Wyoming – Politics, Economy, Society

Constitutional framework

Wyoming’s constitution, adopted in 1889, specifies three branches of state government: a legislature, an executive, and a judiciary. There are five elected executives: governor, auditor, treasurer, superintendent of public instruction, and secretary of state; there is no lieutenant governor. All executive officers serve four-year terms. Each of the five elected state administrators supervises an area of state government with a substantial degree of autonomy.

Wyoming’s constitution specifies a bicameral legislature, including a House of Representatives and a Senate. The Senate has 30 members who are elected for four-year terms, while the House has 60 representatives who are elected every two years. Representation in both chambers is based upon county or district populations. Wyoming’s legislature is composed of part-time citizen lawmakers who meet for limited legislative sessions each year.

Wyoming’s constitution also establishes a three-tier court system that includes local courts, nine district courts, and a Supreme Court. District court justices stand for reelection every six years. The state’s Supreme Court has five justices who stand for reelection every eight years in nonpartisan elections. Local courts included country courts and justices of the peace and municipal courts until the late 1990s, when they were phased out in favour of circuit courts of limited jurisdiction.

At the local government level there are 23 counties and numerous municipalities, school districts, and special districts. The form of municipal government is by local option, the strong and weak mayor and the manager forms all being used. All counties use the commission form of government. The average county government provides services to a sparse population spread over some 4,000 square miles (10,000 square km), an area more than twice as large as the state of Delaware. Sweetwater county, in the southern portion of the state, alone accounts for more than 10,000 square miles (27,000 square km). These large areas require a strong commitment to the effective provision of services on the part of local government officials and a measure of self-reliance on the part of Wyoming’s population.

Wyoming is politically conservative and has traditionally favoured the Republican Party in presidential contests. Wyoming has also tended to send Republican senators and representatives to the U.S. Congress. Although Democratic victories are not uncommon in state executive-branch positions, there has not been a Democratic majority in the state Senate since 1936 or in the House since 1964. Republican Dick Cheney, the vice president of the United States from 2001 to 2009, represented Wyoming in the U.S. House of Representatives for six terms beginning in 1978 and eventually became the Republican whip.

Education

The state’s population is well educated, with the proportion of both high school and college graduates above the national average. Wyoming’s schools are small and have favourable teacher-pupil ratios. In some of the state’s most isolated areas, kindergarten to eighth-grade students are still taught in one-teacher schools. The vast majority of the state’s population graduates from high school.

The University of Wyoming, located in Laramie, was founded in 1886 and is the state’s only public four-year institution of higher learning. There are, however, several private four-year colleges in Wyoming, as well as two-year community colleges in Casper, Cheyenne, Sheridan, Powell, Rock Springs, Torrington, and Riverton.