Leo Lyman's Deep Dive into the “Sausage Making” of Utah's Statehood (Season 2, Ep. 3 - Part 2)

**Brad Westwood** (0:10)
Welcome to the podcast Speak Your Piece. This is a podcast about Utah's history, produced by the Utah Department of Heritage and Arts. I'm Brad Westwood. This is our fourth session with Edward Leo Lyman, about his book, Finally Statehood, to the widest audience. Speak Your Piece is a podcast where writers, historians, curators, and all who contributed to Utah's history, share their insights and discoveries.
My guest today is a continuation of an interview that we've done before. We've done two prior interview segments with Dr. Edward Leo Lyman. In 2021, Utah will celebrate 125 years as a state.
Leo's book is essential reading to understanding just how Utah reached statehood. The title of his book is Finally Statehood, Utah Struggles 1849 to 1896 Hello, my friend. How are you?

**Edward Leo Lyman** (1:16)
I'm good. Thank you. Hey, there are a couple loose ends from back in the middle of the 1880s I'd like to touch on before we jump up to 1890

**Brad Westwood** (1:26)
Please, let's do it.

**Edward Leo Lyman** (1:30)
I tried to stress before how crucial the Utah Commission was. Part of what they're doing is helping alter some of the prevailing domination of the polygamous.
One of the things they did was make an unfair rule and then they changed it, which said that if you've ever been in plural marriage, you could never vote. But after that, it was altered to where if you testify in court that you will no longer live in plural marriage, you can qualify to vote again. And an amazing number, especially around 1885, actually 43% of those who appeared in court in this really concentrated anti-polygamy raid, period, by the US marshal deputies.

**Brad Westwood** (2:41)
This is where the marshals were out and about across Utah.

**Edward Leo Lyman** (2:46)
They were really looking for the deputies. That's absolutely right.
And many of those who came to court promised that they would abandon Leroy Marys. They would still be supporting the wives, but they wouldn't be living with them. And there's an erosion, a dramatic one, during that period. And that's never really been stressed much.

**Brad Westwood** (3:13)
And the Utah Commission reversed or tried to change its voting, the signature signing thing to say, I'm not a polygamist. Previously, it was if you were a prior polygamist, you were unable to vote.

**Edward Leo Lyman** (3:29)
Ever. Yep.

**Brad Westwood** (3:33)
You were going to say something more, please.

**Edward Leo Lyman** (3:37)
The other thing that relates to that, there are two observers. One of them is an almost unknown former congressman from Iowa, who observed the LDS in the Council Bluffs area, which he had represented in Congress. And then he was a longtime Utah Democrat. His name was Hadley D. Johnson.
And he predicted publicly, plural marriage is becoming, quote, so unpopular that the younger members of the church will repudiate the system and refuse in its practice.
Now, there'd be exceptions. Several really impressive young Mormon apostles include one of my heroes, Avermage Cannon, and far from a hero of mine, Rudger Clawson, and their wives. But in fact, there is an erosion going on. The other observer is one of the Utah Commissioners, a former Civil War general in the Battle of Shiloh, General John A. McClernand, who's a Democrat on the Utah Commission, and he's from Illinois, and he said that the fervency in backing polygamy still existed. But then he said this, but the more often the Mormons commit themselves, whether regularly or irregularly, against polygamy. There are times when they have to say, hey, we're backing off. The more they will have increased the obstacles to retreat from the path of reform.
There's an erosion that he's predicting in a letter, actually, to President Grover Cleveland, that's quite perceptive.

**Brad Westwood** (5:38)
If you keep up the campaign and they keep making public statements or writing to this effect or speaking or testifying, that all of this will be a cumulative effect on eventually holding them.

**Edward Leo Lyman** (5:53)
It's a tough thing to state, but sometimes the church officials seem to have their fingers crossed when they say they're backing off.

**Brad Westwood** (6:03)
Go ahead, please, Leo.

**Edward Leo Lyman** (6:07)
McClernand senses that and he says even if they keep announcing it, more and more people are going to start to say, hey, I agree with that and I'm not going back. That's a subtle public opinion kind of thing that I sense having immersed myself in the sources for a long time, that hasn't been stressed and I just wanted to be sure it got into our mix for today.

**Brad Westwood** (6:38)
Absolutely. Isn't there a tremendous amount of, if not acrimony, there were no unanimous decisions in the quorum of the 12 during this time. I mean, isn't there just polarized, constant discussions and the only thing they could default to is, perhaps we could take a legal position or cross our fingers.