 2005 Margaret Brent Honorees |
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The American Bar Association Commission on Women in the Profession has chosen six women lawyers to receive its 2005 Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement Award. The award ceremony luncheon will take place in Chicago on Sunday, August 7, 2005 during the ABA Annual Meeting. SPECIAL AWARD HONOREE 2005 HONOREES Loretta Collins Argrett of Washington, D.C. was the first African American to serve as Assistant Attorney General in the Tax Division of the United States Department of Justice, and is the first African American woman in the history of the Justice Department to hold a position that requires Senate confirmation. She grew up in the segregated south of the late 1940s and early 1950s. In 1954, the year the of the U.S. Supreme Court decision on Brown vs. Board of Education, she was inspired to attend Howard University, and later attended Harvard Law School. Upon receiving her JD, she chose tax law as her area of specialty at a time when few women and almost no African Americans specialized in that area. She also is a former Howard University Law professor and currently serves as a mediator and ethics consultant. Mary Cranston of San Francisco is chair of Pillsbury Winthrop, the first woman to lead an AM LAW 100 law firm. Prior to taking the lead in her firm, Cranston led initiatives in San Francisco law firms in the late 1970s and early 1980s to promote gender friendly policies such as maternity leave and part-time schedules. Her responsibilities as head of Pillsbury have not curtailed her efforts to mentor and promote women into the ranks of partnership. As Margaret Gill, a former colleague and partner stated, Cranston "helped create within the firm an environment friendly to women which resulted in the firm having a much larger percentage of women lawyers than other law firms, large and small, throughout the nation." The National Law Journal named Cranston one of the 100 most influential lawyers in the United States. Carolyn Dineen King of Houston is the first woman appointed to the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, the first woman to serve as its chief judge, and the first woman to chair the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. A beneficiary of the Civil Rights Act, King was hired in 1962 at a large law firm as the first women to be paid the same salary as the men starting at the firm. She courageously quit her job in protest after being passed up twice for partner, setting an example and forcing the firm to offer equal opportunities for women. Since her appointment to the bench, she has ensured that more than half of her law clerks are women, and her influence on the appointment of women judges is significant. Chief Judge Mary Schroeder, a former Brent Award recipient, describes Judge King as "the mentors' mentor." Judith L. Lichtman of Washington, D.C. is immediate past president and senior advisor to the National Partnership for Women and Families in Washington, D.C. Having led the National Partnership for Women and Families for 30 years, she influenced the legal community by litigating cases and lobbying for legislation such as the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, the Civil Rights Act of 1991, and the Family and Medical Leave Act, which insiders on Capitol Hill refer to as the "Judy Lichtman Act." She was the first woman "Washington Power Broker" on equal par with the men-so much so that Ted Kennedy nicknamed her "the 101st Senator." Lichtman fought to open to women lawyers the influential posts traditionally reserved for men, and created institutions such as the Women's Law and Public Policy Fellowship Program and EMILY's List to give women lawyers a voice in the profession. Mary Ann McMorrow of Chicago is chief justice of the Illinois Supreme Court, the first woman to head any branch of government in that state. She was the first woman to prosecute major criminal cases while a Cook County Assistant States’ Attorney, and was elected to the Cook County Circuit Court in 1976. In 1986, she was elected to the Illinois Appellate Court where she became the first woman to chair its Executive Committee. She topped an already impressive career by running for the Illinois Supreme Court and, in 1992, became the first woman to become elected to that court. In September 2002, she was elected chief justice. Former Margaret Brent winner Laurel Bellows says of McMorrow, “She brings to the court a perspective that is colored by her experience as a mother, as a wife, and as a woman who worked her way through the ranks since her admission to the practice of law in 1953.” The ABA Women Lawyers of Achievement Award, established in 1991, honors outstanding women lawyers who have achieved professional excellence in their area of specialty and have actively paved the way to success for others. The award is named for the first woman lawyer in America, Margaret Brent. She arrived in the colonies in 1638, and was involved in 124 court cases over the course of eight years, winning every case. In 1648 she formally demanded a vote and voice in the Maryland Assembly, which the governor denied. Previous winners range from small-firm practitioners in Alabama and Alaska to U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Winners are selected on the basis of their professional accomplishments and their role in opening doors for other women lawyers. Diane Yu, chair of the ABA Commission on Women, says of this year's Brent winners, "This is an exceptional, dazzling group of women lawyers who also happen to be gender diversity champions within our profession. The Commission is delighted to honor them for their stellar accomplishments and longstanding contributions to expanding opportunities for women in the legal profession in countless ways." |