The United Nations General Assembly designates today as International Day of Women Judges. The representation of women in the judiciary is significant for many reasons. In addition to ensuring that the legal system is developed with all of society in mind, it also inspires the next generation of female judges and motivates them to achieve their goals. Learn how you can celebrate this year’s theme of “Women in Justice, Women for Justice.”

Today is International Women's Day, which recognizes the social, economic, political and cultural achievements of women and commits to the acceleration towards true equality for all women and girls. In a statement released today, American Bar Association President Deborah Enix-Ross says the legal profession has much work to do to reach gender equity. Women make up only 38% of all lawyers and only 12% of managing partners, she observes. She calls on the legal community to work for faster progress. “Lawyers are committed to justice and fairness. We have a vital role to play in effecting positive change. On this day, all members of the legal community need to recommit themselves to achieving gender equity.”

The Women Law Students Association (WLSA) at Vanderbilt Law School is sponsoring career-oriented talks throughout March as part of Women’s History Month. Thursday from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. CST is a conversation with a first-generation woman lawyer, Kris Reliford, a partner at Bradley. March 24 from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. will be a conversation with Courtney Urschel, deputy chief of the human rights and special prosecutions section of the Department of Justice.

For Women’s History Month, the Chattanooga Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority will host a Women’s Commemorative Suffrage March at noon EST on March. 3. The march will begin at the Hamilton County Courthouse and end at Miller Park with a formal program. Get more information here.

A new Memphis Suffrage Monument, "Equality Trail Blazers,” was dedicated Saturday, the Commercial Appeal reports. Nashville sculptor Alan LeQuire created the monument to honor a number of individuals instrumental in the woman suffrage movement. Six are recognized with busts while seven are honored with etched portraits and narratives in glass. Among those included is journalist and anti-lynching activist Ida B. Wells, Mary Church Terrell, Marion Griffin, Rep. Joe Hanover, Charl Ormond Williams and Lois DeBerry, the second Black woman elected to the state legislature and the first to be named speaker pro-tempore. The monument sits on the promenade behind the University of Memphis School of Law, facing the Mississippi River. The city also this week renamed a section of Fourth Street in the downtown in honor of Ida B. Wells. The Commercial Appeal has more on that story.

In honor of Women’s History Month, the TBA has again rallied its past, current and future female presidents for a one-hour conversation on their experiences, influences and the impact women have made on the legal profession. The virtual panel will take place this Wednesday from 3 to 4 p.m. CDT. Attorney Julie Bhattacharya Peak will moderate the panel, which will include former TBA presidents Cindy Wyrick, Jackie Dixon, Marcy Eason, Sarah Sheppeard and Michelle Greenway Sellers, as well as current TBA President Sherie Edwards and President-elect Tasha Blakney. RSVP for the event and submit questions for the panelists here.

U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Bernice Bouie Donald is the featured guest on a new podcast episode from Littler Mendelson. Littler’s Inclusion, Equity & Diversity podcast series is hosted by Littler Principal Cindy-Ann Thomas, who talks with Donald about President Joe Biden’s nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court. Donald reflects on lessons from her own personal journey as a pioneer in U.S. judicial history, why diversity of SCOTUS is so important, why Black women have not equally benefitted from women’s movements and much more. Read more and stream the podcast on Littler’s website.

In honor of Women’s History Month, for the second year, the TBA has rallied its past, current and future female presidents for a one-hour conversation on their experiences, influences and the impact women have made on the legal profession. The virtual panel will take place on March 30 from 3 to 4 p.m. CDT. Attorney Julie Bhattacharya Peak will moderate the panel, which will include former TBA presidents Judge Cindy Wyrick, Jackie Dixon, Marcy Eason, Sarah Sheppeard and Michelle Greenway Sellers, as well as current TBA President Sherie Edwards and President-Elect Tasha Blakney. RSVP for the event and submit questions for the panelists here.

In honor of Women’s History Month, the Administrative Office of the Courts recently published a piece looking at the women who became Tennessee’s first female judges. The profile looks at Martha Craig Daughtrey, the state Supreme Court’s first female justice; Janice M. Holder, the Supreme Court’s first female chief justice; Supreme Court Justice Holly Kirby, the state’s first woman to serve on the Tennessee Court of Appeals; Judge Julia Smith Gibbons, the first woman to serve on a state trial court; Chancellor Sharon Bell, the first woman to serve on a state chancery court; Judge Kate M. Drake, the first county judge in the state; and Judge Camille Kelley, the first female judge in the state and the first female juvenile court judge. Thanks to these historic trailblazers, the Tennessee Judiciary is a changed institution. Today, women compose the majority of the Tennessee Supreme Court. At the trial court level, 25% of judges are women while 18 of the state’s 31 judicial districts have at least one woman judge.

In related news, U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Bernice Donald and judicial law clerk LaFonda Willis reflect on the rich legacy of Shelby County women judges in an opinion piece in today's Commercial Appeal. Read about Nancy B. Sorak, the first woman elected as a judge in Memphis; Julia Smith Gibbons, the first woman to be named a federal judge in the state; and Earnestine Hunt Dorse, the first woman elected to Memphis City Court.

Across the state, women hold key leadership roles as executive directors at the state and four largest city bar associations. Nashville lawyer Joycelyn Stevenson is director of the Tennessee Bar Association. Prior to joining the TBA, Stevenson spent 12 years at Bradley Arant Boult Cummings before becoming a shareholder at Littler Mendelson PC. She is a graduate of Vanderbilt University Law School and has served as president of the Nashville Bar Association, the Lawyers’ Association for Women in Nashville and the Council on Aging of Greater Nashville. She also serves on the Metropolitan Nashville Airport Authority Board.

Lynda Minks Hood heads the Chattanooga Bar Association. Hood is a graduate of Leadership Chattanooga and was nominated for the group’s first Lifetime Achievement Award. She has served on the boards of the American Cancer Society, Erlanger Health System Foundation, Rotary of Chattanooga and the Women’s Fund of Chattanooga. She was named one of the city’s “Women of Distinction” in 2011.

Marsha Watson heads the Knoxville Bar Association. A graduate of George Mason University in Northern Virginia, Watson first worked at the Association of Trial Lawyers of America in Washington, D.C., as a fundraiser. She later was named executive director of Maryland Trial Lawyers Association. Wanting to be closer to family, she moved to Knoxville and was hired as the first director of the KBA. She remains the only person to hold that position, marking her 30th anniversary with the organization in September 2020.

Maury Tower has been the Memphis Bar Association's interim executive director since August 2020. She graduated from the University of Tennessee and earned a master’s degree in marketing from the University of Memphis. Tower’s experience includes positions at Good Advertising, WREG-TV and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. She also has served as president of the American Advertising Federation Memphis Chapter and the Midtown Memphis Rotary Club.

Finally, Monica Mackie has been executive director of the Nashville Bar Association since 2015. Mackie ran her own consulting business before joining the NBA. She worked at the TBA from 1998 to 2012, first as financial administrator and then as director of the Leadership Law program.