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The Honorable Kermit Edward Bye
Circuit Judge
United States Court of Appeals
Eighth Judicial Circuit
Fargo, North Dakota
Kermit Edward Bye was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit by President William J. Clinton in 2000, after being unanimously confirmed in a roll-call vote by the United States Senate.
Judge Bye, a native of Hatton, North Dakota, is the first UND law school graduate to be appointed as a United States Circuit Judge. He is the fifth lawyer from North Dakota to serve in that capacity since the founding of this country, and the fourth lawyer from the same law firm in which he practiced for more than 32 years prior to becoming a judge. He is 1959 graduate of the UND College of Business and Public Administration, as well as graduating from its Law School, earning a Juris Doctor degree, with distinction, in 1962.
Prior to taking the bench, Judge Bye was a senior partner in the law firm of Vogel, Weir, Bye, Hunke & McCormick, Ltd., where he practiced in both federal and state trial and appellate courts between 1968 and 2000. Prior to entering the private practice of law, Bye was an Assistant United States Attorney, a Special Assistant Attorney General, and Deputy Securities Commissioner, all in North Dakota.
Judge Bye was the 13th lawyer in the history of North Dakota to receive SBAND's Distinguished Service Award. He has served as president of the State Bar Association of North Dakota, the Western States Bar Conference, and the National Caucus of State Bar Associations. He has recently completed a three-year term as a member of the Board of Governors of the American Bar Association and is currently a member of the Executive Board of the Central and East European Law Initiative (CEELI), which is sponsored by the U.S. State Department in joint cooperation with the American Bar Association. In October, 2001, Judge Bye presented an address on preventing corruption within judiciary at the 10th International Anti-Corruption Conference in Prague, Czech Republic.
Judge Bye has served as chair of the Advisory Board and a founder of the North Dakota Small Business Investment Company, and has served on the Board of Directors of the Greater North Dakota Association and the State Executive Board of U.S. West (now Qwest) Communications, Inc., in addition to serving on numerous other boards of corporations and civic organizations.
He is a past member of the North Dakota Combined Law Enforcement Council and past member of the Board of Directors of the Southeast Mental Health and Retardation Center, and past chair and Board member of the Red River Human Services Foundation in Fargo.
Judge Bye has been active in numerous charitable and business-related organizations during his legal career. He has served as vice chairman and founding member of the Board of Trustees of the Hope Foundation, and is a founder and member of Board of Directors, and served as vice-president of, the North Dakota State University Hockey Club, Inc.
Judge Bye and his wife, Carol Beth, also a native of Hatton, who is graduated of both Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota, and the University of North Dakota, are the parents of three adult children, Laura Lee Klomstad of Des Moines, Iowa; William Edward Bye of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida; and Bethany Ann Bye-Lindemann of Fargo. The Byes have two grandsons, Brekken and Britton Klomstad, of Des Moines, Iowa.
The Eighth Circuit Court includes seven states and has 11 judges and hears appeals from federal courts and administrative agencies in North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, and Arkansas. Its main courtrooms are located in St. Louis, Missouri, and St. Paul, Minnesota; however its judges maintain their chambers and staffs in their home areas. They congregate in three-judge panels to hear oral arguments and decide cases on behalf of the entire court, or in en banc sessions at which all the Circuit Judges sit as one panel under certain limited circumstances. Further appeals of Circuit Court decisions are presented directly to the United States Supreme Court.
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