Justice O’Connor Cites ‘Barriers’ to Women Lawyers

Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor said Sunday that more women than ever are entering law schools, but that “tenacious social barriers” still keep them from reaching the top levels of the legal profession.

O’Connor spoke to about 200 members of the National Assn. of Women Judges, a group she helped found in 1979.

“The number of female judges remains disproportionately small,” said O’Connor, who was named to the Supreme Court by President Reagan. “Only 4% are women.

“Some of this is due to a late start in the profession, but it is mainly due to tenacious social barriers,” she said. Society still expects that women will do other things than embark on a professional law career, she said.

O’Connor said that society is changing, however, and that women now compose a third, perhaps more than half, of the graduating law school classes.

She traced the history of women in law, and said that until this century, especially the last few years, very few women could aspire to make law their profession.

“Single-minded determination can make changes for women,” she told the audience, which gave her a standing ovation.

“The last all-male bastion to open the doors--the court on which I sit--has an increasing number of talented women who clerk at the court before embarking on their careers,” she said.

“I believe the court is a microcosm of the world at large,” she said. “If that is true, it is getting better.”