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CHAPTER XVII.
The Mormon Business System.
If there ever was any spirituality in the Mormon church, it was destroyed under the leadership of Brigham Young, who made of the church a money-making institution. Under the monetary system established by him, if the church increases in membership at the same ratio as it has heretofore done it will in time acquire inordinate wealth, the possession of which will vest it with temporal power in the State. This a church should not possess, especially one which engages, generally, in monetary business affairs, and the capital of which is largely increased each year by tithing, and under a tenet of which its adherents, by oath-bound covenants, are pledged to obey its priesthood in temporal affairs. It is so manifestly against public policy for a corporation, especially a church corporation, to engage in general business, that the right to do so should never be granted or the practice tolerated anywhere.
Joseph F. Smith was chosen President of the Mormon church on November 10, 1901. At that date he was not a capitalist, yet in the investigation in the Smoot case before the Senate Committee in March, 1904, he testified that he was President of the State Bank of Utah, Consolidated Wagon and Machinery Company, Salt Lake & Los Angeles Railway Company, Saltair Beach Company (a bathing resort); president and director of the Utah Light and Power Company, Idaho Sugar Company, Inland Crystal Salt Company, Salt Lake Dramatic Association and Salt Lake Knitting Company, also a director of the Union Pacific Railroad Company, Zion's Cooperative Mercantile Institution (which is the largest one in Salt Lake City), and the Deseret News, owned by the Mormon church, and also vice president of the Bullion Beck and Champion Mining Company. (See printed report of the Smoot case, Vol. I, et seq.)
The Mormon church is largely interested in most, if not all, of these companies; also in the new Utah Hotel, the sugar plants in Utah, and many other business enterprises, and its investments therein were made by the various presidents of the church as "trustees in trust."
The practical working of the Mormon church's financial system is forcibly stated in the speech of Senator Thomas Kearns of Utah in the Smoot case, reported in the Congressional Record of February 28, 1905, in which he said:
"Whatever may have been its origin or excuse, the business power of the president of the church and of the select class which he admits into business relations with him is now a practical monopoly, or is rapidly becoming a monopoly, of everything that he touches. I want to call your attention to the extraordinary list of worldly concerns in which this spiritual leader holds official positions. The situation is more amazing when you are advised that this man came to his presidency purely by accident, namely, the death of his seniors in rank; that he had never shown any business ability, and that he comes to the presidency and the directorship of the various corporations solely because he is president of the church. He is already reputed to be a wealthy man, and his statements would seem to indicate that he has large holdings in the various corporations with which he is associated, although previous to his accession to the presidency of the church he made a kind of proud boast among his people of his poverty.
"He conducts railways, street-car lines, power and light companies, coal mines, salt works, sugar factories, shoe factories, mercantile houses, drug stores, newspapers, magazines, theatres, and almost every conceivable kind of business, and in all of these, inasmuch as he is the dominant factor by virtue of his being the Prophet of God. he asserts indisputable sway. It is considered an evidence of deference to him, and good standing in the church, for his hundreds of thousands of followers to patronize exclusively the institutions which he controls.
"And this fact alone, without any business ability on his part, but with capable subordinate guidance for his enterprises, insures their success - and danger and possible ruin for every competitive enterprise. Independent of the business concerns, he is in receipt of an income like unto that which a royal family derives from a national treasury. One-tenth of all the annual earnings of all the Mormons in the world flows to him. These funds amount to the sum of $1,600,000 annually, or five per cent upon $32,000,000, which is one-quarter of the entire taxable wealth of the State of Utah. It is the same as if he owned individually, in addition to all his visible enterprises, one quarter of all the wealth of the State and derived from it five per cent of income without taxation and without discount. The hopelessness of contending in a business way with this autocrat must be perfectly apparent to your minds, The original purpose of this vast tithe, as often stated by speakers for the church, was the maintenance of the poor, the building of meeting houses, etc. Today the tithes are transmuted in the localities where they are paid, into cash, and they flow into the treasury of the head of the church. No account is made, or ever has been made of these tithes. The president expends them according to his own will and pleasure, and with no examination of his accounts except by those few men whom he selects for that purpose and whom he rewards for their zeal and secrecy. Shortly after the settlement of the Mormon church property question with the United States, the church issued a series of bonds amounting approximately to $1,000,000, which was taken by financial institutions. This was probably to wipe out a debt which had accumulated during a long period of controversy with the nation. But since, and including the year 1897, which was about the time of the issue of the bonds, approximately $9,000,000 have been paid in as tithes. If any of the bonds are still outstanding it is manifestly because the president of the church desires for reasons of his own to have an existing indebtedness.
"It will astound you to know that every dollar of United States money paid to any servant of the government who is a Mormon is tithed for the benefit of this monarch. Out of every $1,000 thus paid he gets $100 to swell his grandeur. This is also true of money paid out of the public treasury of the State of Utah to Mormon officials. But what is worst of all, the monarch dips into the sacred school fund and extracts from every Mormon teacher one-tenth of his or her earnings and uses it for his unaccounted purposes; and by means of these purposes and the power which they constitute, he defies the laws of his State, the sentiment of his country, and is waging a war of nullification on the public school system, so dear to the American people. No right-thinking man will oppose any person as a servant of the nation or the State, or as a teacher in the public schools on account of religious faith. As I have before remarked, this is no war upon the religion of the Mormons; and I am only calling attention to the monstrous manner in which this monarch invades all the provinces or human life and endeavors to secure his rapacious ends.
"In all this there is no thought on my part of opposition to voluntary gifts by individuals for religious purposes or matters connected legitimately with religion. My comment and criticism are against a tyranny which misuses a sacred name to extract from individuals the money which they ought not to spare from family needs, and which they do not wish to spare; my comment and criticism relate to the power of a monarch whose tyranny is so effective as that not even the moneys paid by the government are considered the property of the government's servants until after this monarch shall have seized his arbitrary tribute, with or without the willing assent of the victim, so that the monarch may engage the more extensively in commercial affairs, which are not a part of either religion or charity.
"With an income of five per cent upon one-quarter of the entire assessed valuation of the State of Utah today, how long will it take this monarch, with his constantly increasing demands for revenue, to so absorb the productive power that he will be receiving an income of five per cent upon one-half of the property, and then upon all of the property of the State? This is worse than the farming of taxes under the old French kings. Will Congress allow this awful calamity to continue?
"The view which the people of the United States entertained on this subject forty years ago was shown by the act of Congress in 1862, in which a provision, directed particularly against the Mormon church, declared that no church in a Territory of the United States should have in excess of $50,000 of wealth, outside of the property used for purposes of worship. It is evident that as early as that time the pernicious effects of a system which used the name of God and the authority of religion to dominate in commerce and finance were fully recognized.
"This immense tithing fund is gathered directly from Mormons, but the burden falls in some degree upon Gentiles also. Gentiles are in business and suffer by competition with tithe-supported business enterprises'. Gentiles are large employers of Mormon labor, and as that labor must pay one-tenth of its earnings to support competitive concerns the Gentile employer must pay, indirectly at least, the tithe which may be utilized to compete, and even ruin him in business.
"And in return it should be noted that Mormon institutions do not employ Gentiles, except in rare cases of necessity. The reason is obvious: Gentiles do not take as kindly to the tithing system as do the Mormons.
"The Mormon citizen of Utah has additional disadvantages. After paying one-tenth of all his earnings as a tithe Offering, he is called upon to erect and maintain the meeting houses and other edifices of the church; he is called upon to donate to the poor fund of his ward, through his local bishop; he is called upon to sustain the women's relief society, whose purpose is to care for the poor and minister to the sick; he is called upon to pay his share of the expenses for the 2,500 missionaries of the church, who are constantly kept in the field without drawing upon the general funds of the church. When all this is done, it is found that, in defiance of the old and deserved boast of the predecessors of the present president, there are some Mormons in the poorhouses in Utah, and these are sustained by the public taxes derived from the Gentiles and Mormons alike. * * * * * *
"Mr. President, I must not burden you with too many details, but in order for you to see how complete is the business power of this man, I will cite you to one case. The Great Salt Lake is estimated to contain 14,000,000,000 tons of salt. Probably salt can be made cheaper on the shores of this lake than anywhere else in the world. Nearly all its shore line is adaptable for salt gardens. The president of the church is interested in a large salt monopoly which has gathered in the various smaller enterprises. He is president of a railroad which runs from the salt gardens to Salt Lake City, connecting there with trunk lines. It costs to manufacture the salt, and place it on board the cars, 75 cts. per ton. He receives for it $5 and $6 per ton. His company and its subsidiary corporation are probably capitalized at three-quarters of a million dollars.
"Is there menace in this system? To me it seems like a great danger to all the people who are now affected, and therefore of great danger to the people of the United States, because the power of this monarchy within the Republic is constantly extending? If it be an evil, every apostle is in part responsible for this tyrannical course. He helped to elect the president; he does the president's bidding and shares in the advantages of that tyranny.
"I did not call the social system a violation of the pledges to the country, but I do affirm that the business tyranny of Mormon leaders is an express violation of the covenant made, for they do not leave their followers free in secular affairs. They tyrannize over them, and their tyranny spreads even to the Gentiles. In all this I charge that every apostle is a party to the wrong and to the violation. Although I speak of the president of the church as the leader - the monarch in fact - every apostle is one of his ministers, one of his creators, and also one of his creatures, and possibly his successor; and the whole system depends upon the manner in which the apostles and the other leaders shall support the chief leader. As no apostle has ever protested against this system, but has, by every means in his power, encouraged it, he cannot escape his share of the responsibility for it. It is an evil; they aid it. It is in violation of the pledge upon which statehood was granted; they profit by it."
Upon the admission of Utah as a State, the Congress of the United States lost its authority to correct the indefensible practice of the church in engaging in general business affairs, and this can only be done now by an enactment of the legislature of the State; that it possesses authority to prohibit a practice so manifestly against public policy as that in which the church, as I have shown engages, is clear. There is no hope however that a legislature can ever be elected in Utah which will do so, as long as the priesthood retains the political and financial power and influence which it now possesses.
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