Council/Senate journal of the _____ session of the Legislative of the Territory/State of Utah: 1851-, Salt Lake City, various state printers, 1852–
(The beginnings of present-day Utah are entwined with the success of the Church of the Latter Day Saints, the Mormons, in settling and populating part
of Alta California, Mexican territory that was ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. During the years 1847-49 the
Mormon settlements were governed by a High Council, an ecclesiastical organization appointed by Brigham Young and his Council of Twelve Apostles. A
convention held in March, 1849, adopted a constitution and established a provisional government for an entity called the “State of Deseret.” The journals
of the legislature of this provisional government are not part of the run offered here,. The U.S. Territory of Utah, was established by Congress
effective 26 March 1851. The Utah Territory at that time comprised a much larger area containing parts of present-day Nevada, Colorado, and Wyoming; all of
which areas were severed off as the named entities became states in their own time. The Utah territorial legislature met in thirty-one sessions
between 1851-1896. In the early years the “upper chamber” was styled The Council. Statehood, much delayed because of public opinion in the East resistant
to the Mormon practice of polygamy, was finally achieved in 1896, with the first session of the statehood legislature being held in January of that
year. Volumes for 181851-99 & 1892 include the Journals 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 Library of Congress, the Utah Supreme Court Library, the Church Historical
Office, Church of the Latter Day Saints, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Library).
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