May the Wyoming Supreme Court seek competitive grants for a public judicial learning center?

Plain-English summary

The Wyoming Supreme Court planned a Judicial Learning Center to educate the public about the courts and state legal history. The Legislature had appropriated funds contingent on matching private money. After Opinion 2014-03 advised against the court directly soliciting private donations, the committee considered applications for publicly available competitive grants.

The committee's answer relied on the described grant conditions: governmental, charitable, or nonprofit grantors; low likelihood that the grantors would appear in Wyoming courts; a public competitive process; and use of funds for education rather than court decision making. Under those facts, the applications did not violate the Code's requirements of integrity, independence, impartiality, and public confidence.

The opinion reserved a case-specific check of whether a particular grantor might become a litigant or otherwise call the court's independence or integrity into question. It distinguished this grant process from directly seeking private donations from potential litigants.

In practice

The opinion permits the described grant applications for the learning center. Its reasoning depends on the public, competitive process, the grantors' expected separation from court litigation, and the educational use of the money.

Common questions

Q: May the Wyoming Supreme Court apply for public competitive grants for the learning center?

A: Yes. The committee concluded that applications under the stated conditions would not violate the Code.

Q: Does the opinion cover direct solicitation of private donations?

A: No. It recounts Opinion 2014-03's conclusion that the court should not directly solicit private donations and treats grant applications separately.

Q: Does every grantor automatically meet the opinion's conditions?

A: No. The committee says the court would need to assess each grantor's potential to become a litigant or otherwise affect public confidence and judicial integrity.

Background and rules framework

The opinion applies Wyoming Code of Judicial Conduct Rules 1.2 on integrity and public confidence, 2.4(B) on outside financial influences, and 3.1 on extrajudicial activity. It expressly responds to the earlier Advisory Opinion 2014-03 on private fundraising for the same center.

Citations and references

Wyoming Code of Judicial Conduct:

• Rule 1.2, independence, integrity, impartiality, and public confidence.
• Rule 2.4(B), outside interests and judicial conduct.
• Rule 3.1, extrajudicial activities.

Other opinions cited:

• Wyoming JEAC Advisory Opinion 2014-03, direct solicitation of private donations for the Judicial Learning Center.

See also

No sibling opinions yet indexed.

Source

• Landing page: Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee opinions
• Original PDF: Advisory Opinion 2014-04