User:Kotzker/sandbox-yanna-raw

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The brontosaurus is thin at one end. Then it becomes much thicker in the middle.

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References

• Elk, Anne (November 16, 1972). Anne Elk's Theory on Brontosauruses.

let's do something new

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Initially reluctant, Yannacone was persuaded Reutershan’s fellow activist and veteran Frank McCarthy, who described the suffering of veterans and families...

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MAIN DUNLAP DECLARATION!

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MS. WEBER!

MARY TYLER WEBER.

WILLIAM RODGERS!

PROF ROGERS!

SCIENCE NEWS!

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• Sabin, Paul (November 2015). "Environmental Law and the End of the New Deal Order". Law And History Review. 33 (4). Retrieved 11 December 2024.

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• Sababin, Paul (November 2015). "Environmental Law and the End of the New Deal Order". Law And History Review. 33 (4).

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Initially reluctant, Yannacone was persuaded Reutershan’s fellow activist and veteran Frank McCarthy, who described the suffering of veterans and families...

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• Elk, Anne (November 16, 1972). Anne Elk's Theory on Brontosauruses.

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The public trust doctrine, rooted in ancient Roman law and later English and American common law, asserts that natural resources like harbors, riverbeds, seashores, and air are the common property of the people. These resources are to be held in trust by the government, which is tasked with safeguarding these resources against abuse or degradation.

Critics sometimes described his courtroom style as “showmanship,” but these cases garnered significant press coverage, raising public awareness about critical environmental issues and intensifying demands for government action.

Victor John Yannaacone, Jr., is an American attorney and environmental activist who was a pioneer of environmental law, advancing early legal theories that became foundational to the field. Known for his outspoken and colorful personality, he has been credited with some of the “most creative moments” in environmental law and for being “one of its greatest risk-takers.” His signature phrase, “Sue the Bastards,” epitomized his call for aggressive litigation to protect the environment. Yannacone first gained national recognition in the 1960s for groundbreaking lawsuits against the use of DDT, a pesticide later banned nationwide partly due to his efforts. In the 1970s, he led a massive class action lawsuit on behalf of Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange, a toxic herbicide linked to severe health issues. This lawsuit, the largest and most complex legal action in the US at that time, took nearly a decade to litigate and made Agent Orange a household term. Yannacone’s unorthodox methods, often described as “fiery” and “flamboyant,” sometimes strained relationships with colleagues, and critics called his approach “combative” and “abrasive.” Supporters, however, admired his frank, rhetorical style and principled faith in “courts of equity”—judicial recourse for wrongs that lack a remedy in current statutes. According to Charles Wurster, who worked closely with Yannacone on early environmental lawsuits, “Vic really thinks he can save the world…” and for his cause, “he’ll raise holy hell.” A founding trustee of the Environmental Defense Fund, Yannacone helped shape its mission as the first US organization committed to aggressive litigation to protect the environment. Early Life and Education Yannacone was born in 1936 in Brownsville, Brooklyn. In 1946, his father took the family to the “end of the line” of the Long Island Railroad (LIRR), and walked around the village of Patchogue in concentric circles until they found a house for sale. For a time, Yannacone was the state’s youngest Eagle Scout. In eighth grade, he decided to become a football player and later claimed he had read every football book in the New York Public Library. For high school, Yannacone attended the private Catholic school Seton Hall in Patchogue but later switched to Port Jefferson High School, hitchhiking from Patchogue daily. Upon graduation, he received 34 college scholarship offers. He initially pursued a medical career, intending to specialize as a biophysicist with a focus on electroneurophysiology. He attended several colleges, including Syracuse, NYU, and Kalamazoo, but he claimed his academic performance was unremarkable. At Kalamazoo, he played second-string quarterback and received his only A in “Theory of Coaching Football.” After losing interest in medicine, he enrolled at Brooklyn Law School, often skipping law classes to audit semiconductor physics courses at Brooklyn Polytechnic in the same building. He has described his law school grades as poor, saying he “flunked contracts and received a D in torts” and graduated with “the lowest average… in the history of the law school.” He later pursued graduate work at New York Law School and took philosophy classes at Fordham University nearby. In his pursuit of a legal career, Yannacone was strongly influenced by his father, a first-generation American who worked as a ditch digger to put himself through law school and made a career representing workers, particularly immigrant laborers and construction workers. Yannacone Sr.’s dedication to workers’ rights and public service left a lasting impression on his son, who credited his father with fostering his sense of public duty and commitment to social justice. Yannacone maintains an interest in biological sciences, physics, and engineering, with his broad scientific knowledge reflected in much of his high profile litigation. A 1969 Sports Illustrated profile described him as “formidably learned” with “almost demonic eclecticism.” His résumé listed skills in optical design, histological laboratory techniques, electronics, and offset lithography. It also noted he held a commercial radio-telephone license and played the baritone saxophone. Early Career After college, Yannacone worked as an engineering trainee at RCA Labs and also taught Sunday school. He then began his legal career by doing work for the NAACP and various labor unions. In his 20s, Yannacone started a law firm with his father, continuing Yannacone Sr.’s focus on claimants’ rights in workers’ compensation cases. The firm often represented individuals in high-risk industries and took on numerous low-fee cases. Combined with his aptitude for science, the insight he gained from workers’ compensation claims about industrial practices and toxic chemicals would become foundational to his later environmental litigation. In 1959, at age 23, Yannacone handled one of his first public interest cases—an early example of advancing bold legal arguments rooted in historical or overlooked sources. During Christmas week that year, Yannacone and his father were fishing off Crane Point Neck in nearby Old Field village, within the town of Brookhaven, when Sinclair Hatch, a Wall Street attorney and local property owner, accused them of trespassing on private property. Hatch had them arrested. Yannacone, who had just graduated from law school, subsequently filed suit against the village of Old Field, arguing successfully that all Brookhaven residents had a legal right to use the beaches. To support his argument, he presented the town’s colonial-era Dongan charter, issued in 1686, which he had found in the town hall basement and still remained in effect. Environmental Activism and Litigation In the 1960s, Yannacone’s legal work turned increasingly to public interest advocacy, particularly in halting the rapid spread of environmental degradation. The press often described his lawsuits as “David and Goliath” showdowns, with Yannacone, a self-described “country lawyer,” taking on powerful corporate interests for unchecked pollution of air, water, and other natural resources. In the process, Yannacone introduced innovative legal theories and litigation strategies that significantly influenced the rising environmentalist movement and the emerging field of environmental law. His early lawsuits, often brought on behalf of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), an organization he co-founded, integrated robust scientific evidence with legal arguments, forcing industrial actors to publicly defend their products and operations. Critics sometimes described his courtroom style as “showmanship,”

but these cases garnered significant press coverage, raising public awareness about critical environmental issues and intensifying demands for government action. Breaking sharply from the conventions of environmental activism at the time, which he criticized as overly cautious and ineffectual, Yannacone championed an aggressive, litigation-focused strategy. Although many of his cases fell short of decisive courtroom victories, their broader impact on public opinion and policymaking was significant. Publicity from these cases contributed to shifts in federal, state, and local policies and helped bring about landmark environmental legislation. DDT Wars Yannacone first introduced his litigation philosophy with efforts to halt the use of DDT, which signaled his emerging approach to environmental advocacy. DDT (dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane) came into wide use after World War II to control agricultural pests and malaria. However, it very quickly caused catastrophic declines in wildlife, especially birds like peregrine falcons, bald eagles, and brown pelicans, whose eggshells became so thin that they often cracked before hatching. Entire ecosystems suffered as the pesticide disrupted reproduction, poisoned food sources, and decimated populations of fish, mammals, and insects across the entire food chain. These devastating effects stemmed from DDT’s persistence in the environment, its inability to dissolve in water, its accumulation in animal fat, and its disruption of calcium and hormone metabolism. Rachel Carson’s 1962 book Silent Spring brought widespread awareness to persistent pesticides’ far-reaching ecological devastation as well as their potential harm to humans. Industry groups and their allies dismissed her findings, accused her of alarmism, and attempted to undermine her credibility, but despite this aggressive opposition, Silent Spring galvanized public concern and inspired activists like Yannacone to take action. In a string of legal actions in New York, Michigan, and Wisconsin, Yannacone brought ecological science into the courtroom, triggering intense public debate and laying the groundwork for an eventual nationwide ban on DDT."Toxic Chemicals and Citizen Activism". Give Earth a Chance: Environmental Activism in Michigan. Retrieved 4 November 2024.</ref>

Suffolk County DDT Lawsuit In the mid-1960s, Yannacone filed one of his earliest major environmental cases in Suffolk County, Long Island. A year earlier, his wife Carol came upon a massive fish kill at Upper Yaphank Lake, which had been a favorite childhood swimming spot. Later reports showed the fish likely died as a result of a 5,000-gallon DDT dump by the Suffolk County Mosquito Commission. Outraged, the Yannacones decided to take legal action. In April 1966, Yannacone filed a class action lawsuit to prevent the county from further spraying of DDT on local marshlands. The complaint, which Yannacone drafted together with his wife, was filed in New York State Supreme Court and brought on behalf of Carol Yannacone as plaintiff, representing “all the people of the United States, not only of this generation, but of those generations yet unborn.” The court immediately granted an 18-month injunction on the county’s use of DDT. The case was the first of many environmental lawsuits in which Yannacone would advance his innovative legal theory, arguing that environmental protection was a Constitutional right with roots in the Public Trust Doctrine—an argument initially met with skepticism but later broadly recognized as foundational to environmental law. The lawsuit was also the first use of his signature litigation strategy in which he made no claim of personal damages but sought rather to prevent further ecological degradation on behalf of the public. The case attracted national news coverage and widespread interest among legal scholars and environmentalists. The National Audubon Society contributed funds to the lawsuit and announced it would publish the trial transcript in full. Describing his early strategy as “basic Neanderthal,” Yannacone said he initially had no scientific experts and intended to simply ask the court to take judicial notice of the skull and crossbones on DDT packaging. In his trademark colorful language, he told a reporter he was going to prove in court that the commissioner “was an idiot” and to ask for a ruling that “idiots not be allowed to spray toxic substances in Suffolk County.” Nonetheless, Yannacone realized the case needed scientific support and enlisted the help of biologist Charles Wurster, who brought together experts from local institutions like the State University of New York at Stony Brook and Brookhaven National Laboratory. Courtroom testimony provided by these scientists demonstrated the pervasive environmental and biological impacts of DDT, including its accumulation in wildlife and humans. In one memorable instance, Wurster testified, “Everybody in this room has got DDT in them,” and compared its use as a pesticide to “using atomic weapons to clear the New York streets of criminals.” While the evidence for DDT’s harm was virtually incontrovertible, there was only circumstantial evidence linking it to the fish kill. Still, Yannacone argued, given the massive amount of DDT that had been dumped at the site, it defied logic to say it was unrelated, saying, “If the circumstantial evidence against DDT were presented against a criminal, he would be convicted without the slightest hesitation.” The publicity around the case brought public pressure to bear on county officials, and before the court ruled on the case, the Mosquito Commission announced it would no longer use DDT, which was alone a substantial victory for Yannacone. In his ruling issued a year later, Judge Stanislaw recognized the harmful effects of DDT, writing, “It is fairly apparent… DDT in Suffolk County has and is continuing to have a demonstrable effect on local wildlife, reducing it slowly but surely.” However, he deferred a permanent ban to the legislature, believing such decisions were best addressed through policymaking. While the lawsuit did not achieve a definitive legal resolution, Yannacone considered it a victory, for successfully raising public awareness by marshalling the scientific evidence in open court and achieving its primary goals. The case exemplified the “winning while losing” strategy he would advocate and employ in many of his cases, in which the litigation’s broader impact often outweighed a conclusive legal outcome. Ultimately proving to be a landmark case, the Suffolk lawsuit has been frequently cited in legal scholarship on environmental law. The case also marked the first recorded use of “environmental law” as a legal field, with its coinage attributed to Yannacone. Yannacone’s partnership with Wurster during this trial led to their founding of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) the following year and a series of legal actions across the US throughout the late 1960s. Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) In the fall of 1967, after partnering on the Suffolk County DDT case, Yannacone and Wurster, along with a group of other scientists and environmentalists, founded the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). Building on the strategy employed in the Suffolk case, the EDF was the first environmental organization to focus primarily on litigation, earning it a reputation as “militant.” The group sought to persuade the courts that environmental protection was a matter of equity and a Constitutional right and aimed to establish a coherent body of environmental law through legal precedents. Central to the EDF’s mission was Yannacone’s integration of multidisciplinary scientific research with legal activism. As general counsel, he worked with Wurster and the EDF’s scientific advisory committee to recruit over 200 scientific experts to support legal cases with robust evidence. The EDF launched its activities with lawsuits filed by Yannacone against DDT and other persistent pesticides in Michigan and Wisconsin, and an air pollution lawsuit in Montana, often hurriedly drafting briefs while traveling. His efforts in leading these actions brought the organization national prominence, particularly with the Wisconsin hearings. The National Audubon Society threw its support behind EDF early on, after it previously backed Yannacone in his 1966 Suffolk lawsuit. However, some environmentalist groups were critical of the EDF’s approach, urging more conservative methods, such as influencing policy and legislation. David Brower, director of the Sierra Club, one of the most prominent environmentalist groups at that time, said he thought the EDF’s approach was overly aggressive. “I think there needs to be more consultation with some people who are older and stuffier,” he told Science Magazine. However, Yannacone and the EDF viewed the environmental crisis as too urgent for incremental reforms. In a 1967 speech to the National Audubon Society Annual Convention, Yannacone described the civil rights movement as a major inspiration for the EDF’s founding. Environmentalists, Yannacone said, should “look to the 50-year history of the human rights struggle… Somebody had to sue somebody before the legislature acted.” Yannacone’s rhetorical signature phrase, “Sue the bastards,” became the EDF’s unofficial motto. Yannacone left the EDF in 1969 following disagreements over the organization’s long-term strategy. Some members sought a more moderated approach, particularly after the group applied for a grant from the Ford Foundation. Yannacone told the Long Island Press that some members were “embarrassed” by his confrontational style and saw it as a potential obstacle for securing funding. In an interview over two decades later, Wurster said that the EDF had abandoned Yannacone’s “Sue the Bastards” slogan in the interest of “respectability.” Nonetheless, Wurster acknowledged, “EDF would never have started without [Yannacone].”

Florissant Fossil Beds Yannacone’s legal theories faced another significant test in the spring of 1969, when he led efforts to preserve the Florissant fossil beds in Colorado. Described by scientists as a “Rosetta Stone” of life on earth, the Oligocene-era lake beds contain a fossil record of more species of plants and insects than any other site in the world."Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument". National Park Service, US Department of the Interior. Retrieved 27 October 2024.</ref> A coalition led by paleobotanist Estella Leopold and botanist Beatrice Willard sought federal protection for the 6,000-acre site. A master plan for a national monument was approved, and a bill had already passed in the senate. A vote in the House was imminent, facing little opposition. “’It is worth mentioning,’ says Dr. Richard C. Bradley, of Colorado College, ‘that we have here a most unusual circumstance, perhaps without precedent in recent legislative history: a proposal is being made to put a substantial piece of land under the protection of the National Park Service, and it stands virtually unopposed…. If this bill fails to pass, it will not be because the powerful lobbies were arrayed against it, but because this Congress, deeply involved as it is with the weightier issues of the day… could not seem to find the time to consider it.’” However, in May, before Congress could finalize legislation, housing developers purchased nearly half the proposed side, and moved in to subdivide it for summer homes. In early July, bulldozers stood poised to begin razing the site. Yannacone, asked by Leopold and Willard to help save the fossil beds, filed a lawsuit to stop construction on the site, arguing the government had a duty to protect it on behalf of the people as it constituted a “national natural resource treasure.” As in many of his other environmental cases, Yannacone invoked the Public Trust Doctrine and the Ninth Amendment to argue that the government had a duty to protect the site for “the full benefit, use, and enjoyment of an irreplaceable natural resource.”Defenders of Florissant Inc. v. Park Land Development Co., retrieved 4 November 2024</ref>

—------ Arguing later that day before the full appeals court, Yannacone presented his key arguments from the public trust doctrine and the Constitution’s Ninth Amendment, adding for emphasis that the national monument bill had passed in the senate and was all but assured passage in the House. President Nixon had indicated he would sign it. The court, Yannacone said, was all but obligated to halt destruction of the site so as to aid in “the orderly operations of the Legislative and Executive branches.” In a stunning victory for Yannacone, the court upheld the restraining order indefinitely, effectively prohibiting construction on the site until Congress acted. On August 4, the bill passed unanimously through Congress, and President Nixon signed it a few days later, creating the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. The case divided opinion among legal scholars. According to environmental lawyer Zygmunt Plater, “The argument Victor Yannacone made for the restraining order was bold and innovative. It was also without precedent.” Law professor William H. Rodgers was even more skeptical, writing that while Yannacone’s arguments were bold and creative, it was his “sheer chutzpah” that succeeded. “Yannacone had no theory and he had no law,” Rodgers wrote, but used his “rashness” to offer an argument that was “a figment of his imagination.” Other legal scholars found the case highly significant, and praised Yannacone’s persistence and an astonishing outcome. Prominent environmental legal scholar Joseph Sax wrote that the appellate court clearly believed the public interest justified interfering with private property rights, even though no explicit statute existed for it, which made this case “one of the most extraordinary lawsuits yet to arise in the area of environmental litigation.” Yannacone himself countered that his arguments had both theory and law, resting on centuries of natural law and equity jurisprudence, and in his view, the appellate court’s decision validated his argument. What remained undisputed, however, was the effectiveness of Yannacone’s argument. As Leopold, the paleontologist who had turned to Yannacone for help, wrote, “On Yannacone’s creative argument hung the fate of the fossil beds.” In March 1970, Yannacone received the National Wildlife Federation’s National Distinguished Service Conservation Award, known as the “Connies,” for his efforts in the Florissant case and its impact on the emerging field of environmental law.

Agent Orange Class Action Lawsuit [...] Initially reluctant, Yannacone was persuaded Reutershan’s fellow activist and veteran Frank McCarthy, “According to McCarthy, Yanacone… declined, explaining why the effort would be too costly to sustain and could not succeed, except perhaps on behalf of a class he could not then identify. But Yanacone could not get the case out of his mind. Several days later, after he had heard about some new cancer cases among Vietnam combat veterans, a class action began to seem more viable. He telephoned McCarthy and said, ‘You must realize what we would be up against.’ McCarthy, sensing Yannacone’s change of heart, replied, ‘I don’t care. We have to do it.’ They immediately met and began to map out a comprehensive campaign. The centerpiece was a national class action lawsuit, but their plan also incorporated other elements: a legislative strategy at the federal and state levels, outreach to veterans and their families, mobilization of the scientific community, and pervasive use of the mass media.” who described the suffering of veterans and families, the government’s refusal to acknowledge the chemical’s harms, the veterans’ political impotence, and the widespread public indifference to their plight. The systemic issues made the case align with the public interest litigation Yannacone had pursued over the course of his career. “Yannacone, then, was more than a lawyer who could make legal arguments and muster scientific data to advance a client’s interest. He was also a passionate partisan, a crusader who was personally and ideologically committed to subduing toxic chemicals in the interest of preserving ecological balance and human health. The incandescent intensity of his commitment, resonating through his flamboyant oratory, charismatic persona, and eccentric operating style, was to shape the course of the Agent Orange litigation.” Adding a handful more veterans to the lawsuit and naming six more chemical companies as defendants, Yannacone refiled it as a class action, asking the court for a trust fund financed by the defendants’ earnings to provide compensation and medical care for affected veterans and their families. It also sought to hold corporations to account as trustees of public health and safety with “a fiduciary responsibility to the public” that used or was exposed to their products.

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Strategy and Complexity Some legal observers were doubtful of Yannacone’s strategy, given the veterans’ disparate health issues. Combining tort law with class action was a tactic never before used in federal courts. “Yannacone’s team broke new legal ground by combining two types of litigation, torts and class actions. Class actions generally involve a commercial wrong… in which a large number of people have been harmed. The underlying facts are mostly straightforward, basically the same for everyone, so the question of liability can be resolved in one stroke…. Combining many potential cases into a single lawsuit saves everyone time and money….Tort cases involving negligence are messier. It’s harder to prove harm and even harder to demonstrate who’s actually responsible for that harm…. These problems get even trickier when dealing with toxic torts. People can be exposed to a poison in all sorts of ways, often without realizing it at the time, and suffer very different kinds of harm, sometimes years after the fact.” However, Yannacone claimed it was the only path to an equitable remedy for all victims, given the systemic nature of dioxin exposure and its potential for latent harm. “If left to the vagaries of each jurisdiction, the results would be predictably chaotic and patently unjust,” he argued. [...]

A more daunting hurdle was proving causation and fault, given the limited scientific evidence on dioxin’s effects at the time. Since the government refused to conduct scientific studies on the chemical’s effects, Yannacone told his legal team they would likely have to do their own epidemiological studies—a monumental undertaking. “From the outset, Yanacone emphasized his intention to buttress the veterans’ causation argument, which would clearly be the weakest link in their case, by conducting his own epidemiological study. With the assistance of his wife, Carol, he planned to take computer-coded case histories on the individual veterans—including their pre-war medical condition, their exposure to Agent Orange in Vietnam, their post-war symptoms—and those of their families, and store these on computer tapes. Starting with this information base he would then refine the data in an effort to develop patterns of exposure, symptomatology, etiology, and legal responsibility that could stand up in court.” Yannacone’s wife Carol, a biologist with a background in medical physics, played a particularly significant role in gathering biological evidence linking Agent Orange exposure to long-term health effects. In addition, Yannacone hired a software engineer to create a relational database system to track plaintiffs’ medical histories, exposure levels, and claims—a novel solution for a small firm at that time. [...] A Veterans’ Ally For Yannacone, there was also another goal: he wanted to restore dignity to the veterans, whom he saw as unfairly maligned by the public. “By getting their day in court,” he said, “[veterans] could undo their image of being baby killers and lunatic murderers.” “According to Yannacone, ‘One of the major goals in this case had always been whether or not Vietnam combat veterans, by getting their day in court, could undo their image of being baby killers and lunatic murderers. It was a valid goal of the lawsuit.’” Yannacone and his wife Carol also provided strong emotional support to the veterans and their families, many of whom saw the Yannacones as their only allies. “[In the words of veteran Frank McCarthy,] ‘We get no support from anyone except Victor.’” Veterans helping with the case often camped out at the small Patchogue office, which was in the same building as the Yannacones’ residence. The Yannacones grew particularly close to Michael and Maureen Ryan, whose 8-year-old Kerry, born with 18 different birth defects including missing limbs and deformed vital organs, was a representative plaintiff as a veteran’s child victim. The Yannacones’ own 7-year-old daughter, Claire, became friends with Kerry, and would often accompany her during courtroom sessions or at Congressional hearings.

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Outcome In May 1984, under strong pressure from Judge Weinstein, the parties agreed to a $180 million settlement, the largest mass tort settlement in US history at that time. The case concluded in 1988, with the $180 million grown to $240 million through investments.

Yannacone, who was not involved with the settlement, criticized it as “chump change” and “grossly insufficient” and argued that it failed to address long-term systemic issues associated with Agent Orange exposure. Quoted by Sills, p. 326, “They had taken a case that was ‘unique, different, unprecedented and unheard of and tried to make it fit into a conventional mold’; they’d agreed to an ‘inadequate’ settlement; and they’d failed to understand that this was really a ‘public interest litigation.’ Many veterans also saw the compensation as inadequate, believing the PMC prioritized their own financial reward over the veterans’ interests. Many also expressed outrage that Yannacone had been sidelined, believing he had been their only true ally. “From the very first day, the veterans viewed Yannacone, in the military metaphors that McCarthy and others almost always use in discussing the case, as their ‘legal field commander.’”

Environmental Law Yannacone has been described as “the father of environmental law” and played a significant role in shaping the field during its formative years in the 1960s. His pioneering lawsuits, often regarded as landmark cases, have been widely cited by legal scholars for their impact on the development of environmental law as a distinct discipline. Yannacone also contributed to the institutionalization of the field, serving as chairman of the Environmental Law Committee of the American Bar Association. In 1966, Yannacone’s lawsuit against the Suffolk County Mosquito Control Commission was one of the first legal cases to frame environmental protection as a matter of public trust and Constitutional rights. Reporting on it at the time, The New York Times described the case as part of the emerging framework of “environmental law,” a coinage attributed to Yannacone “Professor R. Lisle Baker tells a story (possibly apocryphal) about Vic Yannacone and his invention of the term ‘environmental law’ in one of the early DDT cases. Yannacone took his cue from the objection of opposing counsel: ‘Your honor, how do I respond to this kind of claim? There’s no key number I can look it up under!’ Turning to Yannacone, the court replied: ‘Well, what does he look it up under?’ Responded Yannacone, with a surge of sudden and anxious insight: ‘Well, your honor, he could look it up under environmental law.’ The court, turning to opposing counsel: ‘Yes, why don’t you look it up under environmental law?’” and which was the first recorded use of the term in major media. [...] Public Trust Doctrine The public trust doctrine, rooted in ancient Roman law and later English and American common law, asserts that natural resources like harbors, riverbeds, seashores, and air are the common property of the people. These resources are to be held in trust by the government, which is tasked with safeguarding these resources against abuse or degradation. Before the 1960s, US courts rarely invoked the doctrine, primarily to protect riverbeds. Yannacone was among the first to advance it as a principle for environmental law, invoking it in cases against DDT in New York and Michigan, air pollution in Montana, and fossil preservation in Colorado. Yannacone also called for extending the doctrine to forests, oil and mineral deposits, geological formations, and other unique or irreplaceable resources of public significance. These applications were considered novel at first but later gained broad acceptance. Yannacone’s use of the doctrine in the Missoula lawsuit against the Hoerner Waldorf paper mill was especially influential in shaping its environmental application. By the late 1960s and early 1970s, other environmental lawyers took up similar arguments, solidifying the doctrine’s place in the environmental legal field. The principle has since been widely recognized as foundational for preserving natural resources for public benefit.

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Litigation Philosophy Yannacone was a brilliant tactician, but from the beginning he had no illusions that litigation would produce resounding legal victories. His maverick motto was “Sue the Bastards,” and he envisioned his lawsuits as show trials to dramatize environmental truths that would ultimately compel members of the legislative and executive branches of government to act. He was willing to lose court decisions if his cause prevailed in the court of public opinion. —Stewart L. Udall, US Secretary of the Interior (1961–1969) Yannacone viewed litigation as the most effective tool for addressing environmental crises and driving systemic change.

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In Yannacone’s view, alternative methods were not likely to be effective. Regarding using the legislative processes, he described it as “slow and ponderous” and therefore inadequate for addressing immediate environmental threats. While legislators held prolonged deliberations, he argued, vital natural resources were already suffering “serious, permanent, and irreparable harm.” He was equally critical of administrative agencies, which he perceived as biased in favor of the industries they were tasked with regulating. Yannacone claimed that these agencies often prioritized corporate interests over the public good, lacked ecological expertise, and operated without adequate transparency. “The USDA, Yannacone said, serve the agricultural and chemical interests, rather than the American people. The agency was largely impenetrable to external groups seeking to inform its policies, and it failed to adequately study and address the environmental problems associated with DDT.” As he told reporters during the Wisconsin DDT hearings, “Only in a courtroom can bureaucratic hogwash be tested in the crucible of cross-examination.” Yannacone also dismissed personal damage suits as reactive, focusing on past harms rather than systemic issues to prevent future damage, and could not achieve the broad environmental reforms he considered necessary. [...] Yannacone also emphasized the need for legal creativity in environmental litigation to address challenges posed by industrial expansion. When existing statutes failed to protect public interests, he argued, citizens had a right to demand change. Invoking the courtroom as the modern arena for “trial by combat,” Yannacone frequently said, “Litigation is the civilized alternative to bloody revolution.” “[Yannacone] envisioned the courtroom as the proper setting for a titanic reform struggle. ‘Law is the framework of civilization and litigation is the civilized answer to trial by combat. The courtroom is the arena. Lawyers are your champions. The rules of evidence are the articles of war.’” Public Awareness: “Winning While Losing” For Yannacone, litigation often served as an indirect tool for advancing environmental causes, particularly by raising public awareness. Litigating matters in open court mobilized public opinion about ongoing harms, which, in turn, pressured policymakers to enact legislative and regulatory changes. This strategy came to be known as Yannacone’s “winning while losing” approach, which he honed during his early lawsuits for the EDF. “[According to] Yannacone: ‘Every piece of enlightened social legislation that has come down in the past 50 or 60 years has been preceded by a history of litigation. It is the highest use of the courtroom—even when we lose—to focus public attention and disseminate information about intolerable conditions.’” [...] “Sue the Bastards”: A Philosophy and Rallying Cry Yannacone’s slogan, “Sue the Bastards,” became a defining feature of his legal philosophy and a rallying cry for environmental activists. According to the Yale Book of Quotations, Yannacone coined the slogan, which gained prominence through his public speeches and high-profile cases. Encapsulating his aggressive approach to litigation, the phrase resonated widely and captured the urgency of holding accountable those who degraded the natural resources that belonged to the public. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Patrick Strickler called it Yannacone’s “rhetorical signature,” reflecting his combative personality and commitment to public interest litigation. In another formulation, Yannacone was often quoted as saying, “Don’t just sit there and bitch—sue somebody!” In repeatedly asserting that litigation was the most effective means of achieving broad-based systemic change, he urged environmentalists and other activists to embrace aggressive legal action as an essential tool for the public interest.

General Practice Even as Yannacone worked on public interest litigation, his primary legal practice remained that which he had established with his father, focusing on workers’ compensation and personal injury law. Managing up to 2,500 cases annually, often requiring dozens of court appearances in a single day, Yannacone said the practice honed his skills in litigation and cross-examining medical professionals. These experiences sharpened his ability to adapt quickly in the courtroom, a skill he said he carried into his more complex legal battles. Yannacone’s meticulous preparation for litigation, which he attributed to his father’s influence, was bolstered by his extensive study of scientific and medical literature, giving him a strong foundation for his cases. His practice secured significant victories, including early rulings linking workplace chemical exposure to diseases like leukemia. He also tackled unconventional claims, such as one where a Polish deaf mute alleged that workplace harassment via sign language caused his ulcer. Evident in many of his cases was a commitment to pushing legal boundaries in pursuit of justice for injured workers, particularly the marginalized. Yannacone’s work sometimes extended beyond litigation. One example was his assistance to Linda Boreman, better known as Linda Lovelace, who sought his advice after escaping years of abuse by her first husband, Chuck Traynor. Forced into pornography and sex work for Traynor’s financial benefit while remaining destitute herself, Boreman consulted Yannacone about suing Traynor. Yannacone instead advised her to reclaim her narrative by publishing a memoir and persuaded journalist Mike McGrady, a highly regarded author and columnist, to co-write her books. In attempting to persuade McGrady, Yannacone enlisted a team of lawyers and psychiatrists to assess Boreman’s credibility, and had her sit for an 11-hour lie detector test administered by Nat Laurendi, a famed polygraph expert. This collaboration resulted in her memoirs, Ordeal and Out of Bondage, which told Boreman’s story of coercion and survival. Beyond professional guidance, Yannacone and his wife Carol supported Boreman with food for her and her infant child, with Yannacone often dropping off cases of Campbell’s soup at her home to ensure they always had something to eat.

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Local Governance Yannacone regularly attended Patchogue Village and Brookhaven Town board meetings, urging officials to address issues such as unenforced zoning laws, inadequate housing regulations, and contaminated water supplies. His outspoken style attracted widespread public attention, drawing large numbers of residents to the meetings and encouraging stronger public engagement with local government. Critics labeled his approach theatrical, with one describing the meetings as a “circus,” while supporters called him “the voice of the people.” During one 1992 village board meeting, Yannacone criticized local zoning codes as “unenforceable,” proposing stricter health and fire regulations to address slum conditions, urging residents to “take this community back one block at a time” and offering to draft new ordinances pro bono. The Long Island Advance described his speech as “perhaps the most important speech to be made in Patchogue in more than a decade.”