Idaho Admitted to the Union
Idaho became the 43rd state of the United States on July 3, 1890. The name "Idaho" has roots in the Shoshone language, potentially meaning "gem of the mountains" or "behold the sun coming down the mountain," and it was originally associated with a region in Colorado during the 1850s. Before its statehood, Idaho was part of an expansive territory claimed by various nations, including Spain, Russia, Great Britain, and the United States. The area saw significant exploration by figures such as Meriwether Lewis and William Clark in the early 1800s, who traversed parts of Idaho on their expedition to the Pacific.
Initial settlement in Idaho was slow until the discovery of gold in the 1860s, which spurred a significant influx of miners and led to the establishment of mining towns. This economic boom catalyzed the push for Idaho to gain territorial status, which was formalized in 1863 when President Abraham Lincoln signed the bill. Over the next few decades, Idaho's population grew, and in 1889 a state constitution was adopted, paving the way for its admission to the Union. Throughout this period, issues such as the practice of polygamy among Mormon settlers played a role in shaping the region's social and political landscape.
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Idaho Admitted to the Union
Idaho Admitted to the Union
On July 3, 1890, Idaho entered the Union as the 43rd state. The name of the new state was first used during the 1850s to designate a region in what is now Colorado that was later known as Idaho Springs. The word Idaho is derived from the Shoshone Ee-Da-How, referring possibly to the ubiquitous purple flowers of the area, but also translated as “gem of the mountains” or “behold the sun coming down the mountain.”
Idaho was originally part of the vast northwest Oregon, or Columbia River, country claimed by Spain, Russia, Great Britain, and the United States. In 1818 a treaty provided for joint rule of the area by the United States and Great Britain. At first limited to ten years, joint rule was later extended. In 1846 the United States gained sole possession of the Oregon country below the 49th parallel. The American claim to this northwestern area stemmed primarily from the explorations by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, who were probably the first nonnative people to pass through Idaho, in 1805. En route to the Pacific, they crossed the Continental Divide at Lemhi Pass, traversed the Bitterroot Mountains, and followed the Clearwater, Snake, and Columbia Rivers. They passed through the same part of Idaho again the next year on their return.
Reports of the numerous fur-bearing animals in the area attracted trappers, the majority of whom were acting on behalf of large fur companies. In 1809 David Thompson, a noted explorer for the British North West Company, penetrated Idaho from the north and erected the trading post of Kully-spell House on the eastern banks of Lake Pend Oreille. In the spring of 1810 alone, the region's pelt yield totaled almost 50 90-pound packs. Also in 1810, Andrew Henry of the Missouri Fur Company made an unsuccessful attempt to establish a trading post near what is now Rexburg, Idaho. In 1811 Wilson Price Hunt, representing John Jacob Astor's Pacific Fur Company, explored the Snake River country. Captain B. L. E. Bonneville's expedition entered the region in 1832, and two years later Fort Hall was built by Nathaniel Wyeth of Boston, Massachusetts, on the east bank of the upper Snake River.
The Reverend Henry H. Spaulding helped establish a settlement at Lapwai, near what is now Lewiston, Idaho, in 1836. Several years later Jesuit priests led by Father P. J. De Smet founded a missionary settlement on the Coeur d'Alene River. Mormon missionaries, extending their horizons northward from their settlement in Salt Lake City, Utah, set up a mission and colony in the valley of the Lemhi River in 1855. They left three years later, however, due to early frosts, plagues of grasshoppers, and poor relations with the local Bannock and Shoshone tribes.
None of these early settlements were truly permanent. On June 15, 1860, however, another pioneering band of Mormons established a settlement in Franklin, in the southeastern part of Idaho. June 15, the anniversary of their arrival, was proclaimed Idaho Pioneer Day in 1911.
Although many settlers passed through the Oregon Trail beginning in the 1840s, going through southern Idaho en route to further destinations, they passed Idaho by. Thus the Idaho region, which had been transferred from the Oregon Territory to the newly formed Washington Territory in 1853, continued to rank among the “unsettled” portions of the west. It was only the backwash of the westward movement that finally resulted in any significant settlement. In 1860 Captain E. D. Pierce's discovery of gold at Orofino Creek, a tributary of the Clearwater River, lured hordes of prospectors from Oregon, Washington, California, and Nevada to Idaho. Mining towns mushroomed as the gold strike was followed by others on the Salmon River in 1861, on the Boise River basin in 1862, and on the Owyhee River in 1863.
The competing gold rushes stimulated the growth of rival mining centers, one in the north around Lewiston, the other in the south around Boise and Idaho City (first named Bannock). Numerous and vocal enough to demand a new government separate from that of the Washington Territory, the miners were also willing to join forces in order to achieve independent territorial status. The bill setting up the Territory of Idaho was signed by President Abraham Lincoln on March 3, 1863, during the Civil War.
The new territory, comprising the eastern portions of the Washington Territory and the western portions of the Dakota Territory, was one of the largest ever created in the United States. It included all of what are now the states of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming, as well as small portions of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Nebraska. On March 17, 1863, William H. Wallace was appointed as the first territorial governor by President Lincoln. In July of that year, Governor Wallace proclaimed Lewiston the territorial capital, and it was there that the first and second sessions of the territorial legislature were held in December 1863 and November 1864, respectively. Soon afterwards the capital was transferred to Boise, where it has remained ever since.
The Idaho Territory of 1863 was short-lived. The territorial act itself provided that nothing in it should be so construed as to prevent the government of the United States “from attaching any portion of said territory to any other state or territory.” A little over a year later, Montana gold prospectors persuaded Congress to create the Montana Territory out of a large northern section of the Idaho Territory. In 1868 Wyoming was also taken away, leaving Idaho roughly as it is now.
As the Idaho Territory progressed agriculturally and industrially, a movement for statehood gained momentum. A state constitution was adopted in 1889, and Idaho entered the Union the following year. Mormon polygamy was an important issue in Idaho during these early days. Ever since the 1860s, large numbers of Mormon settlers had come into southern Idaho. In 1883 Idaho's territorial legislature began passing laws that denied polygamists the right to vote and that restricted the Mormons in other ways. Polygamy was violation of federal law as well. After the constitutionality of antipolygamy legislation was upheld by the United States Supreme Court in 1890, the leaders of the Mormon church ruled that polygamy was not an essential article of faith, and Idaho removed its anti-Mormon restrictions.