Eilene Galloway, one of the pioneers of space law and policy in the United States, passed away on Saturday in Washington at the age of 102. She was working as a national defense analyst at the Library of Congress in 1957 when she was asked by then-Senator Lyndon B. Johnson to serve a staff consultant for a series of hearings by Johnson’s committee in the wake of Sputnik. She played several other key roles during that time, ranging from recommending the formation of a separate House committee on space and suggesting that the new space agency be an “Administration” rather than an “Agency”. She also helped create the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) and the International Institute of Space Law.
Unfortunately, she also favored the Moon Treaty. Fortunately, she never got her way on that.
[…] Eilene Galloway, RIP – Space Politics […]
Mrs. Galloway was not only a brilliant thinker and visionary, she was also someone who got things done, by bringing together the various interests of politicians, lawyers, engineers and others across the US government and around the world. She was, additionally, a mentor to multiple generations of individuals now carrying on the work she started. All we do is enhanced by our having known her.