Idaho State Motto: Esto Perpetua

Idaho's state motto is Esto Perpetua, a Latin phrase meaning Let It Be Perpetual. The legislature adopted it on March 14, 1891, inscribed on a banner across the bottom of the Great Seal of Idaho. The motto and the seal came together in a single act — Idaho had become a state only nine months earlier, on July 3, 1890.

The phrase is attributed to Paolo Sarpi (1552–1623), a Venetian theologian and statesman who reportedly spoke it on his deathbed as a wish for the Republic of Venice to endure. Emma Edwards Green, the Boise artist who designed the seal, chose the phrase and became the only woman in U.S. history to design an official state seal.

The standard English translation is Let It Be Perpetual, reflecting the Latin subjunctive mood of esto. Other versions in common use include May It Be Perpetual and May It Endure Forever. All three preserve the sense of the original: a wish, not a declaration.

Emma Edwards Green's own translation, It is forever, shifts the mood to declarative. Idaho law specifies only the Latin motto; no single English rendering is authorized by statute. Both the traditional and Green's versions appear in official Idaho publications and historical accounts.

Idaho became the 43rd state on July 3, 1890. The new state legislature needed an official seal and opened a design competition. Emma Edwards Green, an artist who had recently moved to Boise, submitted the winning entry. The legislature adopted her design, with the motto Esto Perpetua on a banner at the bottom, on March 14, 1891. Governor Norman B. Willey awarded Green $100 for the work on May 5, 1891.

Green was the daughter of former Missouri Governor John Cummins Edwards and had studied at the Art Students League in New York. She was the only woman to enter the competition, and the legislature chose her design unanimously. No other woman has designed an official U.S. state seal.

The phrase itself traces to Paolo Sarpi, a Venetian theologian, scientist, and historian who spent his career defending the Republic of Venice's independence from papal authority. His reported dying words in 1623 were Esto perpetua — a wish that Venice would last. The phrase entered American civic vocabulary in the 19th century before Green placed it on Idaho's seal.