Women in The United States Judiciary - Inappropriate Interactions

Inappropriate Interactions

Many of the task forces found both explicit and implicit unacceptable treatment of female lawyers by male judges. Among the egregious interactions found in this category, a few stand out. First, in 1988, "a senior status federal district court judge refused to address a female attorney as 'Ms.' and threatened to hold her in contempt if she persisted in using her birth name rather than her married name." See Schafran, Gender Bias in the Courts, at 238 (citing Moss, Judge Mrs. the Point, 74 A.B.A. J. 25 (1988).

Examples abound of judges and male opposing counsel calling female lawyers by 'familiar' phrases, such as "honey" and "dear" or even disciplining a female attorney with the statement "I'll tell you what, little girl, you lose." See Schafran, Gender Bias in the Courts, at 263. On the most offensive and outlandish end of this treatment, a shocking number of women reported unwelcome and inappropriate sexual advances and sexually derogatory statements.

However, in addition to these obvious and over the top examples of gender bias and insensitivity, the task forces found a subtler form of discrimination. One way this would manifest itself would be the way judges treat female litigants. For example, the court found that both women and neutral third-party observers discovered that male judges would pay more attention to male attorneys and had less patience for female attorneys—while neither the male attorneys nor the male judges were aware this behavior had been occurring.

The same obliviousness from male judges towards the treatment of their female colleagues exists when it comes to disparaging remarks toward the women judges. "Less than 1% of male judges report hearing disparaging remarks from colleagues about the competence of female judges and less than 2% report hearing disparaging remarks about the competence of minority judges; Among female judges, 7% report hearing disparaging remarks about female judges, and 11% report similar remarks about minority judges." See Carrol Seron, Ph.D. et al., A Report Of The Perceptions And Experiences Of Lawyers, Judges, And Court Employees Concerning Gender, Racial And Ethnic Fairness In The Federal Courts Of The Second Circuit Of The United States, 1997 Ann. Surv. Am. L. 419, 457 (1997).

Overall, in several task force reports, women judges have reported that they receive less respect than male judges from lawyers. These reports are backed up other studies that have found women judges receiving consistently lower ratings than their male counterparts. The Ninth Circuit study found that more than half of female attorneys submitted that "they had heard colleagues question female judges' competency to serve as judges." These task forces have found that traditional attitudes, that may not be directly visible as gender bias in individual cases, when viewed as a whole make a compelling picture of underlying discrimination directed towards women.