Branigan Revives

Women Lawyers Group

A new focus makes this organization

a winner

By Martin C. Daks, njbiz.com, July 14, 2008

Kirsten S. Branigan received the Alice Paul Equality Award. [Steven J. Dundas]

When Kirsten Scheurer Branigan took the helm at the New Jersey Women Lawyers Association in June 2006, the once-active statewide organization was on its last legs.  Membership had long been dwindling and was essentially nonexistent, the group had not met for more than a year and people doubted whether Branigan could save the 20-year-old association.

But the then-36-year-old attorney guided the group through a jump in membership to more than 400 women.  On July 1, when Branigan handed the gavel to Desha L. Jackson, an associate at Wilentz, Goldman and Spitzer PA in Woodbridge, the association was no longer on life support.

Branigan, who is now a partner at McDonald Law Group LLC in Florham Park, also recast the association’s focus to reflect the concerns of a new generation of women lawyers.

“Some people thought that women lawyers had accomplished everything they set out to do,” says Branigan, explaining her decision to try to rejuvenate the Women Lawyers Association.  “But I rejected that assumption.”

On the surface at least, it was easy to see why some people thought there was no longer a need for an association known mainly for trying to get more women appointed as judges.

By the time Branigan took over, Deborah T. Poritz had been named chief justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court, and currently, three of the seven justices are women.  By then it was also no longer unusual to see women partners at large law firms.

“We had a generation of women lawyers who no longer expected their gender to be a barrier to advancement, and that’s good,” says Branigan, a Rutgers School of Law-Newark graduate.  “But the problem was that they saw the Women Lawyers Association as focused on issues that had already been resolved.”

When she took office as president, Branigan updated the association’s focus, expanding it to address issues that she thought would matter to today’s women attorneys.  She also networked, calling friends and colleagues and asking them to reach out to their contacts and get the word out that something new was going on at the New Jersey Women Lawyers Association.

“With each call I made, I was given another name of another woman who would be a great addition to our efforts,” says Branigan.  “I called all of them as well.”

The strategy worked.

At its low point, the association struggled to get 50 or 60 people to show up to an event.  In contrast, more than 500 people showed up on April 9 for the group’s Women's Initiative & Leaders In Law tribute ceremony.

The event, held at the Sheraton at Woodbridge Place Hotel in Iselin, honored a diverse group of women, including New Jersey Supreme Court Justice Virginia Long, Gibbons PC employment law department Chair Christine A. Amalfe and Schering-Plough Associate General Counsel Susan Ellen Wolf.

“I really had not taken much notice of the Women Lawyers Association until Kirsten took over,” says incoming president Jackson.  “There just wasn’t that much going on with it.  But now we’ve got a growing organization, and I look forward to continuing to build on what Kirsten did.”

Branigan will stay on as a board member, says Jackson.  Branigan will also focus on public policy and other issues, and will continue to lead a mentoring program that she created.

Branigan’s efforts have not gone unnoticed.  In April, Branigan received the Alice Paul Equality Award for her work to advance equality for women.  The award is given by the Alice Paul Institute, a Mount Laurel organization dedicated to educating the public about the life and work of Alice Stokes Paul, a New Jersey suffragist.

The Women Lawyers Association also created a leadership award in Branigan’s name.

Today, on a broad scale, the association’s mission is to “…retain women in the legal profession through education and activism, to promote our members to the highest levels of law firm, government, academic, community and corporate positions and to endorse qualified female attorneys for appointments to the state and federal judiciary,” according to the organization’s Web site, www.njwla.org.