The Saints Were Sinners: The Mormon Question and the Survival of Idaho

By Colin Branham

Idaho’s history is not unique simply because it tells of conflict with and persecution of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; many other states can make this somewhat morally dubious claim. Rather, Idaho is unique because its relationship with the Mormons defies conventional wisdom. The Saints have been residents since the Territory’s creation, but were unwilling Idahoans throughout most of the nineteenth century. This contentious partnership, a morass of accusation, disenfranchisement, persecution, and crime ultimately defined Idaho’s future. While at the time neither faction appreciated the other, the symbiosis of frontier politicians and New World religion likely preserved the futures of both. Idaho, in achieving statehood in 1890, avoided being carved up by other states to fit more practically in the ecosystem of western states, and the Mormons were forced to concede the polygamy issue to the US government, which opened their future to mainstream American culture.

The Saints

It was by accident that the unborn Territory of Idaho gained its first incorporated town, Franklin, in 1860. Believing they had settled a new part of Utah Territory, Mormon pioneers migrated north through the Cache Valley at the behest of Brigham Young and even continued to vote as Utahans for the next twelve years. A government survey in 1872 confirmed that Franklin and the other Cache Valley Mormon settlements to its north were indeed a part of the new non-Mormon territory, marking the beginning of a contentious relationship between Idaho and its oldest constituents, the Latter-day Saints.[1]

Only rarely in their 30-year history had the Saints lived without conflict with their Gentile neighbors; indeed, in every place they ever put down roots, events conspired to send them on their way to new promised lands. Mormonism traces its roots to upstate New York in the 1820s and 1830s, a place and time set ablaze with a spirit of religious revivalism. Its founder, Joseph Smith, while trying as a 14-year-old to discern which Christian denomination was correct, claimed to have had a vision of both God the Father and Jesus Christ, telling him none were correct, and he would soon receive a new revelation about a restoration of the true Church.[2]

In the ten years following this incident, and armed with his newly published Book of Mormon, Smith slowly gained followers throughout Palmyra, New York and its environs, until a promising report from some of the first missionaries to the Native Americans convinced him to move with most of the Church to Kirtland, Ohio in 1831. Kirtland was the site of Mormonism’s first temple, first success, and first taste of large-scale conflict. Here the Church solidified its authority over matters spiritual and temporal by keeping property in common, owned by the church itself, and establishing a bank. Smith also began his secret practice of polygamy during this period, something he considered a divine responsibility.[3]

The success of Kirtland soon revealed itself to be an illusion, as Church members and leaders engaged in unlimited speculation, driving real estate prices up. The local economy, already suspect because of the deteriorating relationship between the Church and the growing community of non-Mormons and ex-Mormons populating the town, could not handle the strain. Soon residents could not afford to pay back incurred debts, nor could many afford to live in Kirtland anymore. All of this prompted the outbreak of mob action against Church members, which eventually forced the Saints to pack up and move.[4]

Although Joseph Smith had proclaimed the Independence, Missouri area as the new Zion for God’s people in 1831, the Saints were forced out of that area well before the Church headquarters sought to relocate to Missouri. In place of Zion, they constructed a new city in Caldwell County known as Far West. The Latter-day Saints’ sojourn in Missouri was short-lived, however, as Governor Lilburn Boggs expelled them from the state with these words: “The Mormons must be treated as enemies, and must be exterminated or driven from the state.” Boggs’ message did not exist in a vacuum; earlier settlers of the state had traded violence with the Danites, a Mormon vigilante secret society, since their arrival in the area.[5]

The Saints next followed their prophet to the small town of Commerce, Illinois, which the Church bought and renamed Nauvoo. Nauvoo, perhaps the most formative of the Saints’ early experiences in terms of the establishment of doctrine and practice, was from 1838 to 1844 the final headquarters of the Church before its exodus across the Continental Divide. While both conversion and attrition rates had been high prior to the Nauvoo years, some of Joseph Smith’s “friends denounced him as fallen,” including the Book of Mormon’s transcriber, Oliver Cowdery, who accused Smith of a “terrible affair.” The accusations stated that Smith was living with a young woman whom he considered his wife—as well as his first wife, Emma. These internal disputes mirrored the experiences of the Saints in their surroundings, and mob violence in 1844 by Gentile residents of the area killed Joseph Smith and his brother, Hyrum.[6]

Brigham Young, Smith’s heir following a succession crisis that split the Church into multiple factions, then opted for a dramatic solution to the ongoing conflicts. Rather than find another headquarters in the Midwest where violence and war were inevitable, the Saints left the area altogether and trekked across the Great Plains to the Salt Lake Valley, where they finally gained ten years of peace for their frontier theocracy.[7]

The seeds of dissent began anew once word spread during the early 1850s that polygamy was being openly practiced and taught in Brigham Young’s Utah. This news caused great unease in the East, as evidenced by the 1856 Republican Platform, which grouped polygamy together with slavery as the “twin relics of barbarism.” Inspired by this anti-polygamy fervor, sentiment against the isolated Mormons grew, until rumors of a Latter-day Saint rebellion reached the ears of President James Buchanan. While ignoring the increasingly secessionist antics of Southern slave-states, Buchanan decided to send out the largest US military expedition between the Mexican and Civil Wars to put down a nonexistent revolt on the frontier.[8]

The Utah War, as it became known, pitted the army against the Nauvoo Legion—the Mormon militia formerly under Joseph Smith in the city of the same name—now commanded by Brigham Young. Though there were no major military actions during the Utah war, its results affected the future of Mormonism immensely. Brigham Young was replaced as governor with a federally chosen Gentile but remained the de facto king of Utah, while the wider American distrust of the Mormons’ professed loyalty only increased. Accounts of the Mountain Meadows massacre, where Mormons and Natives murdered the members of a wagon train passing through, only served to drive a further wedge between the Church and the rest of the United States.[9]

The double shadow of polygamy and loyalty to America continued to fall upon the Saints until the practice of polygamy was abolished through the Manifesto of 1890 delivered by Church President Wilford Woodruff, creating space for Mormons to integrate into wider American society. Injected into this perilous commingling of interests in Idaho was Fred Dubois, a man prepared to challenge the status quo and Latter-day Saint dominance of Southeastern Idaho to save his adopted homeland’s future.

Fred Dubois: A Frontier Statesman

The Dubois family had the frontier in its blood. A feudal clan tracing its lineage back to before the days of Louis XIV, the first major Dubois in American history was Toussaint Dubois, a Frenchman born in Montreal. Following the French colonizers down the Wabash River to Vincennes, Indiana, Toussaint established himself in the history of the New World republic by serving under future President William Henry Harrison at the Battle of Tippecanoe. Jesse Kilgore Dubois, Toussaint’s youngest son by his second marriage, followed the family tradition by pioneering farther west to the new Illinois. Continuing the Dubois’ other legacy of contact with major figures, Jesse befriended a young Abraham Lincoln, cementing a family connection to high politics.[10]

Fred Thomas Dubois was born in 1851 into a climate of frenzied partisan politics in the nation; Illinois functioned as a microcosm of the larger fervor. Growing up in a “devoutly Whiggish and Republican family,” the young Dubois was steeped in the political landscape from an early age. He recalled later the “memorable debate,” between Lincoln and Stephen Douglas prior to the 1858 midterm elections, an event that propelled Lincoln onto the national stage just in time for his nomination and election as President in 1860.[11]

The career of Fred Dubois was defined in equal parts by his dynamism and his wellspring of highly-placed friends and personal connections spread throughout the country. After graduating from Yale College in 1872, Dubois bounced around jobs for the next ten years, dabbling with political appointments as the Secretary of the Board of Railway and Warehouse Commissioners of Illinois in 1875 and 1876. However, his real break came in 1880, when his brother was offered a job as the physician at the Fort Hall Indian Agency in Idaho Territory. Following family tradition west, Dubois packed a few belongings and money for a month’s living and caught the emigrant train from Omaha to Blackfoot, Idaho. Once in Blackfoot, after realizing he had no job and little money, he landed the first job offered to him: as a cowboy on a drive to Casper, Wyoming. Although the Dubois family was not known for its agricultural knowledge, Fred soon learned the business which, unfortunately for his urban sensibilities, came with a compulsory infestation of lice.[12]

Returning to Blackfoot with a solider standing in the territory, Dubois worked a variety of jobs on the reservation near his brother, all the while constructing his local network of friends and allies. This preparation came in handy when, in 1881, he decided to try to become a lawman. In keeping with his pattern of doing jobs without prior experience or knowledge, he prevailed on family friend Shelby Cullam, Governor of Illinois, to petition President Chester Arthur for an appointment as United States Marshal of the Territory of Idaho. Secretary of War Robert T. Lincoln, whom Dubois had known since childhood, also helped him secure the appointment during a trip to Washington, D.C. [13]

As Marshal, Dubois at once became one of the Territory’s most powerful men. Where he had been a “tenderest of tenderfoots,” just a year before as a junior cowboy, he now had legal authority over an area larger than the island of Britain. This power came with a drawback: in Dubois’ eyes he “had been made a peace officer of a territory which had within its borders probably more criminals than the State of Illinois.” With no law enforcement experience and little courtroom knowledge, Dubois set to work stamping out crime in the territory. Besides a persistent problem with stage coach bandits, the majority of these criminals were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. As a result of the Edmunds Act recently passed by Congress, “Every member of the Mormon Church was a criminal either actually in practice or as an accessory.” Mormon contempt for the law of the land was such that Fred Dubois recalled meeting a Mr. Hendricks in Soda Springs who cheerily introduced him to his family: Mrs. Hendricks, Mrs. Hendricks, and Mrs. Hendricks. Dubois said, “I afterward sent Mr. Hendricks to the penitentiary.” [14]

Polygamy, Dubois’ main enemy during his tenure as Marshal, was uniquely positioned in Southeastern Idaho to continue despite being federally illegal. The problem the Marshal faced was that while a man could be indicted for polygamy—legally known as unlawful cohabitation—he could not be convicted because of the jury system. Juries were chosen by drawing from a box with the names of the county’s legal voters from the previous election, creating a system where almost no jury could ever be formed without a Mormon jurist because of the overwhelming population of Mormons in Oneida county. Since every Mormon would vote to acquit the polygamists, the system uniquely allowed for blatant law-breaking. Fred Dubois’ solution to this problem was to ask Judge John T. Morgan for an open venire, that is, the power for the Marshal to choose who will be on juries in cases of polygamy. [15]

This strategy, of course, worked well, and many Mormons were convicted and imprisoned for polygamy during Dubois’ tenure as Marshal. His other goal during this time was suppressing Mormon voting. The most effective strategy turned out to be political; in 1881 Dubois founded the Oneida County Independent Anti-Mormon Party, which joined together candidates formerly associated with both parties in a bloc aligned against Mormons. In this way, the Democrats were unable to take advantage of Mormon voting to gain territory-wide power. [16]

Through legal and political means, the Saints were totally excluded from voting by the 1888 election, almost solely through the efforts of Fred Dubois, who was elected as territorial delegate to Congress. Once there, he became Idaho’s greatest champion, creating friendships, breaking alliances, cutting deals, and exhorting the press on the virtues of Idaho as a state. Following Idaho’s admission to the Union, Dubois became its first Senator, a position he held for two terms. He was best known in the Senate for his backing of Free Silver, a policy supporting a bimetallic standard for American money rather than the gold standard, which promised to fill the sails of Idaho’s silver mining industry. Dubois eventually bolted his beloved Republican Party over this issue for first the Silver Republican Party, and finally his former enemy, the Democratic Party. [17]

Perhaps Fred Dubois’ greatest strength was his ability to use personal connections and friendships to his advantage; he rose from a penniless cowboy to become the leading character in the founding of the State of Idaho through a careful cultivation of acquaintances. A curious combination of blue-blooded destiny and self-made persistence, Dubois’ legacy as rabid anti-Mormon statesman is a serious understatement of his accomplishments.

Innis v. Bolton: A Generous Interpretation of Government Power

Dubois’ most famous accomplishment, the disfranchisement of Mormon voters, was not universally popular, as many considered it to be an illegal power grab by territorial Republicans. In Idaho, during the 1886 and especially the 1888 election cycles, there was considerable pushback from citizens concerned about this possible infringement of rights. The case of Latter-day Saint and disfranchised voter James Innis is a perfect illustration of the suspect legal underpinnings of such acts—the law barring even Mormons who did not practice polygamy from voting would be considered questionable today.

The case of Innis v. Bolton, heard before the Supreme Court of the Territory of Idaho on March 6, 1888, featured a complaint by a citizen plaintiff against a local election official defendant on the basis of wrongful disfranchisement. What should have been an open-and-shut case in favor of the plaintiff’s voting rights was instead “dubiously” but decisively ruled in favor of the defendant. The reason? Innis was a member of the most controversial group in Idaho Territory during the 1880s, the Mormon Church.[18]

James Innis’ legal debacle began in the midst of an early winter storm season that blanketed the West in November 1886. It was remarked that the widespread snowstorm might have been Nature’s attempt at “cooling down the fever of the recent campaign that was not allayed by the election returns.” Unfortunately for peace-loving Idahoans, Nature seemed to have no influence on their beloved territory.[19]

In the Bear Lake county seat of Paris, occupying Idaho’s extreme southeastern corner, locals prepared to vote in a special election for the position of county surveyor. Opening the polls that morning at eight o’clock, Parisian election officials must have had an inkling of the issues to come, for when James Innis and William Hayward attempted to vote the officials were prepared to stop them. Upon entering Paris’ First Ward schoolhouse and declaring their intention and eligibility to vote (being male, twenty-one years of age, a citizen of the United States, a resident of the territory of Idaho and Bear Lake County, sane, not a polygamist or bigamist, and not currently “cohabiting with more than one woman”), the men were “challenged” by Robert Bolton and the election officials. Suspecting the two men did not fulfill the voter qualifications of the Idaho Test Act of 1885 simply because they were known Mormons, the election judges refused to accept their ballots.[20]

Following their disfranchisements, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints dipped into its $600 legal defense fund to pay for each man’s nearly identical trial. Employing Richard Z. Johnson, well-known Boise lawyer, Yale university graduate, and soon to become attorney general, the Church knew the outcome of these cases would be pivotal in determining the future of their movement.[21]

Over a year later, Johnson opened for the plaintiff, Innis. Though the two men fulfilled all legal voting requirements, they were barred from voting by the Idaho Test Oath Act, passed through the territorial legislature in 1885, which established membership in any organization as a disqualifier: “The principle question in this case is whether the appellant[s] could be compelled, in addition to the above to take an oath that he was not a member of any order, organization or association which teaches, advises, counsels, or encourages its members… to commit the crime of bigamy or polygamy.”[22]

Johnson brought up the federal Edmunds Act of 1882, which only allowed for the disfranchisement of practicing polygamists and bigamists. He declared “The history of this (Idaho 1885) legislation shows … that however it is attempted to be disguised, the intent and purpose of the clause under consideration is to reach those that believe that bigamy and polygamy are morally right, thought they neither practice, teach, nor encourage either.” Johnson established the original Edmunds Act did not in word or intention disfranchise those who believed in polygamy, but simply those who practiced it.[23]

In a sweeping argument considering the state constitutions of many of the 13 original colonies, the words of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton, and a discussion in the US Senate of the Hindu rite of suttee (sati), Johnson undertook to prove the Idaho Test Oath went illegally above and beyond the scope of the federal Edmunds Act.

Though his argument was well put and convincing, the Justices of Idaho’s Territorial Supreme Court ruled in favor of the defendants. They did so, claiming suffrage was not a right, but rather a privilege. Since polygamy was a crime, and supporting polygamy was aiding and abetting a crime, and since membership in an organization supportive of a crime could be considered supporting the crime, the Test Oath could not be considered illegal. The court upheld the idea that each state or territory had control over who received the franchise. Justice Case Broderick ended the case saying, “The courts are not warranted, nor are they authorized, to abrogate laws merely because they may be deemed unwise or impolitic.” In other words, it was up to the legislature to decide the morality of the law, which Johnson argued convincingly against, because its legality was not questionable by the court based on the laws as they were.[24]

A similar case made it through appeals to the United States Supreme Court, where Justice Stephen J. Field delivered a majority opinion affirming the previous decisions. These court cases were key in removing any possible barrier to anti-Mormon politics in Idaho in the years leading up to its statehood. In overwhelmingly Mormon Bear Lake County, horse thieves and cattle rustlers ran free because not enough Gentiles—Non-Mormon, legal voters—could be found to man the county’s juries.[25]

Survival

The histories of the Latter-day Saints and the State of Idaho have been intertwined from the time of the first European settlements of the area. Rarely a relationship without friction, their shared experience had an indelible impact on the development and existence of each. The Mormon practice of polygamy, federally illegal for years, was the greatest barrier for the improvement of their social and political standing. The governing Republican Party had publicly condemned polygamy since its founding, and United States public opinion was markedly against the Mormons. However, in Mormon-controlled Utah and Southeastern Idaho, the Saints experienced no political or legal ramifications to plural marriage until the 1880s, during Fred Dubois’ tenure as US Marshal for the Territory of Idaho. He was responsible for the open venire system used to form juries in areas with heavy Latter-day Saint populations that would convict the Saints of polygamy. Also founded through his efforts was the Independent Anti-Mormon Party of Oneida county, which created a coalition of all Republicans and most Democrats in the area against the Mormon bloc.[26]

Worries about the increasing population and power of Mormons in Idaho and Utah politics fueled opposition and fear; the Saints’ loyalty to the United States’ legal system was equivocal because they had continued to blatantly and openly disobey the law. However, because of the efforts of Dubois and other anti-Mormons, by the elections of 1886 and 1888, and certainly by Idaho’s admission as a state in 1890, Southeastern Idaho was no obstacle to his faction of pro-Idaho politicians and interests. The Territorial Supreme Court’s affirmation of Dubois’ legacy through its decision in Innis v. Bolton further solidified the legitimacy of Idaho as a candidate for Statehood.[27]

Polygamy was not Idaho’s sole obstacle to admission, because geography itself also spoke against its existence. Idaho was and is a state of enormous distances, impenetrable mountains, and fast-flowing rivers. From the Idaho territory’s beginning in 1863 as an amalgamation of pieces of earlier territories, it had been an unwieldy place to govern. The southwest, containing the capital in Boise, was the center of the territory’s administration, and the mining and trade hub of the Territory. The southeast, inhabited by the overwhelming majority of Idaho’s Mormons, was agricultural in orientation, and represented the second major geographical sector. The north, even more remote from the administrative center in Boise, marked the third sector, and Dubois’ second barrier to Idaho statehood.[28]

While the southwest and southeast were always connected by stage lines and eventually railroads, the north was extremely isolated. The Salmon river bisected the territory and provided a natural boundary between the north, with its hub at Lewiston, and the southwest. Because of this geographical complication, and the not-unfounded perception that the north was ignored by the other two southern regions, it lobbied for years to any powerful person who would listen to be included with the new Washington state instead of Idaho. The North Idaho Annexation movement gained support from Oregon’s senators and from others back east.[29]

North Idaho annexation to Washington was also favored by Nevada, a state and territory focused almost exclusively on mining. The prevailing attitude in Boise and in the West was that if North Idaho were severed from the south, the rest of Idaho would be left weakened and alone. Rather than entering the union soon as a brand-new state, the leftover parts of Idaho could be absorbed by neighboring states. Betraying the overt self-centeredness of almost every state’s policy at the time, Nevada would, of course, have been willing to welcome mineral-rich southwest Idaho. Since the Latter-day Saints, originally in the Territory by accident, would likely have preferred to join Utah territory, Idaho would easily have been cannibalized by its neighbors in the event of annexation. In this light, it is reasonable that Idahoan politicians sought to deny these entities political power; Idaho statehood was their only real path to political power because in a larger Washington or Nevada, the newcomers would not be established statewide.[30]

The danger to Idaho politicians lay in an alliance of sorts between the Mormon bloc and the annexationists. If these two combined with Democrats fearful of another Republican State being admitted, Idaho as an entity could easily have not existed. For Dubois to undercut the Annexationist message by building alliances in northern Idaho as well as in the Senate showed remarkable resolve and effectiveness for one person.

The final piece of the Idaho puzzle did not reside in the Territory, nor was it present in the West. It was in Washington, D.C. that the battle needed to finally be won. Congress in 1890 was, if nothing else, two things: Republican and anti-Mormon—exactly the kind of people Fred Dubois connected with. Their antipathy toward Mormon/polygamist political power was evident in that Utah did not become a state until 1896, six years after the Woodruff manifesto prohibited polygamy in the Mormon Church. For Idaho to become a state when it did, a few months before the manifesto was published, Congress required more proof that Idaho would not allow the Saints to run rampant. A bonus to Idaho was that Congress was also loath to admit a new Democratic state to possibly threaten its own dominance in the Senate; this was avoided by the severe weakening of the Idaho Democratic party after the Mormons lost the vote.[31]

All told, the disfranchisement of the Mormons was extremely important to Idaho’s admission as a state and to its very survival in any capacity. Idaho, in an odd quirk of history, needed to pursue some policies that run distinctly counter to the professed values of the United States. While the overall justice of the anti-Mormon campaign of the 1880s is questionable, there is no doubt that it was legal at the time and was incredibly expedient. To avoid being chopped up and apportioned to other states and Territories, Idaho needed to deny self-determination to its own people, and pursue the statehood of a territory whole heartedly supported by only one of its three main geographic regions. This monumental feat was mainly accomplished by the tireless efforts of Fred T. Dubois and his web of alliances and contacts, who manipulated the interests of local and national figures to preserve Idaho.

Notes

[1] Merle W. Wells, Anti-Mormonism in Idaho, 1872-92 (Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press, 1978), xii.

[2] Terry L. Givens, By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture that Launched a New World Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 3-10.

[3] Karl R. Anderson, Joseph Smith’s Kirtland: Eyewitness Accounts (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 1996), 10, 209-226.

[4] Ibid, 220-226.

[5] Glen M. Leonard, Nauvoo: A Place of Peace, A People of Promise (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 2002), 9.

[6] Glen M. Leonard, Nauvoo: A Place of Peace, A People of Promise (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 2002), xvii; Karl R. Anderson, Joseph Smith’s Kirtland: Eyewitness Accounts (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 1996), 226-227.

[7] Richard D. Poll and Ralph W. Hansen, “” Buchanan’s Blunder” The Utah War, 1857-1858,” Military Affairs 25, no. 3 (1961), 121-122.

[8] Richard D. Poll and Ralph W. Hansen, “” Buchanan’s Blunder” The Utah War, 1857-1858,” Military Affairs 25, no. 3 (1961), 130-131; The Republican Platform (Boston: John P. Jewett and Company, 1856), 3.

[9] Richard D. Poll and Ralph W. Hansen, “” Buchanan’s Blunder” The Utah War, 1857-1858,” Military Affairs 25, no. 3 (1961), 130-131

[10] Helen L. Allen, “A Sketch of the Dubois Family, Pioneers of Indiana and Illinois,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society (1908-1984) 5, no. 1 (April 1912): 53-61.

[11] Fred T. Dubois, The Making of a State (Rexburg, Idaho: Eastern Idaho Publishing Company, 1976), 22; Larry Shweikart and Bradley J. Birzer, The American West (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2003), 413.

[12] Fred T. Dubois, The Making of a State (Rexburg, Idaho: Eastern Idaho Publishing Company, 1976), 11.

[13] Fred T. Dubois, The Making of a State (Rexburg, Idaho: Eastern Idaho Publishing Company, 1976), 31; Larry Shweikart and Bradley J. Birzer, The American West (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2003), 413; Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 27.

[14] Fred T. Dubois, The Making of a State (Rexburg, Idaho: Eastern Idaho Publishing Company, 1976), 46.

[15] Ibid, 39-41.

[16] Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 31.

[17] Larry Shweikart and Bradley J. Birzer, The American West (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2003), 413; Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 30-31.

[18] Merle W. Wells, Anti-Mormonism in Idaho, 1872-92 (Provo, UT: Brigham University Press, 1978) 112.

[19] “Storms and cold weather…,” Idaho World (Idaho City, ID), November 23, 1886).

[20] Idaho Reports, Vol. 2 (St. Paul, Minnesota: West Publishing co., 1893), 407. “The Idaho Test Oath Case,” Idaho World (Idaho City, ID), March 9, 1888.

[21] Merle W. Wells, Anti-Mormonism in Idaho, 1872-92 (Provo, UT: Brigham University Press, 1978) 112.

[22] “The Idaho Test Oath Case: Argument Delivered in the Supreme Court of Idaho Territory, Feb. 10, 1888,” (Salt Lake City, UT: The Deseret News Company, Printers, 1888), 5.

[23]“The Idaho Test Oath Case: Argument Delivered in the Supreme Court of Idaho Territory, Feb. 10, 1888,” (Salt Lake City, UT: The Deseret News Company, Printers, 1888), 7.

[24]Idaho Reports, Vol. 2 (St. Paul, Minnesota: West Publishing co., 1893), 416.

[25] “The Test Oath Case,” Idaho Statesman (Boise, ID) March 7, 1888. Merle W. Wells, Anti-Mormonism in Idaho, 1872-92 (Provo, UT: Brigham University Press, 1978) 113-114.

[26] Fred T. Dubois, The Making of a State (Rexburg, Idaho: Eastern Idaho Publishing Company, 1976), 22; The Republican Platform (Boston: John P. Jewett and Company, 1856), 3.

[27] Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 27; Idaho Reports, Vol. 2 (St. Paul, Minnesota: West Publishing co., 1893), 407.

[28] Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 29.

[29] Ibid.

[30] Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 29-31.

[31] Merle W. Wells, “The Idaho Admission Process, 1888-1890,” Oregon Historical Quarterly 56, no. 1 (March 1955): 32-39.

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