Publication Date
2026
Document Type
Article
English Abstract
Although women and racialized lawyers comprise significant proportions of the Canadian bar, they and other equity-deserving lawyers remain markedly underrepresented among counsel making oral submissions before the Supreme Court of Canada. This article presents findings from a five-year empirical study (2017–2021) examining who appears before the Court through an observational analysis of 273 cases and a survey of 279 counsel. The research reveals that presenting counsel are predominantly white, cis-male, and have extensive experience at the bar: e.g., women account for only 26.9% of appearing counsel, while racialized lawyers comprise 12.8%. After evaluating whether this gap can be attributed to experience deficits, the article dismisses alternative explanations, including that diversity will improve with time or that equity-deserving lawyers lack interest, and argues that discrimination within the legal profession is the most plausible explanation. The article examines how bias from clients, courts, and employers operates to exclude equity-deserving lawyers from elite litigation opportunities and proposes that senior advocates must actively sponsor diverse counsel to argue before the Supreme Court.
Citation Information
Nichini, Tom and Brooks, Kim.
"The Closed Door at 301 Wellington Street."
Journal of Law and Social Policy
38.
(2026): 109-139.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.60082/0829-3929.1518
https://digitalcommons.osgoode.yorku.ca/jlsp/vol38/iss1/7
References
1 As described by Peter Hogg, the constitutional legal scholar who is the most cited academic in Supreme Court of Canada decisions; see Drew Hasselback, “National Securities Regulator Would be Unconstitutional: Alberta Court of Appeal”, Financial Post (8 March 2011), online: [perma.cc/EEB2-3UVW].
2 Just highlighting a few full-length monographs by Canadian scholars, see Mary Jane Mossman, The First Women Lawyers: A Comparative Study of Gender, Law and the Legal Professions (Oxford: Hart, 2006); Jean McKenzie Leiper, Bar Codes: Women in the Legal Profession (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2006); Joan Brockman, Gender in the Legal Profession: Fitting or Breaking the Mould (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2001); Constance Backhouse, Petticoats and Prejudice: Women and Law in Nineteenth-Century Canada (Toronto: Women’s Press, 1991).
3 But see Constance Backhouse, “Race and Gender in the Construction of Legal Professionalism” in Adam Dodek & Alice Woolley, eds, In Search of the Ethical Lawyer: Stories from the Canadian Legal Profession (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2016) 126; Kim Brooks, “The Daily Work of Fitting in as a Marginalized Lawyer” (2019) 45:1 Queen's LJ 157; Charles C Smith, “Who is Afraid of the Big Bad Social Constructionists? Or Shedding Light on the Unpardonable Whiteness of the Canadian Legal Profession” (2008) 45:5 Alta L Rev 55. See also Camille A Nelson, “Out of Sync: Reflections on the Culture of Diversity in Private Practice” (1999) 19:1/2 Can Woman Studies 199; Asher Alkoby & Pnina Alon-Shenker, “Out of the Closet and Up the Ladder? Diversity in Ontario’s Big Law Firms” (2017) 34:2 Windsor YB Access to Justice 4. For books on the topic of lawyers from equity-deserving backgrounds, see: Meera E Deo, Unequal Profession: Race and Gender in Legal Academia (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2019); Ronit Dinovitzer et al, Diversity in Practice: Race, Gender, and Class in Legal and Professional Careers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016); Tsedale Melaku, You Don’t Look Like a Lawyer: Black Women and Systemic Gendered Racism (Lanham, USA: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2019).
4 For the purposes of this paper, lawyers who have identities or come from communities that are equity-deserving (e.g., racialized, Indigenous, disabled, queer, working class, ethnic) are referred to as equity-deserving or non-normative lawyers. Lawyers who are male, white, middle- or upper-income, able-bodied, straight and cisgendered are referred to as “normative” lawyers. This language is intended to suggest that when we think of the “typical lawyer” we have a vision of who that person is; we do not automatically imagine a racialized, disabled person, for example, in that “type.”
5 We use the word normative to describe lawyers who easily conform to the standards or norms established in a profession historically dominated by white, heterosexual, able-bodied, cis-men, frequently from upper class backgrounds. It is used in its colloquial meaning. See the Oxford Languages definition: “establishing, relating to, or deriving from a standard or norm, especially of behavior” (14 January 2023).
6 Borrowing tongue-in-cheek from the New York Times, the Supreme Court is more likely to hear from a Peter, James, or David than to hear from a woman. Claire Miller, Kevin Quealy & Margot Sanger-Katz, “The Top Jobs Where Women Are Outnumbered by Men Named John” The New York Times (25 April 2018), online: [perma.cc/ML2Z-E2ZR].
7 This hypothesis aligns with the findings of a 2020 study by the New York State Bar Association about women litigators. The report found that women accounted for 26.7% of those appearing in commercial and criminal cases in courtrooms across New York and 25.3% of lead counsel roles. The study found women were more likely to appear as counsel for public sector matters and less likely to appear in private civil and criminal matters. The percentage of women appearing at trial and appellate courts was about 25%. (The study looked only at a sample of New York State courts.) New York State Bar Association, The Time Is Now: Achieving Equality for Women Attorneys in the Courtroom and in ADR (New York State Bar Association, 2020), online (pdf): [perma.cc/KNU8-396K]. See also American Bar Foundation & Commission on Women in the Profession, First Chairs at Trial: More Women Need Seats at the Table: A Research Report on the Participation of Women Lawyers as Lead Counsel and Trial Counsel in Litigation (American Bar Association, 2015), online (pdf): [perma.cc/3C7L-3U7X].
8 See e.g. Chris Tennant, “Discrimination in the Legal Profession, Codes of Professional Conduct and the Duty of Non-Discrimination” (1992) 15:2 Dal LJ 464; Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion, Power, Privilege and Inequities in the Legal Profession (Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion, 2018), online (pdf): [perma.cc/U2N9-BA72]; Joan Brockman & Fiona M Kay, “Barriers to Gender Equality in the Canadian Legal Establishment” (2000) 8 Feminist Leg Studies 169; Noel Semple, “Male, Pale, and Stale? Diversity in Lawyers’ Regulatory Leadership” (2017) CJLS 405.
9 We are grateful for the hard work of five research assistants who were engaged in this project across 5 years: Zainab Adejumobi, Charlotte Hobson, Shane Isler, Maryn Marsland, and Megan Thompson.
10The concept of “passing” refers to the management of one’s social identity, allowing one’s identity and stigmas associated with it to be discredited. Erving Goffman, Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963) at 73—75.
11 For further discussion of passing as a lawyer, and other strategies employed to “fit in,” see Brooks, supra note 3.
12 We excluded intervenors for two reasons. First, we wanted to look at what might be considered the most “elite” aspect of going to the show: being engaged by the main parties to the action. Second, the reasons why a lawyer might be selected by an intervenor group may be quite different from the reasons lawyers are selected to represent the main party and we were interested in exploring the “why” behind the data we uncovered. For a deeper study on the composition of intervenors in SCC cases, see Danielle McNabb, “Who Intervenes in Supreme Court Cases in Canada?” (2023) 56:3 Can J Political Science 715.
13 Erin Cowling, “Diversity and Inclusion in the Courtroom: A Necessity, Not a Luxury” (2018) 37:1 Adv J 27.
14 Arthur Peltomaa, “Gender and Racial Diversity of Counsel at the Supreme Court of Canada: An Empirical Study” (28 September 2021), online: [perma.cc/AM5Y-7UAY].
15 A 36% response rate from legal professionals met our expected range, given the low response rates frequent among legal professionals. Many emails bounced back as lawyers have changed firms or left practice.
16 Some limitations emerged due to the survey software; once published, it was not possible to make corrections and the description box for the “other: please describe” category for racial identity did not function. To allow a better comparative dataset, we matched our racial identity category with the Law Society of Ontario’s bar surveys; some survey respondents found that the “White” category was overbroad by including minority groups—such as Greeks and Jews—who experience discrimination. Some respondents were also confused as to whether an appearance included a non-speaking role; we compared the survey responses with our observational study to ensure only advocates who spoke were included.
17 Given that law is provincially and territorially regulated, statistics collection on lawyers is predominantly done through law societies. Ontario collects the most sophisticated data on diversity; while other provinces, like British Columbia and Alberta, collect some related to gender.
18 Statistics Canada, “Census Profile, 2021 Census of Population” (15 November 2023) Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-316-X2021001, online: [https://web.archive.org/web/20260723023520/https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2021/dp-pd/prof/index.cfm?Lang=E].
19 Federation of Law Societies of Canada, 2019 Statistical Report of the Federation of Law Societies of Canada (2019), online (pdf): [perma.cc/EF24-DJGU].
20 For gender of counsel listed by the factum, we made assumptions about gender based on names and by searching for those lawyers’ profiles online. Where gender could not be confidently inferred from name and public profiles, we coded as unknown and relied on survey self-reporting if available. Similar to the broader observational study, this comes with risks of mis-gendering counsel based on assumptions.
21 Michael Ornstein, Statistical Snapshot of Lawyers in Ontario: from the Lawyer Annual Report 2021 (Toronto: Law Society of Ontario, 2021) at 3, online (pdf): [perma.cc/6HHX-VWSL].
22 Statistics Canada, “Census Profile, 2016 Census” (15 November 2023) Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-316-X2016001, online: [https://perma.cc/KK6N-RHK4]; Statistics Canada, supra note 18.
23 Ornstein, supra note 21 at 3.
24 Ibid.
25 Equity Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Committee, “Diversity Action Plan” (Law Society of British Columbia, 2020) at Appendix C, online (pdf): [perma.cc/Z2X9-W2S2].
26 Ornstein, supra note 21 at 3.
27 See Supreme Court of Canada, “Statistical Summary 2013 to 2022” (10 February 2023), online: [perma.cc/E8D3-F3VQ] (when compared with a search on LexisNexis for SCC cases between 2017 to 2021 mentioning Aboriginal Law) [Supreme Court of Canada, “Statistical Summary”].
28 Statistics Canada, “Socioeconomic Profile of the 2SLGBTQ+ Population aged 15 years and older, 2019 to 2021” (25 January 2024), online: [perma.cc/XZ9L-X6ER].
29 Ornstein, supra note 21 at 10.
30 Statistics Canada, "New Data on Disability in Canada, 2022" (1 December 2023), online: [perma.cc/8MFX-4PNF].
31 Ornstein, supra note 21 at 10.
32 The disparity between the percentage of the general population having a disability and lawyers reporting a disability may be partially explained by the nuanced decision to disclose disability in the workplace, see e.g. Fitore Hyseni, Arzana Myderrizi & Peter Blanck, “Diversity and Inclusion in the Legal Profession: Disclosure of Cancer and Other Health Conditions by Lawyers with Disabilities and Lawyers who Identify as LGBTQ+” (2022) 16 J Cancer Survivorship 165.
33 Statistics Canada, “Immigration and Ethnocultural Diversity Statistics” (26 April 2024), online: [perma.cc/SR28-PUYX].
34 The COVID-19 pandemic may have affected appearance rates in 2020-2021. Multiple studies have found that COVID-19 had a disproportionate impact on marginalized groups, see Cynthia L Cooper, “Work-Life Imbalance: Pandemic Disruption Places New Stresses on Women Lawyers” (2020) 28:2 Perspectives 3 (observing the difficulties faced by women during the pandemic); Tsedale M Melaku, “The Awakening: The Impact of COVID-19, Racial Upheaval, and Political Polarization on Black Women Lawyers” (2021) 89:6 Fordham L Rev 2519 (recognizing the experiences of racialized women in the pandemic); Julia Lockhart, “‘Holding up the Sky’: In the COVID-19 Pandemic, You Can Be a Lawyer or a Parent, but Not Both” (2020) 78:6 Adv J 817 (noting the impact of the pandemic on parents, particularly mothers).
35 The research team included Brenda Beagan, Kim Brooks, Merlinda Weinberg, Brenda Hattie, Tameera Mohamed, and Bea Waterfield.
36 For a fuller description of the method of this study, see Brooks, supra note 3.
37 Or, applying a public-duty lens, experience better facilitates the Court’s understanding (even if the party loses) and therefore results in “better law.”
38 See e.g. Kevin McGuire, “Repeat Players in the Supreme Court: The Role of Experienced Lawyers in Litigation Success” (1995) 57:1 Journal of Politics 187; Susan Haire, Stefanie Lindquist & Roger Hartley, “Attorney Expertise, Litigant Success, and Judicial Decision making in the US Courts of Appeals” (1999) 33:3 Law & Soc’y Rev 667. There is also evidence that suggests that lawyers who were clerks before the highest level of court are more likely to be successful in front of that court. See e.g. Kevin McGuire, “Lobbyists, Revolving Doors and the U.S. Supreme Court” (2000) 16 JL & Pol 113 at 135. This suggests that the composition of the clerks selected by the Supreme Court of Canada matters. If that group is not diverse; perhaps the Court is failing in its aspiration to encourage a diverse bar.
39 Timothy Johnson, Paul Wahlbeck & James Spriggs, “The Influence of Oral Arguments on the US Supreme Court” (2006) 100:1 Am Political Science Rev 99.
40 Pamela Corley, “The Supreme Court and Opinion Content: The Influence of Parties’ Briefs” (2008) 61:3 Political Research Q 468.
41 Roy Flemming, Tournament of Appeals: Granting Judicial Review in Canada (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2004).
42 Ibid; Roy Flemming & Glen Krutz, “Repeat Litigators and Agenda Setting on the Supreme Court of Canada” (2002) 35:4 Can J Political Science 811.
43 John Szmer, Tammy Sarver & Erin Kaheny, “Does the Lawyer Matter? Influencing Outcomes on the Supreme Court of Canada” (2007) 41:2 Law & Soc’y Rev 259.
44 Michael Ornstein, Statistical Snapshot of Lawyers in Ontario: from the Lawyer Annual Report 2017 (Toronto: Law Society of Ontario, 2017) at 5, online (pdf): [perma.cc/9LNV-J65V].
45 Margaret Thornton describes this as the stock response that “it will be only a matter of time before women are equitably represented”: “The Gender Trap: Flexible Work in Corporate Legal Practice” (2007) 45:4 Osgoode Hall LJ 773 at 774.
46 As a DRI Task Force concludes, “In the past, firms have attributed the low percentage of women partners to under-representation in law schools, and have reasoned that the number of women partners would increase over time as more women joined the ranks of law firms. This is no longer a viable explanation.” DRI, A Career in the Courtroom: A Different Model for the Success of Women Who Try Cases (DRI, 2004) at 8, online (pdf): [perma.cc/D42A-QYLY] [DRI, A Career in the Courtroom].
47 Backhouse, “Gender and Race,“ supra note 3; Fiona M Kay & Joan Brockman, “Barriers to Gender Equality in the Canadian Legal Establishment” (2000) 8:2 Feminist L Stud 169.
48 Ornstein, supra note 21 at 17.
49 In 2020, pre-pandemic, the base salary of women was $19,000 less than men, while in 2022, the gap widened to $24,000 (see The Counsel Network, “The 2022 In-House Compensation & Career Survey” (30 June 2022), online: [perma.cc/Y322-5H5E]).
50 Ibid.
51 Ornstein, supra note 21 at 15.
52 Ibid.
53 Some creative advocates have marshalled literature that differentiates between men and women as presenting a unique set of litigation advantages that ought to result in more clients using women litigators. See e.g. Jan Nielsen Little, “Ten Reasons Why Women Make Great Trial Lawyers” Keker, Van Nest & Peters LLP (1 June 2006), online (pdf): [perma.cc/B44V-SELS]; Sara Lincoln & Tricia Derr, “The Benefits Of Being A Woman In The Courtroom” Mondaq (14 August 2019), online: [perma.cc/CP3V-K8AQ].
54 Jerry Kang et al, “Are Ideal Litigators White? Measuring the Myth of Colorblindness” (2010) 7:4 J Empirical Leg Stud 886 at 891.
55 Thornton, supra note 45 at 775.
56 Supreme Court of Canada, “2023: Year in Review” (2024) at 28, online (pdf): [perma.cc/W666-NZZA].
57 Supreme Court of Canada, “Statistical Summary,” supra note 27.
58 See R v Gladue, 1999 CanLii 679 (SCC) at para 58; R v Ipeelee, 2012 SCC 13 at para 58.
59 Department of Justice, “Overrepresentation of Black People in the Canadian Criminal Justice System” (December 2022), online (pdf): [perma.cc/RFA3-M9C6].
60 See e.g. R v S (RD), 1997 CanLII 324 (SCC) (where the SCC ruled that a Black judge’s comments about her experience of racism did not indicate bias); Reference re An Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families, 2024 SCC 5 (where the SCC determined the constitutional validity of a federal act that set national standards and provides Indigenous peoples with effective control over their children’s welfare) [Reference re Indigenous Children’s Welfare]; R v Le, 2019 SCC 34 (where the SCC explored the interaction between race, Charter rights, and law enforcement) [Le].
62 Supreme Court of Canada, “2021: Year in Review” (2022) at 6, online (pdf): [perma.cc/8A58-6LSF].
63 See e.g. Reference re Indigenous Children’s Welfare, supra note 60; Le, supra note 60 (for examples of intervenors representing equity-deserving groups).
64 John Szmer, Erin B Kaheny & Tammy A Sarver, “’I Haven't Come a Long Way, and I'm Not a Baby’: Task Assignment and Diversity of the Supreme Court Bar” (2021) 102:6 Social Science Quarterly 2907 at 2921.
65 Someone who claims to have 30 years of litigation experience in federal court (US) advances this justification in the comments of Hon. Shira Scheindlin’s article, “What makes a person right on a case…is a mix of brains, background for a case, client preference and personal skills… To compel, coerce, or otherwise interfere with the attorney-client relationship by injecting gender, race or any other non-merits factor is appalling and unethical” (see Shira A Scheindlin, “Female Lawyers Can Talk, Too” The New York Times (8 August 2017) at comments, online: [perma.cc/PZA4-PPJB]).
66 See e.g. Anthony G Greenwald, Debbie E McGhee & Jordan LK Schwartz, “Measuring Individual Differences in Implicit Cognition: The Implicit Association Test” (1998) 74:6 J of Personality & Social Psychology 1464; Kristin A Lane, Jerry Kang & Mahzarin R Banaji, “Implicit Social Cognition and Law” (2007) 3:1 Annual Review of Law & Social Science 427 (who demonstrate biases present in the judiciary).
67 Studies that attempt to test whether these implicit biases (whether stereotypes or attitudes) translate into discriminatory behaviour in the real world increasingly find that they do. See e.g. Anthony G Greenwald et al, “Understanding and Using the Implicit Association Test: III. Meta-Analysis of Predictive Validity” (2009) 97:1 J of Personality & Social Psychology 17.
68 Kang et al, supra note 54.
69 Ibid at 910.
70 See e.g. Alice H Eagly & Steven J Karau, “Role Congruity Theory of Prejudice Toward Female Leaders” (2002) 109:3 Psychological Rev 573; Erin Crandall, “A Reflection of Canadian Society? An Analysis of Federal Appointments to Provincial Superior Courts by the Liberal Government of Justin Trudeau” (2022) 45:2 Dalhousie LJ 359.
71 Peltomaa, supra note 14 (“Canada: 21.5%; Alberta: 50.8%; Ontario: 48.5%; British Columbia: 37.7%; Quebec: 26.0%” at 4).
72 Ibid at 4–5.
73 Government of Canada, “The 50 – 30 Challenge: Your Diversity Advantage” (27 June 2025), online: [perma.cc/4ABQ-PZG8].
74 There is some empirical work on the bias of juries toward lawyers from equity-deserving groups. It is not reviewed here because appellate level courts do not have juries and appellate level court experience is presumably more important in securing a mandate before the Supreme Court of Canada. See e.g. Janet Sigal et al, “The Effect of Presentation Style and Sex of Lawyer on Jury Decision-Making Behavior” (1985) 22:3–4 Psychology: A Quarterly J of Human Behavior 13; Peter W Hahn & Susan D Clayton, “The Effects of Attorney Presentation Style, Attorney Gender, and Juror Gender on Juror Decisions” (1996) 20:5 Law & Human Behavior 533.
75 See Erin Crandall & Robert Schertzer, “Competing Diversities: Representing ‘Canada’ On The Supreme Court” in Elizabeth Goodyear-Grant & Kyle Hanniman, eds, Canada: The State of the Federation 2017: Canada at 150: Federalism and Democratic Renewal (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019) 111; Kathleen Harris, “The Changing Face of Canada's Judiciary: More Women, More Diversity” CBC News (5 May 2019), online: [perma.cc/3MPQ-QX4C].
76 John Szmer et al, “The Impact of Attorney Gender on Decision Making in the United States Courts of Appeals” (2013) 34:1 J of Women, Politics & Policy 72; John Szmer, Tammy A Sarver & Erin B Kaheny, “Have We Come a Long Way, Baby? The Influence of Attorney Gender on Supreme Court Decision Making” (2010) 6:1 Politics & Gender 1 [Szmer, Sarver & Kaheny, “Have We Come a Long Way, Baby”].
77 Szmer, Sarver & Kaheny, “Have We Come a Long Way, Baby,” supra note 76 at 29.
78 Erin B Kaheny, John Szmer & Tammy A Sarver, “Women Lawyers Before the Supreme Court of Canada” (2011) 44:1 Can J of Political Science 83 at 94 [Kaheny, Szmer & Sarver, “Women Lawyers”].
79 Ibid at 104.
80 Ibid.
81 As Lara Bazelon recounts, “I told myself my duty was to my client, not my gender” (see Lara Bazelon, “What It Takes to Be a Trial Lawyer If You’re Not a Man” The Atlantic (September 2018), online: [perma.cc/CA25-SU86]).
82 See e.g. Latonia Haney Keith, “Visibility Invisibility: Feedback Bias in the Legal Profession” (2021) 23:2 J of Gender, Race & Justice 315 at 332; Ziva Kunda, Lisa Sinclair & Dale Griffin, “Equal Ratings but Separate Meanings: Stereotypes and the Construal of Traits” (1997) 72:4 J of Personality & Social Psychology 720; Elizabeth H Gorman, “Gender Stereotypes, Same-Gender Preferences, and Organizational Variation in the Hiring of Women: Evidence from Law Firms” (2005) 70:4 American Sociological Review 702 at 722.
83 DRI, A Career in the Courtroom, supra note 46 at 9.
84 Natasha S Madon, “Early Departure: Factors Associated with the Flight of Women from the Private Practice of Criminal Law” (2018) 65 Crim LQ 395 at 407.
85 Ibid at 410–411.
86 Ibid at 408.
87 Ibid at 408–409.
88 Constance Backhouse, “Turning the Tables on RDS: Racially Revealing Questions Asked by White Judges” (2021) 44:1 Dal LJ 181.
89 Ibid at 184.
90 See e.g. Christine Boyle, “Teaching Law As If Women Really Mattered, or, What About the Washrooms?” (1986) 2:1 CJWL 96 at 102; Supreme Court of Canada, “2023–2025 Accessibility Plan” (last modified 23 December 2025), online: [perma.cc/D24Y-WQUV].
91 For a discussion on the Supreme Court building, see David DesBaillets, “Representing Canadian Justice: Legal Iconography and Symbolism at the Supreme Court of Canada” (2018) 14:1 International J of L in Context 132.
92 The Canadian Press, “Lawyers to Get Unisex Change Room at Ontario's Top Court Following Petition” CBC News (20 February 2019), online: [perma.cc/S7EB-39Q9].
93 Shannon Kari, “A Woman’s Place” Canadian Lawyer Magazine (25 June 2018), online: [perma.cc/A4RK-GAFU].
94 Scheindlin, supra note 65.
95 Bazelon, supra note 81.
96 Ria Guidone, a 3rd year Schulich School of Law student, was advised to “[t]ry to warm up, try and smile a little. You should seduce the court” (see Sandra Shutt, “Sexism is Not Moot” Canadian Lawyer Magazine (8 August 2017), online: [perma.cc/D3KS-6KJ4]); Amanda Byrd, an Osgoode Hall Law School student, was told by both judges of her competitive moot that “a smile would be nice” and that she should smile more (see Amanda Byrd, “I Spent Hundreds of Hours Preparing for Moot Court. When I Got There, I Was Told to Smile More” CBC Radio (1 June 2018), online: [perma.cc/D4QL-FHVA]).
97 Various associations in the United States have been particularly active around keeping women in the litigation bar. See e.g. The DRI Women in the Law Committee, Women in the Law Tool Kit: A Resource for State and Local Defense Organizations (Chicago: DRI, 2018), online (pdf): [perma.cc/QK7V-4NPR]; DRI, Women in the Courtroom: Best Practices Guide (Chicago: 2007), online (pdf): [perma.cc/3HT7-DB5D; DRI, A Career in the Courtroom, supra note 46; American Bar Association, “The Woman Advocate” (last visited 29 May 2022), online: [perma.cc/ZXY6-9S3F].
98 The research suggests this will facilitate the fairness of the hearing received by marginalized lawyers and that over time it will shift the kinds of decisions panels of judges make. The point of the 2011 Kaheny, Szmer & Sarver study was to test whether having a more gender-balanced bench (as the Canadian Supreme Court does relative to the United States Supreme Court) resulted in a more even-handed treatment of women litigators; they concluded that it might (see Kaheny, Szmer & Sarver, “Women Lawyers,” supra note 78 at 104).