Journals of the Senate of the Legislative Assembly of the State of Idaho: title varies, 1863-, var. state printers, series continues. (Future Idaho’s boundaries changed drastically during the fifteen years preceding 1868. At the start of 1853 future Idaho was still an undifferentiated part of the massive Oregon Territory, which at that time also included all of the area that later became Washington State and big parts of present-day Montana and Wyoming. Later that year, the northern portion of future Idaho became part of the new Washington Territory, while the southern portion remained with the Oregon Territory. In 1859 what is now Oregon became a state, and Washington Territory was expanded to include all of future Idaho and the parts of future Wyoming and Montana that used to belong to the Oregon territory. That huge area proving too large for effective governance, in 1863 all of modern Idaho and Montana, and much of modern Wyoming were severed off from Washington Territory to become the Idaho Territory {Version One}; an area larger than modern Texas. It quickly becoming clear that this new jurisdiction was equally unwieldy, in 1864 Congress elevated the Montana portion into a separate territory, and gave much of the Wyoming portion to the Dakota Territory; leaving the Idaho Territory {Version Two} with its current footprint plus some of future Wyoming. Finally, in 1868, Wyoming became a territory on its own, taking part of the eastern Idaho Territory with it. The 1868 boundaries of Idaho Territory {Version Three} became the final boundaries of the Idaho we know today. The first session of the Legislature of the Territory of Idaho met in Dec., 1863. The first session of the State Legislature met in Dec., 1890. The Council journal for the 4th Territorial Legislative Assembly includes the journal of the House of Representatives.) (Documents which are part of the Early State Records collection were digitized from a microfilm copy of title originally held by the Idaho State Law Library, Idaho Secretary of State, University of North Carolina Library at Chapel Hill and Library of Congress).
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