Admission of Nevada to the Union
The admission of Nevada to the United States as the 36th state occurred on October 31, 1864, during a critical period of the Civil War. This event was facilitated by President Abraham Lincoln's proclamation, reflecting the need for additional Republican representation in Congress at the time. Nevada's journey to statehood was influenced by its geographical features, including arid landscapes and mountainous regions, which shaped the lives of its early inhabitants, such as the Paiute, Shoshone, and Washoe tribes. European exploration began in the 1770s, but significant settlement did not take place until the discovery of mineral wealth, particularly the Comstock Lode in 1859, which attracted a rush of fortune-seekers and led to rapid population growth in towns like Virginia City.
Prior to statehood, Nevada was part of the Utah Territory, and local efforts for self-governance emerged as early as 1851 due to a lack of effective control from Salt Lake City. Although Nevada's population was below the typical threshold for statehood, its strategic importance during the Civil War prompted Congress to overlook this requirement. In 1866, Nevada's boundaries were expanded to their current form by acquiring additional land. The state's formation reflects a complex interplay of political, economic, and social factors during a transformative period in American history.
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Admission of Nevada to the Union
Admission of Nevada to the Union
The territory of Nevada was admitted to the Union as the 36th state on October 31, 1864, by proclamation of President Abraham Lincoln, issued in accordance with the provisions of an act passed on March 31 of that year.
The history of Nevada before it entered the Union reflects the important role played by geographical, physical, and human, factors. Formed as a result of turbulent geological upheavals, Nevada is a land of many contrasts: vast arid stretches of sagebrush and creosote bush, lofty mountains extending north to south, and relatively few rivers. Its early inhabitants, the “Basketmakers” and later the Paiute, Shoshone, and Washoe tribes, were preoccupied with struggling to survive. Their sparse population existed on a diet of wild animals, insects, and plants.
The first Europeans to enter the region of Nevada are said to have been Franciscan missionaries en route from Mexico to California in the 1770s. Friar Francisco Garcés probably passed through what is now the extreme south-western part of the state. Friar Silvestre Vélez de Escalante may have crossed the eastern edge in search of a new route to the coast. Their reports about the forbidding wilderness of mountains and semidesert were sufficient to discourage further exploration for almost 50 years.
Only in the 1820s and 1830s did American and Canadian fur traders and trappers penetrate the unknown region for beaver pelts. Peter Ogden and other members of the Hudson's Bay Company, trading out of the Oregon country, crossed into what is now Nevada from the north and discovered the Humboldt River valley. Jedediah Smith, an American Fur Company trader from St. Louis, traversed the area of the present state while journeying from the Mississippi to the Pacific. Another adventurer, Joseph Walker, scaled the precipitous Sierra Nevadas into California. In an 1843 -1845 expedition, Captain John C. Frémont, guided by the renowned frontier scout Kit Carson (after whom the capital city of Nevada was named), conducted the first systematic exploration of the region. Writing in 1846, the trapper James Clyman still characterized the area as one of the “most sterile barren countrys I have ever traversed…[having the] most thirsty appearance of any place I ever witnessed.”
In the 1840s wagon trains and gold seekers hurried across the inhospitable territory on the way to California. At the end of the Mexican War, the territory from which Nevada was formed came into the possession of the United States by the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo on February 2, 1848. Since it was adjacent to the Mormon commonwealth that was just being formed in the Salt Lake City area, Nevada was included in the vast Mormon “state” of Deseret proclaimed by the Mormon leader Brigham Young in March 1849. The Mormons soon established a trading post and base for exploration in the Carson River valley. Known as Mormon Station and later as Genoa, it was the first permanent American settlement in Nevada.
When the United States government rejected the Mormon claim to Deseret, most of the area of Nevada was included in the newly organized territory of Utah in 1850. Salt Lake City, seat of the Utah territorial government, proved to be too far distant to provide adequate political control and military protection for the area's westernmost inhabitants. As early as 1851, therefore, these settlers tried to form a more satisfactory and hopefully more independent form of government. In 1854 the Utah legislature quashed all such attempts by including the settlements of the western Utah territory in a newly created Carson County. In 1859 the people of Carson County made an abortive attempt to form a state government of their own.
In general, life in the area remained quiet until 1859, when Nevada's huge mineral wealth was discovered. The famous Comstock Lode, one of the richest silver deposits ever tapped, yielded silver worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Near its site, the little settlement of Virginia City mushroomed overnight as news of the strike spread like wildfire. In its heyday, Virginia City boasted a population of 30,000 people and 106 saloons. Mark Twain, who was a Virginia City inhabitant from 1862 until 1864, vividly depicted the wild Nevada Days in Roughing It (1872). He also left little doubt that although the mining boom had unearthed riches underground, the area's physical attractiveness had not improved:
I overheard a gentleman say the other day, that it was “the d——dest country under the sun” and that comprehensive conception I fully subscribe to. It never rains here, and the dew never falls. No flowers grow here, and no green thing gladdens the eye. The birds that fly over the land carry their provisions with them. Only the crow and the raven tarry with us.
The influx of people seeking quick riches and the lack of effective federal control made lawlessness rampant in the raucous mining towns. In a move partly designed to impose law and order, Congress divided the territory of Utah on March 2, 1861, and out of its western portion created the territory of Nevada. The name, originally designating the snow-capped Sierra Nevada, means “snow-clad” in Spanish. An effort to achieve statehood in 1863 failed. By the following year, however, it had become obvious that two more Republican senatorial votes were needed in Congress in order to push certain antislavery measures through as the Union's victory in the Civil War neared.
Thus, in a political maneuver supported by Republican President Abraham Lincoln, Nevada attained statehood on October 31, 1864, a mere three years after gaining territorial status. Even then, the “battle-born” state formed during the Civil War was considerably short of the 60,000 population theoretically necessary for entry into the Union, a shortcoming that was conveniently overlooked.
In 1866 Nevada reached its present boundaries by acquiring its southern tip from New Mexico and certain eastern lands from Utah.