Legal Skills Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Legal Skills - Essay Example In the United States alone, they take up 24% of the total number of attorneys. This volume continues to grow especially with the fact that the current number of women law students today is 40% of total. Furthermore, it is forecasted that by 2010, 40% of the legal profession will be made up of women1,2. Despite these fact however, it is regrettable to note that some sectors in society remain reluctant in accepting the legitimacy of women as barristers and solicitors and their eventual appointment to judicial office. No less than the media is participatory in such discriminatory actions towards women. This is evident in many of the articles written about women in the legal profession such as â€Å"Justice Wears a Skirt† and that which talked about the law being â€Å"feminized†.3 This paper will be focusing on the women in law profession and their role as barristers and solicitors. It will make mention of several of the most famous of them and how they got to where they a re. II. The Role of Solicitors and Barristers Solicitors refer to lawyers who have complied with the educational demands and other prerequisites of the Law Society and have worked for two years under the supervision of a practicing solicitor. They have restricted authorization to plead before a court but in general, do not. Solicitors act as professional middlepersons between clients and barristers. They spend majority of their time in the office to plan strategies for the case and to write comprehensive guidelines for the barristers to follow. Barristers, on the other hand, are the legal experts who actually appear in court, and present the case compliant with the guidelines provided by the solicitors. Unlike solicitors, they do not interact with the clients; rather, they function as highly-trained and well-experienced specialists in legal procedure and points of law. Unlike solicitors also, they have direct access to court. However, the restriction on the right of solicitors to ap pear before the court has been removed by the Court and Legal Services Act. Also, the clients are given more direct access to barristers who have complied with the Bar Council prerequisites and have informed the council that they plan on doing direct access work. III. Statistics on Women Solicitors and Barristers Women make up 24% of the lawyers of the country. This amount is almost twice higher since 1985, when the percentage was just 13%, and higher by eight times than in 1971, when the percentage was just 3%. The place of women in the legal profession continues to rise. Women comprise 44% of all law students. However, despite making up over 50% of the population, the present projections indicate that the percentage of women in the profession will never reach 50%. Women are instituting themselves as leaders in the legal profession. By 1997, women made up 32% of the ABA Board of Governors, 22% of the members of the American Bar Association House of Delegates, 20% of state civil jud ges, 19% of federal judges, 8% of deans of law school, 19% of law school professors, and 14% of law firm partners4. Since the early part of the 1970s, the portion of female law students has increased by over four times, from 9.4% in 1972/1973 to 44% in 1996/19975. In response to reports by members of the faculty and female law students in law schools regarding gender discrimination, a sequence of hearings were carried out in 1994 and 1995 by the ABA Commission on Women in the Profession for the purpose of