For Phyllis Cancienne, her status as the only female managing partner of a major law firm in Baton Rouge is a sign that while women comprise a large percentage of lawyers in the city, it’s now time to promote them.
“I think women are very well represented in local law firms and being hired at very healthy rates. Almost 50 percent of our associates are women,” says Cancienne, Baton Rouge managing shareholder of Baker Donelson. “The challenge we face is retention, keeping them focused and promoting them to shareholders.”
As Business Report details in a new feature, “Rise of the ‘lady lawyers,’” Cancienne has been practicing law for 25 years and opened the Baton Rouge Baker Donelson office 10 years ago. As a labor employment attorney, she mainly works for traditionally male-dominated industries, but says she doesn’t blink an eye at being a woman surrounded by men and “they don’t either.”
Cancienne graduated from LSU Law Center in 1989, nine years after experts say the law profession changed dramatically for women. In the late 70s and early 80s, women lawyers faced gender inequality in law school, courtrooms and many male-dominated law firms.
“They used to call them ‘lady lawyers,’” says Jan Reeves, president of the Baton Rouge Association of Women Attorneys. “And if a ‘lady lawyer’ did go to court, she was asked to do minutes if the court clerk wasn’t around.”
BRAWA was formed in 1978 to lobby the Louisiana State Legislature to abolish the Head and Master Law, which stated if there was a dispute within the household, the man had final say. Louisiana was the last state to terminate that law, in 1979. Many of the gender inequality laws were also rewritten in Louisiana following former President Ronald Reagan’s 50 States Project, which was signed in 1981 to end discrimination against women. Because of that project, a committee, appointed by then Gov. Edwin Edwards, changed 22 laws. These laws redefined women’s roles as a wife and mother and ended discriminatory language. Some of the changes include: laws to protect women from domestic violence, laws to make marital rape illegal and requiring day cares to be licensed.
Ann Wise is the founding director of the Louisiana division of administrative law, served as vice-chair of Edwards’ committee and was instrumental in changing the 22 gender discriminatory laws. She has been practicing law for 35 years and says she experienced gender discrimination both in law school and in her early career.
“I had a professor say to me point blank, ‘You should be at home being a wife and mother,’” Wise says. “I’ve been treated dismissively. I would get honeyed and sweet-hearted all the time. What’s changed is acceptance. We used to be an oddity and a commodity, but now you see women professionally everywhere.”
Read the full feature, which includes statistics detailing gender diversity in Baton Rouge’s five largest law firms. Send your comments to editors@businessreport.com.
