Cecil J. Olmstead, of Westport, CT, died on June 25 at age 92. Of Counsel with the international law firm, Steptoe & Johnson LLP, in Washington, D.C., and former executive vice president of Texaco, Inc., he was one of the nation’s leading authorities on international law, trade and arbitration. A member of The American Law Institute for 53 years, he included a bequest to the Institute in his will.
A native of Jacksonville, FL, Mr. Olmstead served in the U.S. Army Air Corps as a first lieutenant during the Second World War. He was a graduate of the University of Georgia and its law school, and also studied at Yale University Law School as a Sterling Graduate Fellow.
Early in his career, Mr. Olmstead was the assistant to State Department legal advisor Adrian Fisher. When Mr. Fisher served during the 1960s as the Chief Reporter for the ALI’s Restatement second, The Foreign Relations Law of the United States, Mr. Olmstead was an Associate Reporter for the project. He later was an Adviser for the Restatement Third, The Foreign Relations Law of the United States, published in 1987.
Mr. Olmstead served as president of both the International Law Association and its American branch, receiving its first distinguished service award in 2004. He was the recipient of numerous other honors, including being named a commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II. He was a former delegate to the United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea and the U.N. Conference on the Code of Conduct for Transnational Corporations.
Mr. Olmstead’s wife of 63 years, Frances Hughes Olmstead, died in 2006. He is survived by four children, including ALI member Cecil Jay Olmstead III of Houston.