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Show THE NEWS AS A TWISTER. H The News squirms under Dr. Wishard's pamph- M lets. It is incensed that the loyalty of Apostle M Smoot to the Government of the United States M should be questioned. It is too bad, but it is true, M Apostle Smoot's first allegiance is not to the Unit- M ed States, but to another temporal government M within the government of the United States. We H do not believe that Apostle Smoot would deny this H unless he received instructions to do so from the H President of the Mormon kingdom. The News poo- H poos over the charge that Apostle Smoot is bound H by oath to this inside kingdom and asks what that H oath is. It has often been published, the editor H of the News has taken it more than once. It binds a man's fealty irrevocably to the Motmon church and included in it Is a pledge to avenge the deaths of the prophets. The News sneers at the statement that the apostle had to seek permission to enter politics. But there was very much more to this permission. Apostle Smoot was "set aside" to be a candidate and the whole power of the church was Invoked to secure his election. That he has taken an oath as Senator does not count, for an apostle can take no such oath except with a mental reservation. It counts no more than did the published statement state-ment that henceforth Mormons should be politically political-ly free. The News denies that there is any imperium in imperlo here. That Is an old joke on the part of the News. What then becomes of the claim of the church that obedience in all things is the first requisite for membership of the Mormon church? It charges Dr. Wlshard with falsehood because he says, "the church leaders dissolved the church ? political party," and explains that "public political meetings were held in different parts of the territory, ter-ritory, that first a meeting of the party leaders was held In Social Hall In this city when the matter mat-ter was fully discussed and the dissolution determined." de-termined." The News puts that out at this lute day and seeks to convoy the idea that it was all , due to those party leaders, and declares that "the movement had been urged by some of the members for years, and that the church cut no figure In it." Why did not the News give the names of those leaders and try to point to some political act that any one of them ever performed except with the approval of the church. That meeting in Social Hall meant that word had goue out from headquarters that in the play for statehood the People's party must be dissolved. i The discussions held there were after the same , fashion that tho debates were carried on in that famous constitutional convention which was held a in the eighties, but which ended in adopting without with-out amendment, the Constitution which Mr. Scott of Pennsylvania had drafted and which Hon. John T. Calne brought from Washington in his back ' m j pocket. The News says, "The movement had been m r urged by some of the members for years." How B 1 1 urged? In public? Not much. The urging was In B 1 1 secret, and it was to get the permission of the WM- i II church to proceed with it. Thousands of Saints B I if all over Utah are bowed in shame that the church B' 1 1 1 chiefs after their promises made to secure state- B J hood, drove the people up like sheep to the sham- mm 1 1 hies, to vote for a legislature that would In turn , f volo for Apostle Smoot for Senator, but how B s r many of them dare to lead or to join a movement B to demand that this dictation shall cease? Not B one. The discipline of the church will not permit B j it. Again, when the News says, "The Church cut B I I no figure in the action of the party," what does H If it mean by "The Church?" What does the Church II amount to in such a case? It meant "The First I Presidency" in 1891, it means now the first Presi- jl dent. B r !r Next, the News declares that the author of the Hi f n pamphlet "clips little sentences from works re- H'' 1 1 ferrlng to the Kingdom of God, the term being B ! U used in an ecclesiastical sense. These he con I I strues to signify the setting up of a temporal kingdom by the Mormons, within the United r States, to supercede this government and all oth- i ers." It declares that no such thing can. be found I in the standard works of the Church. , What shameful twisting and lying, when it is I proclaimed, as it has been for half a century, h that this is a dual kingdom; "a Celestial Kingdom Hj - and a Kingdom of God on earth." What does the B : latter mean? How did Brigham Young construe Iff It? How did John Taylor construe it? What has H u been the practice in Utah for six and fifty years? B What except that the chiefs have a right to rule H II ! the people in all things from the selling of a H I band of sheep to the selling of a United States B,, f I Senatorship? And though Ananias was killed for B I lying, Elder Penrose still survives. |