Because the judiciary engages in policy making only by rendering decisions in specific cases, one tactic of interest groups is to make sure that a case appropriate for obtaining its policy goals is brought before the court. In some instances this means that the interest group will initiate and sponsor the case by providing all the necessary resources. The best-known example of this type of sponsorship is Brown v. Board of Education (1954). In that case, although the suit against the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, was filed by the parents of Linda Brown, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) supplied the legal help and money necessary to pursue the case all the way to the Supreme Court. Thurgood Marshall, who later became a U.S. Supreme Court justice, argued the suit on behalf of the plaintiff and the NAACP. As a result, the NAACP gained a victory through the Supreme Court's decision that segregation in the public schools violates the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Interest groups may also provide assistance in a case initiated by someone else, but which nonetheless raises issues of importance to the group. A good example of this situation may be found in a freedom of religion case, Wisconsin v. Yoder. That case was initiated by the state of Wisconsin when it filed criminal complaints charging Jonas Yoder and others with failure to send their children to school until the age of 16 as required by state law. Yoder and the others, members of the Amish faith, believed that education beyond the eighth grade led to the breakdown of the values they cherished and to "worldly influences on their children."

An organization known as the National Committee for Amish Religious Freedom (NCARF) came to the defense of Yoder and the others. Following a decision against the Amish in the trial court, the NCARF appealed to a Wisconsin circuit court, which upheld the trial court's decision. An appeal was made to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the Amish, saying that the compulsory school attendance law violated the free exercise of religion clause of the First Amendment. Wisconsin then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which on May 15, 1972, sustained the religious objection that the NCARF had raised to the compulsory school attendance laws.