Center created to protect individual rights

CARSON CITY -- The Nevada Policy Research Institute long has prepared reports challenging excessive and questionable government spending.

Now it has an attorney to actually sue governments when they trample on fundamental individual rights or the U.S. Constitution.

The conservative Las Vegas think tank announced Thursday it has created a legal division, the Center for Justice and Constitutional Litigation.

Attorney Joseph Becker, who was chief legal counsel and policy director for Texas Congressman Ron Paul's 2008 presidential campaign, will head the center.

The institute has not yet identified an issue where Becker might file such a lawsuit against local, state or federal government.

"Government passes all kinds of laws that make things illegal, but that doesn't mean they are constitutional," he said.

As a member of the staff of Mountain State Legal Foundation in Colorado, Becker, 52, three years ago challenged a decision made in a Montana hunting license case by U.S. District Judge Brian Sandoval, now Nevada's governor-elect.

Individuals who believe their rights have been violated by government can contact the new center through its website, justice.npri.org. NPRI will review their complaints and decide whether to file a lawsuit, without charge.

Becker could sue in cases where the institute membership believes free speech, gun ownership or private property rights have been violated, according to Andy Matthews, vice president for operations and communications.

"We will choose cases that further the public interest and have the potential to establish broad-reaching legal precedent," Matthews added. "Our focus will be on the Bill of Rights."

Matthews said the litigation center will start with Becker as its only lawyer, but he hopes other lawyers will be added. The institute exists entirely on donations and does not take any public funds, he said.

NPRI isn't the sole organization that uses litigation as a tool against government. Over the past decade, the American Civil Liberties Union also has been filing lawsuits against Nevada governments when it determines that individual rights have been violated. And in nearby Arizona, the Goldwater Institute has a litigation unit similar to NPRI's.

In frequent policy reports, NPRI has become increasingly critical of state spending decisions and the growing cost of funding public employee pensions. It also has questioned decisions by local governments to increase pay and benefits through collective bargaining done in closed negotiations with employee unions.

Just because the institute publishes a study on a government issue doesn't mean that it is going to follow with a lawsuit against the affected government agency, Matthews said.

"NPRI will continue to advance good policy, talk about lower taxes and limiting government regulation, but the center will be limited to cases where we see government behaving unconstitutionally," Matthews said.

Becker practiced constitutional law between 2001 and 2007 with the Mountain State Foundation.

He filed a legal brief in the controversial case where the U.S. Supreme Court voted 5-4 to let the city of New London, Conn., take people's homes on behalf of a private shopping center developer. He also worked on other cases involving eminent domain and the taking of people's property and on voting rights cases.

Mountain States has gained a national reputation for filing litigation to protect property rights of individuals, often challenging the Endangered Species Act, laws that limit the development of natural resources and challenging affirmative action and racial quotas.

One case Becker worked on concerned a decision made by Sandoval when he was a federal judge. He appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals a ruling by Sandoval that allowed Montana's wildlife agency to grant preferential treatment to American Indians in the awarding of big game hunting license tags.

He argued that Montana needed to use "stricter scrutiny" before giving preferential treatment to Indian hunters. Sandoval's decision was upheld by the appeals court.

Maggie McLetchie, the ACLU legal director in Nevada, welcomed NPRI's decision to hire a litigation director. She said there never has been sufficient financial resources for the ACLU to handle all cases against government.

"The more, the merrier," she said.

Becker is an Air Force veteran. He received a bachelor's degree in Madrid, Spain, while in the Air Force and a master's degree in economics at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He graduated from the Northern Illinois University law school and has practiced law, mainly in Colorado, since 1996.

Contact Capital Bureau Chief Ed Vogel at evogel@reviewjournal.com or 775-687-3901.