| Show STATEHOOD Norma Smith Wanlass Manti UT 84642 Non-Professional Division First Honorable Mention Historical Essay Before admitting Utah to the Union the United States Congress turned down six statehood petitions from the territory and the six petitions are only the efforts that got as far as Washington For 45 years Mormons deliberated petitioned politicked and intrigued almost constantly to achieve Why should in 1849 1856 statehood 1862 be successful 1872 and 18877 in 1895 and failure The answer Polygamy If Congress had admitted the State as in the original petition alnost all of Utah and Nevada as well as large parts of Idsho Wyoming Colorado New Mexico Arizona California and Oregon were within the boundaries of Deseret It took Congress two years to decide what to do When it finally acted it rejected the petition for statehood instead creating the Territory of Utah AsTerritory the Mormon settlers were less able to congrol their own affairs than they would have been asstate When the Mormons came to Utah it was still in Mexico yet part of the problem was that the Mormons had settled the land without authority of the Umited States goverrment They granted tracts to their members to fam and gave vast water and timber rights to their leaders to adninister to the community Because they held their land without title from the United States some gentiles claimed the property of their Mormon neighbors This resulted in court battles and street fights Women were given the right to vote in Utah in 1870 the first in the nation to exercise that right The first votes cast by women in municipal elections in the United States were in Salt Lake City In the Bamunds-Tucker Act of 1887 Congress revoked the right of women to vote--to reduce the political power of the Mormons SH1ff new penalties were prescribed for polygamy by the Bdmunds Act and co-habitation with more than one wife was defined asseparate criminal offense Over 1200 persons L2 |
