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FLORIDA RECORD

Tuesday, March 19, 2024

FLORIDA SUPREME COURT: Supreme Court History: First woman sworn into office 34 years ago

Lawyer

Florida Supreme Court issued the following announcement on Nov. 15.

Thirty-four years ago, the first woman was sworn into office as a Justice of the Florida Supreme Court. Rosemary Barkett's investiture as the state's 71st Justice capped a remarkable career for one of Florida's pioneering women trial lawyers.

Barkett began her adult life as a nun known as Sister St. Michael in the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph in St. Augustine. Later she attended law school at the University of Florida.

After graduation, she became one of the first women to work in trial practice in Palm Beach County, before her appointment to the Fourth District Court of Appeal. Then in 1985, then-Gov. Bob Graham named her as the first woman to serve on Florida's highest court.

She later was appointed to the federal Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta and then to an international treaty court, the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal based in The Hague. Today she is one of the most honored women jurists in the nation and one of only two Florida Supreme Court Justices to become an international law judge.

Original source can be found here.

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