By a narrow margin, Owyhee County voters selected Murphy as county seat in 1934, succeeding Silver City (which was located in the Owyhee Mountains and had been in decline; it is now defunct). Although the county seat was moved to Murphy after the vote, and a new Owyhee County Courthouse was constructed in 1936, the Idaho State Legislature did not ratify the change of county seat until 1999. The error in the Idaho Code, discovered by county prosecutor G. Edward Yarbrough, was finally corrected by Senate Bill 1009.