Utah

With about 2.7 million people, Utah is the 34th most populous state, but because 80 percent of the population is concentrated in the Wasatch Front, which includes the Salt Lake City metropolitan area, it is the sixth-most urbanized state. It is also the most homogeneous state in terms of religion, a deeply influential factor in Utah life and social networks: more than half of the state (58 percent in a 2008 survey) are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS, or commonly known as the Mormons). Salt Lake City actually has the lowest Mormon population, a little more than a third of the state; the overall state percentage is driven up by the near-uniformity of Mormon membership in the sparsely settled rural areas.

Utah is the fastest-growing state in the union, with a birth rate (20 percent in 2008) much higher than average and steady migration from elsewhere in the country. The overwhelming majority of Utah residents are of northern European ancestry; the state is about 95 percent white (about 10 percent of whom are Hispanic), 2.5 percent Asian, 1.7 percent Native American, and 1.3 percent black. Ancestry groups from Great Britain, Scandinavia, and Germany total about 70 percent of the population. The largest non-Mormon religious groups are Catholics (10 percent) and evangelical Protestants (7 percent), with non-Christian faiths under half a percent. Social ties among non-Mormons in Utah are often strong, especially among multigenerational citizens; the Diocese of Salt Lake City, for instance, was established in the 19th century, and some rural Catholic families were able to afford to sent their children to All Hallows College, established in 1886 in Salt Lake City, or other parish schools in Salt Lake City in order to be exposed to a Catholic environment.

The fastest-growing metropolitan area in the country (with a population of about 150,000) is St. George, the county seat of Washington County, about 300 miles south of Salt Lake City. St. George is the center of what is called Utah's Dixie, the cotton-growing region in southwestern Utah, where cotton fields were originally planted in order to capitalize on the scarcity of southern cotton during the Civil War. The growth of the region in the 21st century is due in large part to its retirement communities. As in Arizona, the humidity is low and the temperatures high, with freezing rarely reached in the winter. There are many golf courses in the area, and city planners have encouraged the migration of retired Americans as well as the boom in tourism and recreation centers. One of the largest employers in the area is SkyWest Airlines, which has its corporate headquarters in St. George.

One of the most significant social networks in Utah, however, is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Because of Utah's history as a place settled predominantly to escape religious persecution elsewhere, social, political, and religious life have always been intertwined. Utah's statehood, for instance, was granted only when the LDS Church discontinued the practice of plural marriage, which the federal government disallowed; the LDS Church continues to condemn the practice today not only in the greater Mormon community but also in the many small offshoots of the Mormon tradition that have formed in part to continue the practice of polygamy. Although the LDS Church is officially politically neutral, Mormon ethics and moral teachings necessarily have an influence on Utah voters. The state is considerably more socially conservative than not only the country as a whole but also more than other Republican-dominated states, which tend to lean toward a libertarian position that Utah rejects. The LDS Church and the Utah Republican Party both strongly oppose abortion and gay rights, and even Utah Democrats are largely pro-life and would be considered social conservatives compared to the national party.

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