Dr. Garrett Dirkmaat (72:21)
Well, here's some, here's some parts of his talk. We could read the whole thing, but it's very, very, very long. During the last 80 years, from small beginnings and with small means, we hazard little in the prediction that the whole of our territories may within 20 years become more organized. So it's going on and on about, hey, look, all of our territories are being organized. It's great, wonderful. There is an evil which the remoteness of and wilderness of our immense territories has fostered into fearful importance. I allude to polygamy, that foulest product of the 19th century, which seems to denote a decline in civilization. Mormonism, we are aware, sprung up in the older states, but polygamy was unheard of until the Saints removed beyond the reach of civilization in Missouri and Illinois. That fanatical and persecuted sect was suspected of some of these practices inconsistent with morality. But it was not until they felt themselves secure in the mountain fastness of Utah, a thousand miles beyond the frontiers of civilization, that they threw off all disguise. Apparently he was C. Kimball's disguise, since he's the one, right? And shocked the moral sense of the country in the world by the open practice of polygamy. They feel secure from molestation in that remote and not easily accessible region. We know what their history has been. They have publicly defied the government. They have trampled the laws of Congress. And notwithstanding the millions of money that has been spent in sending an army out to subdue them, still they revel in licentiousness. They insult your judges, they mock your army and murder your citizens. And then he goes on to say that there's an anti polygamy bill that's been introduced, but he's worried that it won't. It, it, it won't be supported. Um, I have no constitutional doubt or scruple. Cause you know, the Constitution forbids making laws against someone's religion. But I have no constitutional doubt or scruple about voting to suppress a practice which is a felony at common law and an insult to decency and morality. Because the problem is polygamy is legal in Utah territory and the federal government when this law is going to say that it's. That it's illegal everywhere. Even though states, at least ostensibly, have the right to make their own marriage laws. The fact that a practice so monstrous has sprung up in one of the organized territories of the Union proves the necessity of a general law to prohibit it not only in Utah, but in all of the territories. But who is to put the law enforce in Utah? There, the institution of polygamy has become permitted to grow up in such proportions as to defy the suppression by any ordinary legal process. The whole population, sustain it and practice it, or desire to practice it. So the one sitting on the sidelines, like, oh, I wish I could. Who is to put the law enforce? The Mormons. Have we no experience with the, the integrity of Mormon sheriffs and Mormon juries? Have they not screened or acquitted the most heinous murderers who murdered in the cause of polygamy? I don't even know what he's making as a reference there, but let me just say this. I mean, I, I don't want to be that guy, but how dare you. How many people served time for the massacre of men and children and the wounding of women at Hans Mill in Missouri? We know, literally, we have a list of all of the people that were in the militia, the Missouri State militia that massacred and murdered unarmed children there. How many of them served jail time? Oh, oh, zero of them. Interesting, because in the land of liberty, you know, the judge, the, the juries and the judge, well, there wasn't even a jury because there was no arrests that were even made. There's estimated there's 200 people in the mob that murdered Joseph and Hiram Smith and attempt to murder John Taylor and Willard Richards? How many people go to prison for a murder which literally hundreds of people witnessed? 0 people. How many people go to prison for murdering Edmund Durfee, shooting him in the back? Outside of, outside of Nauvoo, nobody. The claim that an American can't get justice in a Mormon court is as much, much a tail wagging a dog as I have ever heard. Latter Day Saints. One of the reasons why Joseph finally made the decision that they would have to leave the United States is that they could not get justice in the United States. You know, one of the reasons why no one was convicted in the trial of the murderers of Joseph and Hyrum Smith because they, the judge, barred all Mormons from serving on the jury. Now, Hancock county is primarily made up of Mormons, which means accidentally, if you're just throwing names out of a hat, A majority of the people on that jury are going to be Mormons. And the judge barred Mormons from serving on the jury. But, you know, it's totally fair court. It's interesting. It's interesting. You know, people will say things sometimes like, you know, that what people claim that you're doing is what they're doing themselves, man. The claim that, yeah, Latter Day Saints, they're the ones who don't have a real judicial process. You mean like the ones that the Latter Day Saints got in New York and in Ohio and in Missouri and in Illinois and in Iowa, by the way, similarly, same thing. It is a claim that is, that is ridiculous to act as if that somehow everything was good, but now it's not. But I'll just leave you with this quote from Representative Foster. The only way to render the abolition of polygamy effectual is to encourage the settlement of the territories as rapidly as possible. If such a law were passed, a very few years would suffice to fill the territories with population and overwhelm the polygamists of Utah beneath the advancing tread of Christian civilization. I mean, it's hard for a Latter Day Saint today to hear, but this Republican Party is going to become the masters of the government. You know, only a few months later with this, the secession crisis that takes place after Lincoln is elected. And this Republican Party with these Congress people and these senators are the ones who are going to start passing anti Mormon bills that are expressly anti Mormon. Not just bills that sometimes affect Mormons, but, but laws that are designed to take away their religious rights. And it's not just that. I mean, someone listening might well, yeah, but polygamy is bad, so it should take that, that right away. Okay, what about laws that take away the rights for Mormons to serve on juries? What about laws that take away the rights for women to vote in Utah territory? I want to help the women in Utah so much. I'm going to give them their freedom by taking away their rights to, to vote. I mean, there's no way of getting around that. And so, yeah, my dander gets up when there's something that someone's saying that's antagonistic towards the church from 1860, especially from an unnamed source from a meeting that I don't know that ever happened from a. Without any corroborating evidence from a claim about a practice that wasn't actually going on, and from a political organ that is dedicated to the extermination and destruction of, of my church. So, yeah, no, I, I don't Super. Take it seriously. And hopefully no one else does either. And so I, I adjure you, I plead with you, don't take anything that someone puts in a pithy quote on X or a screenshot on Facebook at face value. If they were trying to be honest with you, they would have already provided the actual source and the actual context and the actual explanation. And they're not doing that. And why aren't they doing it? Well, nine times out of ten, they don't even know what those things are. In which case, why in the world would I listen to someone who doesn't even know where their quote came from? If the person talking to you about something doesn't know where they got their quote, then they should not be listened to at all. Second, for the very few times that they even do know where it comes from, their entire purpose isn't to give you the whole story or they would have given you the entire antagonistic article and you would have read, holy cow, this guy is an anti Mormon fanatic that wants Mormons exterminated. Instead, they cut out a supposed quote from a supposed leader, put their own supposed spin on it, and then handed it to you and said, hey, what do you think about this? As they did their 7:20 off a mogul yelling their extreme anti Mormonism. So my, my advice for everybody is if you find yourself being pained by the constant flood of online attacks, pull back a bit, do some more blocking to do some more, you know, careful realization that when people are not good faith actors, they will not act in good faith. And that is something that I think is important to understand. So thank you so much for joining us. Sorry that we went a little over time. Richard's over here hating himself.
