CHAPTER XLIII.
UTAH.[1]
The results of equal suffrage in Utah for fifty years — 18701920 — with an unavoidable interim of eight years, have demonstrated the sanity and poise of women in the exercise of their franchise. The Mormon women had had long training, for from the founding of their church by Joseph Smith in 1830 they had a vote in its affairs. Although the Territory of Wyoming was the first to give the suffrage to women — in November, 1869 — the Legislature of Utah followed in January, 1870, and the bill was signed by Governor S. A. Mann February 12. Women voted at the regular election the next August and there was no election in Wyoming until September, so those of Utah had the distinction of being the pioneer women voters in the United States and there were over five times as many women in Utah as in Wyoming. The story of how their suffrage was taken away by an Act of Congress in 1887 and how it was restored in full by the men of Utah when they made their constitution for statehood in 1895 and adopted it by a vote of ten to one is related in detail in Volume IV of the History of Woman Suffrage. The women have voted since then in large numbers, filled many offices and been a recognized political influence for the benefit of the State.
The large and active Territorial Woman Suffrage Association held annual conventions until after it succeeded in gaining the franchise. In 1899, during a visit of Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt to Salt Lake City, a meeting was called and steps taken to form a Utah Council of Women to assist the suffrage movement in other States and Mrs. Emily S. Richards was made president. This Council, composed of Mormons and non-Mormons, continued in existence for twenty years. For the first ten years there were
- ↑ The History is indebted for this chapter to Mrs. Susa Young Gates, member of the General Board of the Woman's Relief Society and editor of the Relief Society's Magazine since it was established in 1913 and historian of the activities of Utah women.
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