In the fall of 1988, under the leadership of Tom Hollander, then ACBA president, the ACBA Board of Governors agreed that women attorneys faced various forms of discrimination and inequality and directed the creation of a Women in the Law Committee to address the matter. Mr. Hollander put together an impressive committee with many women attorneys, leaders of the bar, and judges. The Committee’s first chair was Carol S. Mills McCarthy.

 

Soon after its inception, the Committee began working to address gender bias in the legal profession. In 1989 the Gender Bias Subcommittee was formed. In 1991 the Committee conducted the first survey on gender bias in the county legal profession, ultimately leading to the formation of the Institute for Gender Equality. The Committee would later become the Women in the Law Division in 2003.