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Show Tj the Sail Lalto Daily lliUkto. T1IK SITUATION IN I'TAII. j Ilonlilo Aciltude of the Federal and Territorial aiilborttlea Iu fifth Im cause ftnd cure. j M'-:.iiii. Kdil-jin: During my shurt 1 stay in your midr, oiy eyes have been ! gradually opened to the fact that there i i.-xiMts, between your l-'ederal and Territorial Ter-ritorial otlieials, and those who stand behind them, a most lamentable ani wide.-preud antagonism. 1 need not pau.-e here to speak of the magnitude . of this evil. That it gxhU, and grows with frightful rapidity, no sane man will deny; and every thoughtful man, who louks narrowly into the future,! aud traeei the course; of things to their legitimate result, will be quick to pere.ive that it is an evil which, if nut checked by some suitable and sufficient suffi-cient remedy, must ultimately lead to inevitable and mea-ureles.s calamity. W hat is tiie vaiuc of this menacing evil? This is a grave question. It lays the axe at the root of the tree. If wo-are able to grapple with it, successfully, suc-cessfully, it wili be easy to point out the means of averting all po.-sible disasters dis-asters likely to arise, from this source, in the future. But we must know the cause, be Ibn; we can prescribe the remedy. J intend on my pait to be eandid : and I a.-k from the reader of this letter a candid hearing. Liten, I beseech you, to a friendly word, uttered by no unfriendly voice, and prompted by no improper motive. Throw yourselves loose ftom nil narrow and bigoted'prc-jtidiees bigoted'prc-jtidiees divtst, yourselves of "all un-charitableness;" un-charitableness;" hold the balance between be-tween the Federal and Territorial authorities fairly, steadily, and with a firm hand; and as the seale incline-, to the one side or the other, so let your position be taken. Wherever the re-poiu-ibility talN, there let it rest. It is not my purpose to go into a general history oi'nie manner in which the people of Utah have been governed gov-erned iu tho past. That branch of tho subject, it is true, is closely connected con-nected with tho quostion now under review, and hay an important bearing on it; but my limits forbid its dious-sion. dious-sion. I shall simply take up theeaso as I liud it, and point out what strikes mo as the existing cause of tho evil in question. The whole difficulty, in my judgement, judge-ment, lies in this That the people of Utah are, at this moment, practically deprived of the great body of their constitutional rights as American citizens. citi-zens. This may seem, at first blush, a somewhat startling proposition. It is nevertheless truo as we shall proeocd to show. The people of Utah do not enjoy religious liberty as guaranteed by the Federal Constitution. Tho frainers of our political system inheriting the 1 stern virtues of their ancestors, wjio had tied from their homes, and braved the perils of tho sea, and the hardships I and privations of a barren coast, to escapo from tho thraldom of religious tyranny were careful to embody in the Constitution tho absolute freedom of religion. But lest there should still remain some doubt on this vital point,the States, when they came to adopt the Constitution, submitted the following amendment, namely : "Congress shall make no law respect ing au establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Observe the scope and force of theee words. No language could well bo more explicit. It covers, with the protecting aegis of Supreme Law, all religions of whatever name. Tito great generation of men, who embodied the lbrogoing in the Constitution, Consti-tution, meant precisely what they said. They were not political triiiers. They were earnest men; and they intended that every living man, who was then, or might thereafter become an American Ameri-can citizen bo he Protestant, or Catholic, or Mormon, or what not should have, auxl practice, unqualified religious liberty. When they put forth this provision, it was not with a mental reservation standing behind the Constitution, ready to strike it down whenever the protection afforded happened by any chance to apply to a Mormon. Do the people of Utah I mean of course the Mormons, for they are the people do they enjoy the religious freedom guaranteed by the Federal Constitution? The question is a taunt a mockery 1 I make no mention of the religious intolerance which drove the Mormons from State to State and hunted them a thousand miles beyond tho border of civilization, across what was then the Great American Desert, into this valley, inhabited alone at that time by wild beasts, or still wilder men. I leave all that out of view; and point your attention to evidence which has fallen under your own observation within the last few days. No longer ago than last Monday, three prominent citizens of this city, after being summoned to act as Grand Jurors, were rejected solely aud confessedly con-fessedly because of their religious opinions. Of course every respectable lawyer knows that the District Attorney had no right to question the gentlemen abovo referred to touching their "religious "re-ligious belief much less had the Judge a right to make such belief aground of accepting or rejecting them. It is equally clear that a Grand Jury thus constituted is not a legal tribunal, aud has none of the functions pertaining thereto. Briefly, the whole procedure, from beginning to end, was a shameless judicial iiirce; but I am not now discussing the merits of the case, I am simply dealing with the fact: which fact fully establishes the proposition laid down abovo namely That the people of Utah do not CDjoy religious liberty as guaran-' teed by the Federal Constitution How is it in other matters? .Nine-tenths .Nine-tenths of the people of this Territory are iuormoas. Aine-tcnths of the taxes assessed and collected by the Federal government are paid by Mormons. Mor-mons. And yet, although they haVe scores of men amongst them who hold an clevatedi rank in all the manlier provinces of mind, not ono of them today to-day fills a Federal office anywhere in tho Territory unless it be somo humble hum-ble position which cc one else can be induced to accept. But I need not go into detail in reference re-ference to these petty grievances while the great fact stands out, iu bold relief, re-lief, that here in Utah there U no such thing a.s ''Self government by the people. ' ' No man with brains, or without brains, who simply looks around him, can fail to perceive the truth of this statement. When I speak of self-government I use the expression in its enlarged j sense. The G overmen! of the United j States is made up of two co-ordinate i braiwhos the one G aural and the other L-.-:al. The Federal Government wields the .v-Ueral powers; which are ; few in number aac specific in character. ( All othei powers are by express pro- 1 vL-ioa of the Constitution, ":eerved ' ' to the iu.ic.s. or the ptupu. it you I would know wliat powers rightfully , beioiig to the people of Utah, it is easy ' toaA-fVi.u tiic-iii. The oiily thing to 1 be d-. u: i. to look into the Constitution aiii i.i. t luwi-rs have beon uck'U-! uck'U-! ted iv CjU?rr: nil that remain belong j oi'ec.ii.-e to the people of the Territory. Territo-ry. Ah they permitted u wield . ti.--.i".' lil .juCsliuU Oecdi nj li-i Ij-JjM-c. Tliore L iijt an intelligent I man in Una who doea Uyt know that j , horj ;uo Geaorai Government his well i , ui-'b sv.-iiovrcd up the Local Govern-1 1 nitfli. The Constitution is construed j I !''. and day by day the Federal1 arm grows longer and stronger, and , the Territorial arm shorter and weaker. 1 In this way the Territorial establishment establish-ment has been shnrn of it -arenrh. I To-day it is hut the shadow of its former svlf, ami it ''dies daily." A I deep-eealed ulcer is gradually eatiug ! out its heart. A Kuugrene is on its limbs, and is climbiug with dark mortal mor-tal omen to the seat of life. Is it any wonder that the Territorial authorities who are the chosen guardians of the right of the people have been brought at leuth, under the stress of these facts, into direct and open antag-1 onism with the Federal authorities? The wonder Ls rather, that no more serious doubts have arisen. Here then is tho caate, fully and fairly laid open, of the hostile attitude of the Federal and Territorial authori-I authori-I tics in Utah. 1 come now to consider j the wnetlij. Under this head, one ! sentence will accomplish my task. I Let the Federal Government re-j re-j store to the people of this Territory, Terri-tory, all and singular, their constitutional constitu-tional rights as American citizens, and give them their full share of the offices created for their protection and paid for with their money, and tiie euro is effected. Let the government, in a word, be properly administered. Then, the people of this Territory will come to look upon it an their government. They will recognize in it the watchful guardian of all their interests those that are local and peculiar to themselves, them-selves, no less than those that are general and common to all. Lot this be done, and the loyalty of Utah to the Federal Government will rival that of any of the States or Territories, if the sun attract, the planets will not wander from their orbits. L am not a Mormon am not a citizen of Utah and have no private interest to suti-ferve by writing this letter. What has been written comes from a head and heart full of admiration admira-tion and love for my government viewed as a political system. The errors er-rors pointed out are all errors of administration, ad-ministration, whioh ought to be corrected. cor-rected. J f they arc not corrected, the future history of this Territory will form a dark pago in our national annals. an-nals. To the intelligent eye, the storm is even now visible, inarching in anger through the distance. The air is charged with tempestuous elements. Tho leaven is fermenting, the fever rising, the unquiet earth heaving, and the magazines of woe filling up. The men in authority, who will not open their eyes to the existing peril, will sooner or later, if they persist in their course, be aroused by the roar of revolution, rev-olution, but it will only bo in time to see tho unuappiug of the volcano that will roll out a continuous sheet of desolation des-olation all over this beautiful valley. Iu such a conflict the Federal arms would of course prevail; but only by exterminating the population of this city ari(j Territory. With the Mormons, Mor-mons, tho struggle would be one of life and death. They have .etired to their last refuge. There is no place left on this broad continent to whioh they could fy with any assurance of safety. Here, then, they would re-Eolve re-Eolve to defend their firesides or peiv ish in tha attempt. Heaven forbid that any sujh ewergancy may ever arise! "C." Salt Lake City, Sept. 20, 1871. |