Hufstedler, Shirley M. (Shirley Mount), 1925-2016

<p>Shirley Hufstedler was born in Denver, Colorado, on August 24, 1925. She earned a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of New Mexico in 1945 and a Bachelor of Law from Stanford in 1949.</p>

<p>Hufstedler practiced private law in Los Angeles from 1950 to 1960. She then worked as special legal consultant to the attorney general of California (1960-1961). Thereafter, Hufstedler became a judge of the Los Angeles County Superior Court (1961), associate justice of the California Court of Appeals (1966), and judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (1968-1980).From 1980 to 1981, Hufstedler served in the cabinet of President Jimmy Carter as secretary of education. Following her time in the Carter administration, Hufstedler returned to her law practice and taught as a visiting professor at the University of California at Irvine; she then did likewise at the University of Iowa and the University of Vermont.</p>

<p>Hufstedler was the Phleger Professor of Law at the Stanford School of Law (1982) and in 1996 became a Visiting Fellow of St. Catherine's College, Oxford, England. She later became a senior counsel of Morrison and Foerster.</p>

<p>Shirley Ann Mount Hufstedler (August 24, 1925 – March 30, 2016) was an American attorney and judge who served as the first United States Secretary of Education under President Jimmy Carter from November 30, 1979 to January 20, 1981. At the time of her secretarial appointment, she was the highest ranking-woman in the federal judiciary, serving as a United States Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.</p>

<p>Hufstedler was born Shirley Ann Mount on August 24, 1925, in Denver, Colorado. Her mother's side of the family emigrated to the United States from Germany and were pioneers in Missouri. Hufstedler's father worked in construction and during the Great Depression the family had to move frequently so he could find work. As a result, she frequently changed schools and towns starting in the second grade. As a child, she lived in New Mexico, Montana, California, and Wyoming. A friend of her father's and famous war correspondent, Ernie Pyle, became a close friend and mentor of Hufstedler. Hufstedler received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree in 1945 from the University of New Mexico and a Bachelor of Laws in 1949 from Stanford Law School.</p>

<p>Initial attempts to begin her career after graduating proved to be difficult. Her graduating class from law school included only two women, as three of them dropped out, and although she graduated at the top of her class, she was still a woman in a male dominated profession and she struggled to find employment opportunities. She started writing briefs for other lawyers and picked up other similar tasks. Ultimately, she opened up her own office in Los Angeles in 1951. From there, she managed to make her way to the Attorney General's Office. She served as Special Legal Consultant to the Attorney General of California in the complex Colorado River litigation before the United States Supreme Court from 1960 to 1961.</p>