"Women in Utah have made significant contributions to our nation's struggle for sexual political equality." That was Dr. Carol Madsen's core message when she spoke to our October 10th public meeting. Dr. Madsen, professor in the BYU Department of History, highlighted the political battles pioneer women fought to gain suffrage in 1870, the right to their political voice in shaping the Territory of Deseret, and why they lost that right 17 years later, and then regained it when the Territory gained statehood. Her fascinating presentation stimulated a thoughtful discussion period.

Dr. Madsen said that until the 1996 centennial observation of statehood, Utah history books generally ignored the role of women in the state's political development. Consequently, one of the important aspects of the centennial celebration has been bringing to public awareness the important role of the women's suffrage movement in Utah. It's an interesting question asked by many historians, said Madsen, why women in Utah won the right to vote 50 years before women in the rest of the nation. The women's suffrage movement actually began along the eastern seaboard early in the 1880's. One of the reasons was congressional control of territorial governments, and the thought that experimenting with women's suffrage in the territories might help to decide if it was the correct thing to do nationwide. Another facet of the discussion was the assumption that Utah women would oppose polygamy, and be a deciding factor in bringing an end to the practice of plural marriage in the Utah territory.

In 1869, the territorial government of Wyoming granted women the right to vote. Shortly thereafter, 5000 Utah women held the first women's rights conference in the Salt Lake Tabernacle, demanding political recognition. In February of 1870, the Utah Territorial legislature approved women's suffrage. Even though Wyoming was the first to grant women the right to vote, Utah women were the first in the nation to exercise that right. Within a few days of receiving the franchise, Utah women voted in 1870 municipal elections. Seventeen years later, the national congress passed the stringent anti-polygamy law, the Edmunds-Tucker act, which included language eliminating women's suffrage. Nationally, suffragettes lambasted linking women's rights with the polygamy debate. Utah women met again, and vowed that female political equality would be included in any and all proposed statehood constitutions. Susan B. Anthony made a visit to Utah to encourage women to continue their fight for recognition. The constitution approved for Utah's recognition as a state of the United States of America in 1896 included the right of women to political equality.

In the first State election, Martha Hughes Cannon was elected to the Utah State Senate, becoming the first woman in the nation to be elected to a state senate. Professor Madsen noted that Utah still has only one woman in the state senate! In that same election, two other women were elected to the Utah House of Representatives.

It would be another 24 years before the nation gave all women the right to vote by approving the 19th amendment, August 18, 1920.

--Flo Wineriter