The Nickel Report

On March 20, the firm lost a beloved colleague, Henry V. Nickel. Henry joined what was then Hunton & Williams in June 1976.  An enormously gifted lawyer, Henry became the foundation on which Hunton’s environmental law practice flourished. 

“Henry was one of the genuinely great lawyers of our generation,” says former firm managing partner Taylor Reveley. “He was without peer as a master of administrative and environmental law.  Henry was also a caring colleague and an unparalleled trainer of young lawyers.”

Henry’s career of more than 50 years tracked the modern environmental law era, much of which Henry helped to shape through his representation of electric generating and other companies in rulemakings before regulatory agencies (like EPA) and in judicial proceedings, primarily in the federal courts of appeals.  For the decades since Henry’s arrival at Hunton, anyone in the United States laying serious claim to being an “environmental lawyer” knew Henry or knew of him and his remarkable contributions to the field.  Thus, it was only natural for the firm to decide several years ago to call Hunton’s environmental and energy blog “The Nickel Report.” 

It is a daunting task to convey fully how great a lawyer and how great a man Henry was.  The following anecdotes give you at least a glimpse of what it was like to work with Henry and to have called him our friend. 

Retired partner Don Irwin recalls early discussions with Henry about his potential move to Hunton.  “Instead of demanding huge money (I think he actually took a pay cut), Henry asked that the firm add a set of F.2d and F. Supp. volumes to the D.C. office library and subscribe to certain trade publications.  What he most wanted was a collegial environment.  When Henry arrived at Hunton, he brought with him knowledge, subject matter competence, and connections that our office had not had until then.  And he worked doggedly to help create and sustain what has become a great institution.  Henry said in those early discussions, ‘I’m a builder,’ and he sure was a builder!  You can see what he built in the half-century since then.” 

Andrea Field, who started working with Henry in the summer of 1978, remembers being impressed (and intimidated) by Henry’s encyclopedic knowledge of what seemed like the universe of administrative and environmental law cases.  “He knew the old cases, he read the new cases when they came out, and he remembered not only the main holdings of those cases, but also quirky little points that appeared elsewhere in the court decisions and in the case footnotes.”

Bill Brownell – the first associate hired to work with Henry in Hunton’s D.C. office – recalls his first project with Henry.  “He asked me to draft a letter to the EPA Administrator setting out the electric utility industry’s concerns with the agency’s approach in a rulemaking to set standards of performance for the control equipment (SO₂ scrubbers) that was to be installed on new power plants.  I listened carefully and fed back to him a draft letter that (I thought) reflected what Henry described.  He read it as I sat in his office, and I could tell that he wasn’t overwhelmed by my effort (to say the least).  He sent me back to think about it more, and I decided to take it in directions that Henry had not discussed with me but which I thought were useful.  Henry loved it – it wasn’t the final product but a good step on the way.  And I learned an important lesson.  Henry valued everyone’s input, ideas, and creativity.  He wanted an exchange of thoughts, no matter how ‘novel,’ which inevitably leads to an improved product.”

Chuck Knauss recalls that when he was a summer clerk at Hunton in 1980, “Henry welcomed me by letting me stay in his home for part of the summer.  Thus began our wide-ranging conversations about the law and many other topics.  His mentorship over the years inspired me to try challenging things in the law, and he stayed committed to our friendship even when I was not here at the firm.”  Chuck adds, “Henry was multi-faceted.  We shared lunch a couple times a week over the past decade, so I know what the term multi-faceted means!  The man could talk – with insight and humor – about everything from his Japanese art collection to history, politics, sports, and his favorite haute cuisine and travel destinations.  But what most set Henry apart was his boundless and contagious enthusiasm for the law.  That’s why he kept working – even authoring an amicus brief with me last summer.  When I confront gnarly problems, I always try to conjure up what Henry would say.”

Henry valued good writing, particularly writing that made highly complex ideas understandable for regulators and judges.  Henry’s favorite example of this is the “baseball analogy,” which he wrote for a brief filed in the D.C. Circuit case in which our electric utility industry clients were challenging EPA’s SO₂ scrubber rule.  In that rule, EPA had cherry-picked data to argue that all new power plants would be able to meet very stringent emission standards virtually all of the time because a handful of existing power plants had occasionally been able to meet those standards.  Henry realized that talking about SO₂ scrubber performance statistics might be confusing to judges.  But baseball statistics were a whole different ballgame.  Thus, in the brief for our clients, Henry talked baseball:  “On Sunday, September 21, George Brett of the Kansas City Royals had a .400 batting average.  On that day, Eddie Murray of the Baltimore Orioles was batting .302.  Given these facts, EPA counsel’s logic would lead to the conclusion that, in the future, all baseball players can be reasonably expected to bat .350.”  The court understood and included that quote in the court’s very lengthy decision authored by Judge Patricia Wald.

(Years later, when Henry was at a reception for Justice Powell, he saw Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg standing alone and approached her, saying, “Justice Ginsburg, I don’t know if you remember me, but I argued a case in the D.C. Circuit when you first joined that court.”  According to Henry, Justice Ginsburg squinted at him for a moment, seemed to recognize him, and said, “It was that darned scrubber case, wasn’t it?  I was the junior person on that panel, and Pat Wald asked me to personally check every single one of the over 500 very technical footnotes in her opinion.  After doing that, I remember asking my husband, Marty, if I had made the right decision in going on the bench!”)

Former Hunton environmental team counsel David Harlow recalls how he started working with Henry after a major project had ended, “and though I knew little (actually, zero) about the Clean Air Act, Henry welcomed me warmly.  Henry wasn’t troubled by my ignorance of course because the only ‘assistance’ Henry needed was somebody to help him get his thoughts down on paper.  And over the course of the ensuing 25+ years, that’s what I spent much of my time at the firm doing – i.e., trying to do justice, in writing, to those extraordinary insights, oftentimes novel but invariably incisive, that came so freely to Henry – insights grounded in Henry’s insistence that, in addressing any legal issue, it was essential to return to ‘first principles,’ rather than to retread someone else’s old ground.  Beyond being merely a joy to work with, Henry was one of the best men I’ve been privileged to know, and I was blessed to work with him for so long.”

“Henry is the most creative lawyer I have ever worked with,” says former Hunton environmental partner Makram Jaber.  “Even in the five years since I left Hunton, I would regularly call Henry for inspiration in breaking down the most complicated and obscure Clean Air Act rules.  I came to Hunton to work on a set of ‘enforcement initiative’ cases with Henry and Bill Brownell.  A couple of years into it, while brainstorming summary judgment ideas in the round conference room that was Henry’s second office at 1900 K Street, Henry proposed a novel interpretation of the two-decades-old regulation at issue.  It was so novel that, after a heated discussion, I left the room in a huff, telling Henry he was ‘nuts.’  But after a few more discussions and some intensive research, I saw his wisdom, and I wrote up his theory in a (winning) summary judgment brief that went so deep in the history of the program, Henry proudly described as a ‘law review brief.’”  

Some young lawyers came to Hunton expressly to work with Henry.  Recalls retired Hunton environmental team partner Mel Schulze, “Henry is probably the reason I ended up at Hunton.  I learned many years later that his only comment in response to my interview was something like ‘Offer now!’  I always remember fondly the time that he and I flew out to San Francisco for a client meeting.  Although I was just starting my third year at the firm, Henry let me run the meeting.  He was a great lawyer and mentor.  And who couldn’t love his quirks!”  (More about some of those quirks in a moment.)

Lawyers who came to Hunton knowing something about Henry the lawyer quickly learned about Henry the man.  Former Hunton environmental partner Bill Wehrum remembers being grateful that Henry welcomed him as a friend.  “I undoubtedly became a far better lawyer by working with Henry.  But more importantly, I became a better person by experiencing his enthusiasm for life and generous spirit.”

That generous spirit expressed itself in how Henry treated everyone around him.  He innately knew the right thing to do, and he did it.  He loved arguing cases in court, but he made sure that the young lawyers working with him had their chances to argue cases when  they were ready (and he knew when that time was).  He recognized and praised good work when he saw it.  He was gentle in his criticisms of those whose actions or judgments fell short of the mark.  And he never got upset when – in the midst of arguing legal points – someone called him “nuts.”

All these qualities made Henry a skilled mentor – a mentor of both men and women.  Andrea Field says “mentoring was part of Henry’s DNA, but his mentoring of women may also have been influenced by his wife, Carol, whom Henry met when they were in law school together and both served on the Board of Editors of The George Washington Law Review.  Henry proudly shared that Carol’s class rank was higher than his and that Carol was always paid more than he was.  But viewing some of the obstacles Carol faced in her tax practice at another D.C. firm gave Henry an understanding of the unfair challenges that even the most talented female attorneys might face, and he found ways to reduce those challenges for me and other women whom he mentored over the years.”

Shannon Broome first encountered Henry when she was working at another firm, and she and Henry were representing different clients in the same litigation.  Shannon remembers that “Henry was the first (and often the only) industry lawyer to pay attention to and encourage my contributions.  He was about ideas and solving the problem and never worried about if an idea was coming from someone with less experience than he had.  He also taught by example.  I remember when we were co-counsel in a case that Henry was arguing in the Seventh Circuit, I marveled at his fully engaged conversational style with Judge Easterbrook.  They were like two buddies talking about the Clean Air Act.  We won that case by the way, and Judge Easterbrook authored the opinion.”

Former Hunton environmental partner Allison Wood also praised the way Henry encouraged young lawyers, never making them feel stupid or hesitant to offer ideas.  “He wouldn’t say something was brilliant if it wasn’t, but when he found promising ideas in something I said or wrote, he would single those out for praise and suggest ways the ideas could be developed.  He knew how to bring out the best in everyone he worked with.”

Former Hunton environmental team counsel Maida Lerner agrees that Henry was a world-class lawyer who made those around him shine but adds that “Henry was primarily a family man, who spoke with pride about his beloved Carol and their three dear sons.  When I came to Hunton from an in-house position at a utility company, I was unsure that I could succeed at such a large and prestigious firm.  Being given an office near Henry was one of my luckiest breaks.  He would regularly come by just to say hello.  Those visits lightened the day.  We’d talk about the important stuff – family, travels, and restaurants.  Just being in Henry’s orbit helped give me the confidence I needed.  I will forever be grateful for his friendship.”

Retired Hunton environmental team partner Lauren Freeman agrees, praising Henry’s mentoring, exceptional mind, and certain other special traits.  “I came to Hunton out of law school specifically to work with Henry, and I had the pleasure of working under his wing for many years.  He was brilliant and generous, and I always felt honored when he would tap on my door to ask if he could pick my brain on an issue.  His brilliance, however, left little room for mundane details.  (He often related that his wife, Carol, wouldn’t let him have a key to their house for fear he would lose it.)  One time Henry and I had a case that went to trial in federal district court in New Mexico, and he asked me to make the opening argument.  The night before, when we left Albuquerque to drive to Santa Fe with local counsel, Henry generously volunteered to oversee the loading of the luggage so that I could focus on my preparation.  My bag didn’t make it into the car.  Henry felt terrible and found someone to bring it to Sante Fe in the middle of the night so that I would have a suit to wear to court.  There’s no question that Henry’s heart was always in the right place, even when his brilliant mind was in the ether.  That is a rare combination of qualities.” 

Henry also had a great but gentle sense of humor, delighting most in making fun of himself and his own foibles.  For example, Henry lacked an ability to spell even the simplest words correctly.  He shared that, in the eighth grade, he had misspelled his own first name on a test – adding an extra “e”:  Henery.  And in the first memo he wrote as an associate – a memo about a nuclear fuel contract – he misspelled fuel:  f-u-l-e. 

In addition, all of us who worked with Henry quickly became familiar with his large and bold handwriting, which covered most of the pages of draft memos on which he scribbled almost-impossible-to-read comments.  If you made the effort, though, it was worth it.  Retired environmental team partner Norm Fichthorn recalls that “each time I sat down with Henry to discuss a case – or to decipher and apply his scrawled comments on a draft – I grew as a lawyer in a way I don’t think would have happened otherwise.”

Because not everyone had Norm’s patience and deciphering skills, however, it was essential that smart, patient professional assistants step in and learn how to read Nickel Hieroglyphics.  Henry was fortunate (and he knew he was fortunate) to have been supported for so many years by his long-time professional assistant, Ana Aguirre.       

Another of Henry’s foibles was his habit of nibbling and randomly discarding plastic coffee stirrers.  If you ever needed to find Henry, you had only to walk down our hallways following his trail of chewed-up plastic.  Many may not know, though, that before Henry chewed on coffee stirrers, he gnawed on the caps of plastic colored pens and markers.  Andrea Field recalls a night “when we were working late, and Henry couldn’t find any plastic caps to masticate.  He had gone to the file drawer where boxes of plastic markers were usually stored, but the drawer was empty.  Somehow Henry made it through the following few hours without plastic sustenance, and the next day he asked that new pens be ordered.  When he later checked the office supply file drawer, he looked eagerly at the rows of boxes of blue pens, red pens, green pens, and black pens and yelled out:  ‘Smorgasbord!’”

Henry Nickel made the practice of law exhilarating, challenging, rewarding, and fun.  Many of us had opportunities throughout our careers to practice elsewhere, but we didn’t do so in large part because we knew that “elsewhere” there would be no Henry.  As Taylor Reveley sums it up, “We all appreciated what Henry meant to the practice of law in its most telling and elegant reaches.  We are grateful that he chose to join us at Hunton so many years ago.”

A memorial for Henry will be held 11:30 a.m. - 3 p.m. on Saturday, March 29, at Congressional Country Club (8500 River Road, Bethesda, MD 20817).  The formal part of the memorial is expected to start between 12:30 and 1:00 pm.  In lieu of gifts or flowers, please consider making a donation to the Carol Kelley Nickel Scholarship Endowment at William & Mary Law School, a fund that Henry set up in Carol’s name.