Ward Elliott

{{Short description|American political scientist (1937–2022)}}

Ward Elliott (August 6, 1937 – December 6, 2022){{cite news |title=Obituary: Ward Elliott |url=https://claremont-courier.com/obituaries/obituary-ward-elliott-71504/ |work=Claremont Courier |date=December 15, 2022}}{{cite web |title=In memoriam: Professor Ward Elliott, a true renaissance man |url=https://www.cmc.edu/news/memoriam-professor-ward-elliott-true-renaissance-man |website=www.cmc.edu |publisher=Claremont McKenna College |date=December 14, 2022}} was an American political scientist who was the Burnet C. Wohlford Professor of American Political Institutions at Claremont McKenna College (CMC) in California.[http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/facultysites/govt/FacMember/WElliott/ Ward Elliott's home page at Claremont McKenna College] Elliott had been a professor at CMC since 1968.{{cite web|title=Academics - Ward E.Y. Elliott, Ph.D.|url=http://cmc.edu/academic/faculty/profile.php?Fac=22|publisher=Claremont McKenna College|accessdate=4 February 2012}}

Education

Work

Elliott criticized the US Supreme Court's record on voting reforms in his 1974 book, The Rise of Guardian Democracy, and argued that reform should be initiated by citizens by democratic processes and not imposed from above by elites.{{Cite journal|first=Thomas|last=Walker|year=1975|title=Book Review: The Rise of Guardian Democracy: The Supreme Court's Role in Voting Rights Disputes, 1845-1969|journal=Journal of Politics|volume=37|issue=3|pages=850–852|doi=10.2307/2129347|jstor=2129347}}

He researched market solutions to the smog problem in Los Angeles. He was president of the California Coalition for Clean Air from 1980 to 1986. Elliott drafted the economic incentives of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. After his efforts, the number of first-stage smog-alert days declined from one day in three in the 1960s to only one day in 1997.

Elliott founded and led the Claremont Shakespeare Clinic from 1987 to 1994. It used computers to analyze William Shakespeare's writings and published several papers on his and the clinic's findings.{{cite web|last=Moore|first=Peter|title=Claremont McKenna College's Shakespeare Clinic: Who Really Wrote Shakespeare?|url=http://elizabethanreview.com/Claremont_College_Clinic.pdf|publisher=The Elizabethan Review|accessdate=4 February 2012}} His research addressed the Shakespeare authorship question, and his results led him to dismiss the claims of 37 alternative authors of the Shakespeare canon and to reject the authenticity of over 30 poems and plays of the Shakespeare Apocrypha.{{cite web|last=Elliot|first=Ward|title=The Shakespeare Files|url=http://www.claremontmckenna.edu/news/cmcmagazine/2004summer/currents/|publisher=CMC Magazine|accessdate=4 February 2012}}

Awards

  • Distinguished Civilian Service Medal, 1973
  • Roy C. Crocker Prize for Merit, Claremont McKenna College, 1984
  • Presidential Award for Merit, Claremont McKenna College, 1999

References

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