Neil Proto - Law As A Tool For Social Change
To A High Court: The Tumult and Choices that Led to United States v. SCRAP
Law a tool for social change is the subject of this edition of Radio Curious, and it’s also reason why I decided to be an attorney. Neil Proto, now a veteran Washington D.C. attorney, was a law student in the early 1970s in Washington D.C. and one of several law students in a group called SCRAP (Student’s Challenging Regulatory Agency Procedures) which sued the Interstate Commerce Commission of the United States and the nation’s railroads for what they believed was a violation of the NEPA, the National Environmental Protection Act. The regulations, which they successfully challenged, discouraged the movement of materials that could be recycled and encouraged the movement of raw materials. The Federal court issued an injunction, ordered an environmental impact report be prepared and in the end the regulations were overturned. The story is told in Neil Proto’s book, “To A High Court: The Tumult and Choices that Led to United States v. SCRAP.” For the past 35 years, Neil Proto has been practicing and teaching law in the Nation’s capital. In this conversation, recorded in early February, 2006, we discuss the SCRPA lawsuit, importance of citizen involvement in the use of the law as a tool for social change and how court rulings in recent decades have made this involvement more difficult.
Originally Broadcast: February 14, 2006