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

by Frank J. Cannon; Harvey Jerrold O'Higgins

They not only fled, but they allowed themselves in their absence to be made the scapegoats of the hierarchy. They were proven guilty of "new polygamy" before the Senate committee; and, for the sake of the effect upon the country, they were ostensibly deposed from the apostolate by order of the President, who, by their dismissal from the quorum, advanced his son Hyrum in seniority. But their apparent degradation involved none of the consequences that Moses Thatcher had suffered. They continued their ministrations in the Church. They remained high in favor with the hierarchy. They claimed and received from the faithful the right to be regarded as holily "the Lord's' anointed" as they had ever been. They still held their Melchisedec priesthood. One of them afterward took a new plural wife. It seems to be well authenticated that the other continued to perform plural marriages; and every Mormon looked upon them both—and still looks upon them—as zealous priests who endured the appearance of shame in order to preserve the power of the Prophet in governing the nation.

Another crucial point in President Smith's responsibility was his solemnization of the plural marriage between Apostle Abraham H. Cannon and Lillian Hamlin, of which I have already written. One of the women of the dead apostle's family was subpoenaed to give her testimony in the matter. She thrice telephoned to me that she wished to consult me; but she was surrounded by such a system of espionage that again and again she failed to keep her appointment. At last, late at night, she arrived at my office—the editorial office of the Salt Lake Tribune—having escaped, as she explained, in her maid's clothes. The agents of the hierarchy had been subtly and ingeniously suggesting to her that she was perhaps mistaken in her recollection of the facts to which she would have to testify, and she was distressed with the doubt and fear which they had instilled into her mind. I could only adjure her to tell the truth as she remembered it. But on her journey to Washington she was constantly surrounded by Church "advisers;" and the effect of their "advice" showed in the testimony that she gave—a testimony that failed to prove the known guilt of the Prophet.

For the Gentiles, there had begun a sort of "reign of terror," which can be best summed up by an account of a private conference of twelve prominent non-Mormons held as late as 1905. That conference was called to consider the situation, and to devise means of acquainting the nation with the desperate state of affairs in Utah. It was independent of the political movement that had already begun; it aimed rather to organize a social rebellion, so that we might not be dependent for all our opposition upon the annual or semi-annual campaigns of politics.

The meeting first agreed upon the following statement of facts:

"Utah's statehood, as now administered, is but a protection of the Mormon hierarchy in its establishment of a theocratic kingdom under the flag of the republic. This hierarchy holds itself superior to the Constitution and to the law. It is spreading polygamy throughout the ranks of its followers. Through its agents, it dominates the politics of the state, and its power is spreading to other common-wealths. It exerts such sway over the officers of the law that the hierarchy and its favorites cannot be reached by the hand of justice. It is master of the State Legislature and of the Governor.

"By means of its immense collection of tithes and its large investments in commercial and financial enterprises, it dominates every line of business in Utah except mines and railroads; and these latter it influences by means of its control over Mormon labor and by its control of legislation and franchises. It holds nearly every Gentile merchant and professional man at its vengeance, by its influence over the patronage which he must have in order to be successful. It corrupts every Gentile who is affected by either fear or venality, and makes of him a part of its power to play the autocrat in Utah and to deceive the country as to its purposes and its operations. Every Gentile who refuses to testify at its request and in its behalf becomes a marked and endangered man. It rewards and it punishes according to its will; and those Gentiles who have gone to Washington to testify for Smoot are well aware of this fact. Unless the Gentiles of Utah shall soon be protected by the power of the United States they will suffer either ruin or exile at the hands of the hierarchy."

When this declaration had been accepted, by all present, as truly expressing their views of the situation, it was decided that they should confer with other leading Gentiles, hold a mass meeting, adopt a set of resolutions embodying the declaration on which they had agreed, and then dispatch the resolutions to the Senate committee, as a protest against the testimony of some of the Gentiles in the Smoot case, and as an appeal to the nation for help.

But although all approved of the declaration and all approved of the method by which it was to be sent to the nation, no man there dared to stand out publicly in support of such a protest, to offer the resolutions, or to speak for them. The merchant knew that his trade would vanish in a night, leaving him unable to meet his obligations and certain of financial destruction. The lawyer knew not only that the hierarchy would deprive him of all his Mormon clients, but that it would make him so unpopular with courts and juries that no Gentile litigant would dare employ him. The mining man knew that the hierarchy could direct legislation against him, might possibly influence courts and could assuredly influence jurors to destroy him. And so with all the others at the conference.

They were not cowards. They had shown themselves, in the past, of more than average human courage, loyalty and ability. All recognized that if the power of the hierarchy were not soon met and broken it would grow too great to be resisted—that another generation would find itself hopelessly enslaved. Every father felt that the liberties of his children were at stake; that they would be bond or free by the issue of the conflict then in course at Washington. And yet not one dared to throw down the gauntlet to tyranny—to devote himself to certain ruin. They had to prefer simple slavery to beggary and slavery combined. They had to hope silently that the power of the nation would intervene. They could work only secretly for the fulfillment of that hope.

At first, in President Roosevelt they saw the promise of their salvation. He had opposed the election of Apostle Smoot. When the report of the apostle's candidacy had first reached Washington, the President had summoned to the White House Senator Thomas Kearns of Utah and Senator Mark Hanna, who was chairman of the National Republican committee; and to these two men he had declared his opposition to the candidacy of a Mormon apostle as a Republican aspirant for a Senatorship. At his request Senator Hanna, as chairman of the party, signed a letter of remonstrance to the party chiefs in Utah, and President Roosevelt, at a later conference, gave this letter to Senator Kearns to be communicated to the state leaders. Senator Kearns transmitted the message, and by so doing he "dug his political grave" as the Mormon stake president, Lewis W. Shurtliff, expressed it.