Re: Mormonism in The New Germany, by Dale Clark
Posted: Thu Jul 19, 2018 11:02 pmThe Order of Enoch: Remarks by President Brigham Young
delivered in the Bowery, Logan City, Sunday Morning, June 29, 1873.
Reported by David W. Evans.
NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT
I say to the Latter-day Saints, that the only reason why we do not take up the subject and enter into the organization of Enoch, or a city of Enoch, is simply because we have not yet been able to find every item of law bearing upon this matter, so as to organize in a way that apostates cannot trouble us. This is the only reason. It is a matter that I am paying particular attention to, with some of my brethren, to see if we have skill enough to get up an organization and draw up papers to bind ourselves together under the laws of the United States, so that we can put our means and labor together and join as one family. As soon as we can accomplish this, and get an instrument that lawyers cannot pick to pieces and destroy, and apostates cannot afflict us, we expect to get up this institution, and enter most firmly into it.
Yesterday and the day before I had considerable to say to the Latter-day Saints, reading the dark side of the page. I will say here, I am not discouraged with regard to this latter-day work, I am not discouraged with regard to the Latter-day Saints. If we were to pick and choose today, we should find a large majority of the people called Latter-day Saints, who are ready and willing, with open hands and pure hearts, to enter into the Order of Enoch, and to live and die in this Order. This is my faith concerning the people at large, consequently I am not discouraged. But there are some who need chastening. We cannot call names, this will not answer. We cannot tell a man that he is going to apostatize, but we can chasten him as a member of the Church, not as an individual. In this capacity, while in public, we do not take the liberty of chastening an individual. But we can say to the brethren and sisters, we are encouraged. “Mormonism” is onward and upward, the Gospel that the Lord Jesus has introduced in the latter days is enjoyed by many, and it is our life, our joy, our peace, our glory, our happiness, our all; and when we come to the trying scene, as some call it, of sacrificing our property, and putting it together for the good of the community, I do not expect the brethren will receive any more trials than they have heretofore, I do know whether the sisters will.
Brother George Q. Cannon says the sisters have borne a great deal. So they have, but if they could only stand in the shoes of their husbands who are good, true and faithful, they would know that they are by no means free from perplexities. Just fancy a man with two, three, or half a dozen of his beloved wives catching him on one side, and before he can take three steps more, catching him on the other, and “I want this,” “I want that,” and “this is not right,” and “that is not right,” and so on; their minds just pulled to pieces. I say if the hair is spared on their heads they may consider that they have got blessed good wives. I have as many wives as many other men, and I keep my hair yet. But as to trials, why bless your hearts, the man or woman who enjoys the spirit of our religion has no trials; but the man or woman who tries to live according to the Gospel of the Son of God, and at the same time clings to the spirit of the world, has trials and sorrows acute and keen, and that, too, continually.
This is the deciding point, the dividing line. They who love and serve God with all their hearts rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks; but they who try to serve God and still cling to the spirit of the world, have got on two yokes—the yoke of Jesus and the yoke of the devil, and they will have plenty to do. They will have a warfare inside and outside, and the labor will be very galling, for they are directly in opposition one to the other. Cast off the yoke of the enemy, and put on the yoke of Christ, and you will say that his yoke is easy and his burden is light. This I know by experience.
God bless you.
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The Order of Enoch—Study of Law—How to Become Rich: Remarks by President Brigham Young
delivered at the General Conference, in the New Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, Monday Morning, April 7, 1873.
Reported by David W. Evans.
There are a few minutes to spare, and I wish to lay some matters before you. I will say, first, that the Lord Almighty has not the least objection in the world to our entering into the Order of Enoch. I will stand between the people and all harm in this. He has not the least objection to any man, every man, all mankind on the face of the earth turning from evil and loving and serving him with all their hearts. With regard to all those orders that the Lord has revealed, it depends upon the will and doings of the people, and we are at liberty, from this Conference, to go and build up a settlement, or we can join ourselves together in this city, do it legally—according to the laws of the land—and enter into covenant with each other by a firm agreement that we will live as a family, that we will put our property into the hands of a committee of trustees, who shall dictate the affairs of this society. If any man can bring up anything to prove to the contrary I am willing to hear it. But no man can do it.
Brother Pratt has told you, in his explanations this morning, what the Lord has revealed and how he has been merciful to the people; and when we have not been willing to be Latter-day Saints altogether, but only in part, he has said, “Well, you are the best there is, and I will accept of you. I cannot get anybody else who is willing to be part Saints, and I will lead you, my people, as long as you will let me, and I will forgive you your sins this time, and I will accept part of your property if you will not give it all,” etc., all showing the kindness and forbearance of our Father in heaven; but he has not the least objection in the world to our being perfect Saints.
I have a few things to lay before the Conference, one of which is—and I think my brethren will agree with me that this is wise and practicable—for from one to five thousand of our young and middle-aged men to turn their attention to the study of law. I would not speak lightly in the least of law, we are sustained by it; but what is called the practice of law is not always the administration of justice, and would not be so considered in many courts. How many lawyers are there who spend their time from morning till night in thinking and planning how they can get up a lawsuit against this or that man, and get his property into their possession? Men of this class are land sharks, and they are no better than highway robbers, for their practice is to deceive and take advantage of all they can. I do not say that this is the law, but this is the practice of some of its professors. The effort of such lawyers, if they are paid well, is to clear and turn loose on society the thief, perjurer and murderer. They say to the dishonest and those who are disposed to do evil, “Go and lay claim to your neighbor's property, or to that which is not your own, or commit some other act of injustice, and pay us, and we will clear you and make your claim appear just in the eye of the law;” and officers and judges too often join in the unrighteous crusades for the lawyers to wrong the just. I have been in courts and have heard lawyers quote laws that had been repealed for years, and the judge was so ignorant that he did not know it, and the lawyer would make him give a decision according to laws which no longer existed. Now, I request our brethren to go and study law, so that when they meet any of this kind of lawyers they will be able to thwart their vile plans. I do not by any means say these things of all lawyers for we have good and just men who are lawyers, and we would like to have a great many more. You go to one of the pettifogging class of lawyers, and get him to write a deed for you, and he will do it so that it can be picked to pieces by other lawyers. Employ such a man to write a deed, bond, mortgage or any instrument of writing, and his study will be to do it so that it will confound itself. This is the way that such men make business for their class. We want from one to five thousand of our brethren to go and study law.
If I could get my own feelings answered I would have law in our school books, and have our youth study law at school. Then lead their minds to study the decisions and counsels of the just and the wise, and not forever be studying how to get the advantage of their neighbor. This is wisdom.
My mind is so led upon the subject brother Pratt has been speaking upon with regard to the orders that God has revealed that I can hardly let it alone when I am talking to the people. He said there are many rich men who are willing to do anything that the Lord requires of them. I believe this, and there is quite a number of poor men, likewise, who would like to do anything if they could only know that it was the will of the Lord. I am about to make an application of my remarks with regard to the willingness of men. But in this I shall except brother Pratt, for the simple reason that I do not know a man who is more willing to do what he is told than he is. If he is told to teach mathematics, he is willing to do it; if he is told to make books, preach the Gospel, work in a garden or tend cattle, he is willing to do it, and I know of no man more willing to do anything and everything required of him than he is. But I want to say to our willing, kind, good brethren that, so far as obeying the orders which God has revealed, I can bring the rich into line quicker than I can get many poor men who are not worth a dollar, and who do not know how to raise a breakfast tomorrow morning. I have tried both, and know. Who is there among us who came here rich? It was alluded to by brother Pratt. Look over our rich men, where are they? Who is there among the Latter-day Saints that is wealthy? When I came to this valley I was a thousand dollars in debt. I left everything. I think I got about three hundred dollars, a span of horses, and a little carriage, for all my property I left in Nauvoo. But I bought cattle, horses and wagons, and traded and borrowed and got the poor here by scores myself; and I have paid for these teams since I have been here.
When I got here I was in debt only about a thousand dollars for myself and family to a merchant in Winter Quarters, but I was in debt for others, and I have paid the last dime that I know anything about. When I reached here I could not pay one-tenth—I could not pay my surplus—I could not give my all—for I had nothing.
Here is Horace S. Eldredge, he is one of our wealthy men. What did he have when he came here? Nothing that I know of, except just enough to get here with his family. William Jennings has been called a millionaire. What was he worth when be came here? He had comparatively little. Now he is one of our wealthy men. William H. Hooper is another of our wealthy men. He is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. How much had he to pay as surplus when he came here. He could pay no surplus, for he was worth nothing; but he is now wealthy. If he had gone to California I believe he would have been poor today.
There is any amount of property, and gold and silver in the earth and on the earth, and the Lord gives to this one and that one—the wicked as well as the righteous—to see what they will do with it, but it all belongs to him. He has handed over a goodly portion to this people, and, through our faith, patience and industry, we have made us good, comfortable homes here, and there are many who are tolerably well off, and if they were in many parts of the world they would be called wealthy. But it is not ours, and all we have to do is to try and find out what the Lord wants us to do with what we have in our possession, and then go and do it. If we step beyond this, or to the right or to the left, we step into an illegitimate train of business. Our legitimate business is to do what the Lord wants us to do with that which he bestows upon us, and dispose of it just as he dictates, whether it is to give all, one-tenth, or the surplus. I was present at the time the revelation came for the brethren to give their surplus property into the hands of the Bishops for the building up of Zion, but I never knew a man yet who had a dollar of surplus property. No matter how much one might have he wanted all he had for himself, for his children, his grandchildren, and so forth.
If we are disposed to enter into covenant one with another, and have an agreement made according to the laws of our land, and we are disposed to put our property into the hands of trustees, and work as we are directed—eat, drink, sleep, ride, walk, talk, study, school our children, our middle-aged and our aged, and learn the arts and sciences, the laws of the Priesthood, the laws of life, anatomy, physic and anything and everything useful upon the earth, the Lord has not the least objection in the world, and would be perfectly willing for us to do it, and I should like, right well, for us to try it. I know how to start such a society, right in this city, and how to make its members rich. I would go to now, and buy out the poorest ward in this city, and then commence with men and women who have not a dollar in the world. Bring them here from England, or any part of the earth, set them down in this ward and put them to work, and in five years we would begin to enter other wards, and we would buy this house and that house, and the next house, and we would add ward to ward until we owned the whole city, every dollar's worth of property there is in it. We could do this, and let the rich go to California to get gold, and we would buy their property.
Would you like to know how to do this? I can tell you in a very few words—never want a thing you cannot get, live within your means, manufacture that which you wear, and raise that which you eat. Raise every calf and lamb; raise the chickens, and have your eggs, make your butter and cheese, and always have a little to spare. The first year we raise a crop, and we have more than we want. We buy nothing, we sell a little. The next year we raise more; we buy nothing, and we sell more. In this way we could pile up the gold and silver and in twenty years a hundred families working like this could buy out their neighbors. I see men who earn four, five, ten or fifteen dollars a day and spend every dime of it. Such men spend their means foolishly, they waste it instead of taking care of it. They do not know what to do with it, and they seem to fear that it will burn their pockets, and they get rid of it. If you get a dollar, sovereign, half-eagle or eagle, and are afraid it will burn your pockets, put it into a safe. It will not burn anything there, and you will not be forced to spend, spend, spend as you do now. See our boys here, why if my boys, by the time they are twenty, have not a horse and carriage to drive of their own, they think they are very badly used, and say, “Well, I do not think father thinks much of me.” A great many things might be said on this subject that I do not want to say.
Brethren, we want you to turn in and study the laws of the Territory of Utah, of this city and other cities, and then the statutes of the United States, and the Constitution of the United States. Then read the decisions of the Supreme Court. I do not mean the self-styled “United States Supreme Court for the Territory of Utah;” but the United States Supreme Court that sits at Washington—the seat of government. Read up their decisions, and the decisions of the English judges and the laws of England and of other countries, and learn what they know, and then if you draw up a will, deed, mortgage or contract, do not study to deceive the man who pays you for this, but make out a writing or instrument as strong and firm as the hills, that no man can tear to pieces, and do your business honestly and uprightly, in the fear of God and with the love of truth in your heart. The lawyer that will take this course will live and swim, while the poor, miserable, dishonest schemers will sink and go down. We live by law, and I only condemn those among the lawyers who are eternally seeking to take advantage of their neighbors.
Now we will close, and adjourn until 2 o'clock this afternoon.
delivered in the Bowery, Logan City, Sunday Morning, June 29, 1873.
Reported by David W. Evans.
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In the early days of the church, the duty was strongly enjoined of consecrating all the possessions to the Lord; and this was not to be a figurative, but a real consecration; in which all the possessions were to be catalogued and consecrated in legal form, and the transaction authenticated by witnesses. The custodian of this property was to be a "Trustee in Trust," the community into which the faithful Saint thus entered was to be called "The United Order of Enoch," and the property was to be held for the benefit of this community.
The Saints did not take kindly to the Order, and it existed in theory merely. Within a year or two Brigham has been making the most arduous efforts to bring his followers into this community, meeting, however, with very little better success than its founders. When he first proposed its re-establishment, it was decidedly opposed in the Tabernacle, by the apostles Orson Pratt, John Taylor, and George Q. Cannon, and a regular quarrel took place; the Prophet and his dissenting followers parting, each with a firm determination not to yield to the other side. The next week the four went north on a preaching tour, and labored harmoniously together in the attempt to build up the Order.
Whoever joins this community gives all his earthly possessions into the keeping of Brigham Young. His children, too, are required to sign away all claim or title to the property; if any are too young to write, the pen is given them, and their hands guided by their elders, and they are thus deprived of their rightful patrimony; and in return for all this, the family is to be furnished with what food and clothing the officers think they require.
As Brigham and his co-workers journeyed northward, he telegraphed to the bishops of the various settlements through which he would pass, informing them what time he would visit them, and requesting them to call special meetings of the residents of their wards before his arrival, and read to them the following telegram: "I am coming north, organizing branches of the Order of Enoch; how many of you are willing to join the Order without knowing anything about it?"
In the little town of Fillmore seventy-five men responded to the call for a meeting, and, strange as it may seem, fifty of those men voted to join the "Order." They fully understood that all on becoming members were required to deed their property to the "Trustee in Trust," otherwise, "Brigham Young, his heirs, executors, and assigns," yet they decided, with full knowledge of this, to make a blind investment of all their "worldly gear," and upon the arrival of the religious Autocrat, one half of the remaining twenty-five accepted the situation, and signed their names to an agreement binding themselves to obey "Enoch's" requirements. The following were the unanswerable arguments which Brigham used to secure their conversion: "I want you to understand that the car (meaning Enoch) is rolling on. The set time of the Lord has come, and no man can stay its progress. If you do not want to be run over, jump on, or get out of the way. I do not want a part of your property, I want it all. If there are any of you who cannot abide the requirements of the Lord, I do not want you to come near me, or to speak to me. I feel as far above you as the heavens are above the earth."
Those who became members of this branch of Enoch worked well, determined to make it a success. All labored together for the interest of the Order, and were credited a certain sum, I think fifteen cents an hour. They were economical, hoping to make the books show a balance in their favor, after deducting expenses of sustaining their families. But there were so many sinecures, and so much mismanagement, that after the lapse of one single summer an investigation of affairs became necessary, and the fact became known that their divinely directed labors had not paid the running expenses of the institution. Many who had expected that the records would exhibit a balance in their favor, awoke to the disagreeable fact that they, as co-partners in the United Order, the grand scheme that was to reconcile "the irrepressible conflict between capital and labor," must discount the sum stipulated as payment for their services. And they are at present in debt for the commonest necessaries of life consumed during their short-lived experiment.
A similar condition of affairs exists wherever this gigantic swindle has been in operation. And while Brigham has been gloating over his ill-gotten gains, he has bound these poor victims more firmly to himself by the terrible bondage of debt. The wildest dissatisfaction exists, and in nearly every county the Order may be regarded as dead, and beyond even the power of Brigham Young to restore.
The Tithing System is a direct outgrowth of "Enoch." When Joseph saw that the people did not take kindly to his community plan, he found it necessary to adopt some other means of raising a permanent fund for the church, and Orson Pratt proposed that every member should every year be obliged to pay one tenth of his income, out of which the church should be supported. This plan met with the approval of the officers, and it has been continued ever since. Every town has its tithing-house, which is in charge of the local bishop. He takes charge of all the goods that are brought in, usually paying himself a handsome commission, and sees, when any quantity has been gathered, that it is transported to the large tithing-house in Salt Lake City.
This tithing-house is under the direct control of Brigham Young, and he, his counsellors and clerks, have the first choice of all the goods that are brought in; the remaining stores are dealt out as payment to the poor men who are employed by Brigham as laborers. I have seen the tithing-store beseiged by a crowd of tired, care-worn women, wives of these men, waiting for their turn to be served. Sometimes a poor woman will stand all day waiting for a sack of flour, a basket of potatoes, or a quart of molasses. Let the day be ever so cold or stormy, there she must wait, until the clerks see fit to attend to her wants.
Everything is received here in payment for tithing: hay, grain, vegetables, butter, cheese, wool, or any other product. If a man has not money, he must give one tenth of what he has. It matters little whether he can afford it; the church demands it, and "the church" gets it.
-- Wife No. 19, the Story of a Life in Bondage, Being a Complete Expose of Mormonism and Revealing the Sorrows, Sacrifices and Sufferings of Women in Polygamy, by Ann Eliza Young, Brigham Young's Apostate Wife
Moreover, at the beginning, the Mormon Church was a thoroughly collectivist and communal economic system ("the Order of Enoch"), a form of primitive communism. The right-wing, market-fetishist, Mormon apostles of today are thoroughly embarrassed by any reference to the communistic phase of their faith....
The Prophet Joseph Smith was born in eastern Vermont, in the valley of the White River. During the I790s there appeared in this state, not far from the Massachusetts border, a utopian and collectivist community of about 40 persons known as the Dorrilites, named after their founder, who, appropriately enough, was a retired redcoat officer from the British Army. Was this Dorril a stay-behind operation of the British Empire? The importance of the Dorrilites is that they offer a substantial repertoire of those organizational and doctrinal features which will later characterize Mormonism. Like the Mormons, the Dorrilites had communist property relations, but no political democracy, since the Britisher Dorril demanded total submission to his divinely inspired commands. He imposed a rigorous regime of vegetarianism, banning even leather shoes. The Dorrilites were accused by local ministers not just of doctrinal deviations, but also of holding bacchanalian orgies....
In the midst of these events, and under the influence of the nullification crisis between President Jackson and the state of South Carolina, Joseph Smith issued his infamous Civil War Prophecy on December 25, 1832. A civil war, starting with the rebellion in South Carolina, was imminent, he intoned, and the secessionists would soon seek the help of Great Britain.
By now he was calling himself "Joseph Smith The Prophet." In Kirtland, the Saints began practicing primitive communism, according to that passage of the Acts of the Apostles which specifies that the early Christians "had all things in common; and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men as every man had need." The vehicle for this collectivism was called the United Order of Enoch, with center of gravity in Kirtland....
Joseph Smith was guilty of financial corruption, because he allowed his revelations on the conduct of the Church to be colored by his own economic needs. After ousting an opposition faction, he attempted to revivify the United Order of Enoch, his primitive communist administration. On July 8, 1838 in Far West, Smith announced a new revelation urging the Saints to transfer the title of all of their property to the Mormon Church. In return, each man would receive a tract of land for his "everlasting inheritance," with the number of acres increasing with the size of his family. (Brodie, p. 220)
Since many had already been skinned in Kirtland, Joseph asked the Saints to lease their property to the Mormon Church "without consideration or interest" for terms varying between 10 and 99 years. What he had in mind was a kind of theocratic corporate state: "The whole church was then to be divided into four huge 'corporations' -- farmers, mechanics, shopkeepers, and laborers -- which would utilize the land, machinery, and skills of the church members for the common good." (Brodie, p. 221)
In another measure which modern reactionaries would immediately brand as communist, the Mormon corporations would offer jobs and wages of one dollar per day. Any profit realized by the corporation would then be distributed "according to the needs and wants (not according to the property invested) of each family, annually or oftener if needed .... " (Brodie, p. 221) The farming corporation was developed more than the others. This was a combine of cooperatives doing business as the "Big Field United Firms." Each of the cooperatives was responsible for the "communal farming" of about 7,000 acres of farmland. Mormon overseers assigned tasks and allotted horses and machinery. (Brodie, pp. 221-22)...
Bennett compared the Saints to the Anabaptists in Germany during the Peasant War of the 1520s. Under the prophet Thomas Muntzer, the Anabaptists tried to destroy all earthly authority and create the kingdom of God on earth. Like the Mormons, they practiced primitive communism. Bennett wrote that the Anabaptists "appeared in the year 1525, in Germany, during the religious excitement and confusion produced by the attempts of Luther and his coadjutors to reform the papacy. They so remarkably resemble the Mormons, that it is quite evident the latter have taken them for models, and have copied their doings with as much accuracy as the spirit of the age would permit. The first leader of the Anabaptists was a low, ignorant fellow, named Thomas Muntzer, who, like Joe Smith, was at the same time their Prophet and military commander. They, precisely again like the Mormons, gave themselves out for 'Latter-day Saints,' and profess to be chosen by the Almighty as instruments to produce the promised millennium reign of Christ on earth. They believed, likewise, that they were especial favorites of heaven in every respect, and that they were, when they wished it, favored with familiar personal intercourse with the deity, and from him constantly received revelations and instructions." (Bennett, p. 304)...
Brigham Young also mobilized what amounted to a collectivist war economy in Deseret. Modern Mormons claim to be the true apostles of the free market, but Brigham Young -- alone in North America at the time -- relied on a command economy using centralized planning and coercion. All important economic decisions involving the application of resources were the prerogative of the Mormon Moses. He claimed in 1867 that he had been called by God "to dictate affairs in the building up of his Zion," and that this gave him the totalitarian power to determine everything, "even to the ribbons the women wear." [144] One is reminded of the Soviet planners who wanted to control economic activity "down to the last bolt."
The Mormon statist war economy was fed by tithing. It was also fed by usury, with a rate of 12% interest per year being charged on the money the church had advanced to overseas converts making the journey to Deseret. For this reason, historians have seen many in the Mormon rank-and-file as having "the status of indentured servants." (The Mormon Rebellion, Bigler & Bagley, p. 80)
-- Just Too Weird: Bishop Romney and the Mormon Takeover of America: Polygamy, Theocracy, and Subversion, by Webster Griffin Tarpley, Ph.D.
One of the most tragic episodes in the entire history of the Christian Church was the attempt of certain radicals to set up an Anabaptist kingdom at Munster in Westphalia, Germany.
Melchior Hofmann, a radical on prophecy, predicted that Christ would return to earth in 1533. Hofmann was bitterly opposed by the Reformers and the Swiss Anabaptists, but multitudes in the Netherlands followed his teaching, including Jan Matthys. Hofmann was imprisoned in Strassburg, and eventually died there.
Matthys declared that he was the prophet Enoch, whom Hofmann had said would appear just before the return of Christ. In 1533 the followers of Matthys made themselves masters of Munster, and Matthys soon took charge. He proclaimed that Munster was going to be the New Jerusalem with community of goods and without law.
These Anabaptists preached a wild millennialism, and insisted that God's day of wrath was about to break in which the saints would dominate the governments of the world.
-- The Anabaptists: Reformation Men and Theology, by Dr. Jack L. Arnold
I say to the Latter-day Saints, that the only reason why we do not take up the subject and enter into the organization of Enoch, or a city of Enoch, is simply because we have not yet been able to find every item of law bearing upon this matter, so as to organize in a way that apostates cannot trouble us. This is the only reason. It is a matter that I am paying particular attention to, with some of my brethren, to see if we have skill enough to get up an organization and draw up papers to bind ourselves together under the laws of the United States, so that we can put our means and labor together and join as one family. As soon as we can accomplish this, and get an instrument that lawyers cannot pick to pieces and destroy, and apostates cannot afflict us, we expect to get up this institution, and enter most firmly into it.
Yesterday and the day before I had considerable to say to the Latter-day Saints, reading the dark side of the page. I will say here, I am not discouraged with regard to this latter-day work, I am not discouraged with regard to the Latter-day Saints. If we were to pick and choose today, we should find a large majority of the people called Latter-day Saints, who are ready and willing, with open hands and pure hearts, to enter into the Order of Enoch, and to live and die in this Order. This is my faith concerning the people at large, consequently I am not discouraged. But there are some who need chastening. We cannot call names, this will not answer. We cannot tell a man that he is going to apostatize, but we can chasten him as a member of the Church, not as an individual. In this capacity, while in public, we do not take the liberty of chastening an individual. But we can say to the brethren and sisters, we are encouraged. “Mormonism” is onward and upward, the Gospel that the Lord Jesus has introduced in the latter days is enjoyed by many, and it is our life, our joy, our peace, our glory, our happiness, our all; and when we come to the trying scene, as some call it, of sacrificing our property, and putting it together for the good of the community, I do not expect the brethren will receive any more trials than they have heretofore, I do know whether the sisters will.
Brother George Q. Cannon says the sisters have borne a great deal. So they have, but if they could only stand in the shoes of their husbands who are good, true and faithful, they would know that they are by no means free from perplexities. Just fancy a man with two, three, or half a dozen of his beloved wives catching him on one side, and before he can take three steps more, catching him on the other, and “I want this,” “I want that,” and “this is not right,” and “that is not right,” and so on; their minds just pulled to pieces. I say if the hair is spared on their heads they may consider that they have got blessed good wives. I have as many wives as many other men, and I keep my hair yet. But as to trials, why bless your hearts, the man or woman who enjoys the spirit of our religion has no trials; but the man or woman who tries to live according to the Gospel of the Son of God, and at the same time clings to the spirit of the world, has trials and sorrows acute and keen, and that, too, continually.
This is the deciding point, the dividing line. They who love and serve God with all their hearts rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks; but they who try to serve God and still cling to the spirit of the world, have got on two yokes—the yoke of Jesus and the yoke of the devil, and they will have plenty to do. They will have a warfare inside and outside, and the labor will be very galling, for they are directly in opposition one to the other. Cast off the yoke of the enemy, and put on the yoke of Christ, and you will say that his yoke is easy and his burden is light. This I know by experience.
God bless you.
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The Order of Enoch—Study of Law—How to Become Rich: Remarks by President Brigham Young
delivered at the General Conference, in the New Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, Monday Morning, April 7, 1873.
Reported by David W. Evans.
There are a few minutes to spare, and I wish to lay some matters before you. I will say, first, that the Lord Almighty has not the least objection in the world to our entering into the Order of Enoch. I will stand between the people and all harm in this. He has not the least objection to any man, every man, all mankind on the face of the earth turning from evil and loving and serving him with all their hearts. With regard to all those orders that the Lord has revealed, it depends upon the will and doings of the people, and we are at liberty, from this Conference, to go and build up a settlement, or we can join ourselves together in this city, do it legally—according to the laws of the land—and enter into covenant with each other by a firm agreement that we will live as a family, that we will put our property into the hands of a committee of trustees, who shall dictate the affairs of this society. If any man can bring up anything to prove to the contrary I am willing to hear it. But no man can do it.
Brother Pratt has told you, in his explanations this morning, what the Lord has revealed and how he has been merciful to the people; and when we have not been willing to be Latter-day Saints altogether, but only in part, he has said, “Well, you are the best there is, and I will accept of you. I cannot get anybody else who is willing to be part Saints, and I will lead you, my people, as long as you will let me, and I will forgive you your sins this time, and I will accept part of your property if you will not give it all,” etc., all showing the kindness and forbearance of our Father in heaven; but he has not the least objection in the world to our being perfect Saints.
I have a few things to lay before the Conference, one of which is—and I think my brethren will agree with me that this is wise and practicable—for from one to five thousand of our young and middle-aged men to turn their attention to the study of law. I would not speak lightly in the least of law, we are sustained by it; but what is called the practice of law is not always the administration of justice, and would not be so considered in many courts. How many lawyers are there who spend their time from morning till night in thinking and planning how they can get up a lawsuit against this or that man, and get his property into their possession? Men of this class are land sharks, and they are no better than highway robbers, for their practice is to deceive and take advantage of all they can. I do not say that this is the law, but this is the practice of some of its professors. The effort of such lawyers, if they are paid well, is to clear and turn loose on society the thief, perjurer and murderer. They say to the dishonest and those who are disposed to do evil, “Go and lay claim to your neighbor's property, or to that which is not your own, or commit some other act of injustice, and pay us, and we will clear you and make your claim appear just in the eye of the law;” and officers and judges too often join in the unrighteous crusades for the lawyers to wrong the just. I have been in courts and have heard lawyers quote laws that had been repealed for years, and the judge was so ignorant that he did not know it, and the lawyer would make him give a decision according to laws which no longer existed. Now, I request our brethren to go and study law, so that when they meet any of this kind of lawyers they will be able to thwart their vile plans. I do not by any means say these things of all lawyers for we have good and just men who are lawyers, and we would like to have a great many more. You go to one of the pettifogging class of lawyers, and get him to write a deed for you, and he will do it so that it can be picked to pieces by other lawyers. Employ such a man to write a deed, bond, mortgage or any instrument of writing, and his study will be to do it so that it will confound itself. This is the way that such men make business for their class. We want from one to five thousand of our brethren to go and study law.
Surveyor General Burr wrote urgently to Washington: "The fact is, these people repudiate the authority of the United States in this country, and are in open rebellion against the general government." [156] More reports came to the White House from Federal Judge Drummond about Mormon destruction of judicial records, American citizens imprisoned without due process of law, Brigham Young's suborning of juries, the Gunnison murder on orders from the Mormon Saints, and the assassination of Federal District Judge Shaver through poisoning....
One loyal, effective, and energetic federal official was John Cradlebaugh, who became the federal judge of the second District of Utah Territory. Cradlebaugh set out to punish the perpetrators of the Mountain Meadows Massacre, along with the killings of former Mormons seeking to leave the territory, as well as travelers crossing through Utah. His work was sabotaged at every turn by Mormon juries acting to sabotage the law under orders from their tyrant ruler. In response to one such incident on April 12, 1859, Cradlebaugh confronted the Mormons with their moral depravity:"'You are the tools, the dupes, the instruments of a tyrannical Church despotism. The heads of your Church order and direct you. You are taught to obey their orders and commit these horrid murders. Deprived of your liberty, you have lost your manhood, and become the willing instruments of bad men. I say to you it will be my earnest effort while with you, to knock off your ecclesiastical shackles and set you free." [199]
Judge Cradlebaugh was reprimanded by Washington doughfaces for his efforts to bring justice to Utah. Cradlebaugh was an American hero who went on to Congress and later fought with distinction during the Civil War. But, as long as the Mormons controlled the probate courts, and the probate courts had original jurisdiction in most cases, justice was doomed to miscarry....
Statehood for Deseret, commented an observer familiar with Utah, meant Young as governor, George Smith as lieutenant governor, and Wells as head of the Supreme Court. This Gentile asked: "What chance would a man like me have for justice with Mormon Danites as constables to arrest, and Mormon Elders as Magistrates to bind over; a Mormon Bishop as Circuit Judge to try, and a Mormon Supreme Court High Council to appeal to -- presided over by High Chief Justice, President, Lieut. Gen. Daniel H. Wells -- a cruel and remorseless bigot who knows as much of law outside of Mormonism as Red Cloud does of Blackstone's Commentaries?'" (Hirshson, pp. 309-310)...
According to Lawrence Wright of the New Yorker, "the United States Attorney's office indicted two of the Salt Lake committee's leaders, David Johnson and Thomas Welch, both prominent members of the Mormon Church, on bribery and other charges. It was expected that their trial might implicate other leading members of the Mormon establishment, including Michael O. Leavitt, the governor of Utah. [In August 2001] the federal judge in the case, David Sam, who was also a Mormon, threw out the key charges, calling them an 'uninvited federal intrusion' into the state's affairs." The Mormon judge Sam dismissed the entire case in November 2001. [104]
Welch and Johnson escaped conviction. What happened to them reminds us of how Brigham Young shifted exclusive responsibility for the Mountain Meadows Massacre to John D. Lee, the only person to be executed for that crime. In the 2002 Winter Olympics scandal, Mitt Romney made sure that none of the bigger Mormon fish were caught in the net. The close alliance between Mitt Romney and Mike Leavitt which we see on display today was actually forged in the midst of a cover-up of Olympic proportions which saved not only Leavitt, but unknown bigwigs of the antinomian Mormon Saints....
Arizona, another part of Brigham Young's Inland Empire, also has a large polygamist population. Here, as in Utah, polygamy is outlawed by the state constitution. In 1953, law enforcement officials launched a midnight raid on the polygamist community at Short Creek, with hundreds of children being separated from their polygamous households and dozens of men indicted for bigamy and statutory rape. [323] About 20 girls between 11 and 15 years of age had been forced into polygamous unions with older men. Some 26 men later pleaded guilty on charges of unlawful cohabitation, and were given sentences of one year's probation at Mohave County Superior Court. The 40 women and 160 children were taken into protective custody by the family court in Phoenix. Two judges agreed that the welfare of the children was in danger, so the mothers and children were sent to live with Mormon families in various parts of Arizona. But this ruling was struck down by the Arizona appeals court in 1955, and this finding was upheld by the Arizona Supreme Court. How many Mormons sat on these courts? In any case, the polygamist community of Short Creek was soon restored to its status quo. After that, the elected officials of Arizona basically stopped all enforcement of the anti-polygamy laws. [324]
-- Just Too Weird: Bishop Romney and the Mormon Takeover of America: Polygamy, Theocracy, and Subversion, by Webster Griffin Tarpley, Ph.D.
If I could get my own feelings answered I would have law in our school books, and have our youth study law at school. Then lead their minds to study the decisions and counsels of the just and the wise, and not forever be studying how to get the advantage of their neighbor. This is wisdom.
My mind is so led upon the subject brother Pratt has been speaking upon with regard to the orders that God has revealed that I can hardly let it alone when I am talking to the people. He said there are many rich men who are willing to do anything that the Lord requires of them. I believe this, and there is quite a number of poor men, likewise, who would like to do anything if they could only know that it was the will of the Lord. I am about to make an application of my remarks with regard to the willingness of men. But in this I shall except brother Pratt, for the simple reason that I do not know a man who is more willing to do what he is told than he is. If he is told to teach mathematics, he is willing to do it; if he is told to make books, preach the Gospel, work in a garden or tend cattle, he is willing to do it, and I know of no man more willing to do anything and everything required of him than he is. But I want to say to our willing, kind, good brethren that, so far as obeying the orders which God has revealed, I can bring the rich into line quicker than I can get many poor men who are not worth a dollar, and who do not know how to raise a breakfast tomorrow morning. I have tried both, and know. Who is there among us who came here rich? It was alluded to by brother Pratt. Look over our rich men, where are they? Who is there among the Latter-day Saints that is wealthy? When I came to this valley I was a thousand dollars in debt. I left everything. I think I got about three hundred dollars, a span of horses, and a little carriage, for all my property I left in Nauvoo. But I bought cattle, horses and wagons, and traded and borrowed and got the poor here by scores myself; and I have paid for these teams since I have been here.
When I got here I was in debt only about a thousand dollars for myself and family to a merchant in Winter Quarters, but I was in debt for others, and I have paid the last dime that I know anything about. When I reached here I could not pay one-tenth—I could not pay my surplus—I could not give my all—for I had nothing.
My mother and father both favored his [Brigham Young's] suit, and labored with me to induce me to view it in the same light. Brigham was our spiritual guide; it might be that in refusing him I should lose all hopes of future salvation. That was my mother's plea. My father's was that Brigham was able to hurt him pecuniarily. And then came my oldest brother, who added his influence in Brigham's favor by telling me that Brigham had it in his power to ruin him, and was very angry with him, and had threatened to "cut him off from the church," which was, to a person in his position, the very worst thing that could happen.
The trouble between them was of Brigham's own making, and I will give it, as briefly as I can, to show how Brigham managed to get everything out of his people without paying for it, and, at the same time, show the amount of honor which he has in business matters.
In 1860 the first telegraph line was extended from the Atlantic States to the Pacific, passing through Salt Lake City. Feramorz Little, a nephew of the President, took a contract to furnish about one hundred and fifty miles of poles, at three dollars each. According to Brigham's statement, Little was unable to fill the contract until the Prophet came to the rescue, and secured three dollars and a quarter each, by furnishing one hundred miles of sawed poles, although, in truth, the sawed timber was not so good as common round poles.
Six years later, a rival company commenced putting up a new line. Brigham negotiated for a contract, and succeeded in securing nearly eight hundred miles, -- extending from Denver City westward, -- at the very gratifying price of eight dollars a pole. It is very generally believed that Brigham and one of the new company had a previous understanding to divide the profits on this magnificent job.
He then sub-let the whole contract to Bishop John Sharp and Joseph A. Young,-- his eldest son, who has recently died, -- at three dollars a pole; and my brother Gilbert took about four hundred and fifty miles -- from Green River to Denver at the very reasonable price of two dollars and a half a pole. He was then the owner of ten freight wagons, with six mules to each wagon; but, in order to fill his contract, he found himself compelled to purchase six additional teams, at a cost of seven thousand dollars, which, with tools, provisions, and general outfit, increased the sum to nearly eleven thousand dollars, which he was obliged to borrow, paying a very heavy interest five per cent, a month; but that, of course, was his own fault, not the Prophet's.
Brigham was anxious to have the work done immediately, -- which is not at all strange when one remembers that he would make five dollars on each pole, -- and he had sent for my brother, and urged him to take the job, telling him that he knew of no one so suitable, for Gilbert had such a fine business reputation; adding that he was certain that the blessing of God would rest upon him, for it was His will that all the Saints should accumulate riches. After all this, and very much more talk of the same kind, Gilbert was induced to take the contract, my father giving security for the borrowed money.
My brother left Salt Lake City with his outfit as early as the snow would permit him to cross the mountains. When he had got his wagons loaded with poles for the first time, Brigham telegraphed for him to stop work and return to the city. He immediately complied with the order, and found, on his arrival, that there was a prospect of the new company compromising with the old, and putting up no line. They now desired to buy off all contracts. Brigham would clear on the contract one hundred thousand dollars, if the line was put up, and of course could compromise for no less. Sharp and Joseph A. wanted forty thousand dollars, and my brother ten thousand, if they gave up the contract. Brigham said that, in justice, Gilbert ought to have twenty thousand dollars, to pay the expenses of the delay, &c.
Of course it was cheaper to put up the line than to compromise at this cost, and he returned to his work, having lost twelve days. His expenses at this time were about one hundred dollars a day. He had thirty men employed, at sixty dollars a month and their board, and he also had grain to furnish for one hundred mules. Brigham promised to pay for all this delay, but as usual he failed to do so.
My brother than began to furnish the poles, and succeeded in delivering about twenty-five miles a week. For two months he received his pay quite regularly, and everything went on swimmingly. When he was about one hundred miles from Denver, having completed about three hundred and fifty miles, he was sent for to give up his contract on the eastern line, and take a contract on the northern line instead. That was between Utah and Montana. Gilbert was much averse to the change, as he had finished the most difficult portion of his work, and passed through where the timber is the least accessible. But Brigham insisted, and wrote, promising to make it all right with him if he would come back, and go up north, and furnish one hundred miles or more of poles. Finally he sent Joseph A. down to my brother, who succeeded in persuading him to return.
While on his way back, he met Mr. E. Creighton, the superintendent of the line, with a company of men, setting the poles which he had furnished. Being desirous of giving thorough satisfaction, he sent Mr. Lorenzo Ensign, with three teams, loaded with good poles, to exchange for any poor timber which did not satisfy. Those teams continued with the pole-setters until Mr. Creighton sent them back, remarking that he did not find it necessary to change one pole a day, and that he was entirely satisfied with the timber. I mention this because Brigham afterwards said that the contract was not well filled, and made this an excuse for not paying my brother. Those three teams remained with the pole-setters about four weeks, and, as I before said, were dismissed by one of the owners of the line.
Gilbert returned home in August, and, on starting for the north, Joseph A. asked him to set the poles that he should furnish on the Montana line, at the same time agreeing to pay him a dollar apiece for setting, and three dollars for the poles. That was fifty cents more than he received on the eastern line, but it would scarcely pay him for a move of six hundred miles, to a country where timber was in very high mountains and rough canons.
Removing from the east of course broke the original contract; but as Gilbert had all the confidence in the world in the word of Brigham and of Joseph A., he neglected to make a new written agreement. After he had furnished the poles for about one hundred miles, my younger brother -- who was farming at the time -- took his team, and, after hiring six men, went to set the poles, paying his men two dollars a day and their board. They worked four weeks, for which they never received one dollar.
When my youngest brother was about leaving for home, Gilbert gave him an order on Sharp and Young for one thousand dollars. While Gilbert was in the East he had sent orders for money every month for my youngest brother to collect and disburse. Those orders were promptly paid, and he had no thought that this one would not be paid as promptly. He called at Brigham's office, and presented the order, and was curtly informed by Brigham that he must "hunt up Sharp and Joseph A."
On inquiring for their office, it could not be found. The day following he chanced to meet Bishop Sharp, who referred him to Joseph A. He called at the latter's residence three times without seeing him; finally, four days after, my brother succeeded in meeting him in his father's office. He was told to sit down in the outer room, where he was left alone for two hours; then he was called into the private office, and told that there was no money for him.
"But," said he to Brigham and Joseph A., "I must have the money; I have ten men who have already been waiting five days for their pay, and I am still paying them, or am under obligation to do so, and their board in the city also; and none of this can be done without money."
After a little more consultation Brigham said, "We can give you a draft on New York, which you can cash with some of the bankers or merchants in the city.
My brother then asked for time to inquire on what terms he could cash the draft; but was told that merchants would often pay a percentage on such paper, and that it was always as good as money. He then asked, if he was obliged to have it discounted, if Sharp and Young would lose the amount, but was told that he need not be so particular, for he must take the draft or nothing, since they had no money. He took it then, as he saw very plainly that they did not intend to give him anything else, and presented it to every banker and merchant in Salt Lake City, but could find no one who would take it. On a second call at Walker Brothers', he succeeded in cashing it at three per cent discount. Meeting Joseph A. afterwards, he told him he should charge him with the thirty dollars. Joe replied, "All right;" yet neither he nor Gilbert ever received another dollar from them, though they were in the boys' debt two thousand dollars.
When Gilbert returned from the North he found it difficult to pay his men, and also to meet his other expenses. He spent the winter trying to get his pay, during which my younger brother, Edward, took the teams and went to California for freight, hoping by that means to save Gilbert from bankruptcy. The trip not proving successful, the spring of '67 opened very dark for us financially. Gilbert saw no way but to sell his teams. I remember his coming home one night, feeling extremely dejected, and telling us he had sold sixteen of his best mules for less than half the amount he had paid for them, and expected the remainder to go at a still lower price.
In the spring of 1868 he was forced into bankruptcy by Captain Hooper, one of his principal creditors. This same Captain William H. Hooper had the good fortune to be one of the Prophet's favorites, although he was by no means a Mormon at heart, and Brigham knew it; still, as he liked him, and as Hooper made sufficient pretence to pass for one, it was all right.
When Gilbert delivered up his papers to the assignees, they readily discovered a large indebtedness on the part of Sharp and Young. At a meeting of the creditors, Brigham, who took the responsibility of the whole affair, undertook to have everything his own way, and, as my younger brother remarked, "literally rode over the whole company rough-shod." Among other statements, he said, --
"Gilbert Webb's poles were many of them condemned," which was utterly false. He then said he had never written to Gilbert while he was East. In face of this the letter was produced and read before the company. He then said he was sure he had no recollection of it, and asked George Q. Cannon -- who was his clerk at that time -- if he remembered it. Cannon replied that he believed he did. Previous to this, when Gilbert saw that he must lose everything, he considered it his duty to pay off his men, also to pay the notes which my father had signed, and to save him from utter ruin. At this Brigham's rage knew no bounds; he wanted Hooper to have his pay first. One of Gilbert's creditors was a Mr. Kerr, a Gentile banker, whom he paid without consulting the Prophet, which greatly enraged him. In speaking of it to my mother, he manifested all the growling propensities of an old "cur;" saying that Gilbert had paid all the notes due to Gentiles, and left his friend Hooper to take his chance with the rest of the creditors, and he intended to disfellowship him for it.
This was when he was counselling my parents to use their influence with me in his behalf.
"If you do that, Brother Young," said my mother, "I shall find it very hard to forgive you; although Gilbert may have erred in judgment, he designed to do right. Would you, President Young, like to have his father ruined in the crash? The notes held by Mr. Kerr were signed by him." He said, "If his father signed the notes, he ought to pay them."
"Well," replied my mother, with considerable spirit, "if Gilbert had been paid for his work, he would have been able to have paid all his debts."
He was very angry at this, and said, "What do you know about business, I'd like to know?"
"I know enough to know when my children are ill-used and cheated, Brigham Young," said she, quickly. "I wonder how you would like to have one of your sons cut off from the church, and treated in the manner in which you have treated Gilbert."
"I should think it perfectly right if one of my boys had done wrong and needed punishment." Yet it is well known that there are no more unprincipled men in the Territory than his eldest sons; but there never have been the slightest signs of their being disfellowshipped.
After a still more spirited contest with my mother, the Prophet took his departure in a great rage, saying he should see if "Gilbert would pay his Gentile debts in preference to paying the brethren."
All this was for the purpose of influencing me, and I saw that I must yield. There was nothing but ruin in store for us if I persisted in my refusal. The loss of property was by no means so dreadful a thing to my brother—brought up to believe that there was no salvation outside of Mormonism -- as being cut off from the church and receiving the Prophet's curse, and he was heart-broken at the prospect.
I made up my mind to make one last appeal myself to Brigham Young, and see if I could not touch his heart and induce him to resign his claims to me, and not to punish my family because I could not bring myself to become his wife. I was sure that I could move him. I would make myself so humble, so pathetic, before him. I would do all I could to serve him. I would never forget his kindness to me; but I could not marry him without bringing great unhappiness upon myself. I should also fail to bring happiness or comfort to him. I would be so eloquent that he could not refuse to listen to me.
I went up to the city to visit a friend, quite determined to make this appeal to him, but my courage failed me. Two or three times I started to call to see him, but I would only get in sight of his office, and turn back faint and trembling. One day I saw him coming towards me in the street, and I determined to screw up my courage and speak to him. But when I reached him my tongue refused to speak the words, and I only faltered out a common-place greeting. All my eloquence was frozen under the chilling glance of the steely-blue eyes, which had not a ray of sympathetic warmth in them. No one who has ever been under his peculiar influence but will understand me when I say that in his presence I was powerless. My will refused to act, and I went away from him, knowing that I never could say to him what I felt.
I returned home, feeling, more than ever, that my doom was fixed. My religion, my parents —everything was urging me on to my unhappy fate, and I had grown so tired with struggling that I felt it was easier to succumb at once than to fight any longer. I began, too, to be superstitious about it; I did not know but that I was fighting the will of the Lord as well as the will of the Prophet, and that nothing but disaster would come as long as I was so rebellious. The thought struck me, in a sudden terror, "What if God should take my children, to punish my rebellious spirit?" It was agony. "Not my will, but thine," was my heart-broken cry, more desperate than resigned, however, and I went to my mother and told her that I had decided. I would become the wife of Brigham Young!
-- Wife No. 19, the Story of a Life in Bondage, Being a Complete Expose of Mormonism and Revealing the Sorrows, Sacrifices and Sufferings of Women in Polygamy, by Ann Eliza Young, Brigham Young's Apostate Wife
Here is Horace S. Eldredge, he is one of our wealthy men. What did he have when he came here? Nothing that I know of, except just enough to get here with his family. William Jennings has been called a millionaire. What was he worth when be came here? He had comparatively little. Now he is one of our wealthy men. William H. Hooper is another of our wealthy men. He is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. How much had he to pay as surplus when he came here. He could pay no surplus, for he was worth nothing; but he is now wealthy. If he had gone to California I believe he would have been poor today.
There is any amount of property, and gold and silver in the earth and on the earth, and the Lord gives to this one and that one—the wicked as well as the righteous—to see what they will do with it, but it all belongs to him. He has handed over a goodly portion to this people, and, through our faith, patience and industry, we have made us good, comfortable homes here, and there are many who are tolerably well off, and if they were in many parts of the world they would be called wealthy. But it is not ours, and all we have to do is to try and find out what the Lord wants us to do with what we have in our possession, and then go and do it. If we step beyond this, or to the right or to the left, we step into an illegitimate train of business. Our legitimate business is to do what the Lord wants us to do with that which he bestows upon us, and dispose of it just as he dictates, whether it is to give all, one-tenth, or the surplus. I was present at the time the revelation came for the brethren to give their surplus property into the hands of the Bishops for the building up of Zion, but I never knew a man yet who had a dollar of surplus property. No matter how much one might have he wanted all he had for himself, for his children, his grandchildren, and so forth.
If we are disposed to enter into covenant one with another, and have an agreement made according to the laws of our land, and we are disposed to put our property into the hands of trustees, and work as we are directed—eat, drink, sleep, ride, walk, talk, study, school our children, our middle-aged and our aged, and learn the arts and sciences, the laws of the Priesthood, the laws of life, anatomy, physic and anything and everything useful upon the earth, the Lord has not the least objection in the world, and would be perfectly willing for us to do it, and I should like, right well, for us to try it. I know how to start such a society, right in this city, and how to make its members rich. I would go to now, and buy out the poorest ward in this city, and then commence with men and women who have not a dollar in the world. Bring them here from England, or any part of the earth, set them down in this ward and put them to work, and in five years we would begin to enter other wards, and we would buy this house and that house, and the next house, and we would add ward to ward until we owned the whole city, every dollar's worth of property there is in it. We could do this, and let the rich go to California to get gold, and we would buy their property.
Brigham Young wanted totalitarian control, and not the inquiring mind, and as a result he "made Utah the thinking man's graveyard." (Hirshson, p. 322) The Latter-day Saints like to compare themselves to the people of Israel, but a comparison of Mormonism and Judaism shows that while the Mormons placed a much greater emphasis on proselytizing and recruiting, they neglected education and had contempt for learned individuals. This intellectual backwardness and contempt for science still hangs like a heavy pall over the American Intermountain West.
-- Just Too Weird: Bishop Romney and the Mormon Takeover of America: Polygamy, Theocracy, and Subversion, by Webster Griffin Tarpley, Ph.D.
Although a very ignorant man himself, able neither to read nor write the English language correctly, he has always been a bitter opponent of free schools and liberal education.
"I will not give a dollar," he says, "to educate another man's child. If you school your children, there is great danger of their becoming blacklegs and horse thieves," he announced on one occasion, yet he seems quite willing that his own should take the risk. All of them have received a certain amount of education, enough to make them presentable in society, and some have had quite superior advantages. One son has just graduated at West Point, another is a student at the Michigan University Law School, and a third has just entered Cornell University.
Every attempt that has been made for the establishment of free schools he has fiercely battled against, and the other officers of the church have invariably followed his lead. He assures his people that education is the bitterest foe to labor. If they allow their children to be taught anything they will no longer be of any service to their parrents. He dilates largely upon this subject in the Tabernacle.
"I am utterly opposed to the schools," he said, in one address. "They have been introduced into the States in consequence of the tyranny of the rich over the poor. But instead of keeping the people poor, and then providing free schools for them, I would have the rich put out their money to usury by giving the poor employment, that they may be able to sustain themselves and school their own children. It is the duty of the rich to use their means, as I have done myself, in building factories, railroads, and other branches of industry, in order that the laboring people may have a chance to work together, and improve their condition; the rich taking their portion, and all growing wealthy together."
There is an unconscious sarcasm in this last sentence that is positively sublime. That one expression, "as I have done myself," is the supremest satire. I do not believe there is anywhere a man so suspicious of his workmen, so penurious in his dealings with them, so anxious to cut their wages down to the very lowest penny, as is Brigham Young. I know men who have been in his employ for years, and have never received the least remuneration. They have worked on and on, and when at last they have brought a bill against him for their labor, they have been met with one equally large on his side for house rent, or goods from the co-operative store, or are told that their labor is to go toward paying their tithing.
If all the rich men use their means, "as I have done mine," therefore there will be very little chance of the poor man being able to educate their children at all: which is exactly what Brigham Young wants. Had he spoken the truth he would have said, "I am opposed to free schools. They will rend this dark veil of superstition which envelops you, and let in the light of reason, and this will loosen my hold on you. If you educate your children you make better men and women of them, but they will not be such blind slaves to me as you have been. The day that sees knowledge generally disseminated throughout this community sees my power broken, my 'opportunities' gone, and therefore, with my consent, we will have no free schools."
Unlettered and uncultured as he is, he recognizes the power of education, and that is why he is such a bitter opponent to general culture, and why, at the same time, he takes special care that his own children shall lack no advantages.
-- Wife No. 19, the Story of a Life in Bondage, Being a Complete Expose of Mormonism and Revealing the Sorrows, Sacrifices and Sufferings of Women in Polygamy, by Ann Eliza Young, Brigham Young's Apostate Wife
Would you like to know how to do this? I can tell you in a very few words—never want a thing you cannot get, live within your means, manufacture that which you wear, and raise that which you eat. Raise every calf and lamb; raise the chickens, and have your eggs, make your butter and cheese, and always have a little to spare. The first year we raise a crop, and we have more than we want. We buy nothing, we sell a little. The next year we raise more; we buy nothing, and we sell more. In this way we could pile up the gold and silver and in twenty years a hundred families working like this could buy out their neighbors. I see men who earn four, five, ten or fifteen dollars a day and spend every dime of it. Such men spend their means foolishly, they waste it instead of taking care of it. They do not know what to do with it, and they seem to fear that it will burn their pockets, and they get rid of it. If you get a dollar, sovereign, half-eagle or eagle, and are afraid it will burn your pockets, put it into a safe. It will not burn anything there, and you will not be forced to spend, spend, spend as you do now. See our boys here, why if my boys, by the time they are twenty, have not a horse and carriage to drive of their own, they think they are very badly used, and say, “Well, I do not think father thinks much of me.” A great many things might be said on this subject that I do not want to say.
Brethren, we want you to turn in and study the laws of the Territory of Utah, of this city and other cities, and then the statutes of the United States, and the Constitution of the United States. Then read the decisions of the Supreme Court. I do not mean the self-styled “United States Supreme Court for the Territory of Utah;” but the United States Supreme Court that sits at Washington—the seat of government. Read up their decisions, and the decisions of the English judges and the laws of England and of other countries, and learn what they know, and then if you draw up a will, deed, mortgage or contract, do not study to deceive the man who pays you for this, but make out a writing or instrument as strong and firm as the hills, that no man can tear to pieces, and do your business honestly and uprightly, in the fear of God and with the love of truth in your heart. The lawyer that will take this course will live and swim, while the poor, miserable, dishonest schemers will sink and go down. We live by law, and I only condemn those among the lawyers who are eternally seeking to take advantage of their neighbors.
Now we will close, and adjourn until 2 o'clock this afternoon.
