The
Constitution, to be sure, denies to Congress the power to pass laws
prohibiting the free exercise of religion; but it is the most monstrous
nonsense to argue that the Federal Government is bound thereby to
connive at polygamy, perjury, incest, and murder. There are principles
of social order which constitute the political basis of every state in
Christendom, that are violated by the practices of the Mormon Church,
and which this Republic is bound to maintain without regard to any
pretence that their transgressors act in pursuance of religious belief.
Thirty years ago, no other doctrine would have occurred to the mind
of an American statesman. It is only the special-pleadings and
constitutional hair-splittings by which Slavery has been forced under
national protection, that now impede Congressional intervention in the
affairs of Utah. The Christian Church of the United States, also, has a
duty to perform toward the Mormons, which has long been neglected. While
its missionaries have been shipped by the score to India and China, it
has been blind to the growth, upon the threshold of its own temple, of a
pagan religion more corrupt than that of the Brahmin.
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