Last fall Professor Lisa Heinzerling had just finished writing two briefs for a key environmental case to be heard by the Supreme Court, an exhaustive process that had taken nearly a year. Instead of simply breathing a sigh of relief, she chose to share her experience with members of the Law Center community. The special seminar was sponsored by the Law Center's Supreme Court Institute and the Environmental Law Forum, a student group. Showing a flair for the dramatic, Heinzerling brought a backpack filled to bursting with all the briefs submitted in the case. She then went on to explain the issues, sparking a lively dialogue among students and faculty.

The seminar is one example of the dynamic educational opportunities Georgetown's environmental law program provides. With a distinguished and dedicated faculty, a location that offers easy access to the key governmental agencies overseeing the nation's environmental regulations, and one of the nation's first environmental justice clinics, Georgetown's program is widely acknowledged to be among the finest in the nation.

The five members of the full-time faculty who concentrate their scholarship on environmental law - Hope Babcock, Peter Byrne, Lisa Heinzerling, Richard Lazarus, and Edith Brown Weiss - are frequently at the vanguard of research in their fields. They are also active leaders, opinion shapers, and policy makers, who serve on national and international committees, as witnesses before Congress, and as advocates before the Supreme Court. Richard Lazarus, for example, has argued 11 cases before the Supreme Court and written briefs for two dozen more. Lisa Heinzerling was lead counsel for Massachusetts and New Jersey in Whitman v. American Trucking, a landmark environmental case heard by the Supreme Court last fall. Peter Byrne has been involved in virtually every significant regulatory takings case before the Supreme Court in the past ten years. Hope Babcock, one of a handful of public trust scholars in the nation, is on the front lines every day, as director of the Law Center's highly regarded environmental justice clinic. Edith Brown Weiss, one of the world's leading international environmental law scholars, is a special legal advisor to the North American Commission on International Cooperation.

In the three decades since Congress created the Environmental Protection Agency, statutes regulating use of environmental resources have proliferated. A body of law that a short time ago was counted in the tens of pages today occupies thousands of pages of federal and state regulations. A similar explosion has taken place in the international arena, with individual nations enacting their own laws and nations joining together to protect the earth's environment with numerous international accords.

A challenging legal specialty, environmental law is eclectic and complex. When environmental issues are examined or litigated, attorneys often draw upon a range of legal knowledge. Administrative law, bankruptcy, constitutional law, federal courts, and property law are some of the legal specialties that intersect with environmental cases. "To the extent that the ecosystem is extraordinarily complex, the law will be complex," Richard Lazarus explains.

For this reason, students seeking to practice in the field, whether for the government, at a firm, or for an agency, need to be exposed to a broad range of legal topics. The 100 professors on Georgetown's full-time faculty - the largest law faculty in the nation - are able to offer courses that address the pertinent issues in depth. Consequently, Law Center graduates are extraordinarily well qualified to practice environmental law in both the private and public sectors. A relatively large number have been invited to participate in governmental honors programs at the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of the Interior, programs that typically accept only a handful of law graduates each year out of several hundred who apply.

Fighting for environmental equity
Maria Wiseman, L'97, was one of those tapped for the honors program at the Interior Department. Wiseman, who had worked at the National Park Service before attending Georgetown, knew before she entered law school that she wanted to concentrate on the fight for environmental equity - the concept that all individuals and social groups have equal rights to a safe environment.

In her second year, Wiseman participated in the Law Center's environmental justice clinic. Started by Professor Hope Babcock in 1991, the clinic operates within the Institute for Public Representation, which provides legal services to under-represented groups. "We represent people who could not otherwise get representation," Babcock says. The clinic's goal is to help these groups "avoid and abate environmental harms." The clinic also works to guarantee that clean air and water and parks are fairly distributed among the population.
Babcock directs the clinic, which employs two graduate fellows and includes an average of six students each semester. Students litigate issues related to pollution, natural resources, and land use before courts and administrative agencies. Local environmental issues form the core of the clinic's work; these, in turn, often touch upon key national concerns, from hazardous substances to threatened wetlands.

During her semester with the clinic, Wiseman fought an ash dump located near the site of St. Elizabeth's Hospital in the District of Columbia. For years, the District of Columbia had been dumping incinerator ash, which harbored dangerous chemicals, in a ravine behind the hospital. The site was close to a neighborhood with many children, who played near the dump. A stream ran through the ravine, too, so chemicals washed from the ash dump into the Anacostia River. During her time at the clinic, Wiseman and her fellow students successfully pressured the city to halt their dumping practices. The city also agreed to fence in the ash dump and test children in the area for high levels of lead in their blood.

Wiseman's experience in the clinic, she recalls, was among the most important that she had at the Law Center. "I got first-hand experience with litigation," she notes. "Working on a real project was invaluable."

In the decade since Babcock founded the clinic, students have also worked to protect the Anacostia River watershed in the District of Columbia and to preserve the land rights of the Mattaponi Indian tribe near Richmond, Virginia, among other cases. In one current case, the clinic is seeking adequate environmental review of the impact of cellular telephone towers. In another, students are filing papers in a bankruptcy proceeding involving an automobile recycling facility and polluter. And in the Mattaponi effort, the clinic recently won a victory, when the Virginia Supreme Court ruled that the tribe may contest a permit to siphon water from the Mattaponi River to fill a reservoir. Clinic members will now bring the case before a circuit court. Such diversity in cases reflects the interdisciplinary character of environmental law.

The clinic is clearly on the front line in the fight for environmental equity, a place where Babcock is quite comfortable. Before joining Georgetown's faculty, she was general counsel to the National Audubon Society, one of three faculty members to have held that position. There, for 11 years, she handled national environmental concerns. "When you work on national issues you wonder what is happening at the local level," she says. "You want to see how the laws play out." In recent years, Babcock notes, the clinic has also delved into issues that more directly involve national regulations, such as the Clean Air and Clean Water acts.

Babcock herself drafted sections of the Clean Water Act, a task she includes as one of her central accomplishments as a legal practitioner. She cites her efforts to save the Tuolmne River in California as one of her greatest "on the ground" achievements. A scholar as well as an activist, she has written six major articles since arriving at the Law Center. She is one of a handful of public trust scholars in the nation and is currently developing a major article about Indian sovereignty. Among her long roster of achievements, Babcock also includes her current role as a teacher of law, "passing on a legacy of caring."

The environment and cities
Like Babcock, Peter Byrne, who holds a masters degree in English literature as well as a J.D., is interested in how environmental concerns play out on the local stage. A specialist in property rights, land use, and academic freedom, Byrne also weighs in on issues of national concern.

Byrne's enthusiasm for the local environmental movement focuses on urban life and issues that arise from both city living and suburban sprawl. "We need livable cities in order to have a healthy environment," he believes. The growth of suburbs forces people to drive ever greater distances to get to work, and this, Byrne says, is "canceling the environmental benefits of cleaner burning fuel." An article he published in the Georgetown Law Review asked the question "Are Suburbs Unconstitutional?" Several of his other articles explore the compatibility of environmental concerns and property rights.

On the national level, Byrne has been involved in nearly every major takings case the Supreme Court has heard in the past decade. In relation to these cases, he argues that entrusting basic governmental services to local jurisdictions has contributed to economic stratification and suburban sprawl.

Community building is very important to Professor Byrne, and he is engaged in this effort both within the Law Center community and in his Capitol Hill neighborhood. In the early 1990s, while serving as chair of the appointments committee, he guided the Law Center to deepen its involvement in environmental law by hiring Professor Lazarus, already a noted figure in the field, and Professor Heinzerling, who was quickly making a name for herself. From 1997-2000, Byrne served as associate dean for the J.D. program. In this position, he initiated a revision of the upperclass curriculum in order to create an academic atmosphere that would foster more active learning.

Within the District, Byrne is doing research for the historic preservation office, examining uncollected administrative decisions implementing the city's historic preservation ordinance. Like others members of the environmental law faculty, Byrne balances activism with a passion for ideas. He sees property rights as "a fascinating area in which society and the legal system struggle over issues of individuality and society, often with significant consequences for the environment."

A pioneer on the global front
On the wall in Edith Brown Weiss's office at the Law Center is one of her most prized commendations. "To hold up your wonderfully authored books and articles that we cite in every volume we publish," the framed quotation reads.

It was given to her by the editors of the Georgetown International Environmental Law Review, which Professor Brown Weiss helped students to found more than a dozen years ago. At the time, it was the only journal of its type in the country. Described by a colleague as a "path-blazing scholar" Professor Brown Weiss is one of the most distinguished authorities worldwide in the field of international environmental law. In 1995, she received the Elizabeth Haub prize in Beligum for contributions to the field. Brown Weiss is one of only three Americans to receive the prestigious award. In 1996, the Law Center recognized her accomplishments by naming her Francis Cabell Brown Professor of International Law.

One of these accomplishments is Professor Brown Weiss's landmark book, In Fairness to Future Generations, first published in 1989 and translated into French, Japanese, and Chinese. The book sets forth the concept of intergenerational equity, which at the time was novel in the field of law. According to this premise, each generation has the right to inherit -and an obligation to pass on - a world that provides the same potential as it did in previous generations. The book received the American Society of International Law's certificate of merit for outstanding scholarship. In 2003, Brown Weiss will give the Hague Lectures in the Netherlands, an honor offered to top international law scholars. Brown Weiss will speak about international water issues.

Brown Weiss's extraordinary career has many facets that contribute to the environmental law program. She sits, for example, on the board of the Japanese Institute for Global Environmental Strategies. In this capacity, she has arranged internships for two Law Center students. Her class on international environmental law regularly attracts a number of international students, who enrich the dialogue with broad-ranging perspectives. Brown Weiss also teams up with Professor John Jackson, who specializes in international trade law, to offer a seminar that combines their expertise and adds yet another dimension to the study of environmental law at Georgetown.

Brown Weiss has had a profound impact on students such as Melissa Butler, who is completing her degree this year. Butler served as Brown Weiss's research assistant for a year and is currently editor-in-chief of the Georgetown International Environmental Law Review. She is also president of the Environmental Forum, a student group that sponsors environmental workshops and events. "[Professor Brown Weiss] is obviously one of the most amazing people in her field," Butler says. "She's also an outstanding teacher. She really cares about students. She honestly wants to make a difference in the world."

The constitutional perspective
Professors Richard Lazarus and Lisa Heinzerling bring the perspective of constitutional law to the study of the environment. In the fall of 2000, each submitted to the Supreme Court a brief for a significant environmental case. Professor Lazarus's brief concerned Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, a takings case that the Court heard in February 2001. Lazarus wrote for the state of Rhode Island. It is one of three dozen Supreme Court cases for which he submitted briefs. He has also argued 11 cases before the Court.

A colleague has noted that Lazarus has a "jeweler's eye" for identifying key issues in his field. A scholar with over two dozen academic articles and numerous columns to his name, Lazarus is writing a book on the history of modern U.S. environmental law, which he began last year as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow. In the last two years, he has published several major academic articles. A noted Supreme Court advocate, Professor Lazarus is also the director of the Law Center's Supreme Court Institute. The institute brings together a number of Law Center activities that pertain to the highest court in the nation, including mooting about 40 percent of cases argued before the Court.

Lazarus finds the tension between the demands of environmental law and constitutional doctrine fascinating. Environmental law, he explains, depends on an active federal government. Meanwhile, the U.S. Constitution tends to limit that role. "It's not a neat fit. The tension makes it interesting."

This year students in Professor Lazarus's advanced environmental law class had the opportunity to see this tension in action. In class last semester, Lazarus offered an intensive study of Palazzolo, a case which concerns an individual's right to be compensated for marshland that he owns but cannot develop. Then, in early February, professors Lazarus, Heinzerling, and Byrne mooted the Rhode Island attorney general. A week later, students went to Court to hear the case argued. "You can really see the evolution of the argument," notes Melissa Butler, who was one of the students in the class who attended the Supreme Court argument.

This year was remarkable because the Court heard not just one but two significant environmental cases. Whitman v. American Trucking (formerly Browner v. American Trucking) was the first major challenge to the Clean Air Act in 10 years. "The Supreme Court doesn't deal much with environmental issues," notes Professor Lisa Heinzerling. "It hasn't had a clean air case in ten years." Heinzerling was lead counsel for the states of New Jersey and Massachusetts, which joined the Environmental Protection agency in its suit. A former clerk to Supreme Court Justice William Brennan, she immersed herself in writing the briefs for nine months. Once finished, she shared her thoughts on the case with students at the special seminar sponsored by the Supreme Court Institute and the Environmental Law Forum. One student was so inspired by hearing the issues discussed that she arrived at the Supreme Court just after 5 a.m. on November 7, the day the case came before the Court, to be sure she would be seated.

Heinzerling, who as a child was the person in her household who pushed down the thermostat to save energy, is passionate about her cause. A voracious researcher, with a huge appetite for knowledge, she has published 10 academic articles in half that many years, as well as two book reviews. She focuses her scholarship on pollution and its risks to human health and examines the "appropriate ways to measure and value those risks." Heinzerling is also noted for her independence of mind and her tenacity in challenging institutions. In this era of regulatory reform, she argues the perils of relying too heavily on cost-benefit measures. "I'm trying in my own way to fight against it," she says.

Heinzerling's efforts and those of her fellow attorneys in the American Trucking case were rewarded. In February, the Court handed down a unanimous decision upholding the authority of the EPA to set regulations for clean air.

A cross-cutting field
Georgetown's environmental law program has an added strength in its adjunct faculty, many of whom have held high positions in the federal government or with national environmental agencies. Lois Schiffer, assistant attorney general for the environment under the Clinton administration, has taught environmental law at Georgetown for 15 years as has Nancy Firestone, former deputy assistant attorney general for the environment. Schiffer recently accepted an appointment as visiting professor at the Law Center. William Butler, another faculty member who was general counsel for the Audubon Society, teaches natural resources law and an advanced seminar in environmental law. With their broad practical experience these adjunct professors enrich the program. As established members of the environmental law community, they are also well positioned to advise students in making career choices.

The Law Center is also home to the Environmental Policy Project. Its director, John Echeverria, is the third member of the Law Center community who formerly served as general counsel to the National Audubon Society. The project conducts research and engages in educational outreach on environmental law and policy issues. As part of this mission, the project sponsors an annual conference on issues related to takings litigation. It also publishes a series of research reports on key environmental concerns and organizes seminars that bring together academics and practitioners in the environmental law field.

Last fall, Echeverria, together with Richard Lazarus and Peter Byrne, organized the Environmental Law Seminar for Judges at the Federal Judicial Center in Washington, D.C. Nearly 50 judges, from more than 20 states, attended. The two-day event provided them with an intensive survey of environmental and natural resources law. Speakers discussed the major pollution statutes, constitutional issues involved in environmental law, and risk assessment and management.

Those who have graduated from the Law Center and moved on to careers in environmental law find that they are well prepared for the challenge. Maria Wiseman, the 1997 graduate who is now with the Department of the Interior, mentions the broad range of experience she had at the Law Center. The clinic provided her with invaluable real-life experience. Hope Babcock's environmental justice class included a "broad range of people," which provoked wide-ranging and stimulating discussions. The land use class that Wiseman took with Peter Byrne provided an important foundation for her current work with the Bureau of Indian Affairs. She also participated in the moot court, gaining perspective on courtroom tactics. In addition, Wiseman was a member of section three, which offers an innovative curriculum in the first year. That experience, she says, taught her to "think outside the box," something she has come to appreciate in her work.

Innovative thinking is something at which members of Georgetown's environmental law program excel. It is the kind of scholarship, for example, that Edith Brown Weiss has practiced and which has led to her extraordinary accomplishments in the field of international law. In their scholarly investigations, Lisa Heinzerling, Richard Lazarus, Hope Babcock, and Peter Byrne also examine issues in fresh ways. Through their research, and their activities in the world of policy and litigation, the study and practice of environmental law is enhanced.

Main