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Stanley K. Hathaway
In
1969, Governor Stan Hathaway pushed for the creation of Wyoming’s first
mineral severance tax, as well as a constitutional amendment creating the
Permanent Mineral Trust Fund.
The Permanent Mineral Trust Fund required the legislature to impose a 1.5
percent tax on the extraction of minerals, the proceeds of which were
deposited in the Trust Fund. The principal of the Trust Fund can never be
spent. The Trust Fund balance is now more than $2.25 billion. The income
from the Trust goes into the State’s general fund to pay for State
operations.
The concept of the Permanent Mineral Trust Fund led the 2005 Wyoming
Legislature to authorize the creation of a $400 million permanent endowment
that would fund scholarships for qualified Wyoming high school graduates to
attend the University of Wyoming or any state community college. In
recognition of Hathaway’s contributions to higher education, the Fund was
named the Hathaway Student Scholarship Endowment Account, and the
scholarship program was named for him.
His tenure as Governor was marked by reorganization of state government and
passage of environmental laws – the enactment of air and water quality
standards, surface mining regulations, and the creation of the Department of
Environmental Quality. Wyoming’s economy was in the doldrums when he was
elected governor, but Hathaway set in motion a number of initiatives which
turned the economy around and saw it booming by the time he left office.
After retiring from the governor’s office in 1975, Hathaway was nominated
and served under President Gerald Ford as secretary of the U.S. Department
of the Interior.
Stan Hathaway died in October 2005.
Copyright © 2005 – Wyoming State Bar – Adapted and used by permission April
2006
