The Shoreham,
Washington, D. C.,
My dear Sir:
Having at last reached success in the passage through Congress of the bill
admitting Utah to Statehood, it is due to you to know something of the more important
details of the long and difficult contest. The victory which has been reached has come
only through the help of friends whose services can never be forgotten, and through a
patience and persistence of effort which I have never seen equalled. Indeed, in this
contest have been found nearly all the experiences of effort and resistance, of fidel-
ity as against conspiracy, of loyalty to friends as against temptation, and truly all
the experiences nearly that make up the struggles in human life and effort. Coming
into it at a comparatively late stage, and having passed through before many noted
contests, and not having the intense feeling of the struggle for home and independence
that you and your people have felt after so many long and weary years of waiting, I
have naturally been able to judge more impartially of the struggle, of the work of the
people who have figured in it, of the unworthiness of those who have failed in fidelity,
and of the debt of gratitude that all of you must forever owe to those who have stood
in the storm, and through the stress and trial of years overcoming every obstacle,
foiling every treachery, have brought you triumph at last. In my observation of your
people and my analysis of their character I should judge that they are peculiarly en-
dowed with the qualities of appreciation and gratitude. It has been a long and bitter
school in which they have been taught the value of friendship, and the withering, bitter,
unrelenting force of enmity. It is difficult even now to see, as in a few years it will
be impossible for any fair man to see, how remorselessly and persistently prejudice and
malice have followed you and your people in the crusade of over a generation against
you. As intelligent and Christian people, however, you have that quality which is the
most divine in human nature, the quality of forgiveness; and as I have watched this
struggle year after year and seen how strangely things have come out, how your enemies
have melted away before you, and how unanimously at last has come the victory after so
many years of injustice and oppression, I have been forced to feel that the spirit of a
higher power than that of man has been controlling in the movements and destiny of your
people and in the final judgment toward them of the whole American people. All of us as
we grow older learn to value more and more highly the gifts that come to us through dis-
cipline, and it is a strange part of human life that nearly everything that is dearest
to us, most to be treasured, and most preservative of our liberty, comes to us dearly
bought by suffering, sacrifice, and often longtime oppression. Nearly everything dear
to human life has been gained along these high lines, where human endurance has been
tested, where character and patience have been put to bitter test, and where all that is
good and noble in a people has been developed under storm and trial. Neither in this
generation nor in any soon to come will the strange blessing of final independence which
has come to you and your people be fully understood. But for the spirit that drove you
into the wilderness to combat with the savage elements among men and the more savage
elements of nature, but for the necessity of industry, courage and patience, made necess-
ary by your battle for life in a country so wild and unfruitful at first as to be un-
friendly, but for the strange experiences through which practically the first two genera-
tions of your people have passed, your Church would never have been rooted and grounded
in the everlasting strength which I believe it now holds, and the strong men you have
developed would never have been discovered to you. So it may come out at last that a
Providence has been in it all, a Providence apparently unfriendly for many years, but
with the final proof that it was a loving Providence in the care of you all the time.
Yours will be a very fortunate people as time shall come and different generations shall
follow, if those who come after you shall prove as worthy, as true to everything that is
right in human life and aspiration, as courabgeous in the performance of duty, as the
strong and fearless men and women who first set up the standard of your Church in Utah
and who so loyally and fearlessly upheld it in the first generations of your experience
in the Rocky mountains:
While I never was among the American people who are intolerant toward the
Mormon Church, being of a liberal and tolerant mind, and having acquaintances with the
section of the Mormon Church located in Iowa, made up of as good people as we had in
that State, of course I never knew or had opportunity to know fully and distinctly all
the facts in regard to the career of your Church and people in Utah and the contiguous
western States. It was some ten years ago that in connection with Mr. Blaine, when we
were studying the elements of voters in the United States to try to secure a majority
for the political principles in which we believed, I first learned of the magnitude of
the Mormon people, the greatness of their development in many States besides Utah, and
the large part that they were sure to bear for good or evil in the destiny of this re-
public. Mr. Blaine and I were both surprised to see with what far-seeing wisdom the
pioneers of your people had looked into the future and had laid the lines along which
your descendants were to play a large part in the affairs of this country. Ever after
that both of us realized both how unjustly you had been dealt with in the past and what
a strong call there was upon the conscience of every lover of his country to endeavor
to see that you were dealt with more justly in the future. It was in this way, led by
my natural sense of justice and by my knowledge and by my realization of the wisdom
necessary to deal with all the composite elements making up the people of our country,
and my early recognition of the industry, patience, and good purpose of your people,
that I came to take so much interest in your welfare and became so willing to aid in
relieving you as much as possible of the wrongs inflicted on you in the past and to
secure to you a full share of rights as American citizens in the future.
It was in 1889 that the matter was projected before me so prominently, and at
a time when I was in such position as to have some official power in addition to my
personal influence, and fortunate enough to be near Mr. Blaine with his almost omni-
potent influence, that I took up in zealous manner the effort to serve you to the extent
of my ability. It was in this time that Colonel Trumbo, who has proved such a friend
to your people as I have never known any people to have, came upon the scene, and gave
to Mr. Blaine and to me such a practical and accurate knowledge of your exact situation
as to wrongs in the past and rights in the future, that we were enabled thereafter to
organize and conduct a contest in your behalf on lines that we knew were absolutely
right and as absolutely sure to win for you in the end. Of course, I need not say to
you, or to any of your people, how devotedly and wisely Colonel Trumbo over several years
has subordinated his own interests in life and made your interests the ambition and as-
piration of his every effort, and how with apparently more than human energy he has de-
voted every day and every thought of his life to your service. It has been almost en-
tirely through his influence, through the genius of his persistence in carrying the story
of your wrongs and rights to the door of nearly every influential man in the nation, of
his energy in assembling all these influences, and making friends for you wherever there
were good hearts to make friends with, that success has finally come to you. I have been
much in politics, and in many struggles. I have seen many successful men, gifted with
masterful and even peculiar powers in human affairs; but, as Mr. Blaine and I have often
talked and discussed, such a character as Colonel Trumbo, with his ability to make friends,
his ability to make people listen as to your wrongs and his power to convince them of
your rights, and his singular quality of assembling all these forces together, whether
represented in the public press, or in the organizations of the different churches, or
the more powerful influences of the most powerful corporations, and finally in the seat
of supreme power in the United States, Congress, has never before appeared on the scene
of American politics. It is not in my nature as a devout man and a believer in higher
powers, to reject the idea that he has been given for this work even more than the
strength of a man. It is refreshing in this age of cynicism and indifference in the
world to find friendship of this higher sort sacrificing personal interest and ambition
to a good cause and putting the success of that cause above everything else. Equally
marked and equally beautiful and worthy of admiration as Colonel Trumbo's persistent
and remarkable efforts in your behalf has been the unselfishness of his actions, the
subordination of self with no expectation of reward except the great joy of seeing
justice brought to you and your people at last. That you and all your people will
appreciate this, that you have no confidence too sacred to be given to him, that there
is no honor within your control too high to be offered him, that your children after you
shall be taught to know the value of his services, I am sure from what I know of the
Mormon character will be true.
The story of the struggle of your people, as a people, and the later story of
the struggle of your Territory for Statehood, are both so interesting and absorbing that
it is hard to confine any analysis of it to anything like the proper limits and space
of a letter. But I feel it is due to you, who have been remote from nearly all the
phases of these struggles in the eastern States and out of your own Territory, to be
told by someone who has known of them and who can make the recital impartial something
of the details, to be left in your records in a form that will endure as a part of the
history of your Church and people. I take it up here with the attempt to disfranchise
your people in Congress in 1889, when a bill was introduced to add this further indignity
to the cruelties and wrongs of the Poland Act. It was then that Colonel Trumbo appealed
to me for help, feeling that I as a western man, as a man who had tolerance of opinion,
and especially as a man who was then in an official position of power, could help him
in resisting this further visitation of wrong upon you. He and I craved of Mr. Blaine
the use of his far greater power in your protection, and with his help we went before
the committee of Congress having this proposition of further wrong before it, and were
able to defeat it. If you could have the words, which seemed almost to be the words of
inspiration, as they fell from the lips of Mr. Blaine, protesting against this further
wrong to you, protesting against such an outrage upon any portion of a free people,
asserting that no republic of free men could tolerate such a wrong and li^v^e, I am certain
that they would be treasured in the affections of your Church and people as being only
second in comfort and power to the words of divine speech. I have always regretted that
no report was ever made of his appeal to that committee. It came up suddenly, was very
informal, no one thought of anything but what Mr. Blaine was saying, and he spoke so
deeply from the heart and from the best thoughts that ever arise from the human soul,
that his words came almost unconsciously to him and he was never able to repeat them.
I asked him afterwards if he could not, and he said that they seemed to come to him as
if on wings at a great and critical time, and they had passed away as suddenly and com-
pletely, and there was left to him only the memory of his indignation at the wrong
proposed and of his duty to resist to the highest limit of his power such wrong and
encroachment. Of course, your people know something of the courage and loyalty of
Mr. Blaine towards you in oppression; but the summit and sublimity of it all was
reached when he stood in this small committee room and smote down with the giant
strength of his indignant wrath this further attempt in a free government to degrade
still further a people already wronged too much. If you but knew the burning words
with which he spoke, the spirit with which he spoke, I am sure that the name of Blaine
would never pass Mormon lips without the blessing of a prayer following the spoken
word or the unspoken thought.
This marked the limit of the high tide against the Mormon people in Congress.
Wrong had gone as far as it was possible for it in its malice to go. From that day it
receded. Having curbed it in Congress, then it became necessary to spread out the
feeling represented by Mr. Blaine over this wide nation and mollify all the great ele-
ments into something of the same feeling—nearly all of which, sharing in a preju-
dice and a hatred which were the more intense because of their ignorance of the facts,
were almost implacable at the mere mention of the name of Mormon. Religious intoler-
ance far outruns political intolerance, as you know; and, having checked the highest
tide of this feeling in political circles, it then became necessary in a government of
the people to go back to the sources of all the powers of Congress and mollify all the
great elements toward the final and ^end^ which has now come. In surveying the field Mr.
Blaine, Colonel Trumbo, and myself felt that the next step was to secure, first a
larger tolerance in the Republican party, and finally the active friendship of that
party in behalf of justice to your people and Statehood for your Territory. It had
been the fate of this party, driven forward by the crusade of the churches against your
Church, to be in possession of the government and therefore to enact and enforce the
laws that public sentiment coerced from Congress in enactment against your people in
some of your practices as a church. The first practical step to be taken along this
line was to take away from the so-called Liberal party in Utah, which had always been
more an engine of injustice and oppression toward you than a representative party of
just sentiment, and which had finally become simply a means of persecution and money-
making, the apparent sanction of acting in the name of the Republican party of the
nation. To do this efficiently it was necessary to dispossess this Utah Liberal party
of its membership in the Republican National Committee, and to give admission instead
to the Republican party in Utah, and thus to gain entrance of the national party on the
local ground, where it could deal in justice and fairness with your people and take up
with intelligence the preliminaries of the final settlement which has now come in fair-
ness to you. To those of you who were remote and who know little of the national pre-
judice and of the difficulty of assembling the support of every State in a National
Committee, this may have seemed a trivial matter. I happened to be Chairman of the
Republican National Committee at the time, and even I, who knew much of this prejudice,
was surprised to find how obstinately the most of the members of the Committee held to
the old-time prejudice and how timid nearly all of them were as against the reproaches
of their people for rejecting the Liberal party in Utah and admitting to membership in
the National Committee a party that proposed tolerance and fair play to the Mormons the
same as all other Americans. It took a year of patient effort, of direct personal
appeal to almost every member of the National Committee, and more than that of system-
atic work to reach the influences back of these men personally, to give them the
courage to act along the line that we proposed. It happened that the meeting of the
National Committee where Utah for the first time was admitted to fair-play representa-
tion in any National Committee was held in Washington, where all the allied influences
against your people had their representatives on the ground for action. These influ-
ences stormed at the Committee, frightened away all but the most resolute men, and made
it extremely difficult to carry the matter successfully through the Committee. But it
was finally done, and when it was done the Liberal party of Utah was for the first time
cut off from connection with the supreme sources of national power. Colonel Trumbo may
sometime when he is with you, in the confidence that exists between you and in the great
affection in which he holds you, give you many of the details of that first struggle,
which may seem trivial now but which was the first necessary step toward success at all.
In thus helping to strike down the Liberal party by the hand of the official
national power of the Republican party, I gave assurance to almost every Republican of
influence and prominence in the nation, and to everyone whose help I finally succeeded
in gaining, that despite of the past, when Republicanism and Mormonism were made to
stand as deadly elements of opposition, the future would be one of fair play and one in
which your people would act on the lines of the future and not of the past. There was
the natural fear, of course, after the Republican party had enacted and enforced the
severe laws against Utah, that there would be treasured up in the hearts of your people
the natural feelings of enmity and revenge common to human nature. Utilizing all the
facts Colonel Trumbo had given me, and nearly always having him with me to bear testi-
mony to what I was saying and to answer every question that might be asked, I succeeded
in convincing enough Republican leaders to control the majority of the party that the
future Mormons, all of them instinct^lled^ with patriotism and love of country, all of them
believing in protection to American interests and industries, and all of them animated
by the common purpose of all Americans to serve the republic in its government of free-
dom faithfully, would be found and indeed would be forced by their own destiny as a
people to gravitate toward the underlying principles of Republicanism and Americanism.
The question was a mighty one, and nearly every prominent man to whom I talked when I
revealed to him the fact that this was not merely a Utah question but that the Mormon
people were spread through the valleys of eight or ten western States, and that sooner
or later they would hold the balance of power in the election of every Senator and of
every electoral vote for President in these States, was apalled at the fact and afraid
to trust to the forbearance of a people who had been so severely dealt with as a people
by the Republican party. I mention these things, which were the foundations on which I
laid our efforts to change the Republican party from being a party of opposition to
your people to one of friendship and support, that you may know how deeply the founda-
tions have been laid and that you may understand the expectation and confidence with
which the Republican party has come up so bravely at last to the line of doing justice
toward you all.
After this step in the National Committee, the next important chapter was to
overcome the prejudice existing with President Harrison and the influences almost uni-
versally exerted upon him, a man of peculiar religious prejudices and particularly open
to the appeals of the more intolerant Churches, and induce him to follow out the per-
mission of the law and the demands of justice and issue amnesty to all your people. This
was not dealing with one man, as may appear on the surface. If it had been, and that man
of the tenacious and obstinate character of this President, even that would have been a
great struggle. But we had to go back of him, and reach all the more intolerant Churches,
all the church papers, and lay a mollifying hand upon them and their prejudices, and take
upon our lips the words of Christian peace and gospel and appeal to them that, even
granting all they said against your people, there was everything in the teaching of the
Christian religion, when you had turned away from all things to which they objected, had
conformed to the law, and had as a Church under the revelation of the higher power to
which you conformed put away all these things, they should take you by the hand even
according to their own teaching and make you welcome with them and to equal rights in the
republic. We had to see and bring influence to bear on all the church papers; we had
to see the bishops and controlling men in all the strong Churches, especially the Catholic
and the Methodist. The Catholic, it is only just to say, was more inclined to the new
rule of fair play to you, while the Methodist Church was most tenaciously against it.
I was sent by the National Committee during the campaign of 1892 to renew the talk I had
already had at several times with the President in appealing to him to issue the procla-
mation of amnesty. He said that amnesity meant so much that for him to issue it was to
make an end of all the contest, that if it were done at all it should be an amnesity
complete and final and reaching all people who had come under the offense of the law,
and that to do this during a campaign, when he was a candidate for reelection, would be
considered by the prejudiced people among the Churches as an act influenced more by his
needs and ambition as a candidate than by his sense of justice and duty as a President.
He said that he feared all the church papers would oppose the act and condemn the pro-
clamation, and he required that I should have all the editors of these papers seen,
and that I should test all the sources of power among the leading religious denomin-
ations. When you realize how many there are of these papers and how numberous are the
sources of religious power and authority, you can imagine something of the task that he
laid upon me. It was then that Colonel Trumbo came on to help in this work, and we were
fortunate enough also to have the benefit of the wise counsel and suggestion of Presi-
dent Cannon and General Clawson, who about this time came to New York and remained
several weeks, a fact which in itself was peculiarly fortunate and almost providential
in the line of success to our efforts. Difficult as this work was, we took it up, em-
ploying the help of many people, and finally secured a favorable expression from all th[e]
church papers in favor of showing confidence toward your people in their changed atti-
tudes, and quite a favorable expression from leading church authorities in favor of the
President's immediate and favorable action. The amnesty therefore would have been iss-
ued in October except for the affliction that feel^ll^ upon the President in the illness
and final death of his wife, when to the credit of his heart be it said everything else
even the campaign for his reelection, was made subordinate to his duties toward his dy-
ing wife. Influences counter to our wishes intruded on this effort from Mr. Elkins,
then Secretary of War, ^and for some strange reason from General Tracy, then Secretary of the Navy,^ the latter being influenced, I think, through some unrelenting
leading men in his Church, the Presbyterian. Mr. Elkins I think wanted to reach some
understanding with the authorities of your Church in behalf of some friends and inter-
ests he has in New Mexico. As you know, the amnesty was finally issued after the elec-
tion, and this act of a Republican President following the sanction and permission of
the laws of a Republican Congress put great power in our hands to influence all Repub-
lican elements in the contest to follow.
Then followed the contest for Statehood, in the winter of 1892-3. In prepar
ing for this we reached out and with systematic effort organized into friendly influ-
ences still more all the powerful elements of every State, by reaching the State Com-
mittees of our party, getting them in active line of friendship in their influence on
Congress, together with the members for each State of the National Committee. We also
kept up through the summer of 1892 our active efforts in mollifying all the strong ele
ments of the party and of the Churches, and especially of the newspapers, the latter be-
ing the power that men in Congress fear more than any other, for they depend on their
home papers to keep them right before their people and in public favor. I should not
omit to state somewhere in this letter, and here may do as well, the constant efforts
of Colonel Trumbo while all these things were going on, and his success in assembling
strong influences to accomplish it, in securing favorable action toward your people and
Church in the Department of Justice and the other Departments here where confiscation
of property and other outrages had been perpetrated or attempted. One of these was the
debts imposed by the Poland Act, amounting to nearly a million of dollars, which he was
thus able to save you from. Of course, these things you know as well as I; only I have
felt that reference should be made to them in this letter, which perhaps, with the papers
accompanying it, will be the most detailed statement put into written form of the strug-
gles of your people to emerge from the outrages of Congressional law, to escape penal-
ties laid upon you with so much injustice, and the final struggle of your Territory into
Statehood. Of course, I commit this letter to such purpose through you in the confidenc[e]
that grows up between men who heart to heart have made a struggle against the mightiest
of opposition in a common desire for success. I deal frankly with men, revealing to
you friends who are worthy of your remembrance and gratitude and also under a sense of
duty mentioning those who failed in the time of your need to support you with friendship
and met you with enmity and opposition instead. I do not believe in treasuring up even
a sense of wrong, nor nursing resentment, nor entailing revenge. Human nature is too
weak, the grave too near, the necessity for forgiveness too apparent, for these things
to be. They only dwarf those who entertain and exercise them, and make them appear in
something of competition and likeness with those from whose meanness they have suffered.
But I do believe that every man and every people should know and should remember through
time and generation the difference between those who win friends and those who win en-
emies.
There are some facts in connection with the struggle here in the winter of
1892-3 that should be made known to you in the deep confidence of this letter, and for
you to use your judgment in making known to others in authority with you, and the actual
facts of friendship and enmity. I very much coveted and so did Colonel Trumbo the ad-
mission of Utah to Statehood through a Republican Congress. Through our system of effort,
through the assembling of influences reaching into every State of the Union and almost
every neighborhood, reaching into the Churches, into business elements and corporations,
we succeeded in getting the bill through the House and in gaining practically a unani-
mous vote in the Senate, and were defeated only by the persistence of the Chairman of
the Territorial Committee, who, finding himself finally almost if not entirely alone in
his Committee in opposition to Utah, appealed to that thing called courtesy in the Senate
in order to defeat what had become practically the unanimous desire of the Senate, an
appeal in which he went so fare as to threaten to resign as Chairman if the majority of
the Committee should overrule him and favorably report the bill. We have never fully
ascertained, although we are satisfied that we know, the influences that acted upon him.
They came from Utah, from the Liberal party, whose leaders never abated any of their
efforts to defeat our endeavors, and who I am satisfied have never relinquished their
secret opposition up to the present hour. As you have already been informed, we went so
far and came so near success that through Senator Allison, who was Chairman of the Com-
mittee on Appropriations and who has been, I may say here, one of our most faithful and
powerful friends throughout the contest, as to succeed in getting the gate open on the
floor for Utah to be called in from the Committee at two different times in the Senate
during the absence of Mr. Platt. Colonel Trumbo and I had arranged with Senator Allison
in his committee room to go down and give the floor to Senator Carey. Each time the
Senator left us he said, "When I come back I will bring you the news that Utah is a
State." He did get the chance, but for some reason Senator Carey did not get in in time
and when the gap was opened other men jumped in and utilized the opportunity. I have
studied over this matter and investigated it a great deal, and I am satisfied finally
that Senator Carey erred in these matters only from lack of quickness of action. He is
a loyal man, and I am now satisfied has intended to be true to your people, and has
failed only where celerity of movement, quickness of brain and ale^r^tness of attention wer[e]
needed. We are pretty well satisfied now, after a whole year of investigation, that the
influences that acted upon Senator Platt to hold him in opposition, even after we had
secured every Church and political element who had acted with him before to appeal to him
to be favorable then, came from Utah, from Lannan, Thomas, and Goodwin, and that it was
secretly exerted through Senator Dubois of Idaho. We shall finally discover all the
facts, for it is well enoughf to know even after a campaign has been fought, in guarding
gainst similar occurrences in the future, all the facts in regard to treachery as well
as fidelity. I am fully satisfied that Utah would have been admitted by the Republican
Congress in February of 1893, except for the influence exerted upon Senator Platt, who
alone defeated it then through Senator Dubois. This impression has been confirmed by
the indifference and lack of earnestness of the same Senator in the contest of this
winter and spring. There can be no possible reason to excuse Senator Dubois against this
act of justice toward Utah and its people. He had lived in a Territory where the wrongs
against the people were merely a tithe of those against your people, and had suffered
from them and knew what they were. He had also received, even after he had been your
open and violent enemy, the strange and disarming thing of forgiveness and magnanimity
and support. He was bound by all reasons of honor that govern in the hearts of good men
to forget a past where your people had never wronged him, and after you had forgiven and
forgotten it to become a faithful friend. We have means by which we shall finally ascer-
tain the exact truths in regard to his action and his certain attitude. Meantime I
would not wish you and your people to go so far as to share my positive impression that
he was the successful enemy against you last year, and that he has been, if not an active
enemy this year, at least an indifferent friend. You are making history, and with that
high sense of justice which e^a^nimates all your actions as a Church and a people you will
insist upon knowing the whole truth before expressing judgment. We shall be able within
a year to give you these facts.
This winter and summer Senator Platt proved to be one of our best friends,
wisest counsellers, and most potential influences.
I should have stated earlier in this communication more of the names of the men
among the leaders in the Republican party who early identified themselves with this
movement and have as constantly served in it loyally ever since. Among the most promin-
ent I may mention Senator Quay, who until we took the matter up with him and caused him
to see the truth was amongst your most persistent opponents. For two years, however,
he has used all his great power and influence in your behalf. Ex-Senator Thomas C.
Platt of New York, who is in many respects the most powerful man in the Republican party
and who wields an unusual power in the business elements of the country, was among the
earliest, and has not only served with friendship and influence but helped the Colonel
and me in raising the means necessary to pay the expenses of the many difficult works
and systems we had to carry out—works which required the employment of very many people,
all for purely honorable purposes and yet for purposes which required personal visits to
every considerable community in the nation. Mr. Manley, of the National Committee, Mr.
Fessenden of Connecticut, Mr. Hobart of New Jersey, all also of the National Committee
and among its most powerful members, Mr. Payne, the Wisconsin member of the Committee,
Mr. Kerens, the Missouri member, Mr. L. S. J. Hunt of the State of Washington, who brought
into line nearly all the elements of that portion of the country, Secretary Rusk, now
dead, who was always active and always friendly, Archbishop Ireland of St. Paul, of the
Catholic Church, Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore, Ex-Governor Warmoth of Louisiana, who
has helped us very greatly in dealing with Southern elements, Mr. George M. Pullman, and
Mr. Runnells, his General Counsel, who helped us very much with the large business ele-
ments and corporations, Hon. B. F. Jones of Pittsburgh, Ex-Chairman of the National Com-
mittee, General Russell A. Alger of Michigan, who has been exceeedingly active among great
corporations and in church circles as well as political, Governor McKinley and Ex-Governor
Foraker of Ohio, who have proved friendly at all times and active in their friendship,
William A. Russell of Boston, one of the wealthiest men in New England, who has been aboth
active in help and liberal in means and has drawn into it in help many of the strongest
and wealthiest men of New England, Hon. F. W. Palmer, late Public Printer in Washington,
who has served us with peculiar ability and fidelity, Hon. Thomas Lowry of Minnesota, and
many others I might name and perhaps ought to name, have been as devoted friends as any
people ever had. These are elements, as you will notice, outside of Congress. In Con-
gress we had at the start the powerful help of Senator Allison, who was then the most
influential Republican in the United States Senate, and Speaker Reed of the House, these
two men furnishing out the most of the power we have utilized on the Republican side in
Congress. When Congress was Republican these were our leaders and main helpers.
This brings us down to the expiration of the Republican Congress on the 4th of
March. It is well enough to express again, with sufficient emphasis to make it endure,
that it was in the heart and intention of that Republican Congress to make Utah a State.
Ninety-nine out of every hundred of the Republicans in Congress favored this, the Repub-
lican President desired it, the Republicans in the House did their part towards it, the
Republicans in the Senate stood ready to do it, and the whole gracious act of Republican
intention was defeated only by the strange influence exerted upon the Republican Chair-
man of the Senate Territorial Committee, an influence exerted from your enemies in Utah
in some strange and secret and yet sufficient manner. It is well enought^f^, and I think
fair enough, that you and all your people should understand that the Republican party as
a party in Congress and in executive power desired and intended to give you Statehood.
It was only through that strange thing and its stranger power called courtesy in the
Senate that your disappearing enemies in Utah were able through the exercise of peculiar
power over one Senator holding a place of peculiar advantage, that this Republican inten-
tion was defeated. Let me say here clearly and plainly that this influence, whatever it
was, was not one of corrupt character, for no man ever lived who was further above cor-
rupt things than Senator Platt. In some way I think this malign influence in Utah exer-
cised through some Republican Senators from that region an influence on Senator Platt,
making him believe that it was necessary to defeat Statehood and that the sole reliance
for this necessity was on him.
This brings us to March, 1893. During the summer of [18]93 we kept in constant
motion all the influences through the organizations of friends we had perfected in every
State in the Union, not only to hold the turning tide toward friendship for you among all
the controlling elements of the nation, but if possible to increase this feeling into
friendship. We had able and strong and controlling friends at every influential church
gathering, all the Methodist conferences, and all the synods and associations of the dif-
ferent Churches held during the summer. All the time we had felt that the coercion
of church sentiment over men in Congress was the thing to be feared, for religious in-
tolerance is always last to release its grasp. We succeeded well and increased our chance
among these controlling elements during the summer; and this brings us to the assem-
bling of the Democratic Congress in December. During the extra session in the summer,
called by the President to meet the financial situation, our question played no part.
And when Congress met in December, Democratic in both branches, with a Democratic Pres-
ident, our situation had become irritated against us with the Democrats by the results
of the various State elections held in that year, including the one in Utah, where your
people had elected a Republican Legislature. Nothing during the whole time in which I
had been engaged in this movement has made the difficulty of it so plain as when it was
demonstrated that we had to go to a Democratic Congress, with the traditional intoler-
ance of the Democratic party against Republican communities and Republican interests,
and ask it to make a State of a Republican Territory.
This danger was heightened by the fact that the Democrats held their power in the Senate
by a slight majority, a majority sure to be decreased in some of the States electing
Senators this year and in especial peril against the probability of Republicanism when
Utah is admitted. It was our fortune and salvation in this dilemma that we had been able
in five years of constant effort to gain the friendship of the Republican party general-
ly, and to have it mobilized in such hearty manner that it was willing to play any part
of honor necessary to success. But it became necessary, of course, not only to gain Dem-
ocratic support for Utah, which had gone Republican, but to make the Republican friend-
ship and support as unobjectionable to the Democrats as possible and as unobtrusive as
possible. The Democratic party is wise always in its generation. They were not deceived
as to the Republican Legislature in Utah, nor could they be deceived, with the Wilson
Bill taking the profit of protection from everything raised on Utah ground or from under
Utah ground, of the tendency its people would naturally have in politics hereafter.
There is no doubt that it was the settled Democratic program in December not to admit
Utah, but it is also just as certain that as a party it intended to shirk the responsi-
bility for this and by tactics leave the responsibility on the Republicans. It was then
that the wisdom of our organized Republican strength was made apparent. The Utah bill
was brought into the House in December from the Democratic Committee, not with the in-
tention of passing it, but with the expectation and settled belief that it could be used
in tactics to Democratic advantage on the confident faith that the Republicans would
oppose and filibuster against it. It was brought in with the evident intention to shut
out and occupy the time desired by Republicans to defeat other Democratic measures. How-
ever, when it did come this expectation was disappointed. The Republicans by following
a splendid strategy under the leadership of Mr. Reed politely informed the confident
Democracy that instead of opposing Utah or filibustering against it they were friendly
to the people of Utah and in favor of admitting the Territory to Statehood. The bDempo-
crats had gone too far, they could not recede, and therefore the bill passed—another
strange evidence in this unanimity of both political powers that something higher than
human power and wisdom has been in this matter for its guidance from the first. No one
could have believed that in the same House where for so many years the name of Utah and
the word Mormon had been used to excite bitter contests, and where the Democrats always
stood to challenge the Republicans for their course towards Utah, the time had come when
both parties would act together as one man to admit it as a State. There is a blessing
in this for the State and its people, I am sure. Before leaving the question of its
passage in the House, I should say that in addition to Mr. Reed, whose powerful friend-
ship was so valuable, we had also the benefit of the almost equally powerful influence
of Mr. Burrows of Michigan, Mr. Dolliver of Iowa, Mr. Hooker of New York, Mr. Babcock
of Wisconsin, Messrs. Hepburn, Hull, and Lacey, of Iowa, and indeed of every one of the
stronger men among the Republican leaders. The only speeches made in opposition were
by Mr. Morse, Republican, the stove-polish man of Massachusetts whose opposition was
a help, and Mr. Harter, Democrat, of Ohio, whose intolerance of speech simply emphasized
the need for national sense and action.
The bill therefore went from the House to the Senate bearing the invincible
approval of unamimouss passage. Here the Democrats were placed in a dilemma. They still
professed to hold in cordial degree the same friendship that they undoubtedly had toward
Utah and its people in previous years, notably such men as Senator Faulkner of West Vir-
ginia, Senator Vest of Missouri, and Senator Coke of Texas. They assured us, since they
saw no chance of escaping and since they plainly saw they could not defeat Utah without
putting it on the ground of objection to the Mormons and without thereby forfeiting the
friendship of the Mormon balance of power in several States, that they would pass it and
give you Statehood for the holidays. But they did not meand it. They intended to hide
it away in the Committe, to keep it in the background, claiming that they were still in-
terested in it but that the absorbing question of the tariff bill had relegated that and
everything else of comparatively minor importance to the rear. Thus 1893 was concluded
and 1894 began. We saw very plainly that unless we could use in some way the passing
chances of the current contests in the Senate and be of service to one faction in the
Democratic party as against the other, we could not win. For it was both the party in-
tention and interest not to admit to Statehood a Territory whose two Senators would be
Republican and change the balance of power in the Senate. In addition to this, some
of the most powerful men in the Senate were opposed personally to the admission of
Utah or any other western States. I should have said further back in this letter that
all the time one of the most powerful elements we have had to contend against was the
eastern prejudice against the admission of any more western States, and especially of
any more silver States. The gold people of the East realize the danger to them of more
power going to the West and to the silver States. We have had constantly to combat this
influence, especially amongst all New England Members of Congress, both House and Senate,
and all the New York Members and all the Pennsylvania. Senator Hill of New York, the
most powerful Democrat in the Senate, came here in deadly hostility to the admission of
Utah or any more western States, and sought a place on the Territorial Committee in order
to make his opposition effective and in order more securely to guard the East against
what they considered the danger of the admission of more silver States and Senators. In
furtherance of this program of Senator Hill's he also had himself placed upon the sub-
committee of the Territorial Committee, together with Chairman Faulkner and Senator Platt
Faulkner a former undoubted friend but changed into secret opposition by the secret or-
ders of his party, and the latter the longtime enemy of Utah who the Democrats supposed
would continue that enmity and who could be used as a public scapegoat for the secret
Democratic opposition. Senator Gorman, the most influential Democratic members of the
Senate and the guardian of the party's interest, was also actuated by this fear and be-
lief that Utah would be Republican, and also by the eastern prejudice against western
or silver States. We found also as events developed not only this prejudice amongst
the eastern or gold States, but also a still more dangerous prejudice in the southern
States against the admission of any more western Territories on the ground that they
would become northern States and therefore help to decrease the power of the South.
Thus we had the dangerous opposition of the mercenary interests of all the eastern
States and of the political ambition of all the southern States, which, as you know,
are so covetous of power for the South in the government. In the face of the develop-
to defeat the nomination of Mr. Hornblower. Before doing so we secured the pledges of
honor of Mr. Gorman and Mr. Hill that they would favor the admission of Utah. But for
this opportunity we should have stood no show whatever, despite of all the powerful
influences we had assembled, to pass Utah into Statehood in this Congress. On the
second fight, over the nomination of Peckham, these gentlemen again appealed to us and
we again organized a line and gave them success. This increased their gratitude. Mr.
Hill from the first day changed about and has been our active, willing friend at any
call on our part and at every opportunity he could see himself to serve us. Mr. Gorman
did not come so promptly up to the fulfilment of his promise and kept wishing to post-
pone fulfilment until after the tariff bill. Indeed, it is certain that he went so
far with his power as Chairman of the Caucus Committee of the Senate, and therefore the
dictator of his party in the Senate, to instruct Senator Faulkner, Chairman of the
Territorial Committee, to keep the bill in that Committee and out of the Senate. Mean-
time we had been organizing our forces, and found a splendid ally in Senator White of
California, who has been from the first everything as loyal and helpful and vigilant
in your interest as he could have been if he had been a citizen of Utah and one of your
own people. He has had not only this friendship but he is a man of remarkable re-
sources, of experience in legislation, of determination in purpose, and peculiar facil-
ity for such work. He had rendered you a service your people can never fully repay.
While waiting on Senator Faulkner's movements, who kep^t^ delaying even a meeting of the
Committee to consider Utah and who kept going to West Virginia on days that had been
appointed for that purpose, and who employed every sort of tactics to keep us defeated
and yet in a good humor, we kept strengthening our lines in the Senate and also in the
Committee. Afther they exhausted all their excuses for the non-action of the Committee
they began to lay the whole blame on Senator Platt, who was the principal Republican on
the Committee. Senator Platt had still retained his opposition up to this time, despite
of our bringint^g^ to bear upon him the united influence of the party and many powerful
influences in New England and his own State. Finally he resented the idea of being
made responsible for what was in reality the secret Democratic program of non-action,
and he also found that he could not help to discriminate against Utah because it was a
western State without alienating from the support of the protectionists in the Senate
such western men as Senator Stewart and some others. He was too manly to bear off the
sins of the secret Democratic purpose, and was too mindful of the interests of the
East to help break the protection line or let any Republican Senator vote for the Wilson
or free-trade bill. Finally he came out flat-footed, declared himself for Utah's ad-
mission, and wrote Senator Faulkner a letter that he was in favor of admission and that
as a member of the sub-committee of the Territorial Committee for Utah he was ready to
report favorably. This broke the line, and with Senators White, Hill and Call, Demo-
cratic members of the Committee, favorable, and under the leadership of Seantor Hans-
brough, a Republican member of the Committee whose services I should have mentioned
earlier, we were able to stampede a favorable report from the Committee to the Senate.
This surprised the Democratic line again by tactics the same as we had surprised it by
the passage of the bill in the House. After it was out of the Committee and on the
calendar of the Senate it was not longer possible for the Democrats to defeat it except
by open opposition. I should have said at the outset of our program in the Senate we
found in Senator Hansbrough of North Dakota as valuable and helpful a fir[^ri^]end as we
have found any place in this contest. In conjunction with Senator Allison, who as an
older Senator had that acquired power which is peculiar to the Senate, and acting on
his suggestions, he has been our active and working friend and reliance in the Senate.
A member of the Committee, a western man who had lived in California and other western
States, exceedingly popular in manner and influential and respected by all who know him,
he was labored day by day and constantly in our behalf, not only in the Senate and in
the Committee, but coming almost every night to our rooms to help lay our plans and
programs. Many of the most valuable suggestions have come from him in making the fight.
I want you and your people to know that you never can owe more to any man outside of
your own people than to Senator Hansbrough. He is a young man, in his first term in
the Senate, but sure to be returned and to become one of the most powerful members of
this exalted body, so that his friendship in the future will be as valuable as it has
been in the past.
The contest in the Senate has been one of such detail, changing every day
and frequently every hour in such strange manner, that it is impossible for me to
recite it to you with anything like fidelity here. Suffice it to say that it has been
such a peculiar situation that we have never been able to leave the ground. Colonel
Trumbo and I have remained here since November and devoted ourselves entirely to an
alert, vigilant, constant watchfulness of the situation, ready to detect danger at
the first moment or to utilize an advantage at every opportunity. We have had to
enter into nearly every contest unknown to the public to serve this or that friend or
to gain the friendship of this or that element. We have built up our work as a stone-
mason a wall, stone by stone, laying our hopes in solid mortar and rearing a solid
structure on which we felt, despite of the opinion of nearly everybody else and in-
deed of all the experienced men in Congress, that we should win at last. We have had
in Senators Allison and Hansbrough and in other Senators in less degree, constant
watchfulness and service. On the Democratic side Senators White and Hill have been
supreme in help. It has taken the wisdom of many men to win this difficult fight.
Among others I should mention that Mr. R. C. Kerens, whom I have already mentioned,
member of the National Committee from Missouri, has come on and spent weeks of his
time in our service. He is a friend to remember, for he has been both useful and
faithful. ^I wish I might give you too the names of all our faithful friends.^ Indeed, you can take the Republican roll call, and I may say of
it that two thirds of the names represent loyal and active friends and the other
third men who have been borought to friendship through influence and conscience. The
same may be said of the mass of the Democratic Senators, who when the situation had
to be faced faced it on the side of manliness and justice and voted on the right side
despite of their party's interest and their own secret party desire to keep the Terri-
tory out because it was Republican.
There is another and more delicate matter, which I have confided to General
Clawson, who has been here with us and whose counsel and vigilance have been in the
highest degree valuable, and whose courage and cheerfulness have furnished strength
and confidence to both of us; and he will confide it to you. These means, used for
purely honorable purposes and yet for necessary things, were raised entirely from Repub-
lican sources because of friendship for your Territory and your people and because of
confident faith that the Territory was to be identified with Republican policies and
ambitions. This help has come freely, has been used wisely, and without it success could
not possibly have been achieved. It has been used with as much honor and to as good re-
sults as conscience could suggest or honesty require.
In closing this letter, which is so long that I fear it may weary you but yet
which I could not make shorter and which indeed I might have made longer under my sense
of fidelity to all the friends we have found, I am constrained by such a sense of appre-
ciation as I have never been called upon to feel before, to refer again to the strangely
loyal and successful and splendid service which over long years and in the face of every
obstacle and against impediments which would have dismayed any other man I have evenr
known, Colonel Trumbo has served you and your people. It has been beautiful to me to see
such a friendship possible in the human heart. His ambition for your people, his deter-
mination to lift them up out of wrong into victory, to compensate them for the injustice
they have suffered, to make them known to all the American people for their honesty of
character and their purity of good intentions, and the dedication of his life to the end
of making the Mormon name as honorable and as accepted in honor in the sight of every
high minded American, have renewed my faith in human nature. It has inspired my own
heart to see how he has been actuated also by loving friendship and devotion to you. No
son whom I have ever known could be more loyal, and no son I have ever known has served
a father as well as he has served you. It has been, as he has constantly said to me,
not only his ambition to accomplish this desired vindication for your people, but also to
accomplish it in your time and under your Presidency, while you were still the shepherd
of your people and the hope of all our hearts.
Whatever appreciation you shall show to him, whatever honor you may offer to
him, it will be deserved. In addition to the gratitude you shall forever owe him, I
feel it as a sense of duty to you as well as to myself, and to the pledges I have every-
where made, to say that I think he should be sent on your own motion as one of the men
to represent you in the United States Senate. No other man could possibly represent you
to your benefit and to your vindication as he can. No dozen men nor any hundred men
among you are as well known as he is to the powerful and controlling men not only in Con-
gress in this later time, but throughout the country. You know, and this is realized
probably more by President Cannon than any other member of your people, that experience
and acquaintance are necessary in a Congressman or Senator to serve his people fully and
faithfully. If Colonel Trumbo had been a member of the Senate ten years he could not have
gained more acquaintance and friendship to your advantage than he has gained now. Uni-
versally the people of the country and the people in Congress look to him as representa-
tive of Utah. This fact of itself is sufficient for my position. The friendships he
has formed, the acquaintance he has gained with the most powerful elements of the country,
will all be in your service. Besides, no one else will ever know and therefore no one
else could ever redeem as he can, the thousands and thousands of obligations that we have
incurred in this long contest in your behalf. He knows many things that none of you will
ever know, and yet things that a people or a State can no more afford to forget or fail
to fulfill than any man of honor. I feel my own honor involved in the representation of
the State of Utah in Congress. This whole matter has been on my conscience as nothing in
my public life has ever been. I was the first to take up in detail the position taken
by Mr. Blaine, and the first to carry it to the attention of the Republican leaders in
detail, and the first to organize and assemble all the party influences in your behalf.
Very much of the action taken by others has been taken on my assurance of honor that I
was not being misled, that yours were a people in whom faith could safely be placed, and
that your destiny as a people and a State ran in the same grooves with Republican pol-
icies, Republican patriotism and Republican interest. I shall feel that I am on the bond,
that my honor stands for guaranty, and therefore that I am at liberty, and indeed con-
strained by the highest sense of duty that can actuate an honorable man, to make known to
you the obligations which rest upon you in these sacred regards.
I ought to say also, and will say in brief, that we have carried in parallel
with our contest for Statehood the material interests of Utah, that we have never for-
gotten the industrial and social ambitions of your people, that we have brought to the
attention of everybody with whom we have come in contact the empire of natural wealth
and resources and industrial possibilities in your borders, and your ambition as a
people and a Church to develop a community which will be an example of American in-
telligence and merit and conservative of the highest average good to every citizen, and
always regardful of all true interests of the republic. The railroad enterprise has
been in some degree a backbone in our endeavors. This enterprise can be carried for-
ward and can be made the means not only of fulfilling many obligations that we have in-
curred to many prominent men whose help has been vital, but also of gaining to your
State their personal interest and valuable friendship. It is the destiny of your State
to parallel the career of the most prosperou^s^ States in the Union, prosperous in a
material sense and ranking highest in the noblest senses. Since I have become identi-
fied in sympathy with your people and your ambition the possibilities of Utah have con-
stantly grown upon me, and I shall find much of my future life I am sure involved with
your people and your ambitions. Here occurs to me something I ought to have said earl-
ier, and that is that in securing the help of many of the most powerful elements which
have come to our assistance I have not only given assurance that there will be no cause
for dissatisfaction with the men who shall come to represent the State of Utah in Con-
gress, but that the elements of discord in your Territory will be pacified or removed.
I know it is in your ambition as a people to make your ways by peaceful methods, and
this is the high duty of all leaders of men and of all associations of Christian people.
The arch enemy of your Territory and your people has been a newspaper, ably edited,
almost satanic in its ingenuity for mischief, relentless and cruel, and ever sure to
remain an element of harm and injury if left to its present control. I have given the
assurance that this will be changed, and I have done this confident in the action I
represented faithfully the wisdom and fidelity of your intentions. I think this prop-
erty should be purchased, and I have pledged that it shall be representative of Repub-
lican policies, and I am willing to take it up in connection with such people as you may
assign and help to organize it or do anything in the matter which the common interest
may suggest or your people desire. The necessity for control of this engine of good or
evil is heightened by the fact that such people after defeat are capable of nothing but
bitterness and desire for revenge. While it can never control again, it can always make
mischief, it can always be a subject of annoyance and an element of discontent. There
ought to be no trouble in securing it, for the men who control it are actuated only by
mercenary interests and therefore are open to negotiation and arrangement.
There is another suggestion that I feel that I ought to make to you in view
of correcting evil impressions in regard to Mormonism and its people in all that wider
world outside of Utah, and that is that either in Chicago or New York, and in both would
be better still, should you in some way secure the friendship of an influentail news-
paper in each of the great political parties of the country. To me, while I have been
in five or six years canvassing this subject with the people of every State in the Union
and with people of all shades of opinion and degrees of intelligence, it has been sim-
ply astonishing that such dense ignorance as well as such malicious prejudice exists
everywhere in regard to the real fiber and actual character and purpose of your people.
We have been exceedingly fortunate in our general arrangements and in our effort to
systematize and mobilize all the strong and controlling elements in your favor, in
reaching the influential newspapers of the political parties, as well as of the Churches.
After this I fear many of these publications will naturally lapse into the old-time
feeling, and offer nothing by way of resistance to the prevailing prejudice against you,
nor by way of enlightenment of the public in regard to your actual merits and ambitions
as a community and a people. Undoubtedly the plowing that we have done in every influ-
ential community of the nation will yield good things to you constantly hereafter; but
it is very important in my judgment that you have in one or both of the great commercial
centers of the country such friendship on the part of one or two strong newspapers as
will at all times, without appearing to be special pleadsers for or special champions of
you, defend you against false accusation, and gradually give to all the American people
the actual facts in regard to the Mormon Church and its good purposes, to the Mormon
people with their refinement and education, their love of gentle things in life, their
artistic development, their ambition to rear their children and their States in all the
finer things of life, and their aspiration indeed to make themselves fully the equal of
any American in every test and accomplishment of civilization and refinement, as well as
of Christianity. I shall find it my pleasure, as I have already done in large measure,
to keep supplying to the magazines, to the houses printing syndicate letters, and all
other diffusive agents, such information as will tend to correct the false impressions
existing in this country in regard to the degree of intelligence and the measures of am-
bition of your people. In the magazines you will have a hearing that will be internation^-^
al as well, and along these high lines of publications read by all the more intelligent
people of the world constant effort to render to you all actual justice on your merits
will be advisable. As I have before suggested, I think, in a letter to President Cannon,
a book written in comprehensive manner by someone having the historical quality of anal-
ysis and the judicial quality of fairness and some one not a Mormon, ought to be written
and printed, giving to the world the facts as to the Mormons of today and what they are
and aim to be in every feature and respect.
In reading over my letter after having progessed this far, I notice that I
have omitted any mention, in the hurry of writing, of the one man who through the long
period of your years of trial has stood by you more faithfully than any other public man
outside of your own people. I refer to Senator Teller of Colorado, who has been a tower
of strength to you in all the crises of your career, and who has stood in the Senate and
acted throughout the nation whenever called upon to do so with all his power in your
sufficient defense. No public man of today stands higher in the respect of the American
people than Senator Teller, and his record for sincerity, his approved statesmanship, which
has stood the test of many contests, have all been of wonderful and saving help to you in
the last year, and especially in these nervous months of the contest before the present
Democratic Congress. I need not multiply to you, however, any words of commendation of
this spendid man, for he was deep in your hearts and affections even before you knew of
me, and once there will always remain with abiding appreciation.
Neither do I wish to leave the impression that I fear I might have done if I
left this letter with no further reference to the good work done in your behalf by influ-
ential Democrats in this Congress. Mr. Rawlins, your Delegate, has been faithful, capable
earnest and vigilant, and has done all that could have been expected of him, and is en-
titled to your gratitude and praise. In the House, such Democrats as Mr. Geary of Calif-
ornia, Mr. Washington of Tennessee, Speaker Crisp, Mr. Wheeler, Chairman of the Territor-
ial Committee, and many others who might be mentioned, and in the Senate such Democratic
leaders as Mr. Blackburn, and finally Senator Jones of Arkansas, have constantly rendered
good and very valuable service. I am satisfied that if the settled purpose of the Demo-
cratic leaders at one time to deny sStatehood in some secret manner or in such way as to
leave the blame on the Republicans had been carried into the field of open attempt, leav-
ing us to call upon the Republican leaders to force the bill to a passage, we could have
carried a solid Republican line in both houses, and enought Democrats of good faith and
fairness would have voted with us to carry the bill. Indeed, if it should come that
President Cleveland should veto the bill, I have faith that we could pass it over him with
a solid Republican line and enought from the Democratic side to give us the necessary two
thirds. But so far as we can learn up to this time, President Cleveland is ready to sign
the bill. His expressions have been favorable, his views are very broad, and his own in-
tentions I have no doubt are all favorable to the measure. The only danger in that source
lies in the secret influence that may be exerted upon him from the eastern States and the
gold people of the eastern States, to which influences he is peculiarly susceptible, and
to the influence of Democratic leaders from sSouthern States, who are opposed to any more
northern States. Yet Colonel Trumbo is confident that through the President's favorable
disposition, and with the help of Attorney General Olney and Secretary Carlisle and Sec-
retary Morton, he can gain the coveted Presidential approval.
The delay put upon you by the terms of the bill, in postponing the realizations
of Statehood practically until 1896, were unavoidable. Without these provisions it would
not have been possible to pass the bill without endangering it at the White House. The
solid Republican line in the Senate wanted to amend these features, and we could have
passed the bill as they desired it, but it was not advisable to give any partisan color
to it nor afford any partisan reason for Mr. Cleveland to disapprove it. We have carried
things from the first along the line of the aspiration to make it unanimous, to tran-
quilize all the elements, and to bring Utah into the Union a welcome member of the fam-
ily and welcomed by all elements. Things have moved in a mysterious way to this end,
and the devout may well think that the hand of God has controlled in it, bringing a
blessing for all time with it.
I hope to visit Utah within a short time, and renew with you and your people
the pleasant acquaintance of heretofore, and in the freedom of such interview talk over
this great struggle and bring to your attention and knowledge many things which no doubt
you and your colleagues will be glad to know. In conclusion I wish to express my own
great personal sense of satisfaction that I was permitted to bear a part in this diffi-
cult struggle in a noble cause. It has been with increasing pleasure that I have found
in every year, and almost in the developments of every day, my faith in your people con-
firmed and my good opinion increased. It has gradually grown, beginning with 1889, to be
an absorbing question in my life, and it has been a pleasure for me since that period to
subordinate my own interests to the one aspiration I had come to share with you to make
Statehood certain to you, and to make it certain in such a way as would by the testimony
of the American Congress vindicate you and your people from the obloquy of the past. I
am also glad that the shepherd star of Utah, symbolizing as no other star has ever done
an ambition to serve the common people, and the solidarity and destiny of all your people,
has appeared in all its sovereignty and beauty upon the flag of our country during the
time of your faithful and loving administration as President of your Church. I shall al-
ways account it an honor and a pleasure, to be treasured by my children and held by them
in sacred memory, to have been associated with yourself, with Presidents Cannon and Smith,
General Clawson, and the other good men of your membership, in this praiseworthy enter-
prise of gaining justice to a noble tTerritory and a worthy people. I believe that in the
blessing coming to you with Statehood, a blessing to the spirit and the pride of your
people, this long contest, ending successfully, will also be the means of bringing to your
State countless jmaterial blessings. It has made your resources known to all the intelli-
gent people of the republic, to nearly every community, and this information will bring to
you speedily and in vast volume the capital necessary to develop your natural wealth, to
create your factories, to build your cities, and to make you splendid in everything that
commercial ambition and political aspiration may desire.
Hoping you may be spared many years to continue your gentle rule over the peopl[e]
you love so much, and invoking for you and all your people the highest prosperity and
God's blessing always, I am,
Sincerely yours,
President Wilford Woodruff,
Salt Lake City, Utah.
P.S. It has occurred to me, as I have read this letter over that it would
not be just to let it go to you, and into the records of your people, without
referring to the early, continuous, and remarkably influential and valuable
services of the Hon. M. M. Estee, of California. It may seem superfluous in me
to do it, since you and all of your co-laborers know in far larger degree than
I of the fact and measure of his important and devoted services. In the dignity
of his strength, and with the profound respect for him in the nation, his early
testimony to your honor and merit as a people and a Church, his ceaseless efforts
to correct the wrong and false impressions of the Mormon character and purpose, and
his loyalty in attesting your good-citizenship and your patriotism and love of
the Republic in common with all American citizens, all served you to great results,
and helped potentially in changing the opinions of many leaders of public thought
and party action. I have heard him in many social and political gatherings in
Washington, New York, and Chicago, speak of these subjects; and always he convinced
the most of his hearers of the truth and justice of his opinion of the good faith
and merit of the people of Utah. You will need some great lawyer, versed in
constitutional law and profound in legal wisdom, to draft your Constitution.
Judge Estee, I understand, was largely the author of the original and also the
revised Constitution of California—an instrument which might well be taken as
the model for your Constitution, as it was taken for North Dakota and other Western
States. It would be a graceful act of remembering friendship to commit to Judge
Estee the work of framing a draft for the Constitution of Utah.
In writing this whole letter I have been keenly conscious of omitting
reference to the many good works done, in line with the general effort in the nation,
by men of your own fold and faith. I have fully appreciated the great value of
their service, and yet I felt that I was not entitled to try and tell you of the
great work done in the nation by your own people—from President Cannon, with his
almost unrivalled abilities and fidelity, of which I have often heard Mr. Blaine
speak in words of cordial estimate and admiration, down through many others. But
I did not feel I had any commission or indeed excuse to tell you what you already
knew of your own faithful men. As I have referred to it, I cannot refrain from
speaking from my own knowledge of the especially admirable and capable work
accomplished by Mr. Frank J. Cannon, one of the younger of your influential
brethren, but who, like Aaron, is noted among his brothers for the eloquence and
grace of the speech. Before Committees of Congressmen, before Committees of
Republicans, and before popular gatherings, including a Republican National
Convention, he has held up your standards and proclaimed your noble ambition as
a people, with a persuasive force and enkindling fervor that have wrought great
things in placating prejudice and winning the good will of good people throughout
the nation. I have seen so much of his good and faithful work, in places remote
from you, and in acts unknown to you, that I cannot gain the consent of my own
heart to close this letter without at least speaking of the marked fidelity and
value of his services.
(Signed.) J. S. C.