Posted on March 26, 2014 by Daniel Riesel
David Sive, a founder of modern environmental law, brilliant litigator, untiring mentor and dear friend to many of us, has passed away. He was 91.
David Sive, the founding partner of Sive, Paget & Riesel, P.C. was a great friend to his colleagues, an exceptional litigator, and a loving husband, father, and grandfather. As an intellectual and spiritual leader of the modern environmental law movement, he devoted his energies and passion to protecting the environment.
A veteran of World War II, David fought in the Battle of the Bulge. After graduating from Columbia Law School in 1948, he emerged as an authority on administrative law. However, his love of the wilderness soon led him into the then-nascent field of environmental law. He quickly became an authority in this new field, and was often referred to as the father of modern environmental law. His sustained success in the courtroom over decades established vitally important precedents for later generations of environmental lawyers.
David was one of the first lawyers to bring litigation effectuating the “forever wild” provisions of the New York State Constitution, and litigated a number of cases protecting the environment in his beloved Adirondack and Catskill Mountains. In the 1960s, he played a leading role in the administrative and judicial proceedings that prevented the construction of a power plant on Storm King Mountain along the Hudson River, and helped to establish aesthetics as a recognized environmental value.
In subsequent decades David litigated numerous important environmental cases. He prevented the construction of the proposed Hudson River Expressway (a precursor of the ill-fated Westway Project). He challenged up to the U.S. Supreme Court the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s testing of atomic weapons off Alaska’s Amchitka Island, and litigated the principal case establishing that the military is subject to the National Environmental Policy Act. In a landmark case decided by the New York Court of Appeals, David established that the preservation of wilderness areas for the benefit of the public serves charitable, educational, and moral purposes and entitles nature preserves to the tax-exempt status that is essential to their survival.
David was proud of his role as a teacher, introducing generations of young lawyers to the emerging field of environmental law, both as a member of the adjunct faculty of Columbia and Pace Law Schools, and as the founder of several continuing legal education courses for the Environmental Law Institute and the American Law Institute- American Bar Association. David’s lectures and written scholarship, including an environmental column in the National Law Journal and articles in numerous law reviews, helped to shape the field of environmental law.
David also played a critical role in the creation of the Environmental Law Institute, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and other prominent national environmental organizations, as well as scores of regional and local entities. His legacy is permanently embedded in innumerable precedent-setting cases. But to those who knew David well and worked with him closely, his gentle way and kind soul will be missed most of all.
Tags: David Sive, Sive Paget & Riesel