paying them for it. His enemies declared that he had grown rich by using the tithing fund to advance his own projects. There is truth in both statements.
He was essentially a builder and a manager. He
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hated idleness, and he loathed inefficiency. He created the Mormon empire, and by all commercial rules he had a right to exact pay for his building. His fortune, we repeat, was less than many a captain of industry whom the world calls honourable has collected for services insignificant compared to those rendered by Brigham Young. Also, he had the money-making instinct, and on at least two occasions ---the departure of the garrison from Camp Floyd and the arrival of the Union Pacific railroadhis legitimate or quasi-legitimate chances for gain were very great.
But these things alone neither explain, nor excuse his fortune. Brigham did not build his kingdom as a business enterprise, but as a holy sanctuary for a distressed church. To accept the pay of a real estate promoter for the services of a prophet and a king shocks the moral sense of mankind ---and justly. There is nothing sacred about the rags of Lazarus, and nothing especially sinful about the purple and fine linen of Dives. But the world has long since learned that he who serves a cause with his whole heart and soul has little time or chance to serve himself. Brigham gave wonderful service and unquestionable loyalty to his people ---but never for a moment did he lose sight of his own interests, never did he forget the revelation which commanded him to "care for his family." Brigham had undisputed charge of the tithing fund, which must have amounted to nearly a million dollars a year by the time of his death. He gave no accounting of this vast income. He drew no sharp line between the funds which he held for himself and the funds which he held in trust for the church. In such a case, the unrep-
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resented party always suffers. The story that Brigham once squared accounts with the church by crediting himself with $967,000 "for services rendered," has been denied many times, and certainly lacks specific proofs. But there is no doubt that the tale at least represents Brigham's habitual way of thinking.
The size of Brigham's fortune and its method of acquirement are of more significance as showing the materialistic and temporal character of the kingdom which he built, and which his successors maintain. In the early teachings of the church, it was assumed by all the faithful that the Saints must devote themselves to immediate preparation for the second coming of Christ. A temple was built that Christ might have a place fittingly prepared from which to rule the world when He came. Long before Brigham's death, this faith was so overlaid by worldly activities that it had place neither in the purpose of the kingdom nor in the thoughts of the Saints ---except as some dreamer like Joseph Morris might read Prophet Smith's predictions, and rashly fix a date for the coming of the Heavenly Prince. The belief in a divine mission remained as firm as ever, but that mission was no longer concerned with spiritual advantages. Neither in Brigham's day nor now can the devout Mormon see the anomaly of having a temporal kingdom built in place of a heavenly kingdom; of having commerce harnessed to theology; of the idea that God Almighty, Creator and Possessor of the Universe, wants ten per cent of every human creature's income held in trust for Him by a self-chosen and self-perpetuating line of priests and kings.
The most insatiable and not altogether the most creditable interest in Brigham centres about his mari-
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BRIGHAM YOUNG
tal experiences. We have already explained the impossibility of saying how many wives he had-Ann Eliza claimed to be the nineteenth, but according to a semi-official biography published shortly after the monarch's death, she was No. 25. In the early days of his Utah emperorship, all his wives lodged in the "Beehive House" and the "Lion House"; concerning which a thousand stories were told. At this time, all the work of his household was done by his wives, and one of them served as school-teacher to the children of all. They dined then at a common table, Brigham sitting at the head, with his legal wife, Mary Ann Angell, on one hand, and the reigning favourite on the other.
One of his favourites, Mary Van Cott, presented him with an heir when he was in his seventieth year. In his will, drawn some years later, Brigham bravely acknowledges in advance as his own any child born to any of his wives within nine months following his death. This confidence was justified, and he did not wait until the writing of his will to testify to it. His sermons on many occasions show him the possessor of at least the usual quantity of masculine jealousy, but that jealousy seldom showed itself in concrete form.
His collection of wives included many of the finest women of Utah, both from an intellectual and a physical point of view. Altogether, we may say of Brigham as Townsend says of Mohammed, that he was a lover and possessor of women, whose sensuousness never degenerated into mere sensuality.
Like many of his much-married Apostles, Brigham was called a good family man. He was a good provider for his households. He was gracious to his
page 383
STILL " LION OF THE LORD"
wives, and tender to most of his children. At the death of one of his favourite wives, Emile Free, Brigham mournfully walked alone from her house to the church undertaker's establishment and there sadly made arrangements for the casket and the funeral. Brigham did not do this to be spectacular ---he had no occasion to use such petty aids for his fame; but that he had refused the use of his carriage and the companionship of his counsellors on this occasion, was told throughout Zion at every gathering of the good sisters as a demonstration of his gentleness and a proof of the love which the Divine ordination plants in the male heart toward the female.
Avarice is said to be the vice of old age; and in a way, it showed itself in Brigham's declining years. He was no keener for personal gain than before, but he came to set more and more store on material success. In one instance, shortly before his death, he appointed a local Shylock to be president of a stake. The man was a note-shaver and money-loaner-on the hardest kind of terms. His appointment was secretly resented by the whole population of the stake. But the appointment was made and not revoked, and Brigham rebuked the brethren for their suspected murmuring in a scathing sermon, wherein he praised the new president for having diligently served his own interests and thereby given proof that he could serve the Lord.
Every year, Brigham made the rounds of his immediate empire. His visit to the northern settlements lasted usually three or four weeks; that to the southern towns about twice as long. He was accompanied on these trips by a considerable number of his courtiers, and by one or more or his wives. They
page 384
BRIGHAM YOUNG
were royal progresses, and were treated as such. At each town, the visiting monarch was met by deputations of citizens and officials; and in each place where he stopped for more than a casual halt, he gave clear indications of his imperial pleasure. In earlier years, his scolding sermons included everything in their scope, from the proper education of children to the nature of women's sunbonnets, and the character of community fences. Toward the close of his life, his harsh speech was modified, but he continued to be interested in everything, and to express his views as those of one who has a right to give orders on all subjects.
If Brigham had a weakness, it was one which has afflicted despots since the days of Khufu ---a love of heaping up huge public buildings. The gigantic tabernacle and the far more costly temple in Salt Lake City were a serious drain on the resources of the community. In smaller settlements, the effort was even more severely felt. Whether this drain was compensated by the resultant unity of community effort is a question to which men will give different answers. Our own view is that the specific cost of the great temple is trifling compared to the cost of that suppression of individuality which made the temple possible.
It is noticeable that the public works under Brigham's regime were mostly spectacular in character. The temple, the tabernacle, the theatre, were wonders whose like was unknown in any new Gentile city of similar size and wealth. But laboratories, libraries, and hospitals were conspicuous by their absence.
The point has been made clear in preceding chapters that at the death of Brigham Young his empire
page 385
STILL "LION OF THE LORD"
comprised Utah as its centre and held possession and political control of choice spots from Canada to Mexico. One of the strong evidences of Brigham's genius as a ruler is the fact that he had so well prepared that extensive realm to survive and flourish after he should have passed away. No other single thing so completely marks and proves the difference between Brigham and Joseph.
At the death of the prophet Joseph, the church began to disintegrate immediately, and only the masterful hand of Brigham kept it from going to pieces altogether. At the death of Brigham, the church stood secure. There were no schisms, no revolts, no important apostasies. The kingdom went on, though the king was dead. But it was a kingdom of the dead monarch's fashioning; and to-day, in every corner of the Mormon empire, one may trace the handiwork of Brigham Young.
page 386 XXXV
THE KINGDOM ENDURES
AT the principal corner of Temple Square in Salt Lake City rises a figure of bronze on a pedestal of granite ---the monument to Brigham Young. The great business manager of Mormonism is standing in calm but alert attitude, as he so often stood in life. His back is turned on the great temple ---symbolic of the fervid faith of the people he ruled so long. His face is to the south, that his eyes may look upon Zion's Bank, and Zion's Co-operative Mercantile Institution; and toward these his open hand is outstretched. Whether he is conferring a blessing or demanding a dividend the sculptor has not made clear.
That statue of the real founder of Mormonism, with the spiritual things of the church behind him, and the material values of the world before, is symbolic of the empire which he built. That, likewise, has turned from doctrines to dividends. Behind that also is the temple, and before it are the courts of Dives. In the past are heroic faith and steadfast endurance. In the present, and looming larger in the near future, are banks and stores and factories and railroads, procured tariffs, and secret rebates.
In avarice as in heroism, the kingdom is but the lengthened shadow of the bronze caliph on his pedestal. Its glories and its failings are his own.
page 387
THE KINGDOM ENDURES
At the death of Brigham, there was promise of a change. Under his successor, John Taylor, the kingdom seemed to turn a while from that worship of material success which Brigham frankly avowed, Taylor demanded a sharp accounting from Brigham's estate. He separated the funds which he held as trustee from those of his own private fortune. He sought to exalt the devotional side of his church-state, and to curb its increasing anxiety for wealth and political power. For a time, he and his immediate successor seemed to make progress along this line. But the bent wood sprang back into place; the essential nature of the organization which Brigham had bequeathed to the kingdom triumphed over the passing whim of a passing potentate; and soon the succession came to one who had no quarrel with moneychangers, provided they were ready to share their profits with the anointed of the Lord.
Joseph F. Smith, present president of the Mormon church and ruler of the Mormon kingdom, is likewise president of, or officer in, a score of financial, commercial, and manufacturing institutions. To give an up-to-date list of his enterprises is impossible, for this prophet, seer, and revelator to all the world has not lately been on the witness stand. The last detailed information on this point is contained in his testimony before the Senate committee which was investigating the right of Apostle Reed Smoot to sit in the United States Senate. At that time, Joseph F. Smith was president of Zion's Co-operative Mercantile Institution, one of the strongest commercial organizations in the West. He was president of Zion's Savings Bank and Trust Company, where the humble Mormon people keep their savings. He was
page 388 BRIGHAM YOUNG
president of the State Bank of Utah, the chief commercial bank of the hierarchy. He was president of the Salt Lake Knitting Company, which manufactures the sacred undergarments that each Mormon wears through life after he takes his endowments. He was president of the Utah Light and Power Company, which got a fifty-year blanket franchise on the streets of Salt Lake City, and then sold out to the Harriman interests. He was president of the Utah Sugar Company, a local branch of the sugar trust; of the Inland Salt Company, which sustains the same relation to the national salt trust; of the Consolidated Wagon and Machine Company, which is a selling trust in agricultural implements. He was president of a summer resort, of a dramatic association, of a railroad.
More important than all else, Joseph F. Smith was and is master of a tithing fund of approximately $4,000,000 per year; an unfailing river of liquid capital, which rises in springs of faith on a hundred thousand farms and workshops, and flows through appointed channels to that secret, silent reservoir of gold, from which only the Mormon sultan and his designated favourites may dip. As head of the kingdom, Joseph F. Smith is absolute master and owner of this vast income and its yet vaster accumulations; and no human being can hold him to account for a dollar. Courts have decided, in substance, that Smith is trustee for God, rather than for the people; and therefore nothing less than Divine authority is competent to compel an opening of the books. Since he is likewise the only man now living through whom God deigns to hold converse with the world, Smith's grip on the tithing fund seems fairly secure.
page 389 THE KINGDOM ENDURES
And this, too, is Brigham's handiwork. He would not take pride in it, but he could not deny it. He might claim, and truly, that when he was master of the tithes, no destitute Mormon was sent to the poorhouse in his old age, and make scathing comparison with the records of to-day. He might claim, again with truth, that he built the kingdom over which he tyrannized, and that the wealth which he dispensed with such arbitrary hand was in some sort his own creation. He might rage as of old at the present sultan, whose rule is an accident of inheritance, not a triumph of personality; and whose wealth is the gift
of a church, not the product of his financial genius. But these are changes which come in any monarchy; they do not lessen Brigham's responsibility for creating the system which has fallen into such hands. He designed and enforced this tax on faith and industry; he asserted and maintained an irresponsible despotism in the midst of the freest republic on earth. The perversion of that theocracy, the misuse of that tax, come back at last to the "Lion of the Lord," and claim heirship in his household.
As in finance, so in other matters. After Brigham's death, pressure by the federal government compelled his successors to yield their pretensions for a time. They renounced the practice of polygamy. They pledged their sacred honour to take the church out of politics. By these means, they gained surcease from persecution, restoration of citizenship and of property, and the boon of statehood-for which Brigham had worked so long. Then, they resumed the practices and politics which they had renounced. They bought their independence ---and stole back the purchase price.
page 390 THE KINGDOM ENDURES
Joseph F. Smith, the present head of the kingdom, has begotten twelve children by five wives since he pledged his word and oath to abstain from polygamous living. To the best of their ability, his faithful subjects have followed his example. Nowhere in the kingdom, perhaps, can be found new households of the dimensions known to Brigham and to Heber Kimball; but probably there are more plural wives in that kingdom now than ever before.
The political control of the hierarchy is so absolute that a Mormon official has been reduced to the ranks for circulating at a school election a different ticket from the one favoured by his church superiors; and at Washington an Apostle sits in the Senate as ambassador of the polygamous kingdom-an ambassador who has a highly important vote in the Senate of the republic to which he is accredited.
Throughout the whole range of political activities in the Mormon kingdom, the present polygamous ruler is supreme and almost unquestioned. The legislatures of a dozen states are influenced by his will. Governors court his favour. Visiting Presidents of the United States give to him as much deference as they receive. And national parties carefully avoid offence to his authority.
And for this also Brigham is responsible. He encouraged contempt for the United States. He talked ---and almost proved--- that within the Mormon dominion there could be no rulership except as subordinate to that of the Mormon prophet. He concentrated all the power of devotion which his people could feel into an idolatrous loyalty to the head of the church, leaving no emotion to be wasted upon national patriotism. And what he set in the plastic
page 392 THE KINGDOM ENDURES
time of his kingdom has become its fixed and immovable character.
Through more than forty years of service and of sovereignty, Brigham builded his kingdom; and the indignant might of civilization has not wrecked his handiwork. It stands to-day, inscrutable in its very simplicity; a theocracy encysted in a republic, an ancient clan turned into a modern trust. It endure adversity, it thrives on neglect, and it waits in confidence for the day when the faith of Joseph and the works of Brigham shall march to dominion over the entire earth. And on his pedestal, Brigham waits also, with outstretched hand.
page 393 INDEX
Blood Atonement, 261-272.
Boggs, Gov. L. W.,
Calls out militia, 50.
Issues "extermination" order, 51.
Shooting of, 80.
Brocchus, Judge Perry E., Quarrel with Brigham, 22i-2.
Cannon, George Q.,
Chosen Senator from Deseret" ; 325.
Counsellor to Brigham, 343
Delegate to Congress, 367.
Re-elected delegate, 371.
Connor, Col. P. E.,
Ordered to Utah, 328-9.
Influence for peace, 335.
Cradlebaugh, Judge, Baffled investigations of, 311-2.
Cumming, Gov. Alfred,
Character of, 299-3oo.
Comes to Salt Lake City, 301-2.
Reassures Mormons, 309.
Calls out Nauvoo Legion, 3i3.
Leaves Utah, 320.
Danites, 271.
Dawson, Gov. John W., Troubles and flight of, 323-4.
Drake, judge Thomas J.,
Appointed, 328.
Reply to demand for resignation, 334.
"Deseret,"
Meaning of name, 170.
State of, organized, 213.
Land grants by legislature of, 218.
Reorganization in 1863, 331.
Emigration (including immigration),
From Great Britain, 61.
Perpetual fund for, 180.
Charles Dickens on Mormon, 253.
Management of, 254-5.
By hand-carts, 256-60.
Gold,
Discovery of, 172.
Seekers reach Salt Lake City, 174.
Brigham sends men to mines, 178.
Grant, Jedediah M.,
Part in first emigration, 154.
Character, 202.
Part in blood atonement, 262-6.
Harding, Gov. Stephen S.,
Appointed governor, 328.
Message to legislature, 330-1.
Resignation demanded,
333.
Pardons Morrisites, 335
Removed to Colorado judgeship, 336.
Indians,
Encountered on pioneer march, 133-5.
Fort for protection from, 148
***************************************
page 394 INDEX.
Brigham's policy toward, 182.
War with, 248
Massacre of Gunnison by, 250.
At Mountain Meadows, Kirtland, 2 .
Defeated by Connor, 330.
Johnston, Gen. Albert Sidney,
Commander of Utah expedition, 295.
Reaches ort Bridger, 300.
Marches toward Salt Lake City, 307.
Leaves Utah, 320.
Judges, Recall o. See Drake, Judge Thomas J.
Kane, Col. Thomas L,.
At Winter Quarters, 118,.
Statements to President Fillmore, 2I7-8.
Goes to Salt Lake City, 299.
Mission to Gov. Gumming, 300.
Prevents Cumming's removal, 316.
Summary of character, 3I6-8.
Kimball, Heber C.,
Baptized 16.
Comes to Kirtland, 33.
British mission of, 58.
Brigham's lieutenant, log.
Counsellor to president, I59.
Division of, in emigration, 162.
Chief justice of "Deseret," 170.
Character, 199-200.
Prophecies of, 216.
Injunction to missionaries, 232.
Letter to his son, 256.
Death of, 343.
Kinney, Judge John F.,
Appointed, 323.
Orders arrest of Morris, 326.
Sentences Morrisites, 334-5.
Territorial delegate, 336.
Brigham brings converts to, 33.
Church organization at, 35-6.
Bank at, 44-6.
Abandonment of, 47.
Polygamy at, 65.
Lee, John Doyle,
Campaigns for Smith, 88.
Wives and children of, 240.
Goes to Mountain Meadows, 274.
Supported by Brigham, 280.
First trial, 371.
Conviction, 372.
McKean, Judge James B.,
Appointment and character, 357.
Overrles territorial jury law, 360.
Speech to juries, 361.
Ruling on "polygamous theocracy," 364.
Overruled by Supreme Court, 366.
Sends Brigham to jail, 369.
Removed, 370. March,
From Kirtland to Missouri, 34.
Across Iowa, 107, et seq.
Of pioneer company, 129, et seq.
Of first emigration, I535.
Second, from Winter Quarters, 161-3.
Of hand-cart companies, 256-60.
***************************************
page 395 INDEX.
To Mountain Meadows,
274-5.
Federal expedition, 287, et
seq.
Col. Connor's, into Salt
Lake City, 329.
Missions,
Brigham in Canada 33.
To the Lamanites, 37-9.
To England, g8-62.
Sent out in 1849, 180-1. Missouri,
Expedition to, 34.
Pioneers at Independence,
39.
Revelation on, Jackson
County, 40.
Quarrel with Gentiles in
Jackson County, 4I-2.
Founding of Far West,
43.
Purging of church in, 47.
Final trouble begins, 49.
Expulsion of Mormons
from, 52-5.
Brigham returns to, 56. Mormon Battalion, .
Raised, 110,
Members join pioneers at Laramie, . 136.
Pueblo division reaches Salt Lake City, 148.
Part in gold discovery, 173_4.
Mormon, Book of, 18.
Mormon Church, Founded, 19.
Sketch of organization, 208-11.
Present character, 387, et seq.
Morris, Joseph,
Rebukes Brigham, 325.
Killed by posse, 327.
Followers pardoned, 335.
Mountain Meadows,
Discovery of, 181.
Massacre at, 273, et seq.
Brigham's responsibility for, 279.
Lee's execution at, 282.
Story of, leaks out, 310.
Nauvoo,
Founding of, 56.
Unhealthfulness of, 57.
Charter, 75-6.
Growth of, 77.
Temple, 78-9, 98, 106.
Whittling out at, 83.
Schism at, 88.
Expositor, 90-1.
Burnings at, 101.
Exodus from, begins, 105.
Last attack on, 112-114
Nauvoo Legion,
Independence of, 76.
Called out by Gov. Gumming, 313.
Suppressed, 357.
New Movement, 348-52.
Polygamy,
Mormon doctrine of, 63.
At Kirtland, 65.
Revelation establishing, 65-8.
Reasons for, 69.
Denials of, 72.
Joseph's part in, 73.
Church dukes practice, 205.
Publicly proclaimed, 225.
Practice of, 228, et seq.
Study of, 237-47.
First law of Congress against, 325.
McKean's definition of, 363.
Practised by present head of church, 389.
Revelation,
Of Book of Mormon, 18.
Character of, 24
Smith's fruitfulness in, 30.
At Fishing creek, 34.
On business,. 36.
Concerning Jackson County, 40.
***************************************
page 396 INDEX
Commanding Brigham to
stay at home, 62.
Concerning polygamy, 65,
et seq.
Of Brigham at Winter
Quarters, 121, et seq.
Of Joseph Morris, 326. Smith, Joseph,
Richards, Willard,
Present at prophet's mur-
der, 94.
Counsellor to president,
I59.
One of church dukes, 202.
Death, 263.
Rigdon, Sidney,
Part in founding Mor-
monism, 32.
Opposition to Brigham,
36-7.
Flight from Kirtland, 47.
" Salt sermon," 49.
Counsellor to president,
53.
Opposes Nauvoo settle-
ment, 56.
Postmaster at Nauvoo; 77.
Claims presidency, 97.
Excommunicated, 99.
Rockwell, Port
Charged with assault on
Boggs, 81.
Shoots Worrall, 102.
Brings word army is ad-
vancing, 305.
Practises "ley fuga," 375.
Shoots man implicated in
Dawson case, 324.
Settlement,
Jackson County, 39-¢0.
At Far West, ¢3.
Nauvoo 56-7, 78.
Salt Lake City, 142, et seq.
Other Utah points, 181.
Controlled character of
Mormon, 181, et seq.
In Idaho, 353.
Shaffer, Gov. J. Wilson, Sup-
presses nauvoo Legion, 357.
Smith. Emma Hale.
Commanded to receive plural wives, 67.
Influence over Joseph, 71.
Opposition to polygamy, 72-3.
Meeting with Brigham, 17. Account of Book of Mormon, 18.
Reputation of, 19.
Contrast between Brigham and, 28-32.
Revelations of, 30.
Trip to Missouri, 34.
Experience with cholera, 35.
Favour to Brigham, 38.
Bank at Kirtland, 44-7.
Leaves Kirtland, 47.
Conduct in Missouri, 49.
Surrender to Gen. Lucas, 51.
Escape from jail, $6.
Revelation on polygamy, 65-8.
Adventures in polygamy, 70.
Awe of wife Emma, 71.
General of Nauvoo Legion, 80.
Political trickery and power, 84-5.
Aspires to presidency of United States, 86.
Publishes platform, 87.
Sends out workers, 88.
Suppresses Expositor, 9I.
Murder of, 94.
Sons come to Salt Lake City, 350.
Smith, Joseph F.,
American people his enemies, 216.
Useful to Brigham, 350.
Commercial activities of, 387.
Mastery of tithing fund, 388.
Polygamy of, 389.
***************************************
page 397 INDEX
Tithes,
Origin of, 48.
For Nauvoo temple, 79.
Payment in early Utah, 206.
Uses of tithing fund, 207.
Walkers refuse payment of, 345.
From outlying provinces, 353.
Brigham's use of, 379.
Present status of, 388.
Winter Quarters,
Sickness at, 117.
Organization of, 119.
Revelation given at, 121.
Start from, 129.
First Presidency restored at, 151.
Young, Ann Eliza,
Sues Brigham for divorce, 368.
Suit ends, 372.
Young, Brigham,
Romance of career, 9.
Parentage, 13.
Marriage, I5.
Conversion, 16.
Meeting with Smith, 77.
Contrast between, and Smith, 28.
Mission to Canada, 33.
Becomes Apostle, 35.
Feud with Rigdon, 37.
Leaves Kirtland, 47.
Helps "purging" at Far West, 47-8.
Practical head of church, 54;
British mission, 58, et seq.
Returns to Nauvoo, 62.
Discourages Smith's revelations, 79.
Campaigning for Smith, 88.
Defeats Rigdon, 98.
Letter to church, 99.
Begins marrying Smith's widows, 100.
Promises to leave Nauvoo, 102.
More marriages of, 105.
At Sugar creek, I6.
At Winter Quarters, 119.
Issues revelation, 121, et seq.
Marriages at Winter Quarters, 128.
Heads pioneer party, 129.
Sick with mountain fever,140.
Reaches valley, 141.
Lays down law for settlement, 145.
Appoints place of temple, I47.
Returns to Winter Quarters, 150.
Presient of church, I159.
Epistle to church, 161.
Return to Salt Lake City, 161.
Coins money I65.
Governor of "Deseret," 170.
Stops rush to gold-fields, 176.
Control of colony, 181-7.
Indian policy of, 182.
Patron of arts, I89.
Opposition to lawyers and doctors, 192.
Selecting his inheritance,197
Grant of City Creek canon
to, I98, note.
Founds church aristocracy, 199.
Demands polygamy of favourites, 205.
Opposed to whipping-post, 213.
Territorial governor, 2I8-9.
Attack on Brocchus, 222.
Number of marriages, 236.
Proclaims mastership, 248.
Innocence of Gunnison murder, 251.
***************************************
page 398 INDEX
Reappointed governor, 252.
Responsibility for handcart tragedy, 260.
Preaches persecution, 264.
Preaches blood atonement, 265.
Responsibility for Mountain Meadows, 279-80.
Defies United States, 289.
Orders federal troops from territory, 294.
Prepares to burn city, 303.
Harangues peace commission, 306.
Accused of counterfeiting, 313.
Makes profit from troops, 314.
Buys military supplies, 321.
Encounter with Col. Connor, 330.
Quarrel with Harding, 331.
Denounces federal officials, 333.
Organizes Z. C. M. L, 346, et seq.
Excommunicates Godbeites, 351.
Indicted for "lewd and lascivious cohabitation," 363.
Defiance of Congress, 367.
Sued for divorce by Ann Eliza, 368.
Sentenced to jail, 369.
Growth of empire, 374, et seq.
Last illness and death of, 376-7.
Fortune and will, 379.
Summary of character, 379-85.
Monument, 386.
Zion's Co-operative Mercantile Institution, 346.
***************************************
END