Report From Fronteras The Changing America Desk

To Spanish-English bilingual speakers Fronteras are usually considered the borderlines or border areas between areas [like the westward expanding American Frontier and Manifest Destiny we were taught in history classes].
In recent areas of conflict, the federal government in one case in Oregon is choosing to stand-off and one case from Mormon-dominated towns on the Utah-Arizona border the federal government's Department of Justice is choosing go to trial this week in Phoenix.

[Image from Wikipedia]

Why is such a large geographical area all the way from the state of Oregon to the states of Utah and Arizona a fertile ground for news attention? An answer might be found in the historic settlement patterns and land claims in the West before there were recognized state boundaries on lands
The image to the left from Wikipedia shows boundaries of the provisional State of Deseret (orange with black outline) as proposed in 1849.
Modern state boundaries are underlaid for reference.
Some history is important to note here - The State of Deseret  was a provisional state of the United States, proposed in 1849 by settlers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) in Salt Lake City. The provisional state existed for slightly over two years and was never recognized by the United States government. The name derives from the word for "honeybee" in the Book of Mormon.
The provisional state was a bold proposal, encompassing most of the territory that had been acquired from Mexico the previous year as the Mexican Cession.
The proposal encompassed nearly all of present-day Utah and Nevada, large portions of California and Arizona, and parts of Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, Idaho, and Oregon.
Although

The idea of creating a state based on Mormonism began to fade away after the coming of the railroad in the 1860's which opened the territory to many non-Mormon settlers . . . now over 200 years later  those claims on lands and the domination of religious beliefs in the issue of religious discrimination in the function of government are getting attention. To read and listen to the report on the DDOJ trial taking place this week in Phoenix you can go here >> Fronteras Desk Report on January 19, 2016

How all this plays out remains to be seen 

• in the Bundy Oregon stand-off,
• in the Department of Justice actions at a trial in federal court starting Wednesday in Phoenix,
• and here locally in the City of Mesa on the issues of equality and inclusion for all protected classes by the force of law with the passing of a City Ordinance where the minority Mormon religion has dominated government and politics for decades.

Senior Field Correspondent Jude Joffe-Block (Phoenix) caught the radio bug while assisting a radio reporter in Mexico, and has been happiest wearing headphones and pointing microphones ever since. She initiated Fronteras Desk coverage in Las Vegas as the project's first Senior Field Correspondent there. She then joined the Phoenix newsroom in July 2012.
Previously, she contributed stories on immigration and criminal justice to KALW in San Francisco and multimedia content in both Spanish and English to The Associated Press in Mexico.
Joffe-Block is a graduate of U.C. Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism and Yale University, and was a Fulbright Scholar in Mexico.
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