Buckley, James L. 1923- (James Buckley, James Lane Buckley)

PERSONAL:

Born March 9, 1923, in New York, NY; son of William Frank, Sr. (in foreign oil exploration) and Aloise Josephine Buckley; married Ann Frances Cooley, May 22, 1953; children: Peter Pierce, James Wiggin, Priscilla Langford, William Frank, David Lane, Andrew Thurston. Education: Yale University, B.A., 1943, LL.B., 1949; attended Columbia Law School, 1947. Religion: Roman Catholic. Hobbies and other interests: Natural history, classical music.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Sharon, CT. Office—U.S. Senate, 304 Russell Senate Bldg., Washington, DC 20510.

CAREER:

Writer, memoirist, attorney, broadcaster, politician, judge, and U.S. Senator. Admitted to Connecticut Bar, 1950, and to Washington, DC, Bar, 1953; Wiggin & Dana (law firm), New Haven, CT, associate, 1949-53; Reasoner & Davis (law firm), associate, 1953-57; Catawba Corp. (family business), New York, NY, vice president and member of board of directors, 1957-70; U.S. Senate, Washington, DC, Republican senator from New York, 1970-77, member of public works, commerce, and budget committees; Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (law firm), member, 1977-78; corporate director and business consultant, 1978-80; Undersecretary for Security Assistance, U.S. Department of State, 1981-82; Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty, Inc., president, 1982-85; U.S. Court of Appeals, Washington DC Circuit, circuit judge, 1985-96, senior judge, 1996-2000. Military service: U.S. Naval Reserve, active duty, 1943-46; served in the western Pacific; became lieutenant junior grade.

AWARDS, HONORS:

United Nations Environment Program Award for Outstanding Environmental Leadership, 1982; Emory Buckner Award, Federal Bar Council. Recipient of honorary degrees from St. John's University and Sacred Heart University.

WRITINGS:

If Men Were Angels, Putnam (New York, NY), 1975.

(With Wendy White) Gleanings from an Unplanned Life: An Annotated Oral History (memoir), Intercollegiate Studies Institute (Wilmington, DE), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

Writer and attorney James L. Buckley is a veteran of a long and distinguished career in law and politics. He served as a republican United States Senator from 1970 to 1977. His legal career found him working for several prominent U.S. law firms and culminated with a fifteen-year tenure as a U.S. Circuit Judge in the Washington, DC, circuit from 1985 to 2000. He is the brother of the late William F. Buckley, Jr., a noted journalist, broadcaster, and conservative commentator.

In Gleanings from an Unplanned Life: An Annotated Oral History, Buckley recounts his life history, with emphasis on his childhood and family history, his legal and business career, his military service, his time on the judicial bench, and his retirement. Buckley relates his story via a series of interviews with Wendy White, an attorney who conducted the interviews as part of the Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit's Oral History Project. "Buckley, in a distinctive way, tells his story and keeps alive the family tradition of introducing wit in narrative, and of acknowledging, with extraordinary gentility, the views of others who come to different conclusions," commented reviewer Jaime Sneider in National Review. Buckley recalls the formative days of modern political conservatism; relates his judicial position as a textualist who believes the best guidance for interpreting a law or the U.S. Constitution is to be found within the document's actual text; and explores a political background that often left him with views at odds with both Democratic and Republican colleagues. The book constitutes a "full portrait of a remarkable man," Sneider remarked.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Buckley, James L., and Wendy White, Gleanings from an Unplanned Life: An Annotated Oral History, Intercollegiate Studies Institute (Wilmington, DE), 2006.

PERIODICALS

Harper's Magazine, May, 1981, Tom Bethell, "The Budget Can't Be Cut," p. 22.

National Review, January 4, 1980, "Buckley in Connecticut," p. 17; October 17, 1980, William F. Buckley, Jr., "Are You Honest? How Can We Tell?," p. 1287; February 23, 1998, "The Following Is Excerpted from the Statement Made by Sen. James L. Buckley on March 19, 1974," p. 42; January 29, 2007, Jaime Sneider, "Judge, Senator, American," review of Gleanings from an Unplanned Life, p. 45.

New Republic, October 25, 1980, David Lieberman, "Connecticut," p. 13.

Newsweek, October 13, 1980, "Feud: The Dodds vs. the Buckleys," p. 44.

New York Times, June 24, 1984, Stephen Engelberg, "Conservatives Hope to Link Abortion with Overseas Aid," p. 3; September 17, 1985, Michael Oreskes, "Dispute on Examination of Buckley," p. 3; October 4, 1985, "Judging a Judge Buckley," p. 30; October 9, 1985, Michael Oreskes, "James Buckley to Be Washington Court Nominee," p. 1; October 31, 1985, Ben A. Franklin, "Senators Praise Nomination of Buckley to Federal Bench," p. 16; November 16, 1985, "Panel Approves Nomination of Buckley to Appeals Court," p. 11.

Reference & Research Book News, February, 2007, review of Gleanings from an Unplanned Life.

Time, October 6, 1980, "The Senate: Arguing on the Issues," p. 30; August 20, 1984, Laura Lopez, "A Debate over ‘Sovereign Rights’; U.S. Views on Capitalism and Abortion Stir Controversy," p. 34.

U.S. News & World Report, August 20, 1984, "U.S. Bucks the Tide on Birth Control," p. 8.

Washington Post, October 12, 1983, David Hoffman, "James L. Buckley Takes Himself off List for Watt's Job," p. 6; July 17, 1984, Philip J. Hilts, "James Buckley Set to Head U.S. Group on Population," p. 17.

ONLINE

James L. Buckley Home Page,http://www.jameslbuckley.com (February 12, 2008).

United States Congress Web site,http://bioguide.congress.gov/ (February 12, 2008), biography of James L. Buckley.