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Show AS IT IS TODAY. Nothing seems to offend the chief Priests of the Mormon Church so much as to charge that their holy books have been revised and that at their coming here they did not extend the hand of friendship to Gentiles. To the stranger they hand their "Articles of Faith" as covering all that is in their creed, all that has ever been. When they are challenged on their points they at once become angry and begin to call names. Their veiy anger shows their sensitiveness on these points, and is a confession that there is much that they desire to either cover up or have forgotten. B In that creed they preach perfect liberty of B thought; there is not a word to indicate that in n practice that liberty means absolute obedience jX to the will of the President of the Church, abso- jBh lute obedience not only in all religions, but all Bgr temporal affairs, even to the laying of the B hand of a slave upon the only protection left by jB the fathers of the American people a free bal- ffB6 lot. B.e Neither in those articles is any reference made hHP to a temporal government, a government the rule LWk of which goes to every detail of life, to the jHfi business of men, the politics of men, the schools, jB the government of cities and stated, and which jK as carried out today makes the President of the B Church also in fact the Governor of the State, the B, City Council of each city, the Board of Trustees jB' of each school; the dictator who declares in ad- JBm vance who shall and who shall not be elected B i to office. Again the article which claims that Bfii the authority of Presidents, Kings, Magistrates, BC( etc., is accepted as a part of the Mormon faith Bi gives not the slightest intimation of how in real fl& practice that authority is construed, which is to jjHti to mean that such allegience is subject to the Bt; higher authority of their creed. B For instance, such construction as was made Bt in the 13th Ward meeting house a few evenings wLmL since, which was in substance that while poly- Bc gamy has been suspended, still it is right and the K Saints hope to become so pure that it will be re- stored. That is the way laws and pledges and B promises are revered. B Of late, too, it is being denied that there ever V were Danites or Destroying Angels; in another B generation it will be denied that there ever was B a Porter Rockwell or Bill Hickman and the death B of Dr. Robinson and plenty more will be charged B to suicide. B But there are many sensible Latter-day Saints B Hind to such we wish to-say. that all the recent fKxcitement is due to the breaking-ot, faith on fKhe part of those highest in their church; the Streaking of their plighted word that polygamy IEhould henceforth be forbidden and that hereafter jHjio church which they know means the Presi-IBlent Presi-IBlent and Apostles. should leave to the people ffcerfect political freedqm to espouse any political jEprlnciples they might please to, and to vote any IKicket they might desire to. This is recent his-Btary his-Btary which they all remember and they may judge Whether the faith has been kept which was pledged ten years ago, which caused the Gentiles here to advocate Statehood, and which, moreover, induced the then Congress and Presi-fBdent Presi-fBdent to admit Utah to the Union. We ask the iHmeople to go back over the files of the Deseret News, the organ of their Church, to read those pledges, to read the pledge of the News that 9Hshould there ever be any wavering from these jfcovenants, it would join with the Gentile press in gBdemanding that the wrong should be righted, Inland then to judge for themselves who has kept jBthe faith. After that we ask them to keep in mind Bthat of all things God hates most a liar, and then Hat their leisure to reflect that around them are Hthe meshes of this Politico Commercial net which Kwhile drawing from them one-tenth of all their fBearnings, ia debasing their manhood by compell-9Hng compell-9Hng them to vote as they are counseled to vote. |