True, these criminals ran risks, and took what President Smith in his recent testimony, when telling of his own quintette of helpmeets, called "the chances of the law." To lower these risks, and diminish them to a point where in truth they would be no risks, the Mormon Church, under the lead of its bigamous President several years rearward, became a political machine. It looked over the future, considered its own black needs as an outlaw, and saw that its first step towards security should be the making of Utah into a State. As a territory the hand of the Federal power rested heavily upon it; the Edmunds law could be enforced whenever there dwelt a will in Washington so to do. Once a State, Utah would slip from beneath the pressure of that iron statute. The Mormons would at the worst face nothing more rigorous than the State's own laws against bigamy, enforced by judges and juries and sheriffs of their own selection, and jails whereof they themselves would weld the bars and hew the stones and forge the keys.
With that, every Mormon effort of lying promise and pretense of purity were put forward to bring statehood about. What Gentiles were then in Utah exerted themselves to a similar end, and made compacts, and went, as it were, bail for Mormon good behavior. In the end Utah was made a State; the Mormons breathed the freer as ones who had escaped that Edmunds statute which was like a sword of Damocles above their polygamous heads. To be sure, as a State Utah had her laws against plural marriages, and provided a punishment for the bigamist; the general government would consent to nothing less as the price of that statehood prayed for. But the Mormon criminals, the Smiths, the Lymans, the Tanners, and the Cluffs, were not afraid. They had gotten the reins of power into their own fingers, and made sure of their careful ability to drive ahead without an upset.
The Mormon Church, now when Utah was a State, went into politics more openly and deeply than before. Practically there are three parties in Utah - Republicans and Democrats and Mormons. The Gentiles are Democrats or Republicans; the Mormons are never anything but Mormons, voting on this side or on that, for one man or another, as the Mormon interest dictates and the Mormon President and the apostles direct. Every Mormon who has a vote occupies a double position; he is a Mormon in religion and a Mormon in political faith. In that way every office is filled with a Mormon, or with a Gentile who can be blind to Mormon iniquities. To-day a bigamist in Utah has no more to fear from the law than has a gambling-house keeper in the city of New York.
That Mormon conspiracy, whereof Smoot in the Senate is one expression, was not made yesterday. It had its birth in the year of the Edmunds law and its drastic enforcement. In that day, black for Mormons, it was resolved to secure such foothold, such representation in the Congress at Washington, that, holding a balance of power in the Senate or House, or both, the Congressional Democrats or Republicans would grant the Mormons safety for their pet tenet of polygamy as the price of Mormon support. The Mormons in carrying out these plans decided upon an invasion and, wherever possible, the political conquest of other States. They already owned Utah; they would bring - politically - beneath their thumb as many more as they might. With this thought they planted colonies in Nevada, in Colorado, in Idaho, in Wyoming, in Montana, in Oregon, in Arizona. As a refuge for polygamists, should the unexpected happen and a storm of law befall, they also planted colonies over the Mexico line in Chihuahua and Sonora.
Before going to the latter move they talked with Diaz; and that astute dictator said "Yes," with emphasis. Diaz welcomed the Mormons; they might be as polygamous as they pleased. He wanted citizens; and he was not blind to those beauties of enterprise and courage and hardihood that are the heritage of the Anglo- Dane. He bade the Mormons come to Mexico and make a bulwark of themselves between him and his American neighbors north of the Rio Grande. The Mormons hated the Americans; Diaz could trust them. The Mormons went to Mexico; there they are to-day in many a rich community, as freely polygamous as in the most wide-flung hour of Brigham Young. Diaz smiles as he reviews those prodigal crops of corn and cattle and children which they raise. They make his empire richer in men and money - commodities of which Mexico has sorely felt the want.
Once when a Methodist clergyman went to Diaz, remonstrated against that polygamy which he permitted, and spoke of immoralities, Diaz snapped his fingers.
"Do you see their children?" cried Diaz. "Well, I think more of their children than of your arguments."
From this Mexican nursery the Mormon President can, when he will, order an emigration into Nevada or any of those other States I've mentioned, to support the Church where it is weakest. Moreover, as related, the settlements in Mexico offer a haven of retreat should any tempest of prosecution beat upon the Utah polygamists through some slip of policy or accidental Gentile strength.
In Nevada, in Colorado, in Oregon, in Idaho, in every one of those States wherein the Church has planted the standards of Mormonism, the Mormon, as fast as he may, is making himself a power in politics. He is never a Democrat, never a Republican, always a Mormon. What sparks of independent political action broke into brief, albeit fiery, life a few years ago were fairly beaten out when Thatcher and Roberts were punished for daring to act outside the Mormon command.
Now, pretend what they will, assert what lie they choose, the Mormon President holds the Mormon vote, in whatever State it abides, in the hollow of his hand. He can, and does, place it to this or that party's support, according as he makes his bargain. He will use it to elect legislators and Congressmen in those States. He will employ it to select the Senators whom those States send to Washington. And when they are there, as Smoot is there, for the safeguarding of polygamy and what other crimes Mormonism may find it convenient to rest upon from time to time, those Senators and Representatives will act by the Mormon President's orders. "When the lion's hide is too short," said the Greek, "I piece it out with foxes." And the Mormons, in a day when the Danites have gone with those who called them into bloody being, and murder as a Churchly argument is no longer safe, profit by the Grecian's wisdom.