“WHITE, MALE and stale” is how one legal association describes British judges. For obvious reasons the association does not want to be identified. Sir Colin Campbell, the Judicial Appointments Commissioner, was not much kinder in his recent report about the state of the judiciary. Whether it’s the “costume” of the judiciary or the recruitment policies, there seems to be general agreement that change is long overdue.
In an age where there is no shortage of smart designer suits for men and women to wear to work, it seems anachronistic that 21st-century judges are still wearing not only the long quasi-religious black gown of a bygone era but also the wig.
Cross the Atlantic and it is a different story. There, art definitely imitates life if the popular American television sitcoms are anything to go by. The glamour brought to the courtroom in Law and Order by women judges of every ethnic group is no exaggeration.
Judge Isobel Plumstead, however, says that British women judges are every bit as glamorous as their American counterparts. “We have some very glamorous women judges. They just don’t parade themselves around as much as American judges. Besides, the courtroom is not a catwalk.”
Judge Plumstead has a point. The recruitment and selection process for American judges is political, unlike the British system, and paying attention to one’s public image is, by default, a necessary evil. Whatever the Americans do, the sight of a head wrapped in horsehair is surely outdated. Natural hair, styled according to the fashion of the day, is surely less intimidating to the public.
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The glamour that American judges bring to the court has little to do with anything as superficial as hairstyle and fashionable clothes. In spite of all its imperfections, the American system allows for greater youth and diversity than the British system. Likewise, with the French system. Who can forget the glamour and chic that the blonde, mini-skirted judge brought to the Geoffrey Boycott assault proceedings? Judge Dominique HaumantDaumas just wouldn’t have looked the same with a ton of horsehair on her head. There again, the direct career path to the judiciary that exists in France means that there is a greater scope for youthful, and usually more glamorous, judges in the courtroom.
The 2003 survey about the public perception of courtroom wardrobe, Court Working Dress in England and Wales, came to interesting conclusions about both the public’s and court users’ preference for judges’ “costume”. On a scale of 1 to 7 (where 1 was traditional and 7 was modern) most respondents gave judges’ present attire an overall 1.9 rating but would prefer it to be at grade 4. Two thirds of respondents wanted to retain the wig for criminal judges. However, the pictures of judges that were shown to respondents were “white, male and female stale”. What might the results have revealed if the public had been given the chance to select from a multiracial group of young, glamorous judges without the wig, judges such as District Judge Donna Robinson Millhouse of Michigan’s 36th District Court or Judge Denise Lindberg of Utah State Courts (see www.36thdistrictcourt.org and www.utcourts.gov/judgesbios/distrgal3.htm for photos)?
Judge Isobel Plumstead is convinced that we needn’t cross the Atlantic to find glamorous judges. “Look at Mrs Justice Gloster, Mrs Justice Rafferty and Mrs Justice Hallett. If it’s glamour you’re looking for, there’s plenty there.”