Miami-Dade FAWL Board Member, Linda Leali, of Linda Leali, P.A. was recently appointed as Chair of the American Bar Association's Consumer Bankruptcy Committee,  Chair of the Avoidance Power sub-committee, and Chair of the Women Business and Commercial Advocates subcommittee.   Ms. Leali was also invited to speak about diversity in judicial appointments at the National Association of Women Judges' Annual Conference in October 2014. 

By now, we are all aware of the Governor's recent failure to appoint any women to sit on the Judicial Nominating Commissions (JNCs) for either the Third District Court of Appeal or the Eleventh Judicial Circuit in and for Miami-Dade County and the paucity of female appointees to the other JNCs throughout the state. Were this the only example of the tone-deafness that continues to confront female lawyers in our community, we might be able to pay no heed to it; sadly, however, this is just one example of the many. Consider the following:

• The federal nominating commission that is selected by Senators Nelson and Rubio to interview and nominate federal judges and other significant federal positions has twenty-one members in the Southern District of Florida Section, and only five are women.

• The Dade County Bar Association (DCBA) presented awards to eight worthy recipients at a recent event, only one of whom is a woman, the Co-President of Greenberg Traurig. 

• The Daily Business Review's upcoming Legends of the Courtroom has three panels with zero female moderators. With one exception, the women panelists are all judges, not practitioners, while on the other hand nine panelists are male attorneys. Sadly, the Bench and Bar Seminar offered by the DCBA earlier this year was similarly flawed, with many all-male panels and few female moderators.

• The Federalist Society hosted an event featuring former Assistant Solicitor Miguel Estrada, and after the event, a private dinner was held with a guest speaker. Despite the fact that several prominent female judges were in attendance at the main event ˗ one of whom is even a past president of the Federalist Society ˗ no prominent female judges or attorneys were present at that dinner. (One woman, an administrative staff from The Federalist Society, was present at the dinner.)
   

And this list is by no means definitive.

To properly analyze this situation, a historical perspective is necessary. The time-honored maxim by George Santayana that "those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" comes to mind. Perhaps the quote that haunts me the most is Einstein's definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. I hope that we are neither doomed nor crazy in our expectations of equality. Having been admitted to the Florida Bar in 1983, I can candidly admit that the task remains daunting and the inertia that appears to take hold can be oppressive. If nothing else, we need to start by examining what is not working ˗ and why ˗ before we can even hope to come up with meaningful solutions.

At the outset, it is vital that we dispense with the canards and pat responses that we have heard for decades, especially now that it appears some of the misconceptions are being accepted as The Truth. The first excuse is that women do not apply for leadership positions in sufficient numbers. The problem with this conjecture is that it oversimplifies the issue and ignores the facts. The fact is that very qualified women do apply and the total number of applicants is irrelevant if those who are making the decisions do not choose the qualified candidates who do apply. The Governor's recent selection for the JNC is a good example, to which I offer a two word response: Victoria Platzer. We can get bogged down in the mathematics, but think about it this way, if there are two vacancies and only one very qualified woman applies, why shouldn't she be selected? What if the one woman who does apply is the most qualified? Would we say that not enough women applied? The idea that we need some magic number of applicants for each spot is absurd. It would be nice if for every position there were 10, 20, or 30 women applicants, and this is a goal for us to set, even if that is not likely to happen in the near future for a variety of reasons. Simply put, the number of applicants does not excuse the Governor for his failure to choose from among the qualified women who did apply.

Second, resorting to percentages is not helpful. Just as the courts have eschewed this type of analysis in the realm of affirmative action, we should collectively reject it here. If we are to rely on percentages to establish the appropriate representation, what is the proper metric? The percentage of women law school graduates? The percentage of women in the total population? The number of women members of the Florida Bar? The number of women attorneys in Miami-Dade County? This is not a game worth playing. If it were the proper formulation, many other diverse groups would fare even worse than women, who actually represent the largest number in some of the pools just mentioned.

Third, merely populating the selector group ("the Pickers") with a few women has not proven a formula for success. The reasons why this is not working are complex, and perhaps a subject for another discussion. But one thing is clear: perpetually resorting to a few women, who are chosen by the same group of men who are running things, simply has not meant that more women receive awards or are appointed to positions of leadership.

Fourth, having "sensitive" men as the Pickers is no substitute for having women. The reasons why this issue is so important cannot be minimized. The mere optics of a panel or a JNC lacking women should be disturbing enough because of what it signals, both expressly and subliminally. More significantly, the democratic process requires actual representation, not just representation by "a few good men." I think back to an interview before a JNC where there was not a single woman commissioner. I was fortunate to have known most of the men in the room, and thus did not find the setting to be intimidating. The interviewee after me was an African- American woman who had not practiced as long as I had, nor had she practiced in the civil sector, from where all of the male commissioners haled. As I saw her walk in after me, I tried to put myself in her shoes, and I did not like the feeling. There is a significant, substantive reason why inclusion of more women is necessary. Women bring important things to the table during the selection process, including different experiences, sometimes different skill sets and ways of problem solving. As a result, the absence of women actually detracts from the efficacy of the process.

Fifth, the fact that women do (sometimes) come out of committees and do (sometimes) get appointed is not enough. This "means to an end" approach would not pass muster in any other setting. Consider, for example, an all-white jury acquitting an African-American defendant as an excuse for discriminatory jury selection.

Finally, the excuse that "we asked six women to be on the panel and they all had conflicts" just does not suffice. If anyone who is in charge of putting together panels only knows six women attorneys, then he or she needs to get out in the community to meet more women, or, better yet, contact Miami-Dade FAWL - we have binders full of female attorneys in our community.

It is all too easy to become lazy, complacent, and discouraged; I confess to experiencing all three of those conditions. Nothing is ever going to come to us unless we ask for it. Unfortunately, women still face the specter of being called strident, or worse, if they become a squeaky wheel. All of us ˗ men and women alike ˗ want to be liked and accepted by our peers. Pointing out to the all-male power structure that mistakes are being made does not feel like a formula for personal or professional success. I distinctly recall the eye-rolling and the "there she goes again" attitude when in 2009, Miami-Dade FAWL raised the flaws with Senator Nelson's federal nominating commission.

As for solutions, I offer a few. First, we need to stop blaming ourselves when the fault lies elsewhere. That is nothing more than blaming the victim and it is also myopic. Second, we have to ask ourselves, what have other minority bars done to be successful in promoting their members? We are not reinventing the wheel here. Third, we need to insert ourselves in the process, not just as applicants, but as the Pickers. Leadership is not just about securing a position of power; it is also about promoting others. Here, unfortunately, we can be our own worst enemies. Finally, we have to make our voices heard with the most effective means, and, this is one area where we do share the blame. Politically, there is no reason why we women, as a majority, are ignored by elected politicians of both parties. Sure, one party might take us for granted and the other party may often write us off as liberals, but we have a remedy and we are beginning to employ it. Increasingly, Miami-Dade FAWL members are participating in fundraisers. The flip side is that we need to make those elected officials who are not appointing women aware that we will not support them with our votes, financially, or otherwise, as long as we are being ignored.

Lisa Lehner served as a Director of the Miami-Dade FAWL Board from 1999-2002, and then again in 2008-2009. She has chaired the Political Action and Community Outreach Committees and is the recipient of the President's Award (2010) and the Mattie Belle Davis Award in 2013.

*Note that at the time this article was written, this issue was raised to members of the DCBA who were receptive and supportive of Miami-Dade FAWL's position and who have assured Miami-Dade FAWL that the DCBA will make efforts to ensure its process for making award determinations is appropriately inclusive of women.  

On behalf of Dade Legal Aid/Put Something Back and the thousands of voiceless children, women and families we humbly serve each year, thank you Miami-Dade FAWL for supporting us by taking cases, serving on committees, lecturing at seminars, staffing clinics and participating in LegalLine. Miami-Dade FAWL's participation supports our mission to create a safe haven of civil legal services so that no indigent person falls through the cracks in our justice system.  Since not all clients are able to walk into a Legal Aid office during the workday and those that do may not qualify for free legal services, DCBA's monthly LegalLine provides a great service by allowing clients to call in anonymously and ask questions of our volunteers on the first Wednesday night of each month housed at the DCBA - Legal Aid downtown offices. We are grateful to Miami-Dade FAWL's leadership and assistance with LegalLine.  Your help also supports Dade Legal Aid Child Advocacy Attorneys who advocate for victims of human trafficking in dependency proceedings where our dedicated staff attorneys represent teen victims of human trafficking and other heinous crimes. Child Advocacy is one of the areas where legal representation is needed most. Thank you to Miami-Dade FAWL attorneys who have volunteered to step in and handle these complex dependency cases.  We encourage you to join, accept cases, staff LegalLine and attend an upcoming event.  You can also donate in lieu of taking a case.  Please email psb@dadelegalaid.org to take a case. Learn all about Legal Aid at our website.

- Karen Josefsberg Ladis