Issue link: http://cp.revolio.com/i/24680
fessional women, her evolving femi- nism metamorphosed in two stages: first, in successfully navigating a male- dominated world, then in courageous- ly taking risks for other women. “It was a challenge to decide how to stand up, speak for other women, show that I was concerned about dis- crimination in the profession, in the society, without being rejected by the firm, by my colleagues,” said Born to Ms. “But I think I didn’t really have a choice. You can’t have the advantages I had without thinking about the other people and reaching out to help them.” Born’s feminism helped change the lives of countless other women in her profession and in society. She co- founded the National Women’s Law Center and serves as chair of its board. She was a founder of the Women’s Legal Defense Fund in 1971, founded the American Bar Association’s Women’s Caucus and was the first woman to serve on the ABA panel that evaluates federal judicial nominees. She rewrote the ABA regulations that judicial nominees should have a mini- mum of 15 years of trial litigation work, which had precluded most women. Within the ABA, she helped fight for both the ERA and Title IX. Together with her friend Marna Tucker, Born taught one of the first courses in women and the law in the country, at Catholic University’s Columbus School of Law in Wash- ington, D.C., in the early 1970s. “There were no casebooks or treatis- es available for such a class and so Marna and I began to research what the law was relating to women so that we could teach it,” she recalls. “And the more we researched, the more we realized that not only did the law sup- port the societal discrimination against women, but in fact it was re- quiring it in many respects.…One of the wonderful things about the www.msmagazine.com women’s movement and women lawyers in it has been that [they] have been working since the 1970s to eliminate [discriminatory] laws and make laws gender-neutral.” Born became familiar with derivatives in the mid-1970s when she represented London Futures Exchanges in front of the CFTC. The U.S. had decided to regulate not just trading CAUSED MYSELF A LOT OF GRIEF, BUT THAT’S WHAT A LIFE ACTING ON PRINCIPLE IS ALL ABOUT.” “ W admitted he erred. “All tragedies in life are preceded by warnings,” Levitt told Newsweek’s Michael Hirsh in December 2008. “We had a warning, it was from Brooksley Born. We didn’t listen to that. …I think that the explosive growth of a product that was unlisted and unregulated should have occasioned greater reaction.” The final word in the matter will belong to the 10-member Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, an investigative body appointed in July by Congress. Its December 2010 report should provide “a full explanation of why so many peo- ple lost their homes, their life’s savings and their hard-earned pensions.” Those were the words of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as she announced one of her appointments to the commission: Brooksley Born. Want to know more about groundbreaking women lawyers? Check out one of Brooksley Born’s projects, the “Women Trailblazers in the Law” oral histories: www.abanet.org/srlawyers/oralhistory/home.html NARDA ZACCHINO is publisher/editor of Time Capsule Press, a Northern California book publisher; she was formerly associate editor of the Los Angeles Times and deputy editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. ROBERT SCHEER is author of The Great American Stick-up: Greedy Bankers and the Politicians Who Love Them (Nation Books, forthcoming), from which this article is taken in part. He also is editor of the online news magazine Truthdig.com, a clinical professor at the Annenberg School for Communication at USC and cohost of the KCRW/NPR show “Left, Right and Center.” FALL 2009 | 37 —BROOKSLEY BORN in domestic agricultural products, but also in financial instruments and inter- national commodities like energy products, metal products and international agricultural products. Born spent the next two decades litigating high-profile derivatives cases. So when she entered public service in 1996, she came with a wealth of expe- rience about the ins and outs of the derivatives markets. But expertise and strong convictions can only get you so far in the brutal world of D.C. politics. As a pragmatist, she was not prepared for how ideological her superiors and ri- vals were. Soon after her appointment, she was called to Greenspan’s private dining room at the imposing headquarters of the Federal Reserve. “Well, Brooksley, I guess you and I will never agree about fraud,” Greenspan told Born, as reported in Stanford Magazine. “What is there not to agree on?” Born replied. “Well,” he said, “you probably will always believe there should be laws against fraud, and I don’t think there is any need for a law against fraud.” The market, Greenspan believed, would regulate itself, Born said. ITH ALL THAT HAS TRANSPIRED SINCE THE 2008 CRASH, SHOULD- n’t the bullying characters she faced endure a moment of humility to apologize to Born? At least former SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt has YES, I’VE