The Amicus Curiae lecture series remains without grant funding after federal cuts in spring 2025 ended its primary funding source.

Patricia Proctor, the director of the Simon Perry Center for Constitutional Democracy, which hosts the series, said the series had been funded since 2011 by grants from the West Virginia Humanities Council.

The funding was paused in April 2025 following a cut by the Department of Government Efficiency.

“The Trump administration entered an executive order and basically cut funding for the National Endowment for the Humanities,” Proctor said. “The West Virginia Humanities Council, just like other humanities councils, lost their ability to engage in grant-making activity.”

She said the lecture series has continued but without the support of the grant money the Simon Perry Center had been accustomed to having.

“That being said, we’ve been able to continue to have the same speakers we planned to have when we applied for this grant, and we’ve been able to do this thanks to the generosity of donors who, over the years, have contributed to the Simon Perry Center,” Proctor said.

Proctor said no news has been received from the West Virginia Humanities Council regarding the future of the grants.

In May, President Donald Trump proposed eliminating the National Endowment for the Humanities in his 2026 budget proposal. In August, the NEH was provided with $34.8 million to be allocated to celebrating past presidents, statesmen and the Declaration of Independence’s 250th anniversary, Proctor said. None of the funding went to the humanities councils for the states.

“The humanities councils of the states haven’t, I believe, received any support to resume their prior programming,” Proctor said.

Though the Simon Perry Center and the Amicus Curiae lecture series continue with the support of donors, Proctor said she cannot rely on that funding alone.

“I cannot be complacent. Once you spend money, it’s gone,” Proctor said. “It’s important to make sure that you are responsible and fiscally conservative in looking after the center’s funds.”

As the Simon Perry Center remains without funding, Proctor said the center will be holding a fundraising campaign to coincide with its upcoming 15th anniversary in 2026.

“I want to have a pretty major fundraising campaign to support the work of the center going forward, so that’s something I am pursuing right now,” Proctor said. “I believe we’ll roll that out in the new year, and that will be helpful. I will continue to explore other grant funding opportunities.”

Proctor said it is important to fund civic engagement programs like the Simon Perry Center and its lecture series to keep the country informed.

“I think that people need to think carefully and substantively about what it means to be an educated, thoughtful citizen in our country,” Proctor said. “Our democracy depends upon people being informed and having civic literacy in order to be good citizens and have a healthy country.”

Proctor said the lack of civic literacy plays a major role in the currently polarized political climate in the United States, a problem that programs like hers help alleviate.

“We have an unhealthy civic environment where people are separated so much by polarization and partisanship that they’ve lost sight of what we all have in common as human beings and what it takes to do well and succeed in a society,” Proctor said. “Part of that is actually having a set of tools to analyze information, knowledge of the ideas that have animated our democracy since the beginning.”

Ashton Pack can be contacted at [email protected].