believe some crimes can only be atoned for by the life of the guilty party-should be executed by the proper civil officer, not by any exercise of the lex talionis or the intervention of ecclesiastical authority. With regard to the Mountain Meadow massacre, the testimony of United States Prosecuting Attorney Sumner Howard - himself no friend to the Mormon people-is valuable. At the trial of John D. Lee for participancy in that crime, Mr. Howard said:

"He had been engaged constantly during the past three months in sifting facts and everything related to or connected with the massacre, and that he had come there for the purpose of trying John D. Lee, because the evidence pointed to him as the main instigator and leader, and he had given the jury unanswerable documentary evidence proving that the authorities of the Mormon Church knew nothing of the butchery till after it was committed; and that Lee, in his letter to Brigham Young, a few weeks after, had knowingly misrepresented the actual facts relative to the massacre, seeking to keep him still in the dark and in ignorance. He had all the assistance any United States official could ask on earth in any case; nothing had been kept back, and he was determined to clear the calendar; but he did not intend to prosecute any one lured to the Meadows at the time, some of whom were only boys, and knew nothing of the vile plan which Lee originated and carried out for the destruction of the emigrants."

It is commonly believed that "an ecclesiastical government exists in Utah to-day, intended to meet all requirements as to the temporal affairs of men in this Territory." This is another fallacy. Our Church courts are simply courts of reconciliation or arbitration between Church members, and for determining charges of transgression, and in no way affect the civil powers or the duties and rights of the various courts of law, Federal or local. That this is so is proven by the fact that there is not a member of the Church who is not just as amenable to the laws of the State as any non-Mormon. The decisions of the Church courts carry no penalties of a civil character; all they can do is to withdraw the fellowship of the Church from wrong-doers. These courts consist of presidents of stakes, high councils, bishops, etc. The bishop and his counselors exercise an ecclesiastical jurisdiction to settle difficulties arising between Church members. If parties are not satisfied with their decisions, they can appeal to what is known as the High Council, a body composed of the president of a stake and his counselors, and twelve other high priests, which body forms an ecclesiastical court to hear testimony and decide on matters brought before them. In

this way nine-tenths of the difficulties arising between Church members are settled without going to law, and without any expense whatever.

Complaint is made that the Church of Latter-day Saints holds property of a value in excess of $50,000 in Utah. Has it become a crime, then, to be punished by spoliation and confiscation, to erect beautiful buildings for religious and charitable purposes? It is true we are erecting one beautiful structure on a piece of ground held by the Church before the prohibitory act was passed, which has already cost probably $2,500,000; but it would be going back to barbarism indeed to forbid by Act of Congress the erection of all but the most primitive structures in which to worship God or perform acts of charity. And, again, the Latter-day Saints are not the only religious body that owns more than the prescribed $50,000 in the Territories; others would be affected equally with us if this ill-considered law was enforced in the manner desired.

It is customary for persons in talking about the marriage relations of the Latter-day Saints to confound bigamy with plural marriage-commonly miscalled polygamy. There is in bigamy the essence of fraud which makes it the grievous crime that it is. A man contracts to marry a woman, until death does them part, and keep himself for her and her only. In violation of this covenant he unlawfully marries another, breaking his vows with the first, leading astray and ruining the second, and deceiving the minister or officer who performs the ceremony. In plural marriage there is no fraud, no deception, no breaking of the marriage contract. The parties who marry according to the rites of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints are united for time and eternity. They know that plural marriage is a doctrine of the Church, and accept the obligations of married life with that understanding. When a man thus circumstanced takes a second wife he breaks no vows, he deceives no one. All parties interested in the arrangement are acquainted with the facts, and both first and second wives. understand the position they occupy toward their husband: that they are both his wives and he their husband, with hopes and affections reaching out into the next world, where they anticipate that their union will be eternal.

In plural marriage a man is expected to provide for all his wives and their children. We have no waifs and strays such as

are found in the large cities of Christendom the results of men breaking the laws of social purity. The children of our families do not gravitate to the poor-house, for we have no such establishments in the Territory; and our poor are cared for by the bishops and by the members of our ladies' relief societies.

We do not wish to complain, otherwise we might refer to some acts that have been to us very offensive. Houses of assignation, bagnios, gambling houses, drinking saloons, and other disreputable establishments are not our institutions, but are importations. The efforts of the municipal authorities to suppress them have been defeated by the rulings of the Federal courts. With all deference to His Excellency Governor Murray, we think that his act in giving the certificate of election to Allen G. Campbell, Esq., who only obtained 1357 votes for Delegate to the Forty-seventh Congress, as against Hon. George Q. Cannon, who received 18,568 votes for said office, does not tend to inspire the greatest confidence in his official capacity.

The Mormon question to-day really resolves itself into the query whether a small and unscrupulous minority, for private ends and personal aggrandisement, shall prevail upon the Government of this nation to destroy every vestige of republican liberty in Utah, or whether the grand and glorious principles upon which this great government is founded shall be extended to all people alike who dwell under the flag which is regarded throughout the world as the symbol of freedom and equal rights.

JOHN TAYLOR.

GOVERNOR MURRAY.

THAT the country has resolved to get at the bottom facts in Utah affairs, and to reform the social and political status of that Territory, is a fact patent to every observer of the currents of popular opinion and popular sentiment. But what is the remedy for the abuses which exist in Utah? Always slow to act, except in great emergencies, the people and Congress have long deferred taking decisive action. The reasons for this are at once apparent when we remember the conditions of the country during the past twenty-five years, with graver questions ever pressing for a settlement; the remoteness of the Territory with its great crime; and the not unsuccessful efforts of the Mormon leaders

to keep the country in ignorance of their designs and actions through the machinations of adroit and unscrupulous agents throughout the country, in Salt Lake City, and at Washington.

If it be true that crime prevails and criminals control in Utah; that from the very beginning "the legislation of Utah has been inimical to and subversive of the Federal authority within the Territory"; that an unlawful government has existed there for thirty years; that taxes are levied upon the minority to build schools upon church property into which the children of that minority do not and should not enter; and that laws of Congress are nullified: if it be true, that by territorial statute the whole system of immigration has been given over to the Church; that thousands of "assisted" immigrants have been and are now gathered from abroad; that escheats and confiscations for this immigration fund have been provided for by the territorial legislatures; that fanaticism imposes upon ignorance, and that avarice feeds upon industry under authority of this legislation; that laws have been enacted "respecting an establishment of religion" in violation of the Federal Constitution: if it be true, that Congress and civilization have denounced the "plural wife" system as bigamy; that the appeals of virtue, and the hopes of helpless children born and yet to be born are unheeded, and the unholy system defiantly upheld, defended and practiced in Utah; that a territorial law establishes a new process of naturalization by conferring the right of suffrage upon alien women, when they become wives, without the qualification of time as required by national law; that this system has spread into other Territories the property of the United States, and is occupying the public lands: if these propositions be true, and if these evils exist by the act of legislatures created by authority of Congress and paid out of the Treasury of the United States, then the time is fully come when so vicious a system should be destroyed and such agency of government abolished. These and other facts have been presented to the country during many years by the bench and bar, and by forty thousand American citizens of all creeds and parties in that inter-mountain region.

If they are not true, Congress should repeal much of its past legislation, certainly all that recognizes as true any of the counts charged; should serve notice on the American citizens there that their testimony is regarded as false, that they are "outsiders" in their own land; and should summarily dismiss all

representatives of the Government who bear this false witness and censure all officers, both civil and military, who in the past have made like reports. This, it seems to me, would be fair to all alike, and is certainly demanded by the family and business interests of all in Utah. With such action, however, on the part of the Government, the constantly avowed wish and dream of the polygamous leaders would be realized, and a marked advance made in their design "to supplant this, and all other governments." It is fair to presume that fifty millions of "outsiders" in this country would regard such action as absurd.

A writer whose honesty of purpose I respect has said: "Trying to uproot Mormonism by force, or by the enactment of any penal or prohibitory laws whatsoever, will prove in the future, as it has all along in the past, simply abortive." It must be remembered by the theorists, and understood by the country, that there has been no remedial legislation ever passed by Congress. The "Edmunds bill" contained much that was effective, but does not provide the remedy. It was evidently intended by the Senator from Vermont to prepare a way for the "Mormons" to correct the existing evils themselves through a monogamous legislature returned under its provisions. The legislatures heretofore have been polygamist by a large majority. The existing one is monogamous, and unanimously "Mormon." Giving credit for sincerity of profession, it follows that Mormon polygamists are to be preferred in honor and respect before the Mormon monogamist: the polygamist "lives his religion," the monogamist does not. I fail to see that the monogamist who upholds, defends, and supports an institution that outrages both virtue and the law is better, or as good, as the man who, professing a belief, is consistent enough to practice it. Mormon monogamists pinion womanhood, while polygamists debauch it. Neither will or can provide the remedy. The remedy must come from Congress, which alone can provide it. But, congressional legislation falling short of the remedy, has, as suggested by the writer quoted, proved abortive, only making the adherents to Mormonism more united.

In dealing with the question of government in Utah I speak of "Mormonism" only so far as it aims to establish religion by means of political power vested in its adherents, and to perpetuate an illegal and unrepublican government; so far as it inculcates crime, and engages in conspiracy to nullify the laws