BY: MAGGIE SHEALY, SUMMER 2021 COLLABORATOR, TIME CAPSULE FACILITATOR
Meet Anita Earls
The exclamation “oyez” evolved from the Latin word “audite,” later “oir” or “oiez” in old French and was adapted to American English to what we now know as “oyez.” Oyez is a call repeated two to three times before a federal court begins session. As the justices enter the courtroom in their robes, the spectators, and both arguing sides of the case remain standing until the justices are introduced and have been seated. In Raleigh, North Carolina, on the second floor is the state’s highest court of law, the North Carolina Supreme Court. The Chief Justice sits directly in the center of the bench, and directly to his left (our right) is an Associate Justice with nearly 30 years of litigation practice, political advocacy, and legal mentorship under her belt.
The Person
Justice Earls was born in Seattle, Washington on February 20 th, 1960. She and her brother were adopted by parents Garnett and Hazel Brooks. Earls made her way to the Northeast, attending Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts on the Lehman Scholarship where she studied political economy and philosophy. She graduated class of 1981 and earned another scholarship to study abroad for three years studying the role of women in the Ujamaa villages of Tanzania. Earls returned to the states and went to Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut. There she was an accomplished writer and scholar, earning a fellowship under the Robert Masur Fellowship foundation, which supports law students interested in pursuing careers in civil rights and liberties, and becoming the Senior editor of the Yale Journal, publishing one of her best pieces: “Petitioning and Empowerment Theory of Practice.”
The Attorney
After her graduation from Yale in 1988 joined the Ferguson, Stein, Wallace, Adkins, Gresham, & Sumter firm in Charlotte, North Carolina as an associate partner. Over the next decade with them, she built a solid reputation in the legal field. 10 years later, 43 rd President Bill Clinton appointed her as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the U.S. Department of Justice. And her assignments covered a broad swath of the legal landscape: litigation in state and federal courts, family law, criminal defense, personal injury, voting rights, police misconduct, school desegregation, and employee discrimination. Earls came back to North Carolina where she worked for four years at the University of North Carolina Center for Social Justice, and in 2007 she founded the Southern Coalition for Social Justice in Durham, North Carolina. The organization even served as the plaintiff for a landmark Supreme Court case of North Carolina v. Covington (2017), where the Roberts Court ruled that the state’s house and senate district maps were drawn unconstitutionally based on race. And after 10 years of working at her organization, she would step down as the chief executive officer to run for political office in 2018.
The Candidate
Earls’ decision to run was not without reason, sparked by the 2016 election, she saw significance in supporting the state courts and judiciary as her way to make an impact in law. She ran during a rare election year, a “Blue Moon Election,” Blue Moon Elections occur every 12 years and usually voter turnout is low. However, this election produced an all-time high midterm turnout. Generally speaking, women run for office less often than men do for a variety of reasons. The American political system has always been run and benefitted men. Historically, men have dominated political institutions, and their agendas seldom include or prioritize women’s issues. Unless women are present when and where decisions that affect them are being made, it is unlikely they will be heard. Women may also see conflict between their duties as a family member and running for office. Time management is a barrier to running a political campaign. The majority of candidates running are men. Most women with families have said that their children came first: “maybe when they’re off in college” or “I could’ve run before they were born.” Women also aren’t recruited to run at the same rate as men, finding endorsements and sponsors are challenging. Justice Earls’ ambition to run came from her own volition. She was not recruited to run for political office. Her previous experience as an attorney proved to be an advantage: “I feel like because I’d done so much voting rights work, I knew a lot about the political process [and I] knew about the electorates in North Carolina…I felt like I had a lot of advantages to start with…and while it was certainly daunting to run statewide as a first-time candidate judicial elections are a little different.” Earls continued, “you can’t talk about policy issues the same way that a candidate for a legislative or executive can for their office…All of my work in the past 30 years has been nonpartisan, unlike other attorneys I had never represented a certain party, I had always represented communities and individuals.” Running for office is not an easy task, getting endorsements, name-recognition, and overall stamina to run a campaign is challenging. And running a campaign as a woman of color is challenging. I asked Justice Earls: “where do you get your confidence from? To write your opinions. To write your dissents.” She recalls her time as an attorney. As an attorney, she told her clients a story, but as a candidate, she had to tell hers. On November sixth of 2018, Justice Earls was declared the winner of the election, beating out her opponents with 49.5% of the majority vote, and on January third, 2019, she was sworn into office. She is now coming up on her second year on the court.
The Justice
As she enters her third year on the court, Justice Earls has served under three different Chief Justices within two years: Chief Justice Mark Martin, Chief Justice Cheri Beasley, and currently, Chief Justice Paul Newby. I asked Justice Earls how she’d been handling the transition of Chief Justices. “They definitely all have very different approaches to the role…looking at the opinions that have been issued and the makeup of the judges in terms of how they voted on issues…but I think it’s fair to say that I’m looking at writing more dissents.” In addition to her duties on the bench, in 2020 Justice Earls was appointed to the North Carolina Task Force for Racial Equity. “In direct response to the events last Summer, and particularly George Floyd’s death, and [there were] instances of police killings of unarmed black people in North Carolina,” Earls began to explain. Governor Roy Cooper appointed the Attorney General Josh Stein and Justice Anita Earls as co-chairs for this Task Force along with 23 other members who represent other stakeholders such as law enforcement, public defenders, judges. Earls continued, “…and the charge from the Governor was that in six months developing recommendations and then spend the next two years implementing them.” Already after the first year, the Task Force has identified 120 structural recommendations such as bail reform, jury selection, police reform. One of their biggest accomplishments, Justice Earls notes, is their commission for the Governor to revisit people’s long-term sentences for crimes they committed as a juvenile, and to revisit individual cases to determine whether or not their sentences should be extended or cut short. The Task Force has made significant steps in pinpointing issues that need to be solved and giving solutions, though Justice Earls maintains that there are still failures in our [North Carolina] justice system, and still much work to be done on the judicial side. Justice Earls continues to emphasize that her role as a Justice, and as a woman of color, comes from identifying, upholding, or refuting laws in North Carolina’s constitution. And that the state and local courts are where the roots of change begin. As knowledgeable about the law she is, Justice Earls says she is still learning. One of the things that she aims to emphasize is the importance of mentoring the future. Sometimes making an impact isn’t just what is happening now, but what will happen in the future and who will make that impact.
Maggie Shealy is a rising junior at Brandeis University. She is majoring in politics with a minor in women’s gender and sexuality studies. In addition to her time spent studying, she is team captain for the Brandeis Varsity Fencing Team, a 2020 NCAA qualifier and All-American Honoree, and All-Region Academic Team member as well. She is a cellist in the Brandeis-Wellesley Orchestra and likes to spend her off-days playing rugby and doing graphic design.