University of Wisconsin Law School Alumna Geraldine Hines became the first black woman to sit on the seven-member Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in July.
The 66-year-old Hines fills the spot left vacant when Associate Justice Ralph Grants became chief justice. Hines previously served on the Superior Court, and the Mississippi native also worked as a private attorney and law professor. Democratic Governor Deval Patrick said when he nominated Hines that the legal community had been effusive in its support of her elevation to the top court.
“She has been a beloved and respected colleague, praised by judges and lawyers alike for being smart, prepared, fair, tough, decisive, warm, thoughtful and gentle, all at the same time,” the governor said in announcing her nomination in June.
Hines was raised in Greenville, Mississippi, and earned a degree from Tougaloo College before attending the University of Wisconsin Law School.
“Looking back on my humble beginnings as a child of the segregated South and all that Jim Crow represents, a flood of emotions washes over me,” Hines said after Patrick nominated her. Hines was appointed to the Superior Court in 2001 by the late Gov. Paul Cellucci, a Republican.