On behalf of the Women & Law Division, we wish to congratulate Judge Sarah Evans Barker on her forty years on the federal bench. Judge Barker, an Antoinette Dakin Leach (ADL) Award Recipient herself, has always been a strong proponent of the Women & the Law Division, often nominating other female trailblazers for the ADL award, speaking on topics for our division, and supporting our events.
Judge Barker was nominated by President Ronald Raegan to a seat on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, and confirmed on March 30, 1984, becoming the first female federal judge in Indiana. She began her legal career as a legislative assistant for United States Representative Gilbert Gude in 1969 and for United States Senator Charles H. Percy from 1969 to 1971. She served as a special counsel to the United States Senate Government Operations Committee, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations in Washington, D.C. from 1971 to 1972. She was Director of Research and Director of Scheduling and Advance for Senator Percy's re-election campaign in 1972. She moved to Indiana following her marriage to Ken Barker and became the first woman appointed to serve as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of Indiana from 1972 to 1976, and as First Assistant United States Attorney from 1976 to 1977. She practiced law from 1977 to 1981 as an associate and partner at the Indianapolis law firm of Bose, McKinney & Evans. She was appointed United States Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana in 1981 and served in that position until being appointed to the federal court bench.
Active throughout her career in judicial and bar-related organizations, Judge Barker served as president of the 900-member Federal Judges Association, 2007-2009, and on the FJA Board of Directors. She also served on the Judicial Conduct and Disability Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States by appointment of Chief Justice John G. Roberts. In 2004, she was appointed by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist to serve on the Special Study Committee on Judicial Conduct and Disability (the “Breyer Committee”), as a member of the Judicial Conference of the United States, its Executive Committee, Long Range Planning Committee, Standing Rules Committee, Budget Committee and the Judicial Branch Committee (ex-officio). She has also served on a variety of 7th Circuit committees and been a member and officer of several bar associations.
Judge Barker is active in numerous civic, educational, cultural and religious organizations, including the State of Indiana Bicentennial Commission, having been appointed by then-Governor Mitch Daniels, the board of directors of Indiana University Health Partners, Inc. and the board of the Indiana Historical Society. She has previously served as a member of boards of trustees for several Indiana academic institutions, of the Connor Prairie Museum, the advisory board for the Spirit and Place Civic Festival, and advisory boards of Indiana University and its law schools, including participation on search committees for law school deans, an Indiana University chancellor and two presidents. In 2012, Barker received the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site Advancing American Democracy Award. She is a member of the Indiana Academy, a recipient of the Trailblazer Award given by the Indiana Commission for Women, a Living Legend awarded by the Indiana Historical Society, the Silver Gavel presented by the Indianapolis Bar Association, and a Distinguished Alumna of Indiana University. In addition, she has been awarded eleven honorary degrees from Midwestern colleges and universities. Judge Barker is a member of the Downtown Kiwanis Club of Indianapolis, the Lawyers Club, and the Gathering.
On Thursday, September 21, 2023, at a special meeting of the McKinney-Shepard Indianapolis Inn of Court, Judge Barker was honored for her forty years of judicial service. The gathering included many friends, attorneys and judges from Indiana and out of state, numerous former clerks, two siblings, two of her three grown children and her husband, retired attorney Kenneth R. Barker.
Judge Barker fielded questions from two retired Federal Judges, Robert L. Miller, Senior Judge of the Northern District of Indiana and Barbara Crabb, Western District of Wisconsin. From her responses, the attendees learned details about her family background, her decision to become a lawyer, early years of her career and memorable moments from prior cases over which she presided.
Judge Barker made three main reflections during her speech:
(1) She is privileged to devote most of her professional life to the performance of the work of judging.
(2) She gave her public word of reassurance about the courts, system of justice, judicial branch of government, both in its continued capacity and its commitment to perform its constitutional function. On that note, she stated:
We are flooded with case filings and the issues entrusted to judges for decision-making have been increasingly intractable. In addition to the ordinary disputes that find their ways onto court dockets (the contract and employment discrimination cases, the property and tort claims, the garden variety criminal prosecutions), think what it means now to also have lawsuits which involve climate change, AI, satellite technology and social media including the dark web, alternative currencies, international relations, and the prosecutions of our highest governmental officials for the ways in which they conducted their lives and their official duties. It’s a really big “ask” to require an individual judge, when the scope of the controversy is both novel and enormous, to do what a judge must always do, namely, to interpret the law fairly and wisely, and to enforce effectively and efficiently the promises set forth in our constitution and statutes.
And for her third point, she read two letters from criminal defendants (names omitted), and opined the following:
First, if you read between the lines, they will remind you a that a lot of people have been given much harder rows to hoe in life and have had to overcome much more difficult personal and family circumstances than any of us here tonight ever had to overcome. Thus, it behooves us all to acknowledge that without ever having fully earned it, and without ever having done enough to deserve it, compared to them, we have all been really, really lucky. The other thing these letters prompt me to say is that, in my experience, over all the years almost everyone I have met, no matter where or how or the context in which I met them, is deep down just like everyone else. Everyone possesses the same basic sets of hopes and dreams and aspirations and wishes. They love their children, they have their regrets, but they have their hopes as well, and often defendants express a strong resolve to do better the next time, assuming they get another chance. My primary responsibility when they appear before me is the same as that imposed on every judge: simply to listen to them, to respond as appropriate to what they have told me and to try to understand them as best I can so that during the punishment phase – the phase in which society’s interests are to be protected -- I can mete out a truly fair and reasonable sentence under all the circumstances. When a thank you note comes winging along afterwards, it is high praise, indeed.
She concluded her motivating speech with the following captivating words:
Even when much of my work has involved efforts to ameliorate the harm caused by colossal individual failures, and to reshape governmental and corporate policymaking to conform to the applicable legal requirements, and to assess the nature and impact of criminal behavior and bring the people who committed such acts up short, I believe that: I believe that the world is, indeed, beautiful, and most people are, indeed, good.
In fact, your being here this evening to pay tribute to my four decades of judicial service provides proof beyond a reasonable doubt. So, I rest my case!
We join the Inn of Court's salute to Judge Barker at this important benchmark in her career, grateful for her sustained service and leadership to the legal profession and larger community and State. We thank her for her enthusiasm, reflection, words of wisdom and for her extraordinary contributions to our legal profession and community. We extend congratulations and good wishes for the future and the continuation of her distinguished judicial tenure.
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