History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

JUDGE BROCCHUS. 457
the 7th and 1 Oth of September, a general conference
of the church was held, at which the judge obtained
permission to address the assembly. During his remarks
he drifted into the subject of polygamy, directing
this part of his discourse to the women, whom he
exhorted to a life of virtue. 38 He also took to task
some of the Mormon leaders, who on a previous occasion
had spoken disrespectfully of the government,
one of them having gone so far as to consign the late
President Zachary Taylor to the nether regions.
The Mormons were sorely exasperated, and but
that they were held in restraint by Brigham, would
have done violence to the judge. "If," said the former,
"I had but crooked my little finger, he would
have been used up; but I did not bend it. If I had,
the sisters alone felt indignant enough to have chopped
him in pieces." 39 The governor contented himself
with rebuking the judge, who, he declared, must be
either profoundly ignorant or perversely wicked. It
had become a matter of history throughout the enlightened
world, he declared, that the government of
the United States regarded the persecution of the
saints with indifference, and by their silence gave
sanction to such proceedings. Hundreds of women
and children had in consequence gone to their graves
prematurely, and their blood cried to heaven against
those who had caused or consented to their death.
Nevertheless, he loved the government and the constitution
of the United States; but he did not love
corrupt ministers of the governmei. .. He was indignant
that such men as Brocchus should come there to
lecture the people on morality and virtue, and should
make such insinuations as he had done ; and he repeated
the statement that Zachary Taylor was then in tophet.
At this last remark, Brocchus jumped to his
feet and protested angrily, whereupon Heber C. Kim-
aB Utah Early Records, MS., 134-5; Stenhouse's Rocky Mountain Saints, 276.
39 Journal ofDiscourses, ii. 186-7. After this occurrence, Brigham frequently
warned the troublesome of the danger they incurred should he but crook his
finger. Stenhouse's Rocky Mountain Saints, 277.