OCR Text |
Show SMOOT'S POWER SITE Bibl. It is quite natural that the conservation conserva-tion forces should oppose Smoot's bill for the granting of water control and power gitoa to the States. It is ovident, however, that this opposition is on sentimental sen-timental grounds, and ought not to apply. ap-ply. Tho real grnund of opposition to the Smoot bill is quite different from that which the conservationists would urge. They oppose it in tho interest of tho Gifford Pinchot policies, but the true opposition is on account of the favoritism and graft which would inevitably in-evitably ensue. If this bill passos, there will be legislation in Utah which would give to the Mormon church, its apostles, priests, sccrs and rcvolators, everything of valuo in tho State, relating to water privileges. It would bo a good deal Iika the action of some of the earlier legislatures in this (tlion)' Territory, which made land grants of the different canyons to various of the church leaders lead-ers City Crcok to Briham Young, Bic Cottonwood to Daniel H. Wells, and so on. The difference is that these old land grants would not. stick, being unwholesome usurpations of authority not vested in the Legislature. In the case now supposed, however, with the Smoot. bill passed and the authority conferred con-ferred upon the Lccislaturo to manage these power $itos and water rights, the rights conferred on or obtained by the favorites and church rulers would be valid and would hold. The Mormon Legislature with a Mormon Governor. both departments entirely subservient to the church, wotdd jjivp the church leaders anything ihey might desire, and their desire is limited only by their unbounded un-bounded avarice, their all-embracing appetites ap-petites and lusts. To what extent other Slates might yield to persuasions or coercions of various vari-ous kinds and so part with these valuable val-uable rights and privileges and favor individuals or corporations, for a mere song, is not so evident as in the case of Utah. Tt can bo safely assumed, however, that undue, influences would prevail far moro than lho.y should in most of the States. In Utah it is a forcgono conclusion that tho "Federal "Feder-al bunch" and the church leaders would tako everything in sight, leaving leav-ing the masses of the people more completely com-pletely at tho mercy of these harpies than ever before. A direct precedent for the throwing awny of the people's rights, the wasting wast-ing of their property regardless or their interests, as hero supposed, was furnished immediately upon tho State of Utah being organized, in the disposal dis-posal of lauds granted, csncciallv tho Congressional grants for common schools. These grants wero shamefully frittorcd away; were practically given to favorites of tho church for almost nothing, aud the school fund is depicted, de-picted, so that it amounts to scarcely one-tenth, perhaps wo might sa- one-hundred! one-hundred! h, of what it ought, to be. And so it has been right along with regard to school lands or anything else in sight. The "priesthood has takon everything that it could lay its hands on, and the public has been correspondingly corres-pondingly defrauded. There is not the least possibility of doubting this, and there is not the least possibility of avoiding tho practical certainty that the eamo tactics would bo ropcat cd as to water power that has been put into effect in other directions, through the influences of tho evil powers in control con-trol since tho conferring of Statehood upon Utah. The Smoot bill would probably work evil everywhere. It would inevitably and certainly be an unmitigated evil and scourge upon Utah. |