On March 20, Guilford will host Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as a Bryan Distinguished Visiting Professor in the Arts, Humanities and Public Affairs.He will present a public lecture at 8 p.m. in Dana Auditorium.
As an attorney and environmental activist, Kennedy has prosecuted governmental agencies and industrial companies for polluting the Hudson River and Long Island Sound, winning settlements for the Hudson Riverkeeper, arguing cases to expand citizen access to the shoreline, and suing sewage treatment plants to force compliance with the Clean Water Act.
“The Hudson is my backyard, and the primary obligation of anyone in the environmental community is to clean his or her own backyard first,” Kennedy said. “Global reform starts with local reform.”
In a recent article in The New York Times criticizing President Bush’s plans for developing hydrogen-powered cars, Kennedy wrote that “the White House wants to extract hydrogen from coal and natural gas, (without controlling emissions), and not renewable resources like wind and solar power, thereby increasing global warming and fouling our landscape.”
In an alternate plan to Bush’s, Kennedy proposes requiring cars to average 40 miles-per-gallon by 2012.
“[It] would save nearly 2 million barrels a day; that’s more than we imported from Saudi Arabia last year, and three times our Iraq imports,” Kennedy wrote.
Kennedy is credited with leading the fight to protect New York City’s water supply.
The New York City agreement, which he negotiated of behalf of environmentalists across the state, is regarded as an international model in stakeholder consensus negotiations and sustainable development.
Nationally, he contributed to the defeat of several anti-environmental bills during the 104th Congress.
He has also worked on environmental issues across the Americas and has worked with several indigenous tribes in Latin America and Canada to successfully negotiating treaties protecting traditional homelands.
Earlier in his career, Kennedy served as assistant district attorney in New York City. He has worked for presidential campaigns, including those of Ted Kennedy, his uncle, in 1980, and Al Gore in 2000.
Kennedy is the author of numerous articles and three books, and his articles have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Atlantic Monthly, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, and others.
Kennedy graduated from Harvard University. He studied at the London School of Economics and received his law degree from the University of Virginia Law School. Following graduation he attended Pace University School of Law, where he was awarded a master’s degree in environmental law.