140 years ago today - Jan 6, 1879

U.S. Supreme Court issues its "Reynolds vs. the United States" decision which upholds constitutionality of 1862 Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act, and further rules that not every religious practice is protected by First Amendment. As result of the Supreme Court-s first decision about sexual conduct, George Reynolds is imprisoned from 1879 to 1881 for polygamy. As of 1990s this case continues to be Supreme Court's precedent for limiting some practices defined as religious.

John Taylor preaches in Salt Lake City: "Professor Huxley, in visiting Niagara Falls, made some remarks which I remember were published and copied extensively in the papers, to the effect that here was another evidence afforded of the many thousands or millions of years (I forget the number now) that it had taken to wash away the rocks below these falls. And this evidence was advanced in support of geological ideas. I thought to myself; yes, professor Huxley is a very learned man. I wonder if he knew that rock was once in a friable, plastic condition, when, by the force of the watery element the soft stratum might be disintegrated, excavated and removed by the washing process in perhaps a very few days."