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Pushing the Car of Progress Forward: The Salt Lake Tribune's Quest to Change Utah for Statehood, 1871-1896

The debate over Utah statehood involved several controversial issues that the United States government and the American public wanted resolved before admission would be granted. One strong advocate for such changes in Utah was the widely published newspaper, the Salt Lake Tribune, which continually published anti-statehood and anti-Mormon ideas in the final decades before Utah was finally admitted in 1896. This thesis studies and analyzes the Tribune’s editorials and news stories to better understand which issues opponents of statehood worried the most over and what they wanted to accomplish with their protest. It finds that Mormon political domination was the paper’s central concern throughout the last decade of the debate, even after developments showed change on the horizon.
This thesis also examines the Tribune’s ability to reach Utah readers and a national audience through its connections with the Associated Press. By citing numerous newspapers from throughout the United States and members of Congress who were close to the statehood debate, this thesis shows that the Tribune got its message out and that it played a strong part in the statehood struggle.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UTAHS/oai:digitalcommons.usu.edu:etd-1100
Date01 May 2007
CreatorsMills, Robert Patrick
PublisherDigitalCommons@USU
Source SetsUtah State University
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
SourceAll Graduate Theses and Dissertations
RightsCopyright for this work is held by the author. Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owner. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user. For more information contact Andrew Wesolek (andrew.wesolek@usu.edu).

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