Under the Prophet in Utah; the National Menace of a Political Priestcraft

by Frank J. Cannon; Harvey Jerrold O'Higgins

His humorous idea of my undertaking gave its color to my beginnings. It was rather a spirited adventure, as I look back upon it now. When we organized a Republican Club at Ogden, my intimate friend, Ben E. Rich, and another friend named Joseph Belnap, were the only Mormons, so far as I know, who joined me in becoming members. Outside of us three, I did not know of another Mormon Republican in the whole territory.

Indeed, the status of the Mormon people, in their fancied relation to the two great parties of the country, was almost identical with that of the people of the South after the Civil War. Practically every Mormon believed himself to be a Democrat. Among the young men of the Church there had been occasional attempts to form Democratic Clubs. Mr. John T. Caine, delegate in Congress from the territory, was a Democrat. My father had sat on the Democratic side of the House. Almost all the men who had braved the sentiments of their own states, to speak for us in Congress, had been Democrats. And, of course, the administration of the laws that had been so cruel to the feelings of the Mormons had been in Republican hands.

Two years earlier, in Ogden, I had spoken in a meeting of Republicans that had been called to rejoice over the election of Benjamin Harrison to the Presidency; and I was still being taunted by my Mormon friends with having clasped hands with "the persecutors of the Prophets." When I came out, now, as an advocate of Republicanism, I was met everywhere with this charge—that I had joined the enemies of the Church, that I was assisting the persecutors of my father. The fact that my father approved of what I was doing, relieved the seriousness of the situation for me; and the humorous assistance of Ben Rich in our political evangelism gave a secret chuckle to many of the incidents of our campaign.

We went from town to town, from district to district, up the mountain valleys, across the plains, into mining camps and farming communities—using the meeting-houses, the school-rooms, the town halls—taking the afternoon to coax the tired workers of the fields or of the mines to come and hear us in the evening, and watching them fall asleep in the light of our borrowed kerosene lamps while we talked. They came eagerly. Indeed, my own ambition for citizenship—for a right to participate in the affairs of the nation—was probably no keener than theirs; and they had an innocent curiosity about the questions of national politics, of which they had never before been invited to know anything. They listened almost devoutly.

"Brethren and sisters," a bishop exhorted them at a meeting in which one of our party was to speak, "we have come to listen to this man, and I hope we will be guided in all our reflections by the Spirit of God and that we will do nothing to offend that Spirit. Let there be no commotion, no whispering, and, above all, no hand clapping."

In a life that had as few diversions as theirs, a political meeting was an exciting event. The whole family came, and the mothers brought their babies. Surely in no other American community did politics ever have such a homely and serious consideration. Certainly no other community would have so quickly understood the theories of the two parties or accepted them so implicitly.

But it was all theory! I recognize, now, that I preached a Republicanism that was an ideal of what it should be, rather than any modern faith of the "practical politician." I had gathered it from my reading, from hearing the speeches in Congress, from sympathetic conferences with the great men who were responsible for the dogmas of the party; and every assurance of grace that their ability could give and my credulity accept, I proclaimed religiously as a political salvation to our people. I built up an ideal, and then judged the party thereafter according to the measure of that ideal. When I found that some of the charges against the Republican party were true—charges which I had indignantly repelled—I was as shocked as any pious worshipper who ever found that his idol had feet of clay. Our people, having accepted the faith with as simple a hope as it was offered, were as easily turned from it when they found that it was false. The political moods of Utah, for its first few years of statehood, were a puzzle to the "practical" leaders of the parties; but to us who understood the impulses of honesty that moved the changes, things were as clear as they were encouraging.

During the previous summer in Washington, I had met General James S. Clarkson, then president of the National League of Republican Clubs; and now, on his invitation, in the Spring of 1891, Rich and I went to Louisville to speak before the national convention of the league. Through the kindness of General Clarkson, I was given the official recognition of a perfunctory place on the executive committee of the league's national committee, and came into touch with many of the party leaders. It was about this time, I imagine, that they conceived the idea of using the gratitude of the Mormons in order to carry Utah and the surrounding states in which the Mormon vote might constitute a balance of political power. I know that the idea was old and established when I came upon it, in 1894, during the campaign for statehood. As I also found, still later, the Republican leaders and the business interests with which they were in relation, had their eyes on a distant prospect of fabulous financial schemes in which the secret funds of the Church were to help in the building of railroads and the promoting of other enterprises of associated capital. But at the time of which I am writing, I had not had sufficient experience to suspect the motives of the men who encouraged our work in Utah; and I accepted in good faith their public declarations that the sole aim of the party was to serve the needs of the people of the United States—and therefore of the people of Utah!

It seemed to me that such a noble principle should win the support of Mormon and Gentile alike, and it was on this principle that I appealed for the support of both. I was so sure of winning with it that I resented and fought against the aid of the Church that came to us as our campaign succeeded.

The People's Party (the Church Party) had been dissolved (June, 1891) by the formal action of the executive committee, under the direct instruction of the leaders of the Church. The tendency was for its members to organize themselves immediately as a Democratic party. They were led by such brilliant and trusted defenders of the Church as Franklin S. Richards, Chas. C. Richards, Wm. H. King, James H. Moyle, Brigham H. Roberts and Apostle Moses Thatcher; and a group of abler advocates could not have been found in any state in the Union. It was against the sentiment of the Mormon people, vivified by such inspiring Democracy as these men taught, that our little organization of Republicans had to make headway; and an anxiety began to show itself among the Church authorities for a less unequal division, and consequently a greater appearance of political independence, among the faithful.