Madam Chief Justice: Jean Hoefer Toal of South Carolina, edited by
W. Lewis Burke Jr. and
Joan P. Assey, is out from University of South Carolina Press:
In Madam Chief Justice, editors W. Lewis Burke Jr. and Joan
P. Assey chronicle the remarkable career of Jean Hoefer Toal, South
Carolina's first female Supreme Court Chief Justice. As a lawyer,
legislator, and judge, Toal is one of the most accomplished women in
South Carolina history. In this volume, contributors, including a former
and current U. S. Supreme Court justice, federal and state judges,
state leaders, historians, legal scholars, leading attorneys, family,
and friends, provide analysis, perspective, and biographical information
about the life and career of this dynamic leader and her role in
shaping South Carolina.
Growing up in Columbia during the 1950s and 60s, Jean
Hoefer was a youthful witness to the civil rights movement in the state
and nation. Observing the state's premier civil rights lawyer Matthew J.
Perry Jr. in court encouraged her to attend law school, where she met
her husband, Bill Toal. When she was admitted to the South Carolina Bar
in 1968, fewer than one hundred women had been admitted in the state's
history. From then forward she has been both a leader and a role model.
As a lawyer she excelled in trial and appellate work and won major
victories on behalf of Native Americans and women. In 1975 Toal was
elected to the South Carolina House of Representatives and despite her
age and gender quickly became one of the most respected members of that
body. During her fourteen years as a House member, Toal promoted major
legislation on issues including constitutional law, criminal law,
utilities regulation, local government, state appropriations, workers
compensation, and freedom of information.
In 1988 Toal was sworn in as the first female justice on
the Supreme Court of South Carolina, where she made her mark through her
preparation and insight. She was elected chief justice in 2000,
becoming the first woman ever to hold the highest position in the
state's judiciary. As chief justice, Toal not only modernized her court,
but also the state's judicial system. As Toal's two daughters write,
the traits their mother brings to her professional life—exuberance,
determination, and loyalty—are the same traits she demonstrates in her
personal and family life. As a child Toal loved roller skating in the
lobby of the post office, a historic building that now serves as the
Supreme Court of South Carolina. From a child in Columbia to madam chief
justice, she has come full circle.
Madam Chief Justice features a foreword by
Sandra Day O'Connor, retired associate justice of the United States
Supreme Court, and an introduction by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, an associate
justice of the United States Supreme Court.
