Armando David Mazzone (June 3, 1928 – October 25, 2004) served for twenty-six years as a

United States district judge The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district. Each district covers one U.S. state or a portion of a state. There is at least one feder ...

of the

United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts The United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts (in case citations, D. Mass.) is the United States district court, federal district court whose Jurisdiction (area), territorial jurisdiction is the Commonwealth (U.S. state), C ...

. "He will forever be remembered by the people of Massachusetts for his landmark rulings that led to the cleanup of Boston Harbor," United States Senator Edward M. Kennedy said to the

Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...

shortly after Mazzone's death in October 2004.

Education and career

Mazzone was born Armando David Mazzone in Everett,

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

, to immigrant parents. He was a star tight end on the Everett High School football team, where he won all-scholastic honors, and he later played tight end on the

Harvard College Harvard College is the undergraduate education, undergraduate college of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Part of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Scienc ...

team. After graduating from Harvard with a

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

degree in 1950, he became a supervisor at Inland Steel Corp., a steel mill in East Chicago,

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. He served in the

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for two years during the

Korean War The Korean War (25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953) was an armed conflict on the Korean Peninsula fought between North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea; DPRK) and South Korea (Republic of Korea; ROK) and their allies. North Korea was s ...

, then returned to the steel mill and enrolled at

DePaul University College of Law DePaul University College of Law is the law school of DePaul University, a private Catholic research university in Chicago, Illinois. It employs more than 125 full- and part-time faculty members and enrolls more than 500 students in its Juri ...

, graduating with a

Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...

in 1957. After law school, he opened a small law office in

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. It borders on Lake Michigan to its northeast, the Mississippi River to its west, and the Wabash River, Wabash and Ohio River, Ohio rivers to its ...

, but soon returned to Massachusetts, where he spent two years as an Assistant District Attorney of Middlesex County and four years as an

Assistant United States Attorney An assistant United States attorney (AUSA) is an official career civil service position in the U.S. Department of Justice composed of lawyers working under the U.S. attorney of each U.S. federal judicial district. They represent the federal gov ...

under Wendell Arthur Garrity Jr. In 1965, Mazzone and three other Assistant United States Attorneys resigned to open their own law firm, Moulton, Looney, Mazzone, & Falk. They were later joined by former US Attorney, Paul Markham. He remained in private practice until his appointment to the Superior Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts by Governor

Michael Dukakis Michael Stanley Dukakis ( ; born November 3, 1933) is an American politician and lawyer who served as governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979 and from 1983 to 1991. He is the longest-serving governor in Massachusetts history and only the s ...

in 1974.

Federal judicial service

Mazzone was nominated by President

Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (October 1, 1924December 29, 2024) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...

on January 26, 1978, to a seat on the

vacated by Judge Frank Jerome Murray. He was confirmed by the

United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...

on February 7, 1978, and received his commission on February 10, 1978. He assumed senior status on June 3, 1993. His service terminated on October 25, 2004, due to his death in

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, Massachusetts.

Boston Harbor case

In the early 1980s, the Conservation Law Foundation and the City of

Quincy, Massachusetts Quincy ( ) is a city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the largest city in the county. Quincy is part of the Greater Boston area as one of Boston's immediate southern suburbs. Its population in ...

sued the regional Metropolitan District Commission, saying that it violated clean water statutes because its antiquated sewage treatment plant on Deer Island was dumping hundreds of tons of black sludge into the harbor daily. The

United States Environmental Protection Agency The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on De ...

later joined the suit. Judge Mazzone ruled the

Massachusetts Water Resources Authority The Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) is a public authority in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts that provides wholesale drinking water and sewage services to 3.1 million people in sixty-one municipalities and more than 5,500 large ...

(which was the successor to the Municipal District Commission's operations of the Boston regional water and sewage systems), was in "chronic, flagrant violation" of federal law, and ordered it to set deadlines for a cleanup. He oversaw the case himself, rather than appointing a special master as judges often do in long-running cases.

Judicial philosophy

Judge Mazzone was known for his dedication not only to headline-producing cases, but to the routine caseload of a federal court, which he characterized as "doing the nation's work." "I don't think there are any secrets to being a good judge," Mazzone said in a 1984 interview with the

. "You have to work at it. Few of us have the brilliance of a (Judge Charles E.) Wyzanski or a (Judge)

Learned Hand Billings Learned Hand ( ; January 27, 1872 – August 18, 1961) was an American jurist, lawyer, and judicial philosopher. He served as a federal trial judge on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York from 1909 to 1924 a ...

. What you have is a respect for the law, a knowledge of the principles and a desire to do the best job you can. Good lawyers make good judges. Any lawyer can make a judge look bad. But a good lawyer playing by the rules, playing it straight makes a good case, and the judge is merely incidental, truly an impartial arbiter. A judge should just be there with a knowledge of the law and leave the lawyering to the lawyers."Doherty, William. "Good Lawyers Make Good Judges." Boston Globe, August 1, 1984.

Memorial

A memorial to Judge Mazzone on Deer Island in Boston Harbor (pictured above), near the Deer Island Waste Water Treatment Plant was dedicated on October 19, 2007.

References

Sources

External links

* * Monthly and Quarterly reports, 1998 to present, by the MWRA in compliance with the court case Mazzone presided over.
Judge A. David Mazzone chambers papers on the Boston Harbor Cleanup Case, 1985-2005
University Archives and Special Collections, Joseph P. Healey Library,

University of Massachusetts Boston The University of Massachusetts Boston (stylized as UMass Boston) is a Public university, public US-based research university. It is the only public research university in Boston and the third-largest campus in the five-campus University of Ma ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mazzone, A. David 1928 births 2004 deaths People from Everett, Massachusetts Military personnel from Massachusetts Lawyers from Chicago Massachusetts lawyers DePaul University alumni Harvard Crimson football players Judges of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts Members of the United States Sentencing Commission United States district court judges appointed by Jimmy Carter American people of Italian descent Assistant United States attorneys Harvard College alumni United States Army personnel of the Korean War