Barbara Durham

Barbara M. Durham (October 6, 1942 – December 30, 2002) was the first-ever female chief justice of the Washington Supreme Court. She also was a former federal judicial nominee to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Early life and education

Born in Anacortes, Washington, Durham graduated with a bachelor's degree in finance from Georgetown University. After working for one year at Merrill Lynch, Durham attended Stanford Law School, where she earned a law degree in 1968. She later went into private practice. In 1980, Washington Governor Dixy Lee Ray appointed Durham to the Washington Court of Appeals. In 1985, Governor John Spellman appointed her to the Washington Supreme Court, to a seat vacated by Carolyn Dimmick, who had resigned to accept an appointment to the United States District Court. Durham was chosen as Chief Justice by her peers in 1995. Durham stepped down as chief justice in 1998.

"I have a personal bias in favor of judges working their way up through the judicial system, so that when one gets to the higher court, one is familiar with the system, bottom to top," Durham once said. Durham was Washington's first judge to ever serve at all four levels of the state's courts. "This is a very happy day for me," Durham said at the time. The seat later was filled by Clinton's appointment of Seattle lawyer Richard Tallman, a Republican recommended by Gorton.

Resignation

On September 15, 1999, Durham resigned from the Washington Supreme Court more than three years before the end of her term, declining to give any specifics. Durham had had repeated unexplained absences from the court in the months prior to her resignation, and she gave no explanation for them in her resignation letter. Durham had, however, been recovering from eye surgery during the court's spring 1999 term. "The last few years, especially while serving as chief justice, have been taxing and frequently stressful," she wrote in her resignation to Washington Gov. Gary Locke. "Now is the time to take a fresh look at the future." She also told Locke that she was planning to "pursue some other interests related to the law."