Female Hispanic Lawyers

I haven’t seen the raw numbers, but I just read a bizjournals.com article with some information about Hispanic lawyers:

“According to the lists, nationally, Hispanic women outpace Hispanic men both in enrollment and degrees granted. Hispanic women outnumber Hispanic men in 15 of the 25 schools listed for total enrollment.”

The study is from the Dec. 3 issue of Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education but I don’t think it’s officially out yet, otherwise I would post a link.  I wonder how big the difference is when they say “outnumber”?  When I was practicing in Chicago, I met both male and female Hispanic lawyers, but my favourite Latina judge of all time is hands down Judge Marilyn Milian.

A variation of what partners looks like

Nina Gussack is the chairperson of Pepper Hamilton, a 500 lawyer firm.  Her practice focuses on defending pharmaceutical companies. In this Philly.com article, she said something that caught my eye:

That women chair important practice groups at Pepper at different stages in their careers is a helpful sign to younger lawyers that no one approach is the prescribed route to success, Gussack said.

“You [a young lawyer] look up, and you say, ‘I think I could be like them [leaders of the firm],’ but there is a variation of what ‘them’ looks like,” Gussack said. “We have women who span the spectrum. Partners with young children. Partners with grandchildren. What you really want to say to people coming out of the starting gate is, ‘Look around you, and see what excites and motivates you.’ “

I agree with that.  It’s nice to see different types of men and women as partners and very inspiring to junior lawyers.

Update: Asma Jahangir released

I previously wrote about Asma Jahangir’s house arrest here.  According to yesterday’s Toronto Star article on some of her political views, she has been freed!

How long though before rule of law comes back?

The olden days were not alway the good days

Law Times has an article describing a recent speech by Constance Backhouse, a professor of law at the University of Ottawa and president-elect of the American Society for Legal History, which related a story about a law class in the 1970s.  The author of the article, Gary Lloyd Gottlieb, provided a summary:

“A prominent practitioner and instructor in the course on law office administration was lecturing on legal secretaries.

His written teaching text advised new lawyers to post help wanted ads “[Seeking] a beautiful young and confidential secretary . . . . Unless very beautiful you should be able to take shorthand on machine dictation . . . . You should be a whiz at making good coffee . . . .”

A group of female students objected to the sexist and manipulative course content. When one of them stood up and strode down to the instructor’s podium, ripped the offending pages out of the loose-leaf text and threw them into the garbage as she left the room, the instructor bellowed that she could send the pages back along with her brassieres.”

Good gosh!

Wall Street Journal and friends have made a list…

As I eat my breakfast at my desk, I usually like to skim a couple blawgs, one of which is the one at the Wall Street Journal.  If you read today’s Law blog posts, you’ll see that WSJ and the blog commentators are discussing some of the top women lawyers to watch.

I am tempted to put my friends’ names up, although we are still less than 5 years out   I hope they make the list some day. I’m quite proud of how far all of us have come as lawyers.

Answer filed in Cozen O’Connor gender discrimination suit

I wrote about this gender discrimination lawsuit a few months ago and thought that Cozen O’Connor would try to kill it, but according to Law.com, it is still alive and kicking:

“But the answer says the firm “denies that Ms. Biswanger represented the firm’s ‘most prominent’ clients in ’substantial’ matters because these terms are vague and undefined. The firm regards all of its clients as ‘prominent’ and it treats all matters as ’substantial.’”"

That last line is funny to me although I can’t pinpoint why exactly.

NAWL’s second annual survey results

New survey results by the National Association of Women Lawyers released yesterday. The survey involved 200 large law firms in the US.

I’m glad I don’ work in “big law.”  I think I’m fairly treated at my job. I hope everyone will take a step back and think a little about whether they are being treated fairly or not.  If you aren’t, please do something about it!  Be pro-active!

Female Blawgers unite!

There are a lot of female “blawgers” out there who are practicing lawyers and regularly discuss their practice and work-life balance.  A popular blawg is Carolyn Elefant’s ”My Shingle” at http://www.myshingle.com/ which she has been running since December 2002.

There are also non-practicing lawyers who remain passionate about the law and occasionally blog about the topics they find interesting.  Today I would like to direct visitors to ”The Mommy Blawger” at http://mommyblawg.blogspot.com/ which “monitors legal developments which affect mothering, such as midwifery, breastfeeding, education and homeschooling, healthcare policy” and which has a collection of links to other “Lawyer Mom” blogs!

Lawyers protesting

In solidarity with the lawyers in Pakistan, a lot of lawyers gathered in NYC today.  I wish they had done something like this in Toronto. I would have gone!

Look at the photos; it makes me happy to see all sorts of men and women in the crowd.

Judiciary or legislature?

I’ll admit that I’ve thought about it.  If I had a choice, would I go into the judiciary or the legislature?  According to this Pittsburgh Tribune-Review article, women are finding it easier to go one route over the other.  One political scientist commented:

“Lawyers think about running for judge. But we have to encourage men and women to think about running for the Legislature“

Personally, I would hate the “politics” with being in the legislature. I’m sure there are politics with being a judge too, but I would think there is a lot of discretion as well.  Being in the legislature on the other hand, you’re at the mercy of so many political forces… I don’t think I could handle it.

In Canada, we have made strides in getting female judges but in the legislature, it’s a different story.