July 2003

Breaking News from Goose Prairie

by Lindsay Thompson, Bar News Editor

One of the wonderful things about John Rupp's stories—like "The Douglas-Fortas Connection" republished in the May issue—is that they always seem to generate more stories. His reminiscence about Odd John Solnordahl, a tug captain with a tendency to get crossways with the law, and published over 10 years ago, prompted a number of lawyers who'd had run-ins with Odd John to send Bar News their further recollections.
 
Members' stories are part of what makes Bar News the unofficial history of our profession here in the top left corner of the country. When Bob Free's letter arrived, I was still dithering over something interesting for this space. Managing Editor Amy Hines suggested running Mr. Free's letter. I happily agreed. Here is an eyewitness look back at a significant moment in Washington history.

Editor:
I am writing concerning your interesting article "Anatomy of an Anecdote," which appeared in the May 2003 edition of Bar News. In your article, you recount a story of Justice Douglas's decision 30 years ago enjoining Nixon's bombing of Cambodia. Because I was involved in that case and the lore surrounding Douglas's hearing on the case in the Yakima County Courthouse, I write now to set the record straight.
 
You, John Rupp, and Bruce Murphy, in his new biography Wild Bill: The Legend and Life of William O. Douglas, America's Most Controversial Supreme Court Justice, have some of the facts from 30 years ago wrong.
 
According to your article and according to Murphy, someone at the ACLU telephoned Whistlin' Jack Motel, the closest phone to Justice Douglas's Goose Prairie home, to let Douglas know that the ACLU was coming to request Douglas to issue a stay of the Cambodia bombing during the Supreme Court's summer recess. You and Murphy state that Douglas, on receiving the message, drove down to the motel to use the pay phone to inform the ACLU he would rule after holding a hearing in Yakima. The lore is that Douglas believed his call to the ACLU had been tapped by the FBI, and the information passed on to Justice Marshall so that Marshall and the other justices could quickly overrule his stay of the Cambodia bombing. (The court did hold a telephonic hearing within a few hours of Douglas's order, and the stay was overturned.)
 
I was the "someone at the ACLU" who telephoned Whistlin' Jack to urge the motel proprietor to take a message to Douglas that we were on our way to request the stay. I was working as a legal intern at the ACLU after my first year of law school at the University of Washington. The next day, I and a lawyer from the ACLU in New York arrived on Douglas's doorstep in Goose Prairie in the early a.m. to deliver the petition to Justice Douglas. We saw him, dressed in pajamas, peak out his window at us. He later met us on his porch, dressed in rugged jeans and a workshirt. He requested that we return in a couple of hours—to allow him time to review the petition. When we returned to his doorstep, he informed us that we should arrange for a hearing the next day in the Yakima County Courthouse and inform the U.S. attorney to be present to represent the government.
 
The fact is that Douglas never called the ACLU from Whistlin' Jack Motel, so he never could have been alarmed that his call had been tapped by the FBI. Douglas did inform us that the reason he had not invited us into his house was that he had houseguests. We later learned that his houseguests were Justice William Rehnquist and his wife, with whom Douglas surprisingly had a good friendship. Either Rehnquist or other sources could have been the source of information to get the rest of the Court to act so quickly after Douglas's order was released. The Yakima hearing was widely covered in the press, even before Douglas made his decision. My own anecdote about this event is that I noticed an interesting book located in Douglas's dusty, old Plymouth parked in his driveway. The book was Gilbert's on Contracts, rather unusual reading material for a Supreme Court justice. I assume, but do not know for certain, that the Gilbert's belonged to Douglas's wife, Cathy, who happened to be studying for the bar exam that summer.
 
Working on this case 30 years ago—as a first-year law student—was in many ways the highlight of my legal career. I am sorry to say that I have never been on another Supreme Court justice's doorstep, seen another in pajamas, or had another opportunity to speak with a Supreme Court justice about a president's decision to bomb another country.
 
Sincerely,

Robert A. Free
Seattle

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