Image: 

Joseph L. Sax is House & Hurd Endowment Professor, emeritus, University of California (Berkeley). From 1966-1986 he was the Philip Hart Distinguished University Professor at the University of Michigan, and prior to that taught at the University of Colorado and practiced law in Washington, D.C.

He has taught environmental law, water law, public land law, and property rights since 1962. From1994 through1996 he served as Counselor to the U.S. Secretary of the Interior and Deputy Assistant Secretary, where his areas of responsibility were: property rights legislation, water rights, and endangered species act implementation.

Professor Sax is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Chicago law school. He holds an honorary doctor of laws degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; and was a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford.

He served as Order of the Coif Distinguished Visitor for 2004, and has been a visiting professor at the University of Paris (Panthéon Sorbonne) and Stanford University among others, and has lectured at the Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales (Paris). He was the Centennial Distinguished Visitor, IIT-Chicago Kent College of Law; Virginia Environmental Endowment Professor, University of Richmond; and Wallace S. Fujiyama Visiting Professor, at the University of Hawaii.

Sax is the author of Defending the Environment (1970), Mountains Without Handrails (1980), and Playing Darts with a Rembrandt (2000); and co-author of Legal Control of Water Resources, 4rd edition (2006). He is a contributing author to numerous books, and has written more than 150 articles in scholarly journals.

He is the recipient of the Elizabeth Haub Award, Free Univ. Brussels, Gold Medalist; Professional Achievement Citation, Univ. of Chicago Alumni Assn.; Environmental Law Institute Award; Sierra Club Wm. O. Douglas Legal Achievement Award; University of Michigan Press Biennial Book Award; National Wildlife Federation Resource Defense Award; U.S. E.P.A. Environmental Quality Award; Detroit Audubon Conservationist of the Year Award; University of Michigan Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award; and American Motors Conservation Award. In 2004 he was the Order of the Coif distinguished visitor and that year also recieved the Distinguished Water Attorney Award from the Water Education Foundation. He was the Cook Lecturer in American Institutions at the University of Michigan.

From time to time, he serves as an expert witness, and recently provided an expert report in an original jurisdiction case before the United States Supreme Court involving a dispute over the Delaware River between the States of Delaware and New Jersey. Several years ago he testified as an expert on public trust issues for the State of Mississippi in a case involving submerged lands under the Gulf of Mexico.

Sax lives in San Francisco. He is married to the former Eleanor C. Gettes, and has three children and four grandchildren, all of whom live in California.