> M. Margaret McKeown, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, was born in Casper, Wyoming, and calls herself a “child of the American West” who has a passion for the outdoors.
When she came East for law school at Georgetown University Law Center in 1975, she spent a lot of time at the C&O Canal near the Potomac River, which the late Justice William O. Douglas prevented from being turned into a highway. She became a Ninth Circuit judge in 1998.
> Fast-forward: McKeown recently decided to write about Douglas and his passion for the outdoors, and how he became an environmental crusader while also working as a Supreme Court justice for 36 years, the longest tenure of any associate justice in history.
McKeown wrote an article in 2019 in the Journal of Supreme Court History about Douglas and his dissent in the 1972 Sierra Club v. Morton case, in which he famously asserted that environmental entities such as rivers or valleys could have standing to “sue for their own preservation.” McKeown decided to broaden the story of his environmental legacy. “It was a lark that turned into a book,” McKeown said in an interview... The book is titled “CITIZEN JUSTICE: The Environmental Legacy of William O. Douglas—Public Advocate and Conservation Champion” and is available on Amazon.
I can appreciate good advocacy. (But from a sitting Supreme Court Justice?) Regardless, interesting history. Archive link here if paywalled.