When Republican Gov. Gary Herbert signed SB102 into law on March 28, he all but ended Utah’s compliance with the first condition Congress put on the state’s admission to the federal union, making polygamy illegal under the state’s constitution.
From the moment in 1896 that President Grover Cleveland signed the congressional act admitting Utah to the union as the 45th state until the governor’s signature, polygamy—the practice of one man having multiple wives—was a felony punishable by years in jail. To the present day, Utah’s constitution says polygamy is “forever forbidden.”
