MORMONISM IN GENERAL.
In the two previous chapters, I have discussed Utah pretty thoroughly, touching most of the mooted questions there; and now, to sum up. Without doubt, it must be said of the people of Utah, that they are an industrious, frugal, and thrifty race. By their wonderful system of irrigation, they have converted the desert there into a garden, and literally made the wilderness, "bloom and blossom as the rose." Their statistics (1866) showed, that they had already constructed over a thousand miles of irrigating canals and ditches, watering 150,000 acres of land, at a cost of nearly $2,000,000. Each family has its own few acres, and these are cultivated so thoroughly, that the total annual product is surprising. In Salt Lake City many families almost live on their acre-and-a-quarter lots, and many of their farms elsewhere do not exceed forty or fifty acres, with many much smaller. With their system of careful culture and general double-cropping, one man cannot well manage over ten or twelve acres per year; nor is more necessary for an ordinary family, the land proves so bountiful. Fifty and sixty bushels of wheat per acre, we were told, was not an unusual yield. So, since leaving the Missouri, we had nowhere seen more comfortable and apparently well-to-do homes. We must say, they were much superior to the average homes of our people in Colorado. Evidently, these Utahans had come there to stay, and from the first had "governed themselves accordingly;" while the Coloradoans, it was plain, were too many of them, only "birds of passage," like so much of our population in the West generally. Their towns and villages are well laid out, and in the main neatly built. In the country, their little farms are well-fenced or walled, with comfortable adobe houses clustering with vines and flowers, or surrounded with fruit and shade trees, while a throng of hay and grain-stacks encircle their barns. So, too, the Mormons, whatever else may be said of them, are certainly a sober race of people. Many of them no doubt keep liquor about their premises, and drink when they choose to; but drunkenness as a vice, or habitual drinking as a practice, is unknown in Utah, comparatively speaking. So, too, they allow no gambling there, except "on the sly;" and no houses of prostitution, unless you regard every "much-married" Mormon's as such, which it seems hardly fair to do—the women considered. On the whole, it is safe to say, that the Mormons deserve marked commendation and praise for what they have accomplished in Utah, in redeeming a barren wilderness and building up a prosperous community there, and full credit should be awarded them accordingly. They brag constantly, and largely, about Great Salt Lake City, and surely they have a right to. In the essential points of beauty, comfort, cleanliness, and good order, it has few equals, and perhaps no superiors of its age and size anywhere, and all things considered is indeed a perfect miracle for Utah. In the very heart of the great internal basin of the continent, and the centre of a busy and thriving people, it really seemed to be a natural metropolis there, and was everywhere talked of as the future workshop and mart of that region.
On the other hand, it is due to truth to say, that impartial as I tried to be, the more I studied affairs there, the more Mormonism impressed me as, in many respects, a huge mass of thorough iniquity. It did not strike me as a Religion at all, per se, and I suspect there is less of the purely "religious" about it, than any other ecclesiastical organization on the earth. Their sermons were not so much theological discourses, as they were sectarian stump-speeches. The whole Church, "so-called," struck me ordinarily, as a coarse utilitarianism, not to say rude materialism. Their missionaries seemed to be sent out, not so much to spread the gospel (even according to J. Smith and B. Young), as to induce and hasten immigration to Utah. It is true, they have Bishops and other subordinate clergy; but their main duty appeared to be to preside over and direct colonization, rather than to cure souls. They had indeed their regular dioceses; but these were so arranged as to make the Bishop the chief man in each town or settlement, and judging by those we saw these dignitaries were selected rather for their shrewd business talents, than any special piety or virtue. They were almost invariably sharp smart Americans, while the great majority of the Mormons were English, Welsh, Danes, etc., of the very lowest and poorest classes. In every community, the Bishop's word was law and gospel, as he claimed to receive "revelations" direct from heaven on most knotty questions, and he virtually inspired and directed all its business. Usually he owned the mill, store, and hotel, and he who controls these three essentials of a new community ordinarily controls the community itself. Observation shows, that nearly everybody in a new country becomes mortgaged, sooner or later, to the miller, store-keeper, or hotel-keeper; and hence as the Bishops are all three of these in one, their chances for amassing wealth are simply enormous. The result is, that all or nearly all of the Mormon Bishops have become immensely rich, while Brigham himself is reported worth a fabulous amount in his own right, independently of the vast property he holds, as "Trustee in trust for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints."[12] Indeed, to sum it up in one word, the whole institution of Mormonism—polygamy and all—apart from its theological aspects, impresses you rather as a gigantic organization for collecting and consolidating a population, and thus settling up a Territory rapidly, whatever else it may be; and its success, in this respect, has certainly been notable and great.
As a whole, the Mormons are no doubt a very ignorant, and, therefore, very bigoted people, and the whole tendency of their pulpit-teachings is to lawlessness and violence, so far as Gentiles are concerned. They affect to despise mere intellect and sentiment, and to pride themselves on being plain-spoken and practical. They will not "fellowship" with open and avowed Gentiles, if they can avoid it; and boldly proclaim their hostility to and contempt for the Government of the United States, as on the Sunday we were at their Tabernacle. No doubt, if opportunity offered, they would assail or embarrass it, though now they are more wary and circumspect, than they were before the South learned a lesson on this score. So, Brigham Young is governor de facto in Utah, and has been always, no matter who is governor de jure, and will be, while that other "twin relic of barbarism," polygamy, endures. The evidence on all these points, I must say, seemed fairly overwhelming, though no more can be given here. So, too, they believe, or affect to believe, that the United States dares not touch their "peculiar institution," and brand all our laws against it as acts of "National wickedness," "Federal tyranny," invasions of their "sacred rights," etc. It seemed to me, that we had heard such complaints before; but not from a part of the country, that led us to respect them greatly, when reiterated there in Utah. The true test is, what are the results to Humanity, and how do they affect us as a People? And I am sure, the answer in all candor must be, a bigoted and seditious race of men, a degraded and inferior class of women, an ignorant and degenerate herd of children; and does not the inevitable, and inexorable, logic of things necessitate just these? If these be the elements of progress and the seeds of empire, then Utah should be let alone; if otherwise, then let us lay the strong hand of the Government upon her, and teach her respect for and obedience to the laws, the same as all other parts of the Union.
No doubt their poor women are already relapsing into a condition, that is truly pitiable, as elsewhere intimated, and their tendency must be rapidly to the worse. Evidently the Saints take care to seclude them from Gentile gaze, as much as possible; but a more dreary, homely, pokey set of women, as a whole, were never seen. I may have been unfortunate, but in all Utah, I did not see a truly happy and sunny countenance, or noble and serene, on a mature Mormon woman; nor did I anywhere hear of one, who would fully realize our old and fond ideal of
"A perfect woman nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a spirit—still and bright—
With something of an angel's light!"
But, what else could be expected in a country, where a husband signifies only the fractional part of a man, and a wife—any number of women you please? Beyond controversy, their "peculiar institution" of polygamy is a "relic of barbarism"—yea, verily, a "twin-relic" to slavery—as the Republican party in 1856-60 had the manliness and courage to pronounce it. "Peculiar" institutions, of whatever character, have no business in a republic; they mean inequality, and inevitably tend to violence and disorder. No doubt, had Abraham Lincoln lived, when we had finished our first "twin" right thoroughly, he would have found a way to look well after the other. We owe this to our mothers and sisters, to our wives and daughters,
"The graces and the loves, that make
The music of the march of life—"
to all of womankind, the broad continent across and the wide world over; and Congress should take care, that we lend not the sanction of our flag to this hideous crime, an hour longer than we must. Our age, so far, has largely honored itself, in honoring and respecting womankind, and it is too late now to let Christian America barbarize any portion of herself, with the exploded savagery of pagandom. We must have freedom of speech and of the press there, security of person and property—absolute and perfect—the same as in New York or Massachusetts, or our flag is a lie. We must maintain and execute our national laws against polygamy, the same as everywhere else, no matter who opposes, or our government is a sham. And if Mormon juries won't do this, refusing to indict or convict, and nothing else will do, so that we have to fall back on the bayonet, why then I see nothing in Utah so sacred, that we should not give Brighamdom the bayonet, the same as we did Jeffdom. I believe in the Pacific Railroad, and hope much from its civilizing and refining influences; I have great faith in the locomotive and the telegraph; but I also believe, with Judge —— in "the moral power of bayonets, when nothing else will suffice—especially when used on the right side." We have just had to use them against one "twin-relic," when nothing else would do, in spite of our Railroads there; now let them charge down upon the other, if Utah will not obey the laws, and that right speedily. Were Mormonism merely a religion, as a republic we should be the last to touch it. But polygamy, its baleful flower and fruit, and the source of all Utah's woes, is an unmitigated barbarism; an outrage and crime, not only against woman, but humanity; an organized insult to the Christianity and civilization of the age; and we Americans, of this generation, owe it to ourselves and to history, to end it—to stamp it out if need be—sans ceremony and instanter. Let us not dally with it, as we did with Southern slavery. Else may God, in his just wrath, break us again with a rod of iron, or haply dash us in pieces as a potter's vessel. Let Congress and the President but do their duty in the premises, and Brigham Young I predict will receive a "new revelation," that will quickly end the whole trouble. The power is with them, and History will hold them justly responsible.