Frank McMaster
By John Temple Ligon
Temple@TheColumbiaStar.com
Frank McMaster has expanded his practice into environmental law. He has worked with his brothers and father at Tomkins & McMaster for more than 20 years. McMaster’s team is promoting itself as a fixture in the firm’s winning tradition by taking in new talent and expertise on the environment.
McMaster was born in Columbia Hospital at the corner of Hampton and Harden Streets. His family has always been active at downtown’s First Presbyterian Church, but McMaster’s kindergarten was in St. Michael’s off North Trenholm Road.
After his first few years at Brockman School, McMaster transferred to Hammond Academy. Taking karate lessons all the while, beginning with the eighth grade, McMaster achieved black belt status by 1978.
In USC for four years as a French major, McMaster experienced language immersion in Quebec, Canada, for a good part of 1979. After graduation McMaster moved directly into law school, also at USC. Throughout high school and law school McMaster worked in the Columbia office for U.S. Senator Strom Thurmond.
Out of school and into the S.C. Bar, McMaster clerked for Henry Herlong, federal magistrate, and then joined the family firm, Tomkins & McMaster. Working as the Southern Railroad’s district counsel since the late 1930s, John Gregg McMaster, Frank’s father, led the firm in its practice of railroad law into the current era and the expanded Norfolk Southern.
McMaster married his wife Debbie in 1992, and they have reared sons Joey and Derrick. Accepted for Navy SEAL training this summer, Joey is finishing his studies at USC as a Naval ROTC scholarship student. Joey and his wife have three children: Jonathan, Ian, and Hayden.
McMaster’s son Derrick works at Tomkins & McMaster while he continues his studies in pharmacy.
The McMasters live on 75 feet of Lake Murray shoreline, where scuba diving with a seven- foot visibility is about as clear as it gets.
Besides recreation, water is also a legal concern for McMaster and his environmental law practice. South Carolina can no longer take its water for granted, according to McMaster associate Marshall Lawson.
Lawson clerked for the S.C. Court of Appeals before joining McMaster. Besides his education and experience in law, Lawson brought with him a master’s degree in earth resource management.
McMaster and Lawson cite the 2002 drought as an indication of what to expect in the near future. During the 2002 drought, low flow levels in the Pee Dee and Savannah Rivers threatened freshwater intakes for Beaufort and Myrtle Beach. Groundwater levels reached new lows, and only a few months of storage remained in Clarks Hill Reservoir.
Relations with N.C. are strained over the water issue. The N.C. Environmental Management Commission suggested a transfer of 10 million gallons per day from the Catawba basin to the Yadkin- Pee Dee basin. In S.C., 11 counties, ten cities, the S.C. General Assembly, Governor Sanford and Attorney General Henry McMaster (Frank’s brother) opposed the transfer.
So, who owns the water? And what’s next in the contest between public rights and private rights?
Allocation of water through judicial decisions is retrospective rather than prospective and fails to consider the common good regarding water use, according to McMaster. And interstate water allocation disputes are sure to arise. But the federal government has chosen not to regulate the allocation of water. Quantitative law is the purview of the states.
Hence, McMaster’s move into environment law.
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