Riedel v. Anderson6/4/2003
ion for judicial review of an administrative action. In re Conflicting Lease Application for Lease No. 17027, 972 P.2d 586 (Wyo. 1999).
Riedel then instituted a declaratory judgment case in June 1999 against the Board of Land Commissioners and its members, challenging the constitutionality of Wyo. Stat. Ann. ยงยง 36-5-101 and 36-5-105, the preferential right-to-renew statute. On July 10, 2000, the district court granted a motion to intervene filed jointly by the Wyoming Stock Growers Association and the Wyoming Wool Growers Association ("the Associations") and a separate motion to intervene filed by the Wyoming Farm Bureau Federation ("the Federation").
Before trial, the district court asked the parties to brief the legal issue of whether the conveyance of the school lands to the State of Wyoming by the United States imposed a trust on those lands. After briefing, the district court on October 29, 2001, issued an order concluding that the lands were indeed encumbered by a trust, imposing on the State a fiduciary duty to manage the lands exclusively for the beneficiaries, the State's common schools.
Following the district court's trust ruling, the matter was tried to the court in November 2001 on the issue of whether the right-to-renew statute conflicts with the State's trust duties and is therefore unconstitutional. Riedel's case consisted of testimony by himself; Jim Whalen, Assistant Director of the Department of State Lands and Investments; and Dr. Mark Sunderman, a professor at the University of Wyoming and author of several publications on the state school lands. After plaintiff rested, the district court granted the intervenor Associations' motion to dismiss on the grounds that Riedel failed to present adequate evidence that the preferential right to renew violates the State's fiduciary responsibilities. Riedel timely appealed the dismissal of his complaint (Case No. 02-60), and the Associations cross-appealed the trial court's order that the school lands are held in trust (Case No. 02-61). For purposes of this consolidated appeal, Riedel was designated the appellant, while the Associations, the Federation and the State were designated appellees.
Historical Background
Beginning with the admission of Ohio to the United States in 1803, Congress granted to almost all newly admitted states sections of public land for the support of schools. See, e.g., Ohio Enabling Act, 2 Stat. 173, 175 (1802); Wade R. Budge, Changing the Focus: Managing State Trust Lands in the Twenty-First Century, 19 J. Land, Resources, & Envtl. L. 223, 226 (1999). The specific language of the grants varied somewhat among the early states' enabling laws, but generally was "for the use of schools" with no mention of trusts, fiduciary obligations, or restrictions on the sale, lease or other use of the lands. See, Sally K. Fairfax, et al., The School Trust Lands: A Fresh Look at Conventional Wisdom, 22 Envtl. L. 797, 810 (1992). Substantially the same pattern was used for land grants in the admission of Louisiana, Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois , Alabama, Missouri and Arkansas. See, Budge, supra, at 226. Courts have consistently ruled that Congress had not encumbered these early land grants with a common law trust, but had merely entered into a "solemn agreement" with the states that the land would be used as intended. See, e.g., Branson Sch. Dist. Re-82 v. Romer, 161 F.3d 619, 633 (10th Cir. 1998) (citing Alabama v. Schmidt, 232 U.S. 168, 17374, 34 S.Ct. 301, 58 L.Ed. 555 (1914), and Cooper v. Roberts, 59 U.S. (18 How.) 173, 18182, 15 L.Ed. 338 (1855)).
However, beginning with Michigan in 1837, a pattern evolved by which the states through their own constitution
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