James Ward (judge)

Ward served as a Deputy District Attorney for Riverside County from 1960 to 1961. He then went into practice with the law firm of Badger, Schulte & Ward in 1961, where he continued to work until 1964. He left Badger, Schulte & Ward in 1964 to go into civil litigation practice dealing with media-related law in 1964 with Thompson & Colegate where he continued to work until 1993. He became a Superior Court judge in 1993, receiving an appointment from Governor Pete Wilson on November 29, 1993. On April 24, 1996, Governor Wilson appointed him an associate justice of the California Court of Appeal; his appointment was subsequently confirmed by a popular vote of the California electorate on November 3, 1998.

On January 9, 1960, Ward was admitted to the California Bar. He was admitted to practice in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of California in 1964. Ward was admitted to practice before U.S. Supreme Court on May 14, 1979, where he went on to win two First Amendment Rights cases.

Ward served on active duty in the U.S. Army from 1959 to 1960. He then served in the Army Reserve from 1960 to 1965 and rose to the rank of First Sergeant.

Between 1953 and 1954, Ward attended classes at both the University of Oslo in Norway and the University of Vienna in Austria. He earned his Bachelor of Arts from the University of South Dakota in 1957. Ward then matriculated at the University of San Francisco, where he earned his J.D. degree in 1959.

Ward graduated from Longfellow Grade School in Sioux Falls, South Dakota in 1949. He graduated from Washington High School, also in Sioux Falls, in 1953.

James D. Ward (born 1935) is an associate justice of the California Courts of Appeal, Fourth District, Division Two. As an attorney, he argued two cases in front of the U.S. Supreme Court that defined key rights for the free press under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.