| James Robertson | |
| Office: | Senior Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia |
| Term Start: | December 31, 2008 |
| Term End: | June 1, 2010 |
| Office1: | Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia |
| Term Start1: | October 11, 1994 |
| Term End1: | December 31, 2008 |
| Appointer1: | Bill Clinton |
| Predecessor1: | George Hughes Revercomb |
| Successor1: | Robert L. Wilkins |
| Birth Date: | 18 May 1938 |
| Birth Place: | Cleveland, Ohio |
| Death Place: | Washington, D.C. |
| Education: | Princeton University (B.A.) George Washington University Law School (LL.B.) |
| Spouse: | Berit Persson (m. 1959) |
James Robertson (May 18, 1938 – September 7, 2019) was a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia from 1994 until his retirement in June 2010. Robertson also served on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court from 2002 until December 2005, when he resigned from that court in protest against warrantless wiretapping.[1]
Robertson was born in Cleveland, Ohio, on May 18, 1938; his father was a banker, his mother a social worker.[1] Robertson had a twin sister.[1] He was raised in Oberlin, Ohio, and Dayton, Ohio.[1] He attended his freshman year of high school in the public schools and then transferred to Western Reserve Academy in Hudson, Ohio.[2] He received a B.A. cum laude from Princeton University in 1959,[3] on a Navy ROTC scholarship.[2] Robertson was a member of the American Whig–Cliosophic Society at Princeton.[4]
Robertson served in the United States Navy from 1959 to 1964, achieving the rank of lieutenant.[2] He served on a radar picket destroyer with a home port in Jacksonville, Florida, first in the position of deck officer, then as anti-submarine warfare officer, and then as gunnery officer.[5] Robertson spent his last two years in the navy on desk duty at the Office of Naval Intelligence at The Pentagon and simultaneously attended the George Washington University Law School as a night student.[6] After leaving the navy, he finished his third year as a day student, and was editor-in-chief of The George Washington Law Review.[6] He received his LL.B in 1965.[3] [1] [2]
With the exception of a three-year gap from 1969 to 1972, Robertson was in private practice in Washington, D.C., from 1965 to 1994 at the law firm of Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering.[1] [2] While at Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering, Robertson worked under Louis F. Oberdorfer and later represented the Automobile Manufacturers Association in connection with the development of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards.[7] From 1969 to 1972, when Robertson served with the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, as chief counsel at the organization's offices in Jackson, Mississippi (1969–1970) and as national director in Washington, D.C. (1970–1972).[2]
He became a partner at Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering in 1973.[1] While in private practice, he served as president of the District of Columbia Bar (1991–1992),[1] [2] and president of the Southern Africa Legal Services and Legal Education Project (1989–1994).[2]
On September 14, 1994, Robertson was nominated by President Bill Clinton to a seat on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia vacated by George Hughes Revercomb.[3] The American Bar Association's Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary, which rates judicial nominees, unanimously rated Robertson as "well qualified" (the committee's highest rating).[8] Robertson was confirmed by the United States Senate on October 7, 1994, by voice vote.[9] He received his commission four days later.[3]
Chief Justice William Rehnquist appointed Robertson to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA Court) on May 19, 2002. On December 20, 2005, Robertson resigned from the FISA court, sending a letter to Chief Justice John G. Roberts announcing his resignation.[10] His resignation was in protest against the NSA warrantless surveillance that had occurred outside the FISA statute, a program revealed by the New York Times one week before Robertson's resignation.[10] In 2013, following his retirement from the judiciary, Robertson testified before the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) and said that he had resigned in protest of the George W. Bush administration's warrantless wiretaps, which bypassed the FISA Court. Robertson also criticized the 2008 amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, in which Congress allowed the FISA Court to approve collection of data in bulk, in addition to warrants targeted at individuals.[11] In Robertson's view, this change "turned the FISA court into something like an administrative agency, which makes and approves rules for others to follow," which he viewed as not being a proper role for the judiciary.[11]
Robertson was an early and prominent advocate of the need for an institutional adversary process within the FISA Court, to allow FISA judges to hear arguments from counsel other than the government's counsel.[11] [12] In an oral history, Robertson said:
A compromise provision in the 2015 USA Freedom Act adopted a form of adversary process within the FISA Court, allowing the court's judges to call upon a panel of attorneys as amicus curiae to offer adversary views; Robertson viewed this reform as a sufficient process to satisfy adversaries.[12]
Notable rulings by Robertson include:
After serving for 14 years, Robertson assumed senior status on the District Court on December 31, 2008; he fully retired on June 1, 2010.[3] After retiring from the bench, Robertson became a mediator and arbitrator with JAMS, deciding complex commercial cases.[21] He also wrote two op-eds published in the Washington Post.[22] [23]
Robertson died on September 7, 2019, at age 81,[2] [24] in Washington, D.C., due to heart disease.[1]
Robertson married Berit Persson in 1959; they had three children and six grandchildren.[1]
Robertson lived in North Bethesda, Maryland, and later Georgetown.[25]