Diversity in the Legal Profession: A Problem that Persists
Part One
**On June 4, 2020 the Washington Supreme Court issued an open letter to the judiciary and legal community recognizing deep-seated and continuing institutional racial injustice and calling for action to address systemic inequities. The Washington State Law Library is dedicated to furthering the Court’s goal by publishing stories that highlight the historical context surrounding systemic racism and efforts to dismantle it.**
The law profession suffers a diversity problem. In 2015 late Stanford University law professor Deborah Rhode wrote in the Washington Post that, in fact, the law profession was the least diverse of all American professions. The American Bar Association (ABA) reported last year that almost all people of color are underrepresented in the legal profession with 86% of all lawyers being non-Hispanic whites, down only three percent from ten years earlier.
The problem is present throughout the profession. In 2020 Black and Latinx women each accounted for less than 1% of all partners in major U.S. law firms. The judiciary, likewise, is predominantly white, making up 80.2% of the federal bench. Only two federal judges are Native American, accounting for one-tenth of 1% of the federal bench, while Native Americans make up 1.3% of the U.S. population. Alongside racial diversity, the field of law also suffers from a dearth of LGBTQ and disabled attorneys.
This blog post will address the reasons for the lack of diversity in the legal profession. In a future post, we will explore attempts to remedy the problem and provide further reading on the topic.
Why does diversity in the law matter?
Diversifying the legal profession is one step in addressing many of the problems identified by the State Supreme Court in their open letter. As expressed in the ABA publication Law Practice Today, diversity represents reality, breeds innovation, allows employers to attract top talent, allows firms to gain clients, and leads to economic growth. Also at stake is the perceived legitimacy of the judicial system itself. Confidence in the courts derives from a court system where the judges, prosecutors, and defenders represent the population at large. The courts, which draw on legal professionals from all sectors, have a long way to go to achieve full representation on the bench.
Why is there a lack of diversity?
There are many reasons the legal profession remains mostly white. The costs associated with law school and the resulting debt disproportionately affect students of color. Educational barriers are extensive, including continued attacks on affirmative action programs, overreliance on LSAT scores for entry to law school, and an entrenched system of ranking law schools. These barriers, as well as disparate bar exam passage rates for those who made it through law school, stack the deck against marginalized populations wishing to enter the profession. Even before college, many economically disadvantaged students are not exposed to the idea of law school through family or community members and do not see the law as a career option.
The legal profession, and law firms in particular, also experience recruitment, retention, and promotion issues. The ABA reports in its study, Left Out and Left Behind: The Hurdles, Hassles, and Heartaches of Achieving Long-term Legal Careers for Women of Color, that 70 percent of their study participants left or considered leaving the profession for reasons such as feeling undervalued, barriers to career advancement such as the “persistence of the ‘Old Boys’ Club,” and conflicts between personal responsibilities and professional expectations. Other problems in the workplace include traditional hierarchical law firm structures, lack of objective standards for reviewing work, and explicit and implicit sexism and racism.
In Part Two of Diversity in the Legal Profession: A Problem that Persists we will explore efforts being made to diversify the profession and will offer resources for further reading. (SC)
