BOISE, Idaho (AP) - Some of Idaho’s most conservative Republicans have raised concerns this year about local Muslim populations and the potential influence of Sharia law in the state.
Those fears prompted local GOP events and a special lawmaker luncheon, while culminating in the decision by some lawmakers to kill a child support enforcement bill, threatening the state’s ability to administer more than 150,000 child support cases.
Historians say this isn’t the first time Idaho’s government has focused concern on a specific religious group.
“We have had various periods in our history when there’s been discrimination against particular denominations or religions,” explained Jim Weatherby, political science professor emeritus at Boise State University.
The singling out of different religious groups stretches back to the first days of Idaho Territory in 1863. Here are some notable examples.
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MORMON VOTING RIGHTS
When Idaho was still a developing territory in the late 1800s, the state government - today led by prominent Mormons in both chambers - was actually hostile to Mormon settlers, according to Todd Shallat, who directs the Center for the Study of Idaho History and Politics at Boise State University.
“In Idaho history, the Mormon bloc aligned against the Republicans, who dominated the governor’s office and Supreme Court,” Shallat explained. “So they used that power to neutralize the Mormon vote.”
Idaho’s original 1890 state constitution disenfranchised anyone who practiced polygamy, encouraged polygamy or supported organizations that encouraged polygamy - like many of the Mormon pioneers who had just moved west to escape discrimination. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints stopped endorsing plural marriages later that year, and in 1904 the church warned members that those entering into new plural marriages would be excommunicated.
Still, it wasn’t until just three decades ago that the state removed what it called “obsolete disqualifications to vote” from the constitution.
A third of voters - more than 100,000 people - voted to keep the ban.
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BASQUE CATHOLIC IMMIGRATION
Shallat also pointed to anti-Catholicism in the early 1920s as another example of religious tension in Idaho history.
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