Rovner, Ilana Diamond

English

Valparaiso University

Valparaiso University Law Review Volume 28 Number 4 First Women: The Contribution of American Women to the Law pp.1183-1188 First Women: The Contribution of American Women to the Law Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law Ilana Diamond Rovner Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr  Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Ilana Diamond Rovner, Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law, 28 Val. U. L. Rev. 1183 (1994). Available at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2 This Essay is brought to you for free and open access by the Valparaiso University Law School at ValpoScholar. It has been accepted for inclusion in Valparaiso University Law Review by an authorized administrator of ValpoScholar. For more information, please contact a ValpoScholar staff member at scholar@valpo.edu. INFORMAL REFLECTIONS OF AWOMAN IN THE LAWILANA DIAMOND ROVNER °I sometimes believe I was born wanting to be a lawyer. My parents stillspeak of an essay written when I was seven discussing my future plans. I hadnever met a woman lawyer nor seen a woman lawyer. Even so, I believed thatlawyers helped people and were a force for good in society. I still believe that.The neighbors called me Portia. I always thought I would be a lawyer. But Inever even hoped to be a judge. The truth of the matter is that I have nevercompletely been able to believe that I am fortunate enough to wear a robe. Nineyears plus, and it still all seems somewhat unbelievable to me.A shock went through me the very first time I stood outside of thecourtroom on the nineteenth floor of the Everett Dirksen Federal Building andsaw the words "United States District Court - Judge Rovner" emblazoned onthe sign. I had the same sort of shock after I joined the Court of Appeals, whenI walked past the courtroom and saw the words "United States District Court -Judge Williams" in that same spot. I am having a very difficult time letting go.I loved that courtroom more than I could ever adequately express, and atthe risk of seeming like Pollyanna, that was a place in which I tried my best todo the right thing as often as I possibly could.I am often asked whether or not I ever believed that I would be a federaljudge. The answer to that question is a resounding "no." When I started outat Georgetown University Law School, only two women had ever beenappointed federal judges. Those women were viewed as some sort ofphenomena. Surely it was not something that I would have ever dared to dreamabout, let alone actually aspire to be.I was sworn in as a district judge on November 1, 1984, and returned toa building which I love dearly, despite the fact that we all freeze in the winter,and in the summer as well. I say "returned" because I had spent a number ofyears there as law clerk to Judge James B. Parsons of the U.S. District Courtand as an Assistant U.S. Attorney before entering into state government.I came to the Federal Building with somewhat different paraphernalia thanis carted in by most of the federal judges. In my cardboard boxes were the best' Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.1183Rovner: Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the LawProduced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 1994VALPARAISO UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [Vol. 28wand that money could buy, a pair of wings which were not the usualgovernment issue, and a tiara which would have made a princess green withenvy. Those were items that had been with me since my days in theprosecutor's office, and I came by them as follows.When I tried my first case, I had been in the U.S. Attorney's office foronly two days. It was 1973, and to that date, there had been very few womenin the office. Those who had been there had not, for the most part, been giventhe opportunity to try cases. The FBI agents on the case, which involved a theftin interstate commerce, were very wary about having me on the case at all, andthe fact that I would actually question witnesses was extremely worrisome tothem. Hard as they tried to be polite, their nervousness was palpable.The case involved a forklift truck that had been stolen in Indiana andbrought to Illinois. One of the FBI agents said to me skeptically, "Do you knowwhat a forklift truck is?" I responded incredulously, "Do I know what a forklifttruck is? Here is a forklift truck." And I promptly drew a crane. With that,their nervousness turned into full-blown paranoia. The case was tried for threedays. The defendant refused to stipulate to anything at all and so a ream ofdocuments needed to be authenticated. In his opening remarks, the first-chairassistant told the jury that some of the case would be very boring, that therewould be documents introduced into evidence, that the introduction of thesedocuments would take some time, and that it would not be very interesting. Ofcourse, as luck would have it, I was given the document witnesses.When I stood up to begin questioning, I turned to the jury and said, "Goodmorning, ladies and gentlemen. I am the boring part." I shall never forgetJudge Hubert Will looking down at me, wondering about this woman who wascausing the prosecution table to blanch, and saying, "Well, bore on with it."That was the last time I stood up and started a presentation with a joke to a jury.In any event, the case ended with a conviction. On the sentencing date, mytrial partner was out of town, and I was given the opportunity to becomeinvolved with my first sentencing. The defense attorney was passionate inpleading for probation, explaining that the defendant had a serious heartcondition and that he was nearly seventy-five years old. I, on the other hand,said very little. Judge Will listened intently and then sentenced the defendantto 90 days incarceration.The defense attorney turned to Judge Will and said, "Judge, this man isseventy-four years old and very ill with a heart condition. He absolutely mustbegin serving his sentence immediately to get it over with because his heart willnot hold out with the pure worry of this situation. Please, Judge, please. It isnow October the fifteenth. If he is forced to spend ninety days in jail, he will1184Valparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 28, No. 4 [1994], Art. 2https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/21994] INFORMAL REFLECTIONS 1185spend what will probably be his last Thanksgiving and his last Christmas in jail.Judge, please, can you make it sixty days?"Judge Will looked down at the three of us and said, "Well, I'll leave it tothe prosecutor. What do you say, Madame Prosecutor? Shall it be sixty orninety?" And I said, without a second's hesitation, "Judge, I would never pleadfor thirty extra days of a man's life." "Now then," said Judge Will, "that is afirst. Sixty days."With the sincere thanks of the defendant and his attorney, I gathered mypapers, walked out into the hall, and caught an elevator to the fourteenth floor.I had not been in my office more than three minutes when I was summoned tothe office of the then-United States Attorney, Jim Thompson. Sitting with himwere the First Assistant, the Chief of the Criminal Division, and the Chief ofthe Special Investigations Division. How they all gathered so quickly hasalways been somewhat of a mystery to me. "Ah," said Mr. Thompson, "hereshe is, the fairy godmother of the U.S. Attorney's Office. You're not kidding,you'll never ask for thirty extra days of a man's life, because henceforth andforevermore, you will try civil cases. And if you want to be a fairy godmother,there are lots of other places to do it." That day has been emblazoned on mymemory. Lest I forget, my co-workers presented me with the aforementionedwand, the wings, and the tiara, which, I must admit, I treasure to this day.My years in the U.S. Attorney's Office were among the most meaningfulin my life. In actuality, I did try a number of other criminal cases, but the workthat I found most satisfying was in the area of civil rights. I was privileged totry some of the most significant and complex public employment discriminationsuits then pending in the nation, including landmark cases involving the ChicagoPolice Department and the Chicago Fire Department.But because of my fairy godmother reputation, many prosecutors wondered,when I was named to the bench, how I would handle sentencings, and indeed,the following apocryphal story went the rounds: The scene is the courtroom.I say to the defendant, "Mr. Smith, I am very sad to tell you that a jury of yourpeers has found you guilty and it is now my duty to sentence you to prison. Imust do this, but Mr. Smith, I don't want you to worry about Mrs. Smith andthe children. They will be living with Dr. Rovner and me for the duration."For my move to the federal courthouse, added to the basic tools of mytrade (the wand, the tiara, the wings) were two new indicia of my position-avery large purple wizard's cap and a purple robe with my name spelled out inrhinestones. I have managed to control myself so that the latter outfit comes outonly on Halloween.Rovner: Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the LawProduced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 19941186 VALPARAISO UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [Vol. 28I sat for the very first time as a judge on November 4, 1984. I had decidedthat I needed a total personality overhaul, and in order that this might gosmoothly, I had practiced in front of a mirror sucking lemons and lowering myvoice by a good three octaves. I came onto the bench to a full gallery, half ofwhom were lawyers appearing for status calls and motions, the other half werewell-wishers, including my mother, my father, and the Governor of the State ofIllinois. The Governor I could handle, but has anyone ever tried to do anythingin front of their mother and father? I understand that halfway through the call,my mother turned to my father and asked, "Does she have any idea of what sheis doing?" My father assured her that I did not, but thought that I showed somepromise.I had carried with me into the courtroom that day my brand newpersona-businesslike and somewhat curt-intoning my remarks in a deep voicepatterned after "Lurch" of the Addams Family. I had heard about five caseswhen it suddenly occurred to me that neither my voice nor my mind would holdout much longer. I was starting to get a sore throat, and I did not like theperson that I had become. And so, with a flick of the shoulders, causing someshock, I expect, to the lawyers in the audience, my voice went up three octavesand I became myself. It often struck me that myself might not be what lawyerswould find if they went out to-let us say-an establishment such as "Rent-a-Judge." On the other hand, it certainly has been a lot more comfortable thantrying to be someone else.Every judge has his or her own style. Being on the District Court is muchlike being an independent contractor. The fact of the matter is that if one visitstwenty courtrooms, one will find twenty different individuals conductingproceedings in twenty different ways.It was not always thus. There was a time not so very long ago whenfederal judges were pressed from one mold. They were Caucasian males, withthe rarest exception, and they arrived most often via silk stocking law firms.My own route to the bench was unheard of and nearly impossible.I have always been acutely aware of how difficult it has been for many oftoday's successful women to achieve what they have. Today, it is not at allunusual for women to make up fifty percent of their law school classes.Coming from an era when I was one of three women in my freshman law schoolsection (two after Thanksgiving break), I was in awe of the women who hadgone before me, knowing what a struggle it had been for them. I knew womenwho graduated from law school and became legal secretaries because there wereso few opportunities in the law open to them.It was a very lonely existence for us. There were men who made no secretValparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 28, No. 4 [1994], Art. 2https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2INFORMAL REFLECTIONSof their repugnance at having women in their midst. I had one very elderly lawprofessor who told us that he wore a black armband on the day that women firstattended class. Often we were treated very differently than the men. Somedays, we would be called on constantly. Other days we would be totallyignored. There were, of course, some wonderful professors and classmates whowanted women to succeed, and I will always feel gratitude to those individuals.In discussions with the new generation of women lawyers, I havesometimes detected a "they should have fought harder" attitude toward thewomen of earlier generations. Perhaps they have difficulty understanding thatit was nearly impossible to buck the establishment. We were viewed asanomalies in a profession that had no use for women to begin with. There wereso few role models, and the profession was in many ways virtually the same in1960 as it had been in 1860. I have always been amazed at the lack ofbitterness among my women friends who managed to survive the obstacle courseof law school before the 1970s, only to find that the jobs available to them werequite different from those available to the men in their class-men whosometimes ranked hundreds of places beneath them. I am very proud of theyoung women lawyers I see, of their strength and their attitudes, and yet at thesame time, I want them to fully understand the struggle that other women haveendured in order to ease the way for future generations.My own path to the bench was not remotely typical. After completing lawschool, I promptly retired to have a family. I returned to legal work when myson started school in 1972. My timing could not have been better. JudgeParsons, the first African-American on a United States District Court, wasmaking a concerted effort to hire a female law clerk-his first. In greatmeasure, this was so because his secretary-she who had all of the qualities andnone of the opportunities to study law-had encouraged the idea of a womanclerk. Luck is so much a part of all of our lives-being in a particular place ata particular time.In early 1974, I became Chief of the Public Protection Unit in the U.S.Attorney's office-the first woman supervisor in its history. I marvel today athow much interest was engendered by that event and how much discussion aboutwhether the men in my unit would be willing to report to a woman. Most were,and I was followed by a number of other women supervisors. I stayed in theU.S. Attorney's office for four years and joined the governor in 1977 as hisdeputy and legal counsel. In 1984, I was appointed to the federal bench, andin 1992, I was elevated to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.Today there are many roads that lead to meaningful careers in thelaw-including federal judgeships. For women, the opportunities are indeeddifferent than those that awaited the women of my generation. I saw but two1994] 1187Rovner: Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the LawProduced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 19941188 VALPARAISO UNIVERSITYLAW REVIEW [Vol. 28or three others like myself in gown and cap when I graduated law school. Wehad no expectations of any moment. We were less than one percent of that seaof black gabardine. We had virtually no role models-so few who looked quitelike us. I could not imagine on that day that within thirty years, close to fifteenpercent of federal judges would be women, let alone entertain the daring notionthat fifteen percent was a very modest figure.A few years ago, I was in the hospital for major surgery, and all mythoughts were focused inward. But something occurred that for a few briefmoments allowed me to look outside myself. It happened that both the internand the resident on my case were women, and as I looked at them, even throughthe fog of my personal circumstance, I felt such pride in them and such joy, andI thought how glad I was to have lived to see such a day. I cannot begin toestimate the number of women and men who have told me of their pleasure atseeing women in positions of professional and civic responsibility. I exper-ienced a similar moment one morning during one of the daily motion calls Iconducted as a district judge. A case was called, and four women came forwardrepresenting four different parties. I looked down at them, my heart swelling,and said, "You cannot imagine how good you all look to me, nor how excitingit is that we have reached a day when it is possible to see four womenrepresenting four different parties standing before me." And one of the womenresponded, "It looks pretty good from where we are standing, too."Moments such as this leave me with absolutely no doubt that a great manypeople feel a positive need to see women fully represented in such positions, notonly for the sake of the women, but for what the women will contribute. Weshould never forget, as my neighbors taught me early, that the most famouslawyer in literature, and the inspiration for legions, both male and female, isShakespeare's Portia. How fortunate we are to see the dawning of this day ofmany Portias. How fortunate to be in a position to further what has been sowell begun. How fortunate to be able to teach our daughters and sons thatpositive social change is not only possible, but is ongoing, and that we, andthey, all need to continue the forward momentum. Let us take care to do so.Valparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 28, No. 4 [1994], Art. 2https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2

Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law

ValpoScholar

Valparaiso University Law Review 
Volume 28 
Number 4 First Women: The Contribution of 
American Women to the Law 
pp.1183-1188 
First Women: The Contribution of American Women to the Law 
Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law 
Ilana Diamond Rovner 
Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr 
 Part of the Law Commons 
Recommended Citation 
Ilana Diamond Rovner, Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law, 28 Val. U. L. Rev. 1183 (1994). 
Available at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2 
This Essay is brought to you for free and open access by 
the Valparaiso University Law School at ValpoScholar. It 
has been accepted for inclusion in Valparaiso University 
Law Review by an authorized administrator of 
ValpoScholar. For more information, please contact a 
ValpoScholar staff member at scholar@valpo.edu. 
INFORMAL REFLECTIONS OF A
WOMAN IN THE LAW
ILANA DIAMOND ROVNER °
I sometimes believe I was born wanting to be a lawyer. My parents still
speak of an essay written when I was seven discussing my future plans. I had
never met a woman lawyer nor seen a woman lawyer. Even so, I believed that
lawyers helped people and were a force for good in society. I still believe that.
The neighbors called me Portia. I always thought I would be a lawyer. But I
never even hoped to be a judge. The truth of the matter is that I have never
completely been able to believe that I am fortunate enough to wear a robe. Nine
years plus, and it still all seems somewhat unbelievable to me.
A shock went through me the very first time I stood outside of the
courtroom on the nineteenth floor of the Everett Dirksen Federal Building and
saw the words "United States District Court - Judge Rovner" emblazoned on
the sign. I had the same sort of shock after I joined the Court of Appeals, when
I walked past the courtroom and saw the words "United States District Court -
Judge Williams" in that same spot. I am having a very difficult time letting go.
I loved that courtroom more than I could ever adequately express, and at
the risk of seeming like Pollyanna, that was a place in which I tried my best to
do the right thing as often as I possibly could.
I am often asked whether or not I ever believed that I would be a federal
judge. The answer to that question is a resounding "no." When I started out
at Georgetown University Law School, only two women had ever been
appointed federal judges. Those women were viewed as some sort of
phenomena. Surely it was not something that I would have ever dared to dream
about, let alone actually aspire to be.
I was sworn in as a district judge on November 1, 1984, and returned to
a building which I love dearly, despite the fact that we all freeze in the winter,
and in the summer as well. I say "returned" because I had spent a number of
years there as law clerk to Judge James B. Parsons of the U.S. District Court
and as an Assistant U.S. Attorney before entering into state government.
I came to the Federal Building with somewhat different paraphernalia than
is carted in by most of the federal judges. In my cardboard boxes were the best
' Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
1183
Rovner: Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law
Produced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 1994
VALPARAISO UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [Vol. 28
wand that money could buy, a pair of wings which were not the usual
government issue, and a tiara which would have made a princess green with
envy. Those were items that had been with me since my days in the
prosecutor's office, and I came by them as follows.
When I tried my first case, I had been in the U.S. Attorney's office for
only two days. It was 1973, and to that date, there had been very few women
in the office. Those who had been there had not, for the most part, been given
the opportunity to try cases. The FBI agents on the case, which involved a theft
in interstate commerce, were very wary about having me on the case at all, and
the fact that I would actually question witnesses was extremely worrisome to
them. Hard as they tried to be polite, their nervousness was palpable.
The case involved a forklift truck that had been stolen in Indiana and
brought to Illinois. One of the FBI agents said to me skeptically, "Do you know
what a forklift truck is?" I responded incredulously, "Do I know what a forklift
truck is? Here is a forklift truck." And I promptly drew a crane. With that,
their nervousness turned into full-blown paranoia. The case was tried for three
days. The defendant refused to stipulate to anything at all and so a ream of
documents needed to be authenticated. In his opening remarks, the first-chair
assistant told the jury that some of the case would be very boring, that there
would be documents introduced into evidence, that the introduction of these
documents would take some time, and that it would not be very interesting. Of
course, as luck would have it, I was given the document witnesses.
When I stood up to begin questioning, I turned to the jury and said, "Good
morning, ladies and gentlemen. I am the boring part." I shall never forget
Judge Hubert Will looking down at me, wondering about this woman who was
causing the prosecution table to blanch, and saying, "Well, bore on with it."
That was the last time I stood up and started a presentation with a joke to a jury.
In any event, the case ended with a conviction. On the sentencing date, my
trial partner was out of town, and I was given the opportunity to become
involved with my first sentencing. The defense attorney was passionate in
pleading for probation, explaining that the defendant had a serious heart
condition and that he was nearly seventy-five years old. I, on the other hand,
said very little. Judge Will listened intently and then sentenced the defendant
to 90 days incarceration.
The defense attorney turned to Judge Will and said, "Judge, this man is
seventy-four years old and very ill with a heart condition. He absolutely must
begin serving his sentence immediately to get it over with because his heart will
not hold out with the pure worry of this situation. Please, Judge, please. It is
now October the fifteenth. If he is forced to spend ninety days in jail, he will
1184
Valparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 28, No. 4 [1994], Art. 2
https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2
1994] INFORMAL REFLECTIONS 1185
spend what will probably be his last Thanksgiving and his last Christmas in jail.
Judge, please, can you make it sixty days?"
Judge Will looked down at the three of us and said, "Well, I'll leave it to
the prosecutor. What do you say, Madame Prosecutor? Shall it be sixty or
ninety?" And I said, without a second's hesitation, "Judge, I would never plead
for thirty extra days of a man's life." "Now then," said Judge Will, "that is a
first. Sixty days."
With the sincere thanks of the defendant and his attorney, I gathered my
papers, walked out into the hall, and caught an elevator to the fourteenth floor.
I had not been in my office more than three minutes when I was summoned to
the office of the then-United States Attorney, Jim Thompson. Sitting with him
were the First Assistant, the Chief of the Criminal Division, and the Chief of
the Special Investigations Division. How they all gathered so quickly has
always been somewhat of a mystery to me. "Ah," said Mr. Thompson, "here
she is, the fairy godmother of the U.S. Attorney's Office. You're not kidding,
you'll never ask for thirty extra days of a man's life, because henceforth and
forevermore, you will try civil cases. And if you want to be a fairy godmother,
there are lots of other places to do it." That day has been emblazoned on my
memory. Lest I forget, my co-workers presented me with the aforementioned
wand, the wings, and the tiara, which, I must admit, I treasure to this day.
My years in the U.S. Attorney's Office were among the most meaningful
in my life. In actuality, I did try a number of other criminal cases, but the work
that I found most satisfying was in the area of civil rights. I was privileged to
try some of the most significant and complex public employment discrimination
suits then pending in the nation, including landmark cases involving the Chicago
Police Department and the Chicago Fire Department.
But because of my fairy godmother reputation, many prosecutors wondered,
when I was named to the bench, how I would handle sentencings, and indeed,
the following apocryphal story went the rounds: The scene is the courtroom.
I say to the defendant, "Mr. Smith, I am very sad to tell you that a jury of your
peers has found you guilty and it is now my duty to sentence you to prison. I
must do this, but Mr. Smith, I don't want you to worry about Mrs. Smith and
the children. They will be living with Dr. Rovner and me for the duration."
For my move to the federal courthouse, added to the basic tools of my
trade (the wand, the tiara, the wings) were two new indicia of my position-a
very large purple wizard's cap and a purple robe with my name spelled out in
rhinestones. I have managed to control myself so that the latter outfit comes out
only on Halloween.
Rovner: Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law
Produced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 1994
1186 VALPARAISO UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [Vol. 28
I sat for the very first time as a judge on November 4, 1984. I had decided
that I needed a total personality overhaul, and in order that this might go
smoothly, I had practiced in front of a mirror sucking lemons and lowering my
voice by a good three octaves. I came onto the bench to a full gallery, half of
whom were lawyers appearing for status calls and motions, the other half were
well-wishers, including my mother, my father, and the Governor of the State of
Illinois. The Governor I could handle, but has anyone ever tried to do anything
in front of their mother and father? I understand that halfway through the call,
my mother turned to my father and asked, "Does she have any idea of what she
is doing?" My father assured her that I did not, but thought that I showed some
promise.
I had carried with me into the courtroom that day my brand new
persona-businesslike and somewhat curt-intoning my remarks in a deep voice
patterned after "Lurch" of the Addams Family. I had heard about five cases
when it suddenly occurred to me that neither my voice nor my mind would hold
out much longer. I was starting to get a sore throat, and I did not like the
person that I had become. And so, with a flick of the shoulders, causing some
shock, I expect, to the lawyers in the audience, my voice went up three octaves
and I became myself. It often struck me that myself might not be what lawyers
would find if they went out to-let us say-an establishment such as "Rent-a-
Judge." On the other hand, it certainly has been a lot more comfortable than
trying to be someone else.
Every judge has his or her own style. Being on the District Court is much
like being an independent contractor. The fact of the matter is that if one visits
twenty courtrooms, one will find twenty different individuals conducting
proceedings in twenty different ways.
It was not always thus. There was a time not so very long ago when
federal judges were pressed from one mold. They were Caucasian males, with
the rarest exception, and they arrived most often via silk stocking law firms.
My own route to the bench was unheard of and nearly impossible.
I have always been acutely aware of how difficult it has been for many of
today's successful women to achieve what they have. Today, it is not at all
unusual for women to make up fifty percent of their law school classes.
Coming from an era when I was one of three women in my freshman law school
section (two after Thanksgiving break), I was in awe of the women who had
gone before me, knowing what a struggle it had been for them. I knew women
who graduated from law school and became legal secretaries because there were
so few opportunities in the law open to them.
It was a very lonely existence for us. There were men who made no secret
Valparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 28, No. 4 [1994], Art. 2
https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2
INFORMAL REFLECTIONS
of their repugnance at having women in their midst. I had one very elderly law
professor who told us that he wore a black armband on the day that women first
attended class. Often we were treated very differently than the men. Some
days, we would be called on constantly. Other days we would be totally
ignored. There were, of course, some wonderful professors and classmates who
wanted women to succeed, and I will always feel gratitude to those individuals.
In discussions with the new generation of women lawyers, I have
sometimes detected a "they should have fought harder" attitude toward the
women of earlier generations. Perhaps they have difficulty understanding that
it was nearly impossible to buck the establishment. We were viewed as
anomalies in a profession that had no use for women to begin with. There were
so few role models, and the profession was in many ways virtually the same in
1960 as it had been in 1860. I have always been amazed at the lack of
bitterness among my women friends who managed to survive the obstacle course
of law school before the 1970s, only to find that the jobs available to them were
quite different from those available to the men in their class-men who
sometimes ranked hundreds of places beneath them. I am very proud of the
young women lawyers I see, of their strength and their attitudes, and yet at the
same time, I want them to fully understand the struggle that other women have
endured in order to ease the way for future generations.
My own path to the bench was not remotely typical. After completing law
school, I promptly retired to have a family. I returned to legal work when my
son started school in 1972. My timing could not have been better. Judge
Parsons, the first African-American on a United States District Court, was
making a concerted effort to hire a female law clerk-his first. In great
measure, this was so because his secretary-she who had all of the qualities and
none of the opportunities to study law-had encouraged the idea of a woman
clerk. Luck is so much a part of all of our lives-being in a particular place at
a particular time.
In early 1974, I became Chief of the Public Protection Unit in the U.S.
Attorney's office-the first woman supervisor in its history. I marvel today at
how much interest was engendered by that event and how much discussion about
whether the men in my unit would be willing to report to a woman. Most were,
and I was followed by a number of other women supervisors. I stayed in the
U.S. Attorney's office for four years and joined the governor in 1977 as his
deputy and legal counsel. In 1984, I was appointed to the federal bench, and
in 1992, I was elevated to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.
Today there are many roads that lead to meaningful careers in the
law-including federal judgeships. For women, the opportunities are indeed
different than those that awaited the women of my generation. I saw but two
1994] 1187
Rovner: Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law
Produced by The Berkeley Electronic Press, 1994
1188 VALPARAISO UNIVERSITYLAW REVIEW [Vol. 28
or three others like myself in gown and cap when I graduated law school. We
had no expectations of any moment. We were less than one percent of that sea
of black gabardine. We had virtually no role models-so few who looked quite
like us. I could not imagine on that day that within thirty years, close to fifteen
percent of federal judges would be women, let alone entertain the daring notion
that fifteen percent was a very modest figure.
A few years ago, I was in the hospital for major surgery, and all my
thoughts were focused inward. But something occurred that for a few brief
moments allowed me to look outside myself. It happened that both the intern
and the resident on my case were women, and as I looked at them, even through
the fog of my personal circumstance, I felt such pride in them and such joy, and
I thought how glad I was to have lived to see such a day. I cannot begin to
estimate the number of women and men who have told me of their pleasure at
seeing women in positions of professional and civic responsibility. I exper-
ienced a similar moment one morning during one of the daily motion calls I
conducted as a district judge. A case was called, and four women came forward
representing four different parties. I looked down at them, my heart swelling,
and said, "You cannot imagine how good you all look to me, nor how exciting
it is that we have reached a day when it is possible to see four women
representing four different parties standing before me." And one of the women
responded, "It looks pretty good from where we are standing, too."
Moments such as this leave me with absolutely no doubt that a great many
people feel a positive need to see women fully represented in such positions, not
only for the sake of the women, but for what the women will contribute. We
should never forget, as my neighbors taught me early, that the most famous
lawyer in literature, and the inspiration for legions, both male and female, is
Shakespeare's Portia. How fortunate we are to see the dawning of this day of
many Portias. How fortunate to be in a position to further what has been so
well begun. How fortunate to be able to teach our daughters and sons that
positive social change is not only possible, but is ongoing, and that we, and
they, all need to continue the forward momentum. Let us take care to do so.
Valparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 28, No. 4 [1994], Art. 2
https://scholar.valpo.edu/vulr/vol28/iss4/2


https://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1915&context=vulr

Infromal Reflections of a Woman in the Law

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