September 7, 1943 - Beverly McLachlin - a podcast by Stephen Hammond

Madam Chief Justice Beverly McLachlin is born. Beverly McLachlin was born in Pincher Creek, Alberta on September 7, 1943. Before becoming a law professor at the University of British Columbia in 1974, she practiced law in Edmonton, Alberta, and in two B.C. cities, Fort St. John and Vancouver. Her first appointment to the bench came in 1981, when she sat as a judge in Vancouver’s county court. Only a few months later, she was appointed to the Supreme Court of B.C.; by 1985, she was making decisions at the B.C. Court of Appeal. She became chief justice of B.C.’s supreme court in 1988, on her forty-fifth birthday. Just one year later, when Justice William McIntyre retired from the top bench in 1989, McLachlin became B.C.’s representative at the Supreme Court of Canada – the first woman from B.C. to do so. But her trailblazing for women in law had just begun. When Prime Minister Jean Chrétien appointed McLachlin chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada on January 7, 2000, she was the first woman to hold this position – and one of very few women anywhere in the world to represent their country on the top bench. Inspired by her, of course, others would soon follow. By 2004, four of the nine judges sitting on Canada’s top bench were women.

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