[Apostle/Senator Reed Smoot]
I have concluded in my own mind that public announcement of resignations [of apostles Cowley and Taylor] made at this late day would have an unfavorable effect upon the country and Senators. ... The question of [John W.] Taylor and [Matthias F.] Cowley taking plural wives is the only questions talked of among the Senators, or at least the only one I hear. ... Your telegrams impress me with this idea: You have decided not to use the resignations of Taylor and Cowley unless I say they are necessary to save my expulsion, or save me [as U. S. senator]. ... I would rather be expelled from the Senate, go home and resign from the Quorum than have it said now, or hereafter, that Taylor and Cowley was sacrificed or resigned to save me. If Taylor and Cowley have done no wrong and their acts meet with the approval of the Brethern for Heavens sake don't handle them but let us take the consequences; but I cannot bring myself to believe that President Snow would time and again deceive the Quorum or that President Smith is an untruthful man. I would about as soon lose my life as to become convinced of it.
[Reed Smoot, Letter to the First Presidency, as quoted in Minutes of the Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1910-1951, Privately Published, Salt Lake City, Utah 2010]
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