PHOTO | AVA PUKATCH

Justice Anita Earls stands in her office in the North Carolina Supreme Court building. Earls was elected to the state's highest court in 2019.

It’s been 40 years since the first woman – Sandra Day O’Connor – was nominated to the United States Supreme Court.

But 20 years prior, the first woman was appointed to the North Carolina Supreme Court. While more women have served on the North Carolina Supreme Court there are still barriers to entry.

Anita Earls, one of three women justices of the seven-member North Carolina Supreme Court, still remembers the days when she had to prove she belonged in the courtroom. She was an attorney – preparing to argue a case in a part of North Carolina where she wasn’t well known. But when she arrived, people in the courthouse didn’t believe that.

“The assumption was that I was a court reporter,” Earls said. “I had to, like, really insist, no, I’m an attorney and I’m here to represent a client.”

Even some of those clients have been hesitant to work with her because of her gender. She was a trial lawyer at a time when people traditionally saw women as appropriate to handle things like family law cases, trusts, and estates.

“I’ve had clients who questioned my ability to be an attorney,” Earls said. “You know, are you really going to be aggressive for me in the courtroom? If you’re a woman, like literally putting it out there because I’m a woman, they’re not sure I can be a good attorney.”

She said other clients consciously sought women lawyers out – not because of their abilities but because they thought a woman could do more than a man to influence the jury in their favor.

“I want to be evaluated based on my performance, my skills, my knowledge, my abilities and not treated differently on any grounds,” Earls said.

Earls says attitudes have changed, but that women still face challenges in the courtroom. There are more female lawyers. And women now make up 43 percent of elected positions in the North Carolina judicial branch – including judges, district attorneys and clerks. But, Earls said, they’re not always treated the same as men. Studies show that female justices on the U.S. Supreme Court get interrupted three times as often.

Elizabeth White, president of the National Association for Women judges, said many women have a hard time advancing in the legal profession because it’s difficult to balance work and family.

“The other problem is that women have not had good mentors,” she said. “Sometimes the men don’t mentor the women in the way that the men should, but I think that’s changing.”

Partly because now women are serving as those mentors themselves. Four women have served as North Carolina’s chief justice, and there have been nine women who’ve served on the state supreme court. That’s compared to 90 men, but it’s progress.

Former Chief Justice Cheri Beasley, now running for U.S. Senate, was woman number seven and the first Black woman to be chief justice. During her tenure on the Supreme Court, the North Carolina Judicial Branch honored women trailblazers.

“We have one celebration, to celebrate the women who had served on the Court, and we also had a celebration to commemorate the African Americans who had served on the court,” Beasley said. “It was really important, I think, because representation really does matter, and you know it matters to have leaders who are diverse.”

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was once asked about when there would be enough women on the court. She said “when there are nine” – something Earls said could happen when people are judged on their skills not their gender. For years, the court was nine men, and nobody saw a problem, so why would anyone see a problem with nine women?

“If the top legal minds in the country happened to be nine women great, we would pick them because they’re the top legal minds,” she said.  

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