The Southwest of the United States was a region still largely unincorporated by the time the Church of Latter Day Saints moved in and petitioned for statehood. Brigham Young wanted admission to the union of the state he called Deseret, after the word for “honeybee” in the Book of Mormon. The petition was rejected by the Compromise of 1850, which kept Utah and the land around it as a territory, but in some ways, the rejection made it easier for Utah settlers to forge their own path, independent of the Washington government far to the east.On this day. December 12, in 1870, women in the Utah Territory were granted the right vote; the first time suffrage was granted to any woman in the United States.

Brigham Young led the way to granting women the right to vote in hopes that the act would stem the tide of anti-polygamy legislation pouring out of Congress. Young realized that Utah women would likely vote to outlaw polygamy in the state, but the vote itself would show the Church treated women fairly. Polygamy in that case would be a matter for voters, rather than the government to decide.