| Show f 11 I A PLEASANT SIGHT Ii I 1 j I It was a pleasant sight yesterday in the the IitI tI 1 court room to seo Ella Birmingham second wife of Thomas Birmingham of 44 r tA Bountiful say she did not know who was the father of her two youngest children t t A man is to be pitied when his wife acknowledges i I ac-knowledges the paternity of one of her I children but says she does not know who I 1 IIi the father of two of her children is i That answer was all the Grand Jury could get L t I from this woman and they had to be I I satisfle1 with it as Judge Zane told them I it WAS a comploto answer to their ques if does not i tion Of cours a woman j know who the father of her children is she cannot tell but as such a condition of 4 things in any community is a disgrace and a shame and an injury to society there should be some laws passed to meot t the cases of this nature Among such II t i laws there should be a civil marriage law 1 r i requiring every legal marriage to bet be-t t solemnized by an officer of the lawand a I I I i record of the same should be 1 kept Not only should this be done but it should be made J a crime for any ecclesiastical functionary t to perform a religious marriage ceremony unless the parties wishing their marriage to receive the sanction of religion first I j I I I 1 present the certificate of civil 1 marriage Many religious societies consider marriage I mar-riage a sacrament but tho plan above suggested would in no wiso deprive such I I societies of tho right to solemnize mar riage ceremonies and rites they might deem essential to tho occasion It is i i thus in France where all have to first go to a civil magistrate to he married and immediately after the nowlymarried couple repair church tohavo their marriage mar-riage sanctified by the ministers of God I I Thero is no trouble there about marriage in this way for tho requirements of the I law are complied with and the blessings 1 of religion upon the union are invoked and received Tho right to have marriage marri-age solemnized as a sacrament is in nowise no-wise infringed A marriage law should be supplemented with a law requiring all births to be registered and imposing a penalty upon all parents who neglected to register the birth of a child born to J I them As the entire field of needed legislation is surveyed the I I thought irresistibly comes to the I mind that Utah needs a moral p code enacted and made compulsory I Upon the statute hook of Utah is no law II I against adultery and kindred crimes I against the marriage tie and chastity But still stranger than this disgraceful I fact is tbe reason that the News the organ J of the Mormon church and the chief I I organ of the Peoples party gavo sometime I some-time ago for the absence of such common I I and wholesome laws Jt said that they I had been upon the statute book but that 1 I the Legislature repealed them because they were being used as an engine of oppression I op-pression to break up the marriage relations I I rela-tions of the very people who enacted I them Such in substance was the excuse offered in extenuation of their repeal and absence From this it would appear that tho laws in question were rght and I proper in themselves but that their enforcement I en-forcement was wrong So it is always in I Utah The people here havo no objection objec-tion to the law of 1862 or tho Edmunds I law as laws but they do object I to the enforcement of them Occasionally r t Occasion-ally they murmur against Congress for I passing them but it is upon the officers I of tho law who enforce them that they visit their wrath and pronounce anathemas I anathe-mas The laws are all right but their enforcement I en-forcement is all wrong Is there a man or woman in Utah who i I can look upon this Birmingham case and I eee a woman como into court and swear 1 she does not know tho father of two of I her children and not feel humiliated for I humanitys sake Thero is no doubt in I I the world that tho woman Ella Birmingham Birming-ham came into court and perjured I herself to shield her polygamous husband It is to be hoped I that the evidence of the perjury I may be obtained and that it may be punished to the full extent of the law I I I Heretofore there have been two methods Ii i of avoiding the consequences of a violation rf r j I viola-tion of the law against polygamy and unlawful un-lawful cohabitation which have been for I the wife to refuse to answe and suffer I imprisonment for contempt of court or for the man and woman to plead tho I statute but it is a now and still more disgraceful method for A mother to come into court and on her oath swear that she I does not know who the father of two of her children is And this is done that an I unrighteous system may live and bring I misery and disgrace into the world and bitterness to tho lives of thoso horn in it I |
