Economic and community stability depend on an independent judiciary that fairly applies laws, key legal figures said Friday in Jackson Hole as they called on citizens to defend the rule of law.
“The rule of law is in jeopardy,” said Robert Henry, a former chief judge for the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. During a four-day conference at Jackson Lake Lodge, Henry joined a chorus of judges and lawyers describing the peril of undermining the legal system that underpins a functioning society.
When people take out mortgages or save money for college, for example, they’re banking on those long-term decisions being legally enforceable, said Richard Deane, Jr., president of the American College of Trial Lawyers, which organized the regional meeting.
The comments come at a time when the judiciary has increasingly come under fire by President Donald Trump and his allies, who have blamed judges for thwarting his policies. In Wyoming, some Republican lawmakers have hurled similar complaints.
In response to those attacks on the courts, the lawyers and judges on Friday’s panel emphasized that defending the rule of law, an independent judiciary and access to justice is a nonpartisan issue.
“So what is the rule of law?” Henry asked.
A former Oklahoma legislator and attorney general, he summed up how scholars answer that question. The law must be spelled out so people know it in advance. The law also must be public, clear, stable and certain, though it can change over time.
“It must be applied equally,” he said. “The government also must follow the law.” And it requires an impartial, independent magistrate, he said.
“This is a fight,” Henry said, noting that he’s joined efforts to defend attorneys, under attack, via amicus briefs. That follows a career of asking attorneys to defend judges.
“Judges have famously neither sword nor purse, but only judgment,” Henry said. “Hamilton said that. He’s a figure on Broadway,” he joked, lightening the mood in the room.
But threats to judges are deadly serious, fellow panelist and former Wyoming Gov. Mike Sullivan said, holding up a photo of a “wanted” poster of judges displayed outside the office of U.S. Rep. Andy Ogles, a Tennessee Republican.
“The Federal Bar Association wrote a letter to his office protesting this and expressing the concern that everyone in this country should have about the safety and independence of judges and what this kind of conduct does to the rule of law,” Sullivan, a lawyer himself, warned.
As Sullivan sees it, the administration and Congress are ignoring the rule of law, and the U.S. Supreme Court is looking the other way.
“It is the citizens that are going to have to do something if it’s going to be corrected,” Sullivan said. “If we can’t avoid the cliff we’re walking toward.”
Retired Wyoming Supreme Court Chief Justice Mike Golden said he and others in Wyoming’s legal profession are publicly defending the rule of law. Golden and Sullivan were among more than 100 members of Wyoming’s legal community who called on the state’s congressional delegation to condemn attacks on the judiciary.
“Obviously, that’s the best thing that we can do is speak out at every opportunity in our local communities,” Golden said.
But he expressed frustration with Wyoming’s congressional delegation for describing Wyoming jurists as “biased and liberal.”
“How in the world can that be?” he asked, questioning how following the U.S. Constitution could be deemed liberal and biased.
“And how do you respond to that?” Golden asked. “How do you get through to them?”
Sen. John Barrasso isn’t a lawyer, he noted, but Rep. Harriet Hageman and Sen. Cynthia Lummis are both attorneys, required by their profession to take an oath to defend and uphold the state and U.S. constitutions, Golden said. Golden himself has taken that oath as a lawyer, military officer and judge.
“I think in my own life, I take that oath every damn day,” Golden said. “It’s hard for me not to get angry, and I’m sure it is for all of you.”
But he added the anger has to be tempered and directed to the right audience — not congressional representatives, who respond only with form letters.
“All we can do is speak truth to power and do it responsibly,” Golden said. “I’ll continue to do that as long as I’m able.”
“We need to defend all of those who wear the robe.”
Retired Judge William Downes
Former U.S. District Chief Court Judge William Downes of Wyoming echoed Golden’s call to speak out to civic groups and churches and to stand up for judges.
“It is truly a coward who attacks a judge,” Downes said. “Because a judge has to stay in his or her chambers and be silent.” Cases come to the judges; they don’t seek them out, he noted.
Downes also pointed to Judge Esther Salas, who pursued legislation to enhance security for judges nationwide after a gunman killed her only child and wounded her husband in a 2020 attack aimed at her.
“That woman needs to be honored, and we need to defend her,” Downes said. “We need to defend all of those who wear the robe.”
If I were a judge I’d be infuriated too and adamant in supporting the constitutional limits within ‘the rule of law’. One judge repeatedly and knowingly stepping outside those limits makes the whole profession look bad. Personal threats against judges such as Kavanaugh hunted by assassins or giant posters of ‘wanted’ judges – Not cool either.
I’ve not seen Wyo’s congressional delegation condone such behavior, nor seen an aggressive stance against. I have heard consistent statements that each of our three co-equal branches of government certainly must have limited influence over the others as a check to balance power. But of course no branch has unlimited influence. If one branch presses too far beyond their limits, it should be restrained back, just as the SCOTUS recently denied universal injunction legitimacy within district courts, or not allowing judges to make laws from the bench beyond the interpretation of laws.
If a minority few within the judicial branch continues to step outside their limits, the other two branches will be tempted to ignore those unlawful decrees, eroding the ‘rule of law’. The solution I think starts with the judicial consistently adhering to their limits, especially since they represent ‘the rule of law’. The few rogue judges need their wings clipped. The voters remain the ultimate check to the executive and legislative if they stray too far.
Sorry, but fail. Many judges are appointed by POLITICIANS!! Chuck Schumer said the quite part out loud. He admitted that during Bidens presidency they stack the courts with “progressive judges”. Those are his words. Judges shouldn’t be far left or right. They should be as unbiased as possible. Instead, we’ve got a bunch of activists pretending to be judges. This is the real problem. Obviously.
Our news shouldn’t be biased either, but I think you know that. There wasn’t squat about the proposed theft of public land on our news channels.
Wouldn’t it be nice if you got to choose our judges-not. Obviously.
I’m in complete agreement with this perspective, that our executive branch is disregarding the rule of law.. Disregarding rule of law is terrifying and watching executive branch ignore it and make their own rules. If it can be disregarded in this way, can’t each citizen make his own rules/laws choose which ones to abide? Im hugely disappointed in our Congressional delegation, all three.
I’m proud to be a Wyoming lawyer (retired) when I see the likes of Justice Golden and Governor Sullivan standing proudly by the rule of law. If only Senator Lummis and Representative Hageman, both admitted to the Wyoming bar themselves, felt the same obligation to defend the rule of law. That includes, at a MINIMUM, respecting the judiciary and honoring the US Constitution.
You don’t have to be a lawyer to know that that is only right; Senator Barrasso has no excuse to ignore these basic truths. Nor does our delegation’s liege lord, Donald Trump, whose life has been devoted to lawbreaking on an epic scale. It is time for our delegation and all of Congress to remember their oaths of office. They must check him. It is high time for Congress to apply the provisions of the Constitution which provide for the legal ouster of this dangerous specimen, IncompeTrump, from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. VP JD Vance is no prize, but he’s not obviously mentally unfit for office. IncompeTrump is.
Well said
Wait Judge’s now want protection from the bed they made? The 10th circuit is likely one of the most radical courts in the nation. It’s time judges were elected.
This panel’s appeal to defend the “rule of law” is rich with irony when considered against the American Revolution of 1776. That revolution was, by every definition, a violent rejection of existing law, existing courts, and the very idea of an “impartial judiciary” enforcing imperial policy. Colonists were not clamoring for better judges or more civics lessons—they were tearing down the legal system of the British Empire because they saw it as inherently unjust.
The British Crown had its own trained jurists, legal codes, and courts—just like the ones being exalted here. Colonial courts functioned under British law, yet the American revolutionaries did not respect them as “independent” or worth defending. Why? Because “the law” enforced imperial taxes, punished smugglers, seized property, and treated dissent as sedition. To American revolutionaries, those laws were not legitimate, even if clearly written and equally applied.
In fact, the Declaration of Independence specifically listed judicial tyranny as a grievance: “He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.” The colonists believed the legal system was not neutral but complicit in tyranny. So they didn’t write amicus briefs—they dumped tea, tarred tax collectors, and went to war.
So when modern judges like Robert Henry or Mike Golden invoke Hamilton’s reverence for the judiciary while warning of threats to decorum or civility, they forget that the republic Hamilton helped create was birthed in direct defiance of a functioning legal order. The rule of law, absent justice and legitimacy, is merely a tool of control.
Today’s judges fear for their “independence” not because they are oppressed, but because public trust is eroding—not from lawless mobs, but from decades of judicial double standards, politicized rulings, and courts that rubber-stamp federal power while ordinary citizens get crushed by bureaucracy and partisanship. The outrage they now face is not unlike the contempt the colonists once held for courts loyal to the Crown.
So if these modern defenders of the bench want to be taken seriously, they’d do well to remember 1776 didn’t happen because people lost respect for law—but because they stopped pretending that legality equals justice. When law ceases to serve the people, it will be overthrown. That’s not a threat. It’s American history.
According to Governor Sullivan, “It is the citizens that are going to have to do something if it’s going to be corrected”. By that, I assume he means VOTE to replace legislators who are complicit in the attack on the rule of law. Gladly!
Anything else he can suggest? Letters, phone calls, protest rallies … have done it all, and will keep at it. But if highly respected legal professionals in our state can’t get our delegation to acknowledge the travesty of Trump’s attack on the justice system, Who Can?? and How??
When we get to vote them in so they are not so politically biased I would think of treating them nicely. But because so many district judges have become political props they should not be treated as a separate part of government, or nicely. Our judicial part of government is failing to follow the laws as written. While others are doing congreses job by making laws.
I agree that the judiciary and even politicians should not be attacked. Does the writer of this article have a short memory? When the Democrats were in office were you writing articles about attacks from the left on conservative justices? Like this just happened with the current administration! And I see that Robert Henry was there. 10th circuit court of appeals. Anybody who knows anything knows how far left they are. Come on. I’ll donate again to Wyofile when you show some balance in your reporting.
What is said above is absolutely true – our “Congressional Delegation” (although they do not deserve to be addressed as such) only and always send out form letters written by “Congressional Correspondents” who are one step above the kids who answer the telephone. Calls are not returned, and their offices have no accountability to anyone. The elections are coming, and they deserved to be booted out by overwhelming margins. Wyoming deserves representation – not boot-licking sycophants of a deranged, senile, dangerous wanna-be dictator.
When you elect a criminal as president, the rule of law will be attacked by the executive branch of government. What’s the big surprise? The current president has never in his life respected our country’s laws or it’s constitution and he has never faced the consequences of his crimes. His grift blames the rule of law on his shortcomings and his marks buy it.
As it did during Obama’s and biden’s terms.
I miss Mike Sullivan and folks like him. The state and the country is falling into the sewer. Our three ‘reps’ are traitors to the people of Wyoming. They are indeed cowards. You can’t trust a single thing they say, and they’re willing to sell the citizens down the river.
Amen Gordon.
I would like to personally thank Governor Sullivan, Chief Justice Golden, and judges Henry and Downes for all they’ve done for this state and our country during their long, honorable careers.
If Wyoming were represented more by people with their character and integrity, rather than the three folks who are “representing” us now, we would all be in a much better place and this country would be stronger for it.
Thanks again to all who are pushing back against this madness.