There’s a nascent movement of counties asserting their right not to enforce laws they believe violate the U.S. Constitution. Although the Constitution explicitly states federal law is “the supreme law of the land,” public officials in these counties say they can ignore federal edicts that run counter to their interpretation of the founding document.

That spirit of rebellion has reached into the realm of public notice laws this year in Wyoming, where two municipalities in Natrona County recently claimed the right not to run notices in their local newspapers despite state laws requiring them to do so.

According to the Casper Star-Tribune, the city of Mills and the memorably named town of Bar Nunn have passed “nearly identical ordinance(s)” exempting themselves from specific state statutes requiring newspaper notices as well as “various other provisions of Wyoming State Statute (requiring) municipal corporations to provide notice of actions, hearings and information by way of legal notices or publications in newspapers.”

The preambles of both ordinances claim that newspaper notice is “an inefficient means of providing notice at the present time, fails to give adequate notice, and is an expense imposed upon the town which is not calculated to achieve the desired effect.”

An attorney who represents both Mills and Bar Nunn told the Star-Tribune that statutes relating to the governance of cities and towns can be exempted under Wyoming’s “home rule” principle.

The Star-Tribune and the Wyoming Press Association disagree. “A municipality may not exempt itself from ‘statutes uniformly applicable to all cities and towns,’” wrote an attorney representing both organizations in a letter sent last week to the mayors of both jurisdictions. “A statute cannot get any more uniformly applicable than (the state’s public notice law),” he asserted.

“Whatever intentions (Mills and Bar Nunn) might have, they are making the public’s business less accessible to the public,” said the Star-Tribune in a July 4 editorial. “And that lack of transparency could have consequences. Transparency is what keeps small government from becoming an exclusive and often powerful club.”