In memoriam: Joe Feller, much more than a law professor
Today I learned the sad news that Joe Feller, Professor of Law at Arizona State University, has died after being hit by a car. Joe was a fine scholar (coincidentally, I was reading a terrific piece he wrote on The Adjudication that Ate Arizona Water Law when the news came in), but he was so much more than that. Joe, whose father David was a highly respected labor and civil rights lawyer for two decades before he joined the faculty at Berkeley Law, knew firsthand that (to borrow the words of Dan Tarlock) environmental law is all about marrying wonder to power. Joe loved the west’s great landscapes, even the ones most people don’t find picturesque or beautiful. He knew that law review articles don’t save landscapes. Joe did just that. He used every tool available, from buy-outs to litigation, to reduce the amount of livestock grazing on some of the west’s most ecologically fragile lands. And he got his students out to those lands, passing along both his love of them and his deep understanding of how easily and lastingly they could be damaged by careless use.
I first met Joe at a Natural Resources Law Teachers Institute sponsored by the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation. I was brand new to teaching and very much intimidated by the self-assured, experienced teachers and scholars in the crowd, people whose names were familiar from their scholarly writings. Joe helped put me at ease. He knew just about everything, it seemed to me, about every natural resource conflict in the west, and he had a PhD in physics. Pretty intimidating credentials, but he clearly didn’t take himself or legal academia too seriously. He talked with equal enthusiasm and humor about the latest court decision, the litigation tactics of NGOs and property rights groups, and where he was planning to hike when the conference broke up.
I last saw Joe at another Natural Resources Law Teachers Institute, this one two years ago in the Columbia Gorge. It was the end of a day-long field trip, and the group was hiking up to Multnomah Falls in an intermittent misty drizzle. I fell in with Joe and others who were discussing the recent Congressional action authorizing the Fish and Wildlife Service to delist the gray wolf in Montana and Idaho. People were understandably outraged, but Joe was gently forcing them to confront their intuitive reaction that this couldn’t be lawful, drawing others into the conversation by appealing to their expertise, and turning all of us from mere complaints to thinking about what could be done in a positive way. It was a great teaching moment, an illustration by example of the qualities needed to be a good environmental lawyer or environmental law professor, and it happened while we were all admiring a spectacular landscape.
Joe will be sorely missed, but his influence will be with us for a long time, in the landscapes he worked to save and in the hearts and minds of his students, colleagues, family, and friends.
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About Holly
Holly Doremus is the James H. House and Hiram H. Hurd Professor of Environmental Regulation at UC Berkeley. Doremus brings a strong background in life sciences and a comm…
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Terribly sad, tragic news. It is with great difficulty that I read this post. I’ve known Joe since we were teenagers. Joe was a terrific advocate for the natural world. More, he truly thrived when he was in nature- or when working to save it. Thanks, Holly.
Terribly sad, tragic news. It is with great difficulty that I read this post. I’ve known Joe since we were teenagers. Joe was a terrific advocate for the natural world. More, he truly thrived when he was in nature- or when working to save it. Thanks, Holly.
Joe was one of the nicest people I have had the pleasure of knowing. I would often catch up with Joe on his way home at night while I walked our dog. Joe had a real soft spot for Buford, our 130 lb. slobbering misbehaving golden lab/mastiff mix and being that we lived only two houses away from each other we would often chat as we made our way home in the Pointe. Joe was such a sweet, gentle, and kind man who was so easy going and friendly. Both Buford and I will miss having him as our neighbor and friend. Heather
Joe was one of the nicest people I have had the pleasure of knowing. I would often catch up with Joe on his way home at night while I walked our dog. Joe had a real soft spot for Buford, our 130 lb. slobbering misbehaving golden lab/mastiff mix and being that we lived only two houses away from each other we would often chat as we made our way home in the Pointe. Joe was such a sweet, gentle, and kind man who was so easy going and friendly. Both Buford and I will miss having him as our neighbor and friend. Heather
I, and my husband, am in mourning over our friend and co-rider of Arizona Public Transportation – Joe Feller.
We are thinking sadly but fondly of our friend and the bitter-sweet memory of Joe from very recently, when he had called it a “Sisyphean” task what we (all) did at the bus stop every morning; his & our picking up the cigarette butts & trash…
We 1st met Joe at our local bus stop at Phoenix’s South Mountain near 48th & Baseline for the 8:10am bus to Tempe AZ…he said he was surprised and happy to have company walking to and riding public transportation even in the middle of AZ’s summers, as he had been doing for as long as he was in AZ. We get off & on at Mill Ave and he would continue on to ASU (with a stop for a bagel).
Walking home from the bus, we would casually debate what was the best place or way to cross these particular streets and traffic circles. We would like to help make Joe’s, our and the world’s loss into a better, safer place for the walkers, hikers, bicyclists and runners in AZ.
Good Bye Joe. We miss you.
Love Corinna Fritsch & Kevin Moore
I, and my husband, am in mourning over our friend and co-rider of Arizona Public Transportation – Joe Feller.
We are thinking sadly but fondly of our friend and the bitter-sweet memory of Joe from very recently, when he had called it a “Sisyphean” task what we (all) did at the bus stop every morning; his & our picking up the cigarette butts & trash…
We 1st met Joe at our local bus stop at Phoenix’s South Mountain near 48th & Baseline for the 8:10am bus to Tempe AZ…he said he was surprised and happy to have company walking to and riding public transportation even in the middle of AZ’s summers, as he had been doing for as long as he was in AZ. We get off & on at Mill Ave and he would continue on to ASU (with a stop for a bagel).
Walking home from the bus, we would casually debate what was the best place or way to cross these particular streets and traffic circles. We would like to help make Joe’s, our and the world’s loss into a better, safer place for the walkers, hikers, bicyclists and runners in AZ.
Good Bye Joe. We miss you.
Love Corinna Fritsch & Kevin Moore