Unit D - Blog #26

Women are assisted by men in almost all cases of law. This is because many firms will not allow women to work on cases alone or with only other women. This practice places gender roles on the law because it insinuates that the law must have a male present in it to oversee the process. This goes back to classical republican thinkers where there are two spheres that exist in the world- the house and the political arena. Women belonged in the sphere of the home, taking care of expenses, cleaning and the children and men belonged in politics, making laws and ascribing how the rest of society should act and behave. This has been seen in the law process in the U.S. for many years. "Man" is the word used to describe men and women throughout the U.S. Constitution. At law firms the men are taking women as interns almost as if they need guidance from a man because he will know what is best for the woman to do. Examples of this include assigning a female intern to a case with a male as a leader. Women lawyers are also not promoted as quickly due to this because they are viewed as not being able to handle their own course loads. Women are also not likely to be partners in the firm, but if they are it is always with another male figure. This allows for men to be deciding the interpretation of law more often and thus excludes half of the world's population from getting their views across as a woman.