When Winifred Wentworth graduated from law school in 1951, the door
to interviews at Florida's law firms slammed shut. One law firm
partner told her bluntly: "We see no value in hiring a woman."
Finally, the state Attorney General's office offered her a job, but
only if she'd agree to do the typing for a half dozen male
coworkers too.
"I told them I'd rather clean houses," Wentworth
recalls. "I wouldn't mind doing typing, but I didn't want
to do it for the whole damn crew!"
Sixteen years later, even after Title VII of the Civil Rights Act
of 1964, when Jeanne Crenshaw graduated from the University of Florida law school in 1967, law firms still tacked announcements of interview
times on the bulletin board that included the loud-and-clear message:
"No women." Rather than battling the good ol' boy system,
she and her husband hung out their shingle with a third partner instead.
And when Harvard Law School graduate Janet Reno tried to get a job
at one of Miami's biggest law firms in 1963, she was turned down
because she was a woman. Fourteen years later, that same firm would see
fit to make her a partner.
Wentworth, now retired, served as judge of the First District Court
of Appeal from 1979 to 1991.
Crenshaw has been an Alachua County judge since 1977.
And Reno, after being Dade County's top prosecutor for 15
years, has been the top lawyer in the country since 1993, when President
Bill Clinton named her the first woman Attorney General.
This trio represents how far female attorneys have come in the past
50 years in Florida, a state that now proudly claims two women justices
on the Supreme Court, Justice Barbara Pariente and Justice Peggy Quince;
the second woman president of The Florida Bar, Edith Osman, following
Patricia Seitz in 1993; president-elect of the American Bar Association,
Martha Barnett; and Evett Simmons, president-elect of the National Bar
Association.
As The Florida Bar celebrates its 50th anniversary, it is fitting
to recognize that Florida's women lawyers have come a long way,
especially in the past two decades.
But Rosemary Barkett, who became Florida's first female
Supreme Court justice in 1985 and is now a judge of the U.S. 11th
Circuit Court of Appeals, reminds us that the struggle for equality is
not yet over.
"I am certainly happy with the progress that has been made.
And it's really a thrill to see two women on the Florida Supreme
Court. But I do believe that we do not yet have the kind of equality
that demonstrates that women and minorities are considered totally equal
in terms of opportunities and consideration for positions of
power," Judge Barkett said.
What will it take to change that?
"Continual, unflagging efforts and education so that people
recognize that meritocracy is a good and healthy thing," answers
Judge Barkett, adding that women and minorities must have opportunities
for the necessary training and education to be able to compete in a
society that looks first at abilities, not gender or race.
When Louise Rebecca Pinnell courageously pushed to become
Florida's first woman lawyer more than a century ago, this daughter
of a judge had to wait five months while the Florida Supreme Court
wrestled with the bizarre notion of approving a woman lawyer in 1898. At
the turn of the century, there were only 1,000 women lawyers nationwide.
Early in the 20th century, women could not serve as jurors, vote, or own
property. Now, women make up half of students entering law school and
27.4 percent (16,588) of the Bar's 60.335 members in good standing.
"These numbers could not have been accomplished without the
trailblazing women who came assault and battery lawyer before us," said Wendy Loquasto, who is
writing a book about Florida's first 150 women lawyers, as part of
a joint project by the Florida Association for Women Lawyers and The
Florida Bar to celebrate the state's pioneering women lawyers and
the 50th anniversary of the Bar, at a gala ceremony to be held at the
Sheraton Bal Harbour Resort in Miami on May 25 (see March 1 News).
"It is important to recognize these women, because they risked
public disapproval so their daughters might reap the benefits arising
from their personal sacrifices," Loquasto said. "Their
challenge to us, as women lawyers today, is to continue their struggle
to end gender bias in the legal profession and to shatter Bar statistics
which show that women are under-represented as managing partners and
tenured professors and over-represented in low-paying jobs."
As a recent study sponsored by the American Bar Foundation confirmed: Women remain under-represented in private practice,
over-represented in the public sector, and under-represented as partners
in law firms.
Significant Progress
When Seitz, now a judge of the Southern District of Florida, became
the Bar's first woman president in 1993, that was the one thing she
did not like talking about.
"I look forward to the day when that won't be the
question, and I hope others can look beyond form to substance," she
said at the time.
Has that day come?
"While the day has not yet arrived, we are making significant
progress," Judge Seitz said, taking a break from presiding over a
federal trial, seven years after her Bar presidency.
"The most encouraging signs to me include the fact that I see
more than just one woman on the United States Supreme Court, the Florida
Supreme Court, in cases appearing before me, among the house counsel.
One of the best indicators of our progress is the fact that we have our
second president of The Florida Bar who also happens to be a woman, and
in the recent presidential campaign, Marsha Rydberg was a candidate. I
was particularly pleased that Edith Osman could be elected by
acclamation and not have to run a contested race."
That Osman was elected president of the Bar without opposition was
another important first for Florida's women lawyers.
"In the time I was contemplating running for president, people
were telling me: `Strap on your boots. You'll never run
unopposed,'" Osman recalls.
To her relief as a sole practitioner and testament to her strong
support in the Bar, that wasn't necessary.
"I worked hard, I played hard and I did it with the
guys," Osman said of building relationships and respect in the
mainstream Bar, after serving as president of the Dade County and
statewide FAWL. And when she sat on the Board of Governors as FAWL
president, she said, the men learned: "I wasn't a one-issue
president just talking about women's rights. I frequently spoke
from the FAWL perspective, but I found a way of recruiting my audience,
not alienating them.
"A strong motivating factor for running, aside from personal
gratification, was that I thought we needed to have another woman
president of The Florida Bar. It had been six years between Pat and
me."
She didn't want a woman president to be seen as tokenism or an
aberration, but part of the fabric of the Bar.
"Women needed to be considered capable of running, winning,
and doing a good job," Osman said. And she hopes there will be
plenty of women presidents to follow in the future.
Judge Seitz shares this story about Bar members' attitudes
toward the first woman president.
"My husband, Alan Greer, recounts this anecdote regarding
several board members' expectations as to whether a woman could
deliver the disciplinary reprimands that the Bar president is required
to do. Alan says that after my first board session delivering
reprimands, three different board members came up to him and in their
amazement remarked, `She was a combination of Ray Ferrero and Rut Liles,' (two Florida Bar presidents and former U.S. Marines,
distinguished, among many other things, by their 6-foot-plus stature and
commanding presence). The third male board member said, `She scared me
more than my third-grade teacher.'
"And Alan's response was: `You know her dad is a retired
three-star general.'"
Diversity in the Profession
Shortly after being sworn in last year as president-elect of the
ABA, Barnett said she is considering a conference on the advancement of
women in the profession. Not only is diversity the right thing to do,
she said, it is the smart thing to do in improving the quality of legal
services.
"I believe there is an ongoing need to work on diversity in
the profession," Barnett said. "When you put a woman at the
table, or an African-American, or a Hispanic, the conversation changes.
You are seeing a problem through different eyes. And when you take that
perspective and integrate it into your practice, it rachets you up and
raises the bar in terms of the quality of service you're able to
provide."
Many years after Barnett was hired as the first woman at Holland
& Knight in 1973--fresh out of college and pregnant--she took a peek
in her personnel file. She found that a senior member of the firm had
written on the back of an evaluation form: "Well, if we have to
hire a woman, I litigation lawyer guess she's as good as any."
Now, she's in a position to help bring more women into the
circle of power.
Osman shares this observation from the ABA meeting in February:
Barnett had invited a select group of attorneys to her suite to share
ideas on the future of the profession.
"I looked around the room and out of 33 people, 17 were women
and 16 were men," Osman recounts. "The more women in
leadership, the more things will change. Martha put her money where her
mouth is."
The next morning brought this stark contrast: At the Florida caucus of the ABA, Osman found herself the only woman in the room.
"I looked around and said to Chesterfield Smith: `What's
going on? Where are the women?'"
175 Lady Lawyers
A glimpse of how far women have come in the legal profession is
revealed in an announcement in the October 1963 Florida Bar Journal
inviting lawyers, with the clear presumption they would all be men, to
attend the midyear meeting. "Your wife will be delighted to come
along to do her Christmas shopping in Jacksonville's fine
stores," proclaims the invitation, graced by a pony-tailed woman
clasping her hands in joy.
The truth is, there really weren't many women lawyers in
Florida at that time. In 1966, noted The Florida Bar, "there are
175 lady lawyers," and 101 of them lived along the Gold Coast be
tween West Palm Beach and Miami, and 75 were in Dade County alone.
In a 1973 letter responding to questions from the California
Legislature, FAWL President Claire Cates wrote: "I notice that the
majority of women that I deal with are either in firms in which their
spouses are employed, or are practicing with other women.... As a
practical matter, I do not believe that women are obtaining the same
opportunities as men to practice; there is still a great deal of
prejudice in the employment areas. It is still extremely difficult for a
woman attorney to obtain a job; however, it seems as though when she is
in the practice she does not experience much greater difficulties than a
man would."
By 1975, there were 684 women out of a total of 20,247 lawyers in
Florida (3.3 percent).
Five years later, in 1980, that number would more than triple to
2,117 women out of 28,730 lawyers (7.3 percent).
In 1976, The Florida Bar Journal sent questionnaires to all women
members of the Bar for an article titled, "Women Lawyers--Equal in
the Law?" Of 620 women members, 224 responded. Of those responding,
53 percent felt discrimination while in law school; 67 percent felt
discriminated against while seeking employment; and 61 percent felt
discrimination in their day-to day law practice.
As one woman lawyer said in the survey: "In almost every
interview I have had, I have been asked if I can type, and/or if I am
practicing law to fill a time gap until I can find a husband."
Another said: "Many law firms state that they already `have a
woman in their firm,' so they don't need another."
Even as late as 1983, when Osman graduated from law school at the
University of Miami, she encountered discrimination. She had two
children, ages 6 and 9, and a husband who was a medical intern.
When interviewing for jobs, more than once, senior partners in law
firms asked: "Why would you want to be a lawyer when your husband
is going to be a doctor? Who's going to take care of your
children?"
And in 1987, when she wore a fur coat at an ABA meeting in
Philadelphia, a lawyer remarked: "Good thing you have a doctor for
a husband." And Osman thought in dismay to herself: If they think
you need a man to buy you a fur coat, how are they going to think of you
as an equal?
Attitudes in the mid-1980s had not progressed much since 1949, when
Lynne Douglas Hixon Holley graduated from law school at UF. Hixon
Holley, the only woman listed when the Bar printed its congratulatory
tribute to 50-year members last year, began her love of the law as a
young girl who, after a hot day in school, would cool off in the balcony
of the Alachua County Courthouse and watch her uncles argue cases.
She, shall never forget arguing her own first case in St.
Petersburg, when the circuit judge summoned her to his chambers.
"I just want to ask you a question: Why do you think you are
different from other women?" he asked her.
Hixon Holley, who went on to be the first female lawyer in Florida
to exercise countywide jurisdiction as a judge in Collier County,
recalls answering: "Sir, I never thought of myself as different
from other women. Seems to me a very natural thing to be a lawyer. I
grew up around lawyers. You know, you don't have to have a lot of
physical strength to be a lawyer. Women are known to have a lot of
stamina. To me, there's a lot of nurturing required in the field of
law. You're taking care of people's problems and solving
disputes. Every mother can tell you, you need to be a strong mediator.
It's just strange to me that people think of the law as a
man's field."
With that, Hixon Holley said, the inquiring judge quickly switched
the subject to fishing in Naples.
Florida Association of Women Lawyers
Even though their numbers were few, 27 of Florida's 75 women
lawyers organized into FAWL in 1951 (at that time called Florida
Association of Women Lawyers).
Ninety-year-old Mattie Belle Davis, who served as president of FAWL
in 1957-58, started out as a secretary in a law firm in 1926, and
studied law under Troy Davis, her mentor who became her husband. She
passed the bar exam in 1936, making her one of Florida's first 150
women lawyers, and went on to be appointed Dade County traffic court
judge in 1959.
She has seen a lot of changes in her time as a woman lawyer, back
when waiters refused to serve her when the mostly male Dade County Bar
Association met.
"We've been a part of The Florida Bar, and FAWL has
enhanced the visibility of women lawyers," Davis said, noting that
in 1980 FAWL organized local chapters to be part of the state
organization, and there are currently 18 chapters.
"They've learned to work together as members of this
organization, and, as such, we've had support from The Florida Bar.
Women have been given opportunities to serve on the committees, and we
have our second woman president of The Florida Bar."
The first FAWL president to pull up a chair at the Board of
Governors meetings was Debra Weiss Goodstone of Miami, who served in
1981-82.
She laughs now about her gradual progress to be accepted as a woman
lawyer in a man's world, symbolized by where she literally sat at
Board of Governors meetings. First, her chair was against the wall well
away from the table, then a few feet from the table, then a few inches
from the table, to finally actually sitting at the table, then sitting
at the table with her own materials to read.
"I started attending the meetings as if I were a member of the
Board of Governors," Weiss Goodstone recalls.
"I think they were all thinking, `Who is this feminist woman
activist and what is she doing here?' And then, one day, I got a
phone call from a prominent woman lawyer with (1982 Bar president) Jim
Rinaman on the phone, and I think he wasn't sure if we'd come
in and burn our bras and bang down the door!"
She is quick to add that she and Rinaman "have come full
circle" and are friends who respect each other as colleagues.
"As I became very active with the Board of Governors, Jim
began to accept me. I'm a good drinker, had a good time, and they
saw I wasn't going to burn down their institution or my bra."
With that growing acceptance of women in the law came more
willingness to appoint women to chair Bar committees, Weiss Goodstone
said.
And FAWL, she said, was transformed from its early beginnings as
"four women standing around a bowl of potato chips" to a force
to be reckoned with.
But the struggle is not yet over, she agrees.
"We've come a long way, baby, but not far enough. I could
listen to one of my male partners proudly cancel a deposition because he
had to take a son to the doctor. People would turn and say, `Wow! What a
good father!' But for a woman to say it, they're not a good
mother, they're a bad lawyer."
Dade County Circuit Judge Sandy Karlan, who served as president of
the Dade chapter of FAWL in 1984-85 and went on to serve on the Board of
Governors from 1988-92, gives FAWL a lot of credit for improving
women's status in the legal profession.
"FAWL has been extremely significant in promoting change and
raising awareness (about gender equality)," Karlan said. "But
I don't think it's all fixed. There are still areas with
discrepancies in salaries for women. And women lawyers are not
represented in significant percentages in some communities."
But just being part of women's groups isn't enough, Osman
adds.
"I have given many speeches where I said, `You can't be a
member of FAWL and think you are doing your part for women. You have to
be a part of the mainstream Bar. You need to show you're a player
and you can perform there. You have to lead by example.' Why is it
important for women that I'm president of The Florida Bar? It shows
that it is accessible."
And yet, when Osman looks around the table at the Board of
Governors meetings, she can't help but feel disappointed at what
she sees: five women, no women in this freshman class or the next
freshman class. And When Carol Brewer leaves the board, it will be down
to four women.
What will it take to change that lopsided picture?
"It will take women becoming more active," Osman says.
"I think there's been a fallout in younger groups. I think
they do need to be mentored and encouraged. We have to keep working on
it. We have to do some outreach. Men and women have to identify women
and minorities with talent and take them under their wing. Groom them.
And if they have the desire, encourage them to run for things."
Unequal Treatment
Talk to a woman lawyer who has been around a couple of decades, and
most have stories to tell of being treated unequally in a man's
profession.
When Judge Crenshaw was in law school at UF the late 1960s, she was
"shuffled" by male students' feet on the floor when she
went into the library, as were the women who came before her for
decades.
"There was an attitude by some people that women
shouldn't be there," Crenshaw said.
"I had one professor in a seminar who told me I shouldn't
be taking a seat away from a man who had a family to raise. I was in a
state of shock. I waited to see if I would get the grade I had earned,
and I did."
And in accident lawyer the early 1970s, Crenshaw will never forget the time the
late Clara Gehan, considered the "First Lady of the Law" in
Gainesville, raised a ruckus when the local bar association went on its
annual dinner to Cedar Key and made it clear the women members were not
invited. But the women paid their dues too, Gehan insisted. Finally, the
male members of the Alachua County Bar Association begrudgingly caved in
with a compromise: The women lawyers--there were only five of
them--could have their own annual bar dinner.
So, as Crenshaw gleefully recounts, they chose the most expensive
steakhouse in town, and from appetizers to desserts, "ordered
everything we possibly thought we might want to taste, including a
couple of bottles of the finest wine."
The check was expensive--more for five women than all of the
men's dinner total tab.
"That ended `We can't go to Cedar Key,'"
Crenshaw says with a laugh.
Hitting the men in the wallet made all the difference, and the
women were invited to join the men in Cedar Key from that point on.
Crenshaw, too, believes changing attitudes about women in the law
is an ongoing process that still isn't complete.
"I think in terms of the system, we have achieved everything
that we could have wanted to achieve. I don't think that being a
woman is a disadvantage anymore. But I think we still have attitudes
from some individuals we need to change. Unfortunately, sometimes it
comes from members of the Bar."
On continuing efforts to include women in positions of power in the
legal field, Judge Seitz spells out three ingredients for positive
change:
"First, there need to be leaders and those in positions of
power who are inclusive, who reach out and select and promote women into
positions of power, and not just out of mere tokenism, but because of
what those individuals can add to the success of the group," Judge
Seitz says.
The second ingredient, she continues, is "women who have
`succeeded' and who actively mentor younger women with the goal of
ensuring that those who follow them are even more successful than
they."
The third ingredient is "young women who are proactive in
seeking mentors and taking risks, willing to take themselves out of
their `comfort zone' and taking the initiative to prepare
themselves by acquiring the necessary experience and qualifications to
assume new responsibilities and perform them well.
"If the efforts I have seen by all three of these ingredients
continue," Judge Seitz said, "we will achieve our goal of
evaluating individuals on their `substance and not form.'"
Jan Pudlow is an associate editor with The Florida Bar News.
to interviews at Florida's law firms slammed shut. One law firm
partner told her bluntly: "We see no value in hiring a woman."
Finally, the state Attorney General's office offered her a job, but
only if she'd agree to do the typing for a half dozen male
coworkers too.
"I told them I'd rather clean houses," Wentworth
recalls. "I wouldn't mind doing typing, but I didn't want
to do it for the whole damn crew!"
Sixteen years later, even after Title VII of the Civil Rights Act
of 1964, when Jeanne Crenshaw graduated from the University of Florida law school in 1967, law firms still tacked announcements of interview
times on the bulletin board that included the loud-and-clear message:
"No women." Rather than battling the good ol' boy system,
she and her husband hung out their shingle with a third partner instead.
And when Harvard Law School graduate Janet Reno tried to get a job
at one of Miami's biggest law firms in 1963, she was turned down
because she was a woman. Fourteen years later, that same firm would see
fit to make her a partner.
Wentworth, now retired, served as judge of the First District Court
of Appeal from 1979 to 1991.
Crenshaw has been an Alachua County judge since 1977.
And Reno, after being Dade County's top prosecutor for 15
years, has been the top lawyer in the country since 1993, when President
Bill Clinton named her the first woman Attorney General.
This trio represents how far female attorneys have come in the past
50 years in Florida, a state that now proudly claims two women justices
on the Supreme Court, Justice Barbara Pariente and Justice Peggy Quince;
the second woman president of The Florida Bar, Edith Osman, following
Patricia Seitz in 1993; president-elect of the American Bar Association,
Martha Barnett; and Evett Simmons, president-elect of the National Bar
Association.
As The Florida Bar celebrates its 50th anniversary, it is fitting
to recognize that Florida's women lawyers have come a long way,
especially in the past two decades.
But Rosemary Barkett, who became Florida's first female
Supreme Court justice in 1985 and is now a judge of the U.S. 11th
Circuit Court of Appeals, reminds us that the struggle for equality is
not yet over.
"I am certainly happy with the progress that has been made.
And it's really a thrill to see two women on the Florida Supreme
Court. But I do believe that we do not yet have the kind of equality
that demonstrates that women and minorities are considered totally equal
in terms of opportunities and consideration for positions of
power," Judge Barkett said.
What will it take to change that?
"Continual, unflagging efforts and education so that people
recognize that meritocracy is a good and healthy thing," answers
Judge Barkett, adding that women and minorities must have opportunities
for the necessary training and education to be able to compete in a
society that looks first at abilities, not gender or race.
When Louise Rebecca Pinnell courageously pushed to become
Florida's first woman lawyer more than a century ago, this daughter
of a judge had to wait five months while the Florida Supreme Court
wrestled with the bizarre notion of approving a woman lawyer in 1898. At
the turn of the century, there were only 1,000 women lawyers nationwide.
Early in the 20th century, women could not serve as jurors, vote, or own
property. Now, women make up half of students entering law school and
27.4 percent (16,588) of the Bar's 60.335 members in good standing.
"These numbers could not have been accomplished without the
trailblazing women who came assault and battery lawyer before us," said Wendy Loquasto, who is
writing a book about Florida's first 150 women lawyers, as part of
a joint project by the Florida Association for Women Lawyers and The
Florida Bar to celebrate the state's pioneering women lawyers and
the 50th anniversary of the Bar, at a gala ceremony to be held at the
Sheraton Bal Harbour Resort in Miami on May 25 (see March 1 News).
"It is important to recognize these women, because they risked
public disapproval so their daughters might reap the benefits arising
from their personal sacrifices," Loquasto said. "Their
challenge to us, as women lawyers today, is to continue their struggle
to end gender bias in the legal profession and to shatter Bar statistics
which show that women are under-represented as managing partners and
tenured professors and over-represented in low-paying jobs."
As a recent study sponsored by the American Bar Foundation confirmed: Women remain under-represented in private practice,
over-represented in the public sector, and under-represented as partners
in law firms.
Significant Progress
When Seitz, now a judge of the Southern District of Florida, became
the Bar's first woman president in 1993, that was the one thing she
did not like talking about.
"I look forward to the day when that won't be the
question, and I hope others can look beyond form to substance," she
said at the time.
Has that day come?
"While the day has not yet arrived, we are making significant
progress," Judge Seitz said, taking a break from presiding over a
federal trial, seven years after her Bar presidency.
"The most encouraging signs to me include the fact that I see
more than just one woman on the United States Supreme Court, the Florida
Supreme Court, in cases appearing before me, among the house counsel.
One of the best indicators of our progress is the fact that we have our
second president of The Florida Bar who also happens to be a woman, and
in the recent presidential campaign, Marsha Rydberg was a candidate. I
was particularly pleased that Edith Osman could be elected by
acclamation and not have to run a contested race."
That Osman was elected president of the Bar without opposition was
another important first for Florida's women lawyers.
"In the time I was contemplating running for president, people
were telling me: `Strap on your boots. You'll never run
unopposed,'" Osman recalls.
To her relief as a sole practitioner and testament to her strong
support in the Bar, that wasn't necessary.
"I worked hard, I played hard and I did it with the
guys," Osman said of building relationships and respect in the
mainstream Bar, after serving as president of the Dade County and
statewide FAWL. And when she sat on the Board of Governors as FAWL
president, she said, the men learned: "I wasn't a one-issue
president just talking about women's rights. I frequently spoke
from the FAWL perspective, but I found a way of recruiting my audience,
not alienating them.
"A strong motivating factor for running, aside from personal
gratification, was that I thought we needed to have another woman
president of The Florida Bar. It had been six years between Pat and
me."
She didn't want a woman president to be seen as tokenism or an
aberration, but part of the fabric of the Bar.
"Women needed to be considered capable of running, winning,
and doing a good job," Osman said. And she hopes there will be
plenty of women presidents to follow in the future.
Judge Seitz shares this story about Bar members' attitudes
toward the first woman president.
"My husband, Alan Greer, recounts this anecdote regarding
several board members' expectations as to whether a woman could
deliver the disciplinary reprimands that the Bar president is required
to do. Alan says that after my first board session delivering
reprimands, three different board members came up to him and in their
amazement remarked, `She was a combination of Ray Ferrero and Rut Liles,' (two Florida Bar presidents and former U.S. Marines,
distinguished, among many other things, by their 6-foot-plus stature and
commanding presence). The third male board member said, `She scared me
more than my third-grade teacher.'
"And Alan's response was: `You know her dad is a retired
three-star general.'"
Diversity in the Profession
Shortly after being sworn in last year as president-elect of the
ABA, Barnett said she is considering a conference on the advancement of
women in the profession. Not only is diversity the right thing to do,
she said, it is the smart thing to do in improving the quality of legal
services.
"I believe there is an ongoing need to work on diversity in
the profession," Barnett said. "When you put a woman at the
table, or an African-American, or a Hispanic, the conversation changes.
You are seeing a problem through different eyes. And when you take that
perspective and integrate it into your practice, it rachets you up and
raises the bar in terms of the quality of service you're able to
provide."
Many years after Barnett was hired as the first woman at Holland
& Knight in 1973--fresh out of college and pregnant--she took a peek
in her personnel file. She found that a senior member of the firm had
written on the back of an evaluation form: "Well, if we have to
hire a woman, I litigation lawyer guess she's as good as any."
Now, she's in a position to help bring more women into the
circle of power.
Osman shares this observation from the ABA meeting in February:
Barnett had invited a select group of attorneys to her suite to share
ideas on the future of the profession.
"I looked around the room and out of 33 people, 17 were women
and 16 were men," Osman recounts. "The more women in
leadership, the more things will change. Martha put her money where her
mouth is."
The next morning brought this stark contrast: At the Florida caucus of the ABA, Osman found herself the only woman in the room.
"I looked around and said to Chesterfield Smith: `What's
going on? Where are the women?'"
175 Lady Lawyers
A glimpse of how far women have come in the legal profession is
revealed in an announcement in the October 1963 Florida Bar Journal
inviting lawyers, with the clear presumption they would all be men, to
attend the midyear meeting. "Your wife will be delighted to come
along to do her Christmas shopping in Jacksonville's fine
stores," proclaims the invitation, graced by a pony-tailed woman
clasping her hands in joy.
The truth is, there really weren't many women lawyers in
Florida at that time. In 1966, noted The Florida Bar, "there are
175 lady lawyers," and 101 of them lived along the Gold Coast be
tween West Palm Beach and Miami, and 75 were in Dade County alone.
In a 1973 letter responding to questions from the California
Legislature, FAWL President Claire Cates wrote: "I notice that the
majority of women that I deal with are either in firms in which their
spouses are employed, or are practicing with other women.... As a
practical matter, I do not believe that women are obtaining the same
opportunities as men to practice; there is still a great deal of
prejudice in the employment areas. It is still extremely difficult for a
woman attorney to obtain a job; however, it seems as though when she is
in the practice she does not experience much greater difficulties than a
man would."
By 1975, there were 684 women out of a total of 20,247 lawyers in
Florida (3.3 percent).
Five years later, in 1980, that number would more than triple to
2,117 women out of 28,730 lawyers (7.3 percent).
In 1976, The Florida Bar Journal sent questionnaires to all women
members of the Bar for an article titled, "Women Lawyers--Equal in
the Law?" Of 620 women members, 224 responded. Of those responding,
53 percent felt discrimination while in law school; 67 percent felt
discriminated against while seeking employment; and 61 percent felt
discrimination in their day-to day law practice.
As one woman lawyer said in the survey: "In almost every
interview I have had, I have been asked if I can type, and/or if I am
practicing law to fill a time gap until I can find a husband."
Another said: "Many law firms state that they already `have a
woman in their firm,' so they don't need another."
Even as late as 1983, when Osman graduated from law school at the
University of Miami, she encountered discrimination. She had two
children, ages 6 and 9, and a husband who was a medical intern.
When interviewing for jobs, more than once, senior partners in law
firms asked: "Why would you want to be a lawyer when your husband
is going to be a doctor? Who's going to take care of your
children?"
And in 1987, when she wore a fur coat at an ABA meeting in
Philadelphia, a lawyer remarked: "Good thing you have a doctor for
a husband." And Osman thought in dismay to herself: If they think
you need a man to buy you a fur coat, how are they going to think of you
as an equal?
Attitudes in the mid-1980s had not progressed much since 1949, when
Lynne Douglas Hixon Holley graduated from law school at UF. Hixon
Holley, the only woman listed when the Bar printed its congratulatory
tribute to 50-year members last year, began her love of the law as a
young girl who, after a hot day in school, would cool off in the balcony
of the Alachua County Courthouse and watch her uncles argue cases.
She, shall never forget arguing her own first case in St.
Petersburg, when the circuit judge summoned her to his chambers.
"I just want to ask you a question: Why do you think you are
different from other women?" he asked her.
Hixon Holley, who went on to be the first female lawyer in Florida
to exercise countywide jurisdiction as a judge in Collier County,
recalls answering: "Sir, I never thought of myself as different
from other women. Seems to me a very natural thing to be a lawyer. I
grew up around lawyers. You know, you don't have to have a lot of
physical strength to be a lawyer. Women are known to have a lot of
stamina. To me, there's a lot of nurturing required in the field of
law. You're taking care of people's problems and solving
disputes. Every mother can tell you, you need to be a strong mediator.
It's just strange to me that people think of the law as a
man's field."
With that, Hixon Holley said, the inquiring judge quickly switched
the subject to fishing in Naples.
Florida Association of Women Lawyers
Even though their numbers were few, 27 of Florida's 75 women
lawyers organized into FAWL in 1951 (at that time called Florida
Association of Women Lawyers).
Ninety-year-old Mattie Belle Davis, who served as president of FAWL
in 1957-58, started out as a secretary in a law firm in 1926, and
studied law under Troy Davis, her mentor who became her husband. She
passed the bar exam in 1936, making her one of Florida's first 150
women lawyers, and went on to be appointed Dade County traffic court
judge in 1959.
She has seen a lot of changes in her time as a woman lawyer, back
when waiters refused to serve her when the mostly male Dade County Bar
Association met.
"We've been a part of The Florida Bar, and FAWL has
enhanced the visibility of women lawyers," Davis said, noting that
in 1980 FAWL organized local chapters to be part of the state
organization, and there are currently 18 chapters.
"They've learned to work together as members of this
organization, and, as such, we've had support from The Florida Bar.
Women have been given opportunities to serve on the committees, and we
have our second woman president of The Florida Bar."
The first FAWL president to pull up a chair at the Board of
Governors meetings was Debra Weiss Goodstone of Miami, who served in
1981-82.
She laughs now about her gradual progress to be accepted as a woman
lawyer in a man's world, symbolized by where she literally sat at
Board of Governors meetings. First, her chair was against the wall well
away from the table, then a few feet from the table, then a few inches
from the table, to finally actually sitting at the table, then sitting
at the table with her own materials to read.
"I started attending the meetings as if I were a member of the
Board of Governors," Weiss Goodstone recalls.
"I think they were all thinking, `Who is this feminist woman
activist and what is she doing here?' And then, one day, I got a
phone call from a prominent woman lawyer with (1982 Bar president) Jim
Rinaman on the phone, and I think he wasn't sure if we'd come
in and burn our bras and bang down the door!"
She is quick to add that she and Rinaman "have come full
circle" and are friends who respect each other as colleagues.
"As I became very active with the Board of Governors, Jim
began to accept me. I'm a good drinker, had a good time, and they
saw I wasn't going to burn down their institution or my bra."
With that growing acceptance of women in the law came more
willingness to appoint women to chair Bar committees, Weiss Goodstone
said.
And FAWL, she said, was transformed from its early beginnings as
"four women standing around a bowl of potato chips" to a force
to be reckoned with.
But the struggle is not yet over, she agrees.
"We've come a long way, baby, but not far enough. I could
listen to one of my male partners proudly cancel a deposition because he
had to take a son to the doctor. People would turn and say, `Wow! What a
good father!' But for a woman to say it, they're not a good
mother, they're a bad lawyer."
Dade County Circuit Judge Sandy Karlan, who served as president of
the Dade chapter of FAWL in 1984-85 and went on to serve on the Board of
Governors from 1988-92, gives FAWL a lot of credit for improving
women's status in the legal profession.
"FAWL has been extremely significant in promoting change and
raising awareness (about gender equality)," Karlan said. "But
I don't think it's all fixed. There are still areas with
discrepancies in salaries for women. And women lawyers are not
represented in significant percentages in some communities."
But just being part of women's groups isn't enough, Osman
adds.
"I have given many speeches where I said, `You can't be a
member of FAWL and think you are doing your part for women. You have to
be a part of the mainstream Bar. You need to show you're a player
and you can perform there. You have to lead by example.' Why is it
important for women that I'm president of The Florida Bar? It shows
that it is accessible."
And yet, when Osman looks around the table at the Board of
Governors meetings, she can't help but feel disappointed at what
she sees: five women, no women in this freshman class or the next
freshman class. And When Carol Brewer leaves the board, it will be down
to four women.
What will it take to change that lopsided picture?
"It will take women becoming more active," Osman says.
"I think there's been a fallout in younger groups. I think
they do need to be mentored and encouraged. We have to keep working on
it. We have to do some outreach. Men and women have to identify women
and minorities with talent and take them under their wing. Groom them.
And if they have the desire, encourage them to run for things."
Unequal Treatment
Talk to a woman lawyer who has been around a couple of decades, and
most have stories to tell of being treated unequally in a man's
profession.
When Judge Crenshaw was in law school at UF the late 1960s, she was
"shuffled" by male students' feet on the floor when she
went into the library, as were the women who came before her for
decades.
"There was an attitude by some people that women
shouldn't be there," Crenshaw said.
"I had one professor in a seminar who told me I shouldn't
be taking a seat away from a man who had a family to raise. I was in a
state of shock. I waited to see if I would get the grade I had earned,
and I did."
And in accident lawyer the early 1970s, Crenshaw will never forget the time the
late Clara Gehan, considered the "First Lady of the Law" in
Gainesville, raised a ruckus when the local bar association went on its
annual dinner to Cedar Key and made it clear the women members were not
invited. But the women paid their dues too, Gehan insisted. Finally, the
male members of the Alachua County Bar Association begrudgingly caved in
with a compromise: The women lawyers--there were only five of
them--could have their own annual bar dinner.
So, as Crenshaw gleefully recounts, they chose the most expensive
steakhouse in town, and from appetizers to desserts, "ordered
everything we possibly thought we might want to taste, including a
couple of bottles of the finest wine."
The check was expensive--more for five women than all of the
men's dinner total tab.
"That ended `We can't go to Cedar Key,'"
Crenshaw says with a laugh.
Hitting the men in the wallet made all the difference, and the
women were invited to join the men in Cedar Key from that point on.
Crenshaw, too, believes changing attitudes about women in the law
is an ongoing process that still isn't complete.
"I think in terms of the system, we have achieved everything
that we could have wanted to achieve. I don't think that being a
woman is a disadvantage anymore. But I think we still have attitudes
from some individuals we need to change. Unfortunately, sometimes it
comes from members of the Bar."
On continuing efforts to include women in positions of power in the
legal field, Judge Seitz spells out three ingredients for positive
change:
"First, there need to be leaders and those in positions of
power who are inclusive, who reach out and select and promote women into
positions of power, and not just out of mere tokenism, but because of
what those individuals can add to the success of the group," Judge
Seitz says.
The second ingredient, she continues, is "women who have
`succeeded' and who actively mentor younger women with the goal of
ensuring that those who follow them are even more successful than
they."
The third ingredient is "young women who are proactive in
seeking mentors and taking risks, willing to take themselves out of
their `comfort zone' and taking the initiative to prepare
themselves by acquiring the necessary experience and qualifications to
assume new responsibilities and perform them well.
"If the efforts I have seen by all three of these ingredients
continue," Judge Seitz said, "we will achieve our goal of
evaluating individuals on their `substance and not form.'"
Jan Pudlow is an associate editor with The Florida Bar News.