Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts on motherhood in the legal profession, in partnership with our friends at MothersEsquire. Please welcome the MothersEsquire Board of Directors to our pages.
If you’ve been told, “But you don’t look like a lawyer/judge/general counsel”…
If someone’s ever assumed you were the legal assistant or court reporter because of your gender…
If you’ve been overlooked for an opportunity because someone assumed you wouldn’t have time since you’re a mom…
If you’ve found out you were being paid a lower salary than a more junior male attorney…
If you’ve ever been bullied out of an origination or passed over for a promotion based on your gender…
If you’ve ever been denied the ability to take a tampon into the bar exam with you…
If you’ve been forced to pump in your car or on a bathroom floor during a trial or legal conference…
If you’ve ever been asked if you were going to have more kids in an interview…
Or, if you’re a dad who has ever been denied paternity leave at your firm (or received the message that you aren’t actually allowed to use the available paternity leave policy)…
…Then perhaps you will consider a donation to MothersEsquire. If you’ve experienced these transgressions, you aren’t the only one! MothersEsquire and DadsAtTheBar exist to advocate for gender equity and address the motherhood penalty and caregiver bias in the legal profession.
MothersEsquire, Inc. is a national non-profit organization focused on advocating for gender equity in the legal profession. More than 5,000 members strong, MothersEsquire brings together talented and ambitious lawyers and law students who are either already moms or are planning to become moms, and who recognize the inherent challenges of the motherhood penalty on women’s careers.
MothersEsquire serves as a community of support for women lawyers across the span of their career and parenting years. So, whether our members are currently working as full-time attorneys or as stay-at-home moms, MothersEsquire is there to provide a network for guidance and advocacy. The group has a laser focus on being a catalyst for changes that remove systemic barriers to women’s success in the legal profession, rather than advising women on how to change to fit into a broken system.
Now, MothersEsquire has launched its “Mission: Possible” Capital Campaign that runs until the end of September. We are raising funds to hire a part-time Executive Director and to support our top three target advocacy initiatives through 2021: (1) Parental Continuance policies, (2) #PumpUpTheBar to support nursing mom lawyers, and (3) normalizing parenthood in the legal profession.
Parental Continuance Rule
A Parental Continuance Rule shifts the burden to the opposing party to prove it would cause undue harm to the case when a new parent requests continuance on a case, as opposed to having the parent subjected to potential unconscious caregiver bias. MothersEsquire advocates for each state to adopt a Parental Continuance Rule, wherein courts would presumptively grant a request for a parental continuance by either parent (whether birth or adoption) in an ongoing litigation matter, with some exceptions for child welfare and incarcerated individuals.
Parental Continuance Rules have been adopted in North Carolina and Florida. MothersEsquire was instrumental in the successful advocation of the adoption of the Florida Parental Continuance Rule with the Florida Association for Women Lawyers.
Having every state and territory adopt this rule would help the judiciary apply a fair approach for men and women embarking on the journey into parenthood and decrease the impact of unconscious bias on decisions around continuances.
The legal profession as a whole, and the judiciary especially, should acknowledge the importance of child-rearing and supporting members of the bar who choose to practice law and build families, as well as the disproportionate impact of the failure to acknowledge parental continuance requests on women litigators’ careers.
#PumpUpTheBar Campaign
#PumpUpTheBar is a campaign focused on critical — and imminently solvable — issues that affect women lawyers. Phase I of the advocacy effort will focus on asking every Bar Examination Board in the U.S. to ensure that they have clear, easily accessible, and reasonable accommodations available for women to accommodate three important medical necessities during the Bar exam: 1. breastfeeding/pumping accommodations; 2. accessibility to menstrual products of choice; and 3. provision of necessary bathroom breaks for pregnant women or women in need due to heavy menstruation. If each Bar Examination Board will pledge to a clear, reasonable, and easily accessible policy addressing these issues, women will have fair and consistent support for their medical needs while taking one of the most stressful exams of their lives. Women in 2020 and beyond should not continue to be negatively and irreparably impacted by these clearly gendered issues.
Future phases of #PumpUpTheBar will work to ensure that every bar association provides reasonable and private breastfeeding accommodations at conferences and meetings, and that courthouses provide designated breastfeeding facilities for attorneys who practice there. Sending women to pump in hot cars in parking garages, unsanitary bathrooms, and other random, unsecured spaces is unacceptable and is one of the many indignities that women lawyers face while simply trying to do their jobs.
Normalizing Parenthood in the Profession
One of the ongoing advocacy efforts of MothersEsquire is focused on the core of our mission: normalizing parenthood and addressing, head-on, the motherhood penalty and caregiver bias that remains pervasive in the legal profession. Through elevating our members’ voices — by providing them with opportunities to publish articles, speak on podcasts and at conferences, and serve in leadership roles that address gender equity in the profession — MothersEsquire brings to light the ways in which caregiving lawyers, and disproportionately, mothers, face structural barriers to their success in the profession. Through our various social media platforms — MothersEsquire Facebook Group, Facebook Page, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram — we connect women lawyers globally to network, share referrals, and exchange tips and tricks to successfully manage both a legal career and parenting responsibilities.
We also continue to grow our “brother network” through the Dads At The Bar Facebook group and address the issues that are inherent, and often unspoken, about the challenges of juggling a demanding legal career and fatherhood.
Finally, our founder authored a children’s book, My Mom, the Lawyer, which aims to help children see their lawyer-moms as smart and talented and as community helpers, and gives them a tool to discuss common issues and questions that children have about lawyers. All proceeds from sales of My Mom, the Lawyer go directly to MothersEsquire’s advocacy efforts.
MothersEsquire works stridently to keep clearing the path created by the many trailblazing lawyer-moms before of us to ensure, as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said, “Women [will be] in all places where decisions are being made.”
If you want to join MothersEsquire’s efforts to combat the motherhood penalty and caregiver bias, please consider a tax-deductible donation, or a corporate or firm sponsorship. Donations — whether they be $10 or the amount of one billable hour — all make a difference!
DONATE HERE
FOLLOW ALONG + BE A PART OF OUR NETWORKS
MothersEsquire Facebook Group, Dads At The Bar Facebook Group, Facebook Page, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram