| Show ELDER ROBERTS comments on thatchers candidacy HE WAS NOT AN ISSUE the campaign had nothing to alo with thatchers culty with itis church thursdays deveret evening news contained a very lengthy correspondence between elder B H roberts and a member of tha church at ogden the name of the latter party being withheld it treats quite lolly the doctrine of oie and common consent and winds up with a very lucid explanation on the pirt of elder roberta on the political contest cow being made against the church the party questioned the right of the first presidency as stated by the to change alter or or make laws of the church the doctrine and covenant distinctly lays down the principle f government by common consent he says he is unable to accept the late manifesto as the word of god and ha presumes that elder roberta entertains similar views and while the mistake luay not be within ahe church tie ogden par y leli evea the first presidency can be shown the feeling of the people by the election of moses thatcher Ta atcher to the sanate liberty this nau thought was dead in utah elder roberts then takes up first the doctrine of dissent and shows how it is the privilege ol 01 every one to dissent from any doctrine of the church to put an extreme case by way of illustration the world is at liberty to reject the gospel but it then lays itself liable to the consequences the people may dissent from he laws of god as revealed through his constituted authority but they then lay thema elyea liable common consent is with the church today and has been from the beginning the lord called joseph smith to preside over the church to bo a prophet seer and revelator unto the people but first commanded him to be sustained by his brethren when sustained a revelation waa received say ing that the jorj would speak through him to the church president woodruff has those same powers today after thus discussing at great length the well known doctrines of the church and making them very lucid elder roberts deals with the political phase as follows fol lowB apostle refused to sign the manifesto but it went before the gon eral conference ot the church and was upheld by the common consent of the church then assembled and the apostle who refused to sign the document embodying the rule is not pre aenied before the conference for acceptance as an officer of the church that the rule promulgated by the authorities and accepted by the general conference might be more widely accepted by the chuich members and out of respect for the very principle of common which you seem to is abrogated by the policy of the church in this matter the document is presented to the baake conferences and I 1 thine even to the ward conferences feren ces of the church BO that no rule ever promulgated before by the church has been more widely accepted by the saints than this one nor was the principle of common con cent ever more thoroughly respected briix passed and another general conference of the church is held no action ia taken in the case of the suspended apostle bu extended explanations are made as to why he is meantime a political campaign ia fought out in the past the suspended apostle haa been prominently in politics and the year before was hie bartys candidate for united states senator but in the campaign compa ign of last fall ha ia not made a candidate for the belate though a senator is to be chosen by the legislature elected nothing is said of him in his bartys platform or the principle be is eup P sed in some way to represent by his opposition to his brethren this cani laign waa at its height when the october conference was held at which the reasons why the apostle was suspended from office were given still there was no exception taken by the political party of which he was a member no boice even from the stump was heard in protest so far as I 1 have learned nothing from the editorial columns of his bartys par tys press appeared bat after abo election ia over and is won by the democratic party not on the issue however of exception being taken to the course the church had pursued with reference to moses thatcher but on quite different issues then brother thatcher Tb atcher steps forward and upon the mem bora elect to the legislature an issue upon which they were not elected and them for their in his interview published in the salt lafee tribune in which he announces his willingness to become a candidate for the senate he is quoted aa saying 1 I 1 prefer private to public life and the peace of the docial circe to the strife in politic if I 1 had not been placed in a position involving a great principle I 1 could not ba tempted to abc acc pt even the high office of united states senator but if utah if kounz utah feels that my election would be a vindication of that for which I 1 have contended and donld aid in prevent inc the forging of chains upon the people of this state I 1 should accept the office of senator should it be tendered me brother thatcher does not ask to be ejected on any issue of the campa iea or because of any peculiar fitness of qualification he Rapa above other candidates though in cay judgment he possess some qualifications superior to those of the other candidates bat solely because of the attitude he has assumed howarda the BO cabied manifesto eelem ber that the overwhelming majority of the democratic barty are of the mormon faith remember that the mormon people haya almost unanimously adopted the so called manifesto as a church regulation and boges knatcher Tn atcher and his friends ask the members elect to the legislature to send him to the senate because of his appos tion to a rale of the church which trev to under these circumstances I 1 do not hesitate to eay that his election to the unite 1 states senate would be a gross insult to the members of the mormon church for he is virtually asking their representatives to elect him to the senate because he ia detill opposed to a rule which they in their capacity capa cily as church members have accepted by a free vote as a rule of their church if he thinks that they have accepted that rule under duress or yielded to it because of their weakness or the overbearing tyranny of their leaders then he insults their manhood and their intelligence telli gence but should he succeed in being elected because of his opposition to this church regulation let no one suppose that it would be a vindication of brother thatchers That chera course for the members elect of the coming legisla tare are not elected with reference to that question if that question had been before the people of utah in the baat election and the democratic pir y had championed the cause represented by moses thatcher viz opposition to the church rule in question favorable aa were all other conditions for democratic success there is not a man of sense but that knows there would have been ho democratic victory in utah this year the issue he asks to be elected on is an improper one in andoe itself because be asks to be elected for his opposition to a church it is doubly an improper one because it was not an issue of the campaign which resulted in a democratic victory it ie in addition impolitic I 1 for the democratic party as it would be in the nature of a direct and positive insult to the great majority of that party and would not angur well for future democratic control of the state of utah were I 1 an enemy to democracy instead of now and always an ardent supporter of it I 1 might arze the democratic legislators elect to tak e the course now urged upon them by the chief organ of republicanism but as I 1 desire to see the ground gained by the democratic party of utah maintained I 1 would to the best of my poor abilities dissuade them from fol lowine the course you propose the great principle of separation of church and state is in no danger nor is there any forging ot chains for either the limbs or of young utah let us aa soon as possible haye peace very truly yours B H 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