Name David Eagleson Education USC Gould School of Law | Role Justice | |
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Died May 23, 2003, Long Beach, California, United States | ||
David N. Eagleson (October 4, 1924 – May 23, 2003) served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of California from 1987 to 1991. He practiced law in Long Beach, California for 20 years. He spent another 20 years as a judge, serving on the Los Angeles Superior Court, Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court.
After serving in World War II, Eagleson earned his law degree from the USC Law School in 1950.
Eagleson, a conservative Republican, was elevated to the high court after voters removed liberal Chief Justice Rose Bird and two of her allies from the Court in the 1986 general election as a result of the trio's opposition to capital punishment. During his four years on the court, Eagleson wrote 54 majority opinions. Eagleson's most famous opinion is generally considered to be Thing v. La Chusa, 48 Cal. 3d 644, 667 (1989), which sharply limited the availability of the cause of action for negligent infliction of emotional distress in California.
He was married and was father to two daughters, Victoria and Beth, who now both reside in Southern California. Beth followed her father into law and became an attorney. Beth, in her eulogy for her father delivered before the court on which he once served, cited Thing as the opinion most representative of her father's voice and philosophy: