Wyoming

This is Wyoming in 1897. It's a land of great, open spaces. A land that gives a man plenty of elbow room. Somebody once said that in Wyoming, you could look farther, and see less than any place in the world. Whoever said that couldn't have seen Wyoming as I have. ~ The Virginian

Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The state is the tenth largest by area, but the least populous and the second least densely populated of the 50 United States. The western two-thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High Plains. It is known for two national parks, Yellowstone and Grand Teton. Its state government is currently controlled by the Republican Party, and its current governor is Mark Gordon. Wyoming is bordered by Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, and Idaho.

Quotes

• This is Wyoming in 1897. It's a land of great, open spaces. A land that gives a man plenty of elbow room. Somebody once said that in Wyoming, you could look farther, and see less than any place in the world. Whoever said that couldn't have seen Wyoming as I have.
  • Irwin Blacker and Douglas Heyes, The Virginian, Introduction to the episode "West" [1.10] (air date November 28, 1962).

• He was up in Wyoming,
  And drew a bull no man could ride.
  He promised her he'd turn out,
  Well it turned out that he lied.
  And their dreams that they'd been livin',
  In the California sand,
  Died right there beside him in Cheyenne.
  • Garth Brooks, Fresh Horses (1995), The Beaches of Cheyenne, written by Dan Roberts, Bryan Kennedy, and G. Brooks.

• He heard the wind, the ever present Wyoming wind for the last time.
  • David Shepard, on the death of his son Matthew Shepard, in The Laramie Project (2002).

• Abortion will stay legal in Wyoming after the state's top court struck down laws that placed a near-total ban on the procedures. The court ruled that Wyoming's anti-abortion legislation, including the nation's first ban on abortion pills, were in violation of the state's constitution. "A woman has a fundamental right to make her own health care decisions, including the decision to have an abortion," the court wrote in a 4-1 decision.
  Lawyers for the state had argued that abortion could not violate Wyoming's constitution because it does not constitute health care. The case against the state was brought by four women, including two obstetricians, an abortion advocacy group, and the state's only abortion provider, Wellspring Health Access in the city of Casper. Wyoming is one of many states in which legal fights over abortion bans have ensued since 2022 - when the Supreme Court reversed the landmark 1973 Roe v Wade judgement legalising abortion.
  More than a dozen states have since enacted near-total bans on abortions, several of which have been put on hold by the courts.
  • Sakshi Venkatraman, "Abortion stays legal in Wyoming after state's top court strikes down bans", BBC, 6 January 2026

• In Wyoming, the state's Supreme Court looked at two laws - one banning abortion in all cases except to protect a pregnant woman's life or in cases involving rape or incest, and another banning abortion pills explicitly. Both laws were quashed on Tuesday. Abortion pills are the most common method of pregnancy termination in the US. The Wyoming bill, which was passed by the state's Republican-controlled legislature in 2023, made it illegal to "prescribe, dispense, distribute, sell or use any drug for the purpose of procuring or performing an abortion". At the time, Wyoming American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) advocacy director Antonio Serrano criticised the bill, saying "a person's health, not politics, should guide important medical decisions - including the decision to have an abortion".
  Republicans in the state aren't happy with the laws being shot down. But they are now pushing for something more sweeping. On Tuesday, Wyoming's Republican Governor Mark Gordon expressed disappointed on the ruling and called for state legislators to pass a constitutional amendment cementing the ban in the state. "This ruling may settle, for now, a legal question, but it does not settle the moral one, nor does it reflect where many Wyoming citizens stand, including myself," he said. "It is time for this issue to go before the people for a vote, and I believe it should go before them this fall."
  • Sakshi Venkatraman, "Abortion stays legal in Wyoming after state's top court strikes down bans", BBC, 6 January 2026