Law Offices of Patrick M. Norton

Mr. Norton served for a decade in the State Department Legal Adviser’s Office as Deputy Director of Iran Claims, Assistant Legal Adviser for East Asia and the Pacific, and Assistant Legal Adviser for the Near East and South Asia.  Over the course of his years at State Mr. Norton performed a broad range of functions involving public international law:  conducted the initial legal planning for normalization of diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China; negotiated revisions to the US-Philippines Military Bases Agreement; supervised more than 130 arbitrations between the US and Iranian Governments at The Hague; headed the State Department team and served as the Agent of the United States in Nicaragua vs. the United States before the International Court of Justice; supervised all legal aspects of the U.S. response to the Soviet Union’s shooting down of KAL 007; served as the President Reagan’s personal representative to former Philippine President Marcos after Marcos’ evacuation to Hawaii; supervised U.S. cooperation with the new Philippine Government in its attempts to recoup stolen funds; prepared the U.S. plans for legal resolution of the Korean Armistice Agreement; and mediated the resolution of the final boundary agreement between the Israel and Egypt at Taba.

PUBLIC INTERNATIONAL LAW

Publications:

• “Ending the Korean Armistice Agreement:  The Legal Issues,” (Nautilus Institute 1997)
  
• Back to the Future:  Expropriation and the Energy Charter Treaty, in T. Wälde (ed.), The Energy Charter Treaty (1996)
  
• "A Law of the Future or a Law of the Past?  Modern Tribunals and the International Law of Expropriation,” 85 Am. J. Int’l L. 474 (1991)
  
• “The Nicaragua Case:  Political Questions Before the International Court of Justice,” 27 Va. J. Int’l L. 459 (1987)
  
• “Between the Ideology and the Reality:  the Shadow of the Law of Neutrality,” 17 Harv. Int’l L. J. 249 (1976)