Women in the Law

Being a lawyer is one of the most prestigious, influential and lucrative occupations in our society. Until about 30 years ago, it was dominated almost exclusively by men.

Women saw the allure of the profession and entered the field in record numbers. Per class, law attracted more women than medicine or engineering. Today, half the classroom seats in the nation's top law schools are filled with women.

Similar test scores, grades and law review work among men and women show that both have the same potential to succeed at law. Yet recently, those in the profession have noted a disturbing trend: women have succeeded in legal careers, but are reporting higher dissatisfaction with their jobs, and are leaving the profession.

Hindi Greenberg, a San Francisco lawyer who left her formal law practice to help counsel other lawyers in the midst of career changes, sees a proportionally greater number of women than men in her consulting practice. Some legal scholars, such as the University of Michigan's Catharine MacKinnon, have explored the effect of male-oriented laws on our society. But few others than Greenberg have examined what that influence does to the practice of law and the people within law firms.

After talking with scores of women in her consulting practice, Greenberg has decided that women have found law to be a difficult if not hostile work environment. And when they find they can't even the playing field, they get out.

Women are discovering that it is as difficult to change the way law is practiced as it is to change long-standing laws themselves. ``When it doesn't change, women will say, `I won't settle for this system. Therefore, I will make a change in law or I will choose to leave it completely','' Greenberg says. Men are trained to ``bite the bullet'' and suffer through, she says.

Additionally, Greenberg says, there is ``still unfortunately a lot of sexism in the practice of law. Women who aspire to be lawyers are not being allowed to practice in the same way as their male colleagues. They are not being promoted to partner. They are not getting the same cases. Women have made the recognition that the system is more designed for men and treats them better. Therefore, they get out.''

Associates at law firms in San Francisco agree with Greenberg's assessment. ``Even though there is a lot of lip service paid to women's concerns, women are superficially accepted,'' says one woman, who left her position as an associate at one of the city's largest law firms this year. ``Law firms judge women differently than they judge men doing the exact same task,'' says litigator Stephanie Foster. ``They expect perfection of women, but not of men.''

Right now, half of the new attorneys hired by large law firms are women. Using an average 7-year partnership track, by the year 2000 the partnership ranks of major law firms should have dramatically changed. Unfortunately, trends, studies and personal interviews suggest they won't. When women at lower levels at law firms leave, it means it will take longer to achieve parity. But when more experienced women attorneys are lopped off the top, it signals the profession is one that will be very slow to change.

One of the most dramatic example of women reaching the top ranks of law firms and then being tossed aside is the case of Ingrid Beall, a 65-year-old tax attorney with the mega-law firm of Baker & McKenzie. Beall, who joined the firm in its infancy in 1958 and helped build it into the giant it is today, was the first woman partner. She was a key firm leader, holding positions on important management committees. But after a turnover in firm management in 1984, she was removed from leadership posts and the work she received fell by an order of magnitude. After long negotiations with the firm, she filed a sex and age discrimination suit against Baker & McKenzie on Oct. 7.

In addition to the damage to Beall's own career, her very visible fall from power sends a pessimistic message to younger women associates and partners.

An alarming number of women attorneys are thwarted in their careers. They may make partner, but they will not advance to leadership or management positions in their firms. And, less dramatically and less visibly, they will not achieve the top salary ranks. ``How many firms have women in the top compensation tier,'' asked Michele Corash, a top environmental law attorney at Morrison & Foerster. ``I would venture to guess you would be hard pressed to find one,'' she says.

``There is this notion that somehow compensation is not what it is all about. Nonsense. This is the business world. In the business world, the people at the top are the ones with the highest compensation,'' she says.

Corash's colleagues in San Francisco hold precious few prominent leadership posts. In 1990, for example, while some 13 percent of the partners in large firms were women, only two women held visible leadership positions in those firms: Toni Rembe was elected to the 5-member executive committee of 704-attorney Pillsbury Madison & Sutro, and Kathleen V. Fisher was the managing partner of Morrison & Foerster's largest office, its home base in San Francisco. Rembe was the first woman at the firm and the firm's first woman partner. While not the first, when Fisher joined Morrison & Foerster in 1976, the firm had no women partners. Today, 48 of the firm's 236 partners are women.

In the late 1980s, bar groups began to address some of these bias issues. The State Bar of California commissioned a study to determine to what degree gender bias existed.

Their report, a draft of which was first released in 1989, showed that nearly 9 in 10 women lawyers surveyed say a ``subtle gender bias'' is pervasive in the profession, and a stunning 62 percent say they did not believe they have as much opportunity for advancement as men.

The American Bar Association found much the same. According to a national survey of 3,000 lawyers entitled ``The State of the Profession 1990,'' women have a more difficult climb to success in law firms than men.

They are far less likely to be promoted, get paid less and express more dissatisfaction with their jobs, the bar's report on the study concluded.

One of the most troubling findings of the study was a sharp increase in the degree of dissatisfaction expressed by women partners. In a 1984 study, only 15 percent of women partners said they were dissatisfied with their work. By 1990, 42 percent of women partners were in this category. While overall dissatisfaction among both men and women attorneys is on the rise, more women than men report disappointment.

We know of no studies tracking the progress of women as they enter the profession. But anecdotal evidence and Greenberg's extensive experience clearly shows that women are leaving large law firms. It means much more than a loss of bodies. In several firms in San Francisco, the women who have left recently were the women driving much of the progressive change taking place in these firms. At two major firms, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe and Thelen, Marrin, Johnson & Bridges, in-house groups that focused on the needs of women attorneys in the firm no longer exist because the people involved in the groups no longer work there. At one local firm, associates begged a partner to stay because if she left they would have no role model at the firm.