seat of the legislative assembly and of the supreme court was removed to Fillmore, and in 1856 again transferred to Salt Lake City.18 In the latter year a further appropriation was asked for the completion of the state-house, but the request was refused, and even the expenses of the assembly and other necessary items were not promptly paid."

Meanwhile most of the gentile officials appointed by the authorities were, according to Mormon accounts, political adventurers of the lowest grade—men who, being glad to accept the crumbs of government patronage, were sent to this the cesspool of the United States. The officials, of course, answered with countercharges, among them that the Mormons combined to obstruct the administration of justice. To attempt to carry out the laws was, they declared, a hopeless task, in a community controlled by an ecclesiastical star-chamber, working out in darkness a sectarian law, and with a grand lama presiding over their suffrages. Complications hence arise, and the conflict known as the Mormon war.

Among the principal causes of the rupture were the frequent disputes between the conflicting judiciaries. By act of 1852 it had been ordered that the district courts should exercise original jurisdiction, both in civil and criminal cases, when not otherwise provided for by law, and should have a general supervision over all inferior courts, to prevent and correct abuses where no other remedy existed. By consent of court,

13 Taylor's Narr., MS.; Wells' Narr., MS.; Hist. B. Young, MS.; Utah Notes, MS.; Olshausen, Mormonen, 163; Utah, Acts Legisl. (ed. 1866), 106. In Richards' Narr., MS., 69, it is stated that the extra expense caused to most of the members was the cause of the second removal. Fillmore is about 105 miles south of S. L. City. In the Deseret News of Jan. 11, 1855, is a description of the state-house at Fillmore, so far as it was then completed.

14 Demands were made on congress for the expenses of the assembly in 1856, and for making a survey of the boundaries of Oregon in the same year. Utah Acts, 1855–6, p. 47; 1858–9, p. 38. Neither was granted. In 1852 a bill passed the house of representatives in congress, giving to the legislatures of territories the control of appropriations for their expenses. To this was added an amendment that the provisions of this act shall not apply to Utah.' U. S. House Jour., 32d Cong. 1st Sess., 780. The bill was thrown out by the

senate.

any person could be selected to act as judge for the trial of a particular cause or question, and while in this capacity possessed all the powers of a district judge. The district court judges were, of course, federal magistrates. By the same act it was provided that there should be judges of probate for each county within the territory; that they should be elected for a term of four years by joint vote of the legislative assembly; should hold four regular sessions each year; and that their courts should be considered in law as always open. Besides the powers pertaining to such courts, they had the administration of estates, the guardianship of minors, idiots, and insane persons, and "power to exercise original jurisdiction, both civil and criminal, and as well in chancery as at common law, when not prohibited by legislative enactment." 15 The probate court judges were, of course, Mormons; but appeal lay from their decisions to the district courts. Subject to the revision of the probate courts were the municipal courts, the justices of the peace, and the three selectmen' appointed for each county, whose duties were to oversee and provide for the maintenance of the poor, to take charge of the persons and estates of the insane, and to bind apprentice, orphan, and vagrant children.18

Thus the probate courts, whose proper jurisdiction concerned only the estates of the dead, were made judges of the living, with powers almost equal to those of the supreme and district courts. These powers were conferred on them, as the gentiles alleged, in order to nullify, so far as possible, the authority of

15 Utah, Acts Legisl. (ed. 1855), 120-1, 123-4. Section 8 of this act, relating to pleadings, is worthy of note, as it shows the tendency of the Mormons to simplify their system of legal procedure. Any pleading which possesses the following requisites shall be deemed sufficient: First, when to the common understanding it conveys a reasonable certainty of meaning. Second, when by a fair and natural construction it shows a substantial cause of action or defence. If defective in the former, the court shall direct a more specific statement. If in the latter, it is ground for demurrer; demurrers for formal defects are abolished.'

16 An act creating the office of selectmen, and defining their duties, approved Feb. 5, 1852, will be found in Utah, Acts Legisl. (ed. 1855), 136–7.

the higher courts; and as the Mormons alleged, because justice could not be had at the hands of the federal officials, who were little with them and at such uncertain times that, save for the probate courts, they would have been practically without civil and criminal jurisdiction. To the malevolent representations of the latter the saints mainly ascribed the Mormon war, and, as will presently appear, the violation of some of their most cherished rights and privileges.

After Secretary Harris and judges Brocchus and Brandebury had set out for Washington, taking with them the territorial seal and the territorial funds, Zerubbabel Snow held court," with little heed to gentile law, until succeeded in 1854 by George P. Stiles, W. W. Drummond being appointed associate judge, as will be remembered, and John F. Kinney chief justice, about the same time.

Stiles, a renegade Mormon, who had been counsel for Joseph Smith and the municipality of Nauvoo at the time when the Nauvoo Expositor was ordered to be suppressed as a nuisance, was assigned to the Carson district, but soon afterward returned to Salt Lake City, where he held several sessions of the court. And now trouble commenced. The legislature had appointed a territorial marshal, who was to take the place of the United States marshal, impanel jurors, and enforce writs when the courts were sitting as territorial courts; while the United States marshal claimed the right to officiate in all the United States courts, whether they were sitting as territorial or federal courts. To the latter, the judge issued certain writs, which it was found impossible to serve, and when the question of jurisdiction was brought before the court, several Mormon lawyers entered and

17 According to the provisions of 'an act concerning the judiciary and for judicial purposes,' approved Oct. 4, 1851. A copy of it will be found in Tullidge's Hist. S. L. City, 93-4. Among other proceedings, Snow tried and con victed several Mexicans for buying Indian slaves. The slaves were forfeited and delivered into the keeping of the Mormons. Waites' Mormon Prophet, 23.

insulted the judge, threatening him with violence unless he decided in their favor.18 Stiles appealed to the governor, but was told that if he could not sustain and enforce the laws, the sooner he adjourned his court the better. A short time afterward the records of the United States district courts were taken from the judge's office during his absence, and a few moments before his return a bonfire was made of the books and papers in his office. He, of course, supposed that the records were also consumed, and so made affidavit on his return to Washington in the spring of 1857. Meanwhile the business of the courts was suspended. The records had, in fact, been removed, and were in safe-keeping; but this silly freak was noised abroad throughout the land with many exaggerations, and excited much adverse comment.

The chief justice was a more popular magistrate than either of his colleagues. In Iowa, where he resided before receiving his appointment, he was better known as a tradesman than as a jurist, and on account of his traffic with the saints at Kanesville was called a jack Mormon. On his arrival at Salt Lake City he added to his judicial functions the occupations of store-keeper and boarding-house proprietor. He never lost the good-will of his patrons, and never refused to drink with them. Rotund, of vinous aspect, and of medium height, dull-witted, brusque in manner, and pompous in mien, he was a man whom Brigham knew well how to use; before taking leave of the Mormons he became an open apologist for polygamy. He remained in the territory until 1856,

18 The names of the lawyers were James Ferguson, Hosea Stout, and J. C. Little. Id., 37. In Dec. 1858 a Mormon grand jury found that 'James Ferguson of Salt Lake City did use language and threats calculated to intimidate Judge George P. Stiles.' S. E. Sinclair, who succeeded Stiles after the arrival of the troops under Johnston, did his utmost to bring to justice those who had intimidated his predecessor. Stenhouse's Rocky Mountain Saints, 283, note. Beadle states that Thomas Williams, also a Mormon lawyer, protested against the insult offered to the judge, that his life was threatened in consequence, and that he was murdered while attempting to escape to California. Life in Utah, 175.

and four years afterward was reappointed. We shall hear of him later.

The official who did more than any other, and perhaps more than all others, to bring about the Mormon war was Associate Judge W. W. Drummond. Leaving his wife and family in Illinois without the means of support, he brought with him a harlot whom he had picked up in the streets of Washington, and introducing her as Mrs Drummond, seated her by his side on the judicial bench. Gambler and bully, he openly avowed that he had come to Utah to make money, and in the presence of the chief justice declared: "Money is my God"19 When first he appeared in court he insulted the community by mocking at their laws and institutions, and especially at the institution of polygamy. He also declared that he would set aside the finding of the probate courts in all cases other than those which lay strictly within their jurisdiction. Here was a direct issue, and one that was immediately taken up, for as yet none of the federal judges had declared the powers granted to these courts by the act of 1852 to be of no effect.20 Nor had any such view of the matter been expressed by the authorities at Washington.

When asking for admission as a state or territory, the Mormons did not suppose that the majesty of the

"Adding, 'And you may put this down in your journal if you like.' Remy's Journey to G. S. L. City, i. 469. Remy states that he was present when the remark was made.

20 Judge Shaver tacitly admitted the jurisdiction of the probate courts, but Chief Justice Kinney was the first to render decisions from the bench confirming their jurisdiction. His interpretation of the organic act is noteworthy: The court holds that by virtue of that clause of the organic act which provides that "the jurisdiction of the several courts provided for," including the probate courts, "shall be as limited by law," that the legislature had the right to provide by law for the exercise by the probate courts of jurisdiction in civil and criminal cases.' Burton's City of the Saints, 379. The clause in section 9 of this act to which Kinney refers provides that 'the jurisdiction of the several courts herein provided for, both appellate and original, and that of the probate courts, and of justices of the peace, shall be as limited by law.' If the phrase 'limited by law' be so interpreted as to extend the right of proving wills to jurisdiction in all other matters, one fails to see the need of federal judges. As well indict a man for murder before a justice of the peace.