Join the Bill Lane Center for the American West, Stanford Center for Law and History, and Department of History in conversation with the Hon. M. Margaret McKeown, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.  Judge McKeown will discuss her new book: Citizen Justice: The Environmental Legacy of William O. Douglas—Public Advocate and Conservation Champion.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas was a giant in the legal world, even if he is often remembered for his four wives, as a target of impeachment proceedings, and for his tenure as the long-serving justice from 1939 to 1975.  His most enduring legacy, however, is perhaps his advocacy for the environment.  In a way unthinkable today, Douglas ran a one-man lobby shop from his chambers at the U.S. Supreme Court, bringing him admiration from allies in conservation groups but raising ethical issues with his colleagues.  Douglas organized protests hikes that leveraged his position as a national figure, he lobbied politicians and policymakers privately about everything from logging to highway construction and pollution, and he protested at the Supreme Court through his voluminous and passionate dissents.  Douglas made a lasting contribution to both the physical environment and environmental law—with trees still standing, dams unbuilt, and beaches protected as a result of his work.