Women on the Federal Bench - A Progress Report


WOMEN ON THE FEDERAL BENCH -
A PROGRESS REPORT

THE HONORABLE MIRIAM GOLDMAN CEDARBA UM*

I am delighted to join the celebration of the tenth anniversary of the
Columbia Journal of Gender and Law of which I have been a satisfied
subscriber since its first issue.

Eight years ago, I gave a speech on the history of women on the
federal bench at a luncheon forum of the New York County Lawyers
Association.l At that time, of the 801 federal district judges in the United
States, only sixty-two were women. Of the 241 federal court of appeals
judges, only twenty were women.

At the dawn of a new millennium eight years later, I am happy to
report that the percentage of Article III federal judges who are women has
grown from less than ten percent to almost fifteen percent, a move in the
right direction. Since 1993, eighty-eight distinguished women have been
appointed to the federal bench. Moreover, Columbia's own Justice Ruth
Bader Ginsburg was appointed Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the
United States in 1993. That appointment increased the percentage of women
on the bench of the highest court of the United States from eleven percent
(one of nine) to twenty-two percent (two of nine).

Until two years ago, Amalya Lyle Kearse was the first and only
woman to serve as a member of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
In 1998, Rosemary S. Pooler and Sonia Sotomayor were added to that court.
An examination of the roster of my own court, the United States District
Court for the Southern District of New York, shows that we now have eight
active and three senior judges who are women, as compared with three active
and two senior judges eight years ago. This improvement is reflected in
many of the courts of the Second Circuit. Of the fifteen district judges of the
Eastern District of New York, five are now women.2 Two women have been
added to the bench of the District of Connecticut, and two women have been
added to the bench of the Court of International Trade. There are still no

* Senior Judge, United States District Court for the Southern District of New

York.

1 Women on the Federal Bench, Address Before the New York County Lawyers

Forum (May 6, 1992), in 73 B.U.L. Rev. 39 (1993).

2 Statistics as of February 2000.



Columbia Journal of Gender and Law

women among the judges of the Northern3 and Western Districts of New
York, and the District of Vermont.

Today, there are approximately 940 federal district judges, both
active and senior. There are only 139 women among them. Of the
approximately 247 court of appeals judges, about thirty-nine are women. Of
the nine judges of the Court of International Trade, three are now women.

Fifty years ago when I entered Columbia Law School, I was one of
eight women in a class of 280. There were no women on the faculty despite
the fact that women had been admitted as students for twenty-three years,
since 1927. There were no women among the Justices of the Supreme Court
of New York County. There were only two women among all the federal
judges of the country, Burnita Matthews and Florence Allen. Just the year
before, President Truman had appointed Judge Matthews to the United States
District Court for the District of Columbia. Now, all that has changed.

It is still too soon, and the sample is still too small, to draw any
statistically significant conclusions about the effect of these changes. But I
had an experience not long ago that I found significant.

Twice a year, each judge of my court conducts a naturalization
ceremony. We usually have about 225 new citizens. For me, it is always a
moving and uplifting occasion. Because of the enormous importance of
American citizenship, it is my usual practice to shake hands with each new
citizen at the conclusion of the ceremony. Some of the people I shake hands
with comment on my speech and on the ceremony. Some say: "God bless
America!" At the end of a very recent naturalization ceremony, I shook
hands with a young woman from India who said to me: "It was especially
thrilling to have a woman preside over my naturalization."

I have said and written 4 that I have not seen evidence that judges
have fundamentally different approaches to the law based on gender
differences. 5 I still adhere to that view. But the remark of the new American
citizen from India highlights the importance of more women on the federal
bench.

3 Between 1994 and 1998, when she was appointed to the Court of Appeals for the
Second Circuit, Judge Pooler was a district judge for the Northern District of New York.

4 See supra note 1.

5 See also Gregory C. Sisk, et al., Charting the Influences on the Judicial Mind:
An Empirical Study of Judicial Reasoning 73 N.Y.U.L. Rev. 1377, 1453-54 (1998).

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