Professor Denis Binder, Life Fellow, recently published The First 50 Years of American Environmental Law: 1970–2020 via Carolina Academic Press and the book hopes to serve as a comprehensive history of the formative years of environmental law. It includes coverage of public regulatory and statutory law, air and water pollution, private litigation, injunctive relief, toxic torts, and the newer areas of climate change and environmental justice.
Professor Binder has spent 40 years teaching at law schools nationwide but also goes far beyond teaching. He also served as a consultant to a variety of organizations like the Army Corps of Engineers to Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers. In September 1996, Professor Binder received the National Award of Merit from the Association of State Dam Safety Officials for his contributions to promoting dam safety over the preceding two decades.
Professor Binder says in the preface of the book that his approach to the book was “…to write a living history tableau of Environmental Law, especially the foundation cases and conflicts.” The book combines law with the people, events, and stories that formed environmental protection, from the grandmother who successfully took on Rollins Environmental and Exxon in Louisiana’s Cancer Alley to precursor infrastructure battles, including the Freeway Revolt, Save the Bay, the Cross-Florida Barge Canal, and Storm King Mountain.
Read more here.