| Show IN OPEN LETTER addressed to mr moses thatcher gy w L NELSON ol 01 lutc ex apostle torn 10 the skeletons exposed provo city feb lion thatcher A few ago you made an ap peal to young utah which though it has been answered by the logic of events has not in my opinion been adequately voiced in words true the air has been full of vociferous demon strati ins which you boom to interpret as popular approval nor is it difficult to understand your misconception on this when one reflects how easy it is to believe what one wants to bp cievo your awakening to the real itu atigo is only a question of time the farther you get away from the smoke and turmoil of recent events the more clearly you will see what everyone not immediately in the fray has seen from tlc alc beginning that your popularity nas a case of noise not numbers this letter will aim to voice the senti ments of that eilent majority of the democratic party who have watched your movements first with anxiety then with amazement and at last with dis I 1 trust you will give it the more aamlid consideration that it can not be charged as written to influence the election and also from the fact that a arc of your now orbit has heau exposed to view to enable one to form a fairly correct judgment of your motion and direction I 1 disclaim any intention to hurt your feelings nevertheless I 1 hold truth in higher estimation than man and shall therefore not shade a single of my deliberate conviction for fear its glare may hurt your eyes the tribune of february ard 3rd in commenting on your speech at the logan reception said A synopsis can not convey an idea of the beautiful rhetoric and metaphors I 1 note that all your utterances are thus dressed I 1 shall V proceed presently to examine some of these tine sayings but right here I 1 debiro that wo understand each other on this method of conveying facts while rhetoric serves to make truth beautiful and therefore more effective it ii equally serviceable in hiding the deformities of error in no place can a falsehood lurk so securely as under the full blown petals of a metaphor the beauty of its hiding place prevents the hand of investigation from tearing away its covering dress and polite manners have more to do with the popular reception of both men and their utter ances than has their true inwardness it often happens hip pens therefore that bedi zoned sophistry or downright falsehood clothed in beautiful garb is received with honest acclaim by the thought less multitude I 1 do not insinuate that you are thus masquerading but I 1 do assert my intention of stripping naked bamo bomo of the florid creations anich you have set before the people in the first eyou appeal to young utah in your own words if young utah feels that my election would be a vindication of that for which I 1 have contended and would aid in preventing tho forging of chains upon the people of this state I 1 should accept the office of senator should it be tendered to me three implications may be drawn from your words 1 the young people in utah are separate and distinct from the old peoples more progressive you would eay 2 the old people are forging chains or at least submitting to the forging of chabina upon the state 3 I 1 moses thatcher stand as the representative of the idea of liberty lot us take up these propositions in their order 1 there is something poetic in thug calling upon the to corrott the errors of their fathers and mothers there is a thoughtless and restless period of youth when every young blade is convinced that he is tied to a rusty handle now for thus to ap peal to youthful inexperience see I 1 kings 12 was pardonable because though raw and rash in his judgment he was perhaps honestly seeking the good of the commonwealth but what shall we say of moses thatcher with fifty five years on his head forty of which have been given to teaching the doctrine honor thy father and mother that thy days may bo long upon the earth I 1 ask the moses thatcher who has had time to reflect was the moses thatcher who sought office working for the good of the people or was he beek ing to exalt self even at the sacrifice of a great principle what will be his feelings when gray hairs shall crown his head if this doctrine should boar fruit in disown family but waiving the moral side of the question was not such an appeal apiece of extremely bad judgment boys and girls old enough to vote generally have respect for their garants pa rants good boneo and sterling integrity whatever they may have thought during their teens the attempt to divide the old and the young in politics would be quixotic any anore but most of all in utah where respect for old ago and experience is profound what possible lapse of judgment could make you believe that the young people of utah who justly look upon their parents as heroes and heroines men and women who had the moral courage to accept mormonism niem in the world and the fortitude to face the primeval desert in utah what I 1 re asat could lead you to believe that children of such fathers and mo ther would tako sides against their parents in supporting we have been accustomed all our lives to hear appeals from self seeking politicians and carpet bag preachers urging young utah to rise above superstition of their fathers but we did not expect such sophistry from moses thatcher you have repeatedly said that your election would mean not the triumph of moses thatcher but of the principles he represents think then for a mo ment of the choice you would have young utah make to desert an order of things which the nine hundred and ninety nine pronounce safe and wh ch has been proven so by a steady growth of three quarters of a century and ally themselves to one man who is following a scheme untried even to himself do you recall the fable of the tree that grew slowly upwards for a hundred years and of the gourd that sent its vines to the top in a single season and then spread its silly leaves out so as to hide the tree well the choice you urge is that of deserting the tree and clinging to the vine so much for the absurdity lurking beneath your first metaphor the appeal to young utah I 1 foresee that you will interpret the expression to mean newer utah such is the facility which a figure offers to quibbling on this point I 1 can only say that it is not without a careful comparison of your utterances and those of your conferees that I 1 adopted the other meaning as the one intended by you 2 wo shall now consider the second proposition implied in your appeal viz that chains are being forged upon the state by the assistance or connivance of old utah I 1 shall not insist upon the latter qualification though if young utah are to prevent the forg ing who but old utah could do the forging it is sufficient for my purpose however that you maintain that a eye tern of slavery is being perpetuated in U ah a slavery worse than that of the negroes in the Bouth BUch I 1 think was the tenor of your words on a recent occasion because it enslaves the mind I 1 believe that I 1 state your position correctly at any rate this is the impression that your letters and speeches havu produced in the popular mind in the first place yoa are wab most potent words chains bondage stultification slavery and their positive pasi tive s conscience liberty manhood freed m ence are ideas tha the people of utah into nishat attention what aver te the haim lesa bombast at tachine to these words ID where they are continually on the lips of demagogues and knaves in utah aa yet they burn into the mind with all the fire of their significance woe be to the man then that uses them for merely selfish purposes can intervene to shield him from the contempt that roust follow the false alarm of these the most feelings of the human heart I 1 am noi pre judging you by this preface but it is in tha light of euch a principle that your recent record Is now being ecru tini zed you specifically charge that the mormon church attempts to dominate the state and that liberty is in bame organization in your reply to the new 3 feb ah you aay a great struggle is now inaugurated in utah a for freedom for liberty or the of free for the principles in in american institutions thereby implying that these things are not now in three speeches bince then you do not leave the charge to you reiterate reits rate it and enforce it by the observation that his ory repeats itself that the persecuted berday become tha of etc triss i R 10 isaae against people there is tom thine cub ime in the of a man who can arise and such a judgment cased on a m ie difference differ enco of opinion between him and that peo pie on s ol 01 church discipline but the cainas chinas of was not yet reached it loomed a mila higher ahen chis same man presented to the representatives 1 this same people expecting them to make him senator of the united states au 1 the topmost summit of personal was att tailed chec failing in hia political ambition ha as a martyr of religious liberty a man hounded and persecuted but one nevertheless who cherishes no malice in his h art 1 you evidently rely upon two circumstances as evidences of the wholesale charge you make against the mormon baurch the purport of the late mani and the alleged religious influence used to d baat your candidacy for the senate let us brit fly examine chase two abuts of the case I 1 do not like to thresh old straw the intent and extent of the manifesto arve acon the bone of contention for months now 1 ahall therefore merely state how the successive events which culminated in this declaration affected an ultra democrat lor so all my friends call me anen a few days adfer the oden convention the principle of the manifesto was put forward in a priesthood my first ex claa iati on was it is a good rule put forth in a bad time it was a rule that I 1 had clamored for but coming aa it did I 1 could rp train the feeling that this time had been i chosen in order to prevent if possible the celecion ele cion of yourself and hon B U roberta I 1 believe now that I 1 was wrong it was a vital prerogative of church that was being maintained and it would tare been as certainly had the conditions been reversed and republican high charsh officials been the nominees nomine ea when the election was over my mind was fully ripe lor the written manifesto As a democrat I 1 reasoned at arst we shall have nu end of the neighborhood bitterness that results from the charge now by this tide now by that that ahe church is in politics As a u I 1 reasoned we ahall cow have au end of church officers indiscriminately leaving tasir ecclesiastical duties or trying fco use a favorite phrase of your own to lida two horses at the same time surely the least church officer can da is to apply to his for furlough should he desire a political career not to abide by such a common sense requirement would lead to ensurd ou both aides no no the manifesto is the only safeguard safe guard for the separation of church and state now I 1 asa you as a man of honorias ho there a single day during all the time you fought the manifesto mani testo anat you could not tave cither horse but you wanted to ride both you wanted to ne senator but you wanted to be aboa lie at the same time might you not even have been both had you bean re enough to say to your ecclesiastical superiors kindly provide temporarily tempo rarity for my ecclesiastical duties while I 1 huir hu ir the call of my fellow citi zeat I 1 yon might thug hayy held bour apostleship aal detill gratified your political ambition but aa to the former the church alone would have been the ani aa to the latter tho people I 1 ba fcc i ahat thia could have been done I 1 know in what love and esteem you were held by the church on the one hand and how you were the idol of bour party on the other but even had the church presented to you tho of choo sioe between the oae office and the other on could you have complained litre is the practical working of the manifesto A is tendered to A 1 I cannot accept it says he for my affairs will not permit of it it is tendered to B 1 I cannot accept it is the deply for ny church affairs will not permit of it but cannot you eo adrae your affairs as to accept awill consult my employer baya A 1 I will consult the church authorities B but can you not resign should the decision of your superiors be adverse yes A yes aada B now where is the difference in theao caeti 1 defy anyone to make out a cabe of the church the state aroca the manifest mobs thatcher the conclusion is ii resistible the rhetorical vociferations with which you and your sap portera have cited the atmosphere ot brath for the last six montha are the baldesi baldest ex amples of bun camba and political clap trap at the of tins letter I 1 eald the majority of conr fellow democrats looked on your career first with anxiety then with amazement and at laet with dieguez it was amazement hat they felt at this particular betase and it now becomes my painful duty to record how the feeling rearmed tte camax of dismast dis gast 3 this division of my letter has to do with moses thatcher tha man A few acara ago H alie question had been asked who in this S ata is most nearly the ideal of democracy nine out of ten bouhl lave s thatcher I 1 should h e said so myself to darif t cochon co Cion be asked jents most nearly the aon 0 imol jacv the same nine would be vey likely to make the same reply moses thatched That chei 1 surrounded as you have been by a coterie of echoes you may not ba aware of the change in popular judgment but if you should travel incognito among the people and listen to anat they have to say you would realize that I 1 the be this as it may the ludi ment is in my opinion just A democrat is one who ig willing to let the people rule who will submit and in accordance with the decision of the majority who believes that the highest is in tho collective judgment of the people an autocrat is one who distrusts the people one who 13 willing to uee the people as tools and graisa them with patriotism and other wordy epithets as loag as they remain subservient but one who when the people decide against him uha in his tent on the theory that to acquiesce would a surrender of manhood manh cod and d groveling before the mob depend upon it the only thing intervening by tween sch s ch a man and tyranny is opportunity port unity you will doubtless agree with me in there abstract principles aud yet now truly the latter aspect uta your own case for years you held out in opposition to your brethren oi jhc thc twelve in matters vital to the unit and integrity of the church held oui but did not resign j here for instance am I 1 a member of the faculty of the BY academy it has happened once or twice that matters relating to the policy of the institution have been decided in council contrary to my personal views did I 1 con edier it stultification to surrender mv bia i and turn round and carry out the thour I 1 had opposed as munh will as if I 1 had advocated it long ago r maeser augh his students the doctrine that an india ferenec plan ia wiser and more effective than divided effort on a good plan this is putting the ahn negatively the chances are altogether that the plan of the naji rity will be the better every subordinate officer ia any man zea this and makes it a matter of hoerr to resign whenever he cannot yield a cordial support to the policy of his how much more readily he should acquiesce when it ia a matter decided to be liht and juat by a majority oi hia peers I 1 should like to know on what other plan any association can be conducted and it seems to me thavone th atone of the things on which ou plume yo arsell is this very standing out a ona against your brethren the and all the general quorums of tha priesthood united and sill you remained obdurate the question between you wat next presented to the general conference and afterward to every biake and ward aud all decided against you and yei you call |
