Interview with. Mary Ann Tally March 4, Maureen O'Neill. Law School Oral History Project University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Transcription

1 X~'S Interview with Mary Ann Tally March 4, 1993 By: Maureen O'Neill Law School Oral History Project University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Original transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection Louis Round Wilson Library Copyright 1994 The University of North Carolina

2 INTERVIEWEE: MARY ANN TALLY DATE OF INTERVIEW: MARCH 4, 1993 INTERVIEWER: MAUREEN O'NEILL PLACE: FAYETTEVILLE, NC TAPE 1 SIDE A MAUREEN O'NEILL: This is Maureen O'Neill. It's Thursday, March the 4th, and I'll be conducting an interview with Mary Ann Tally. We're here in Ms. Tally's offices in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Okay, Ms. Tally, I'd just like to start with getting some general background information on you and on your childhood. And the first thing I think I'd be interested to know is where you grew up. MARY ANN TALLY: I grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee. I lived there all my life until I came to North Carolina when I started at Duke Law School. MT: What was your family like in Tennessee? Upper middle class Republican family - - a mother and daddy and I have one sibling. I have a sister who is 15 months younger than I. My father was involved in a family woolen mill up until the time I was in high school. With the invent of polyester, they sold the woolen mill, and then he became a stock broker. My mother really never worked when I was growing up. She was a homemaker. When I was in high school, she taught school for a couple of years. But other than that, it was sort of what I would call an upper middle class Republican-type family. When you were a child, did you know much about the 1

3 ancestry and background of your family? MT: Yeah. We had a very close family, particularly on my mother's side, who was always interested in family history and things like that. My mother was from a small town in northeast Mississippi. We spent our summers, my sister and I and our first cousin, spent our summers in Mississippi with my grandparents. And so my mother's family was very, very close -- lots of family members and we all knew all their history. My father's family not quite so much. Was your mother's family from the South, for many generations back? MT: Yeah, Mississippi and Georgia. Although interestingly enough, when I moved to North Carolina, a friend o'f my mother-inlaw's who is an artist here -- he's up in his 70s --is also a historian and gets all of his history from court minutes from the 1700s, found my mother's family in this county back in the 1700s by a similar name. My mother's family name is very odd. It's Dukeminier, D-u-k-e-m-i-n-i-e-r. And when they were here in North Carolina, they were Dukemier and traced it all the way back. So my mother actually, since I've lived here, has been over here and worked on family history, back to North Carolina. And you said on your father's side there's not necessarily as much knowledge of his background? MT: Right. You mentioned that you spent summers at your grandparents' house. Were you very close to your grandparents 2

4 then? MT: Yeah. We were --we loved going to Mississippi. And we spent lots of time down there. My sister lives in Mississippi, married a boy that we knew growing up -- as a matter of fact, a guy that I dated when I was in high school. And she still lives down there. My grandmother died on Halloween of last year, when she was 94. So up until a couple of months ago, she was still living. I have really fond memories of Mississippi. And in retrospect, I saw a lot of things that I really didn't understand. But I can remember as a child "colored folks" workers, which I really didn't understand. And of course all I got was the white Mississippi version of what was going on, really, in the early '60s. But I can remember that and look back on it thinking that I really wasn't aware of what was going on in front of me, of what the civil rights movement was. When do you think you were able to look back on that and sort out what you had seen and realize what was going on? MT: Truthfully, probably not until I was in law school. We are a product, I think, of how we're brought up. And I don't think I had any objectivity about the civil rights movement in the South at all until I really got away from home and could kind of put things in perspective. Do you remember anybody from your childhood who you think strongly affected the way you developed as a person? MT: Well, I'm sure my parents for better or for worse good things and bad things. I think a strong influence on me in 3

5 deciding to go to law school was my mother's brother who is a lawyer. He's a law professor at UCLA and has been out there for over 20 years now. He's famous in legal circles because he has property and trust and estates textbooks that are used all over the country. Is that the Dukeminier Property text? MT: Yeah. That's the one I used. MT: So I always felt close to him. He was always somebody who was different, I suppose, in the family, because he had done something that was very different and had really moved away and moved out and was also a very intelligent person. I always felt close to him. I still do. Was it significant to you that he moved out of the South? Did that have an impact on you? MT: Yeah, it did. As a matter of fact, belatedly I suppose. I grew up in Knoxville and lived in Knoxville all my life, went to the University of Tennessee, which is in Knoxville, for four years --by choice. A lot of my friends went to girls' school in Virginia like Sweet Briar and Hollins and all that. And I just wanted to go to UT. I had a double major in history and Latin. And I really thought that what I wanted to do was get a doctorate and teach. I thought that I wanted to get a doctorate in history. I had an advisor in college whom I admired a lot and was very close to, took a lot of his seminar courses. And when I told him of my plans, he said, "Well, Mary Ann, number 4

6 one, Ph.D.'s are a dime a dozen, and number two, you're a woman, and so you're not going to get a job." And at the time he said it, I think he was right because it was so difficult for women. Probably by the time - - if I had pursued that, probably opportunities would have already begun to open up. So I was really discouraged. And I was talking to my uncle. He said, "Well, have you ever thought about going to law school?" And I said, "No, that's never occurred to me." And he said, "Well, you know, you should just try it. You know, if you don't like it, you don't have to keep on. You can quit after six months, but why don't you just try it?" Well, of course I'd never quit anything in my life. So even if I had -- and at points in law school I was miserable - - I wouldn't quit, because, you know, you start something and you finish it. But I said, "Well, all right, I'll think about going to law school." And he said, "But the thing that I really want you to understand is that you need to get out of the South. You need to expand your horizons. You need to be exposed to more things. And he encouraged me to apply to places like Harvard or Columbia or Yale, where he had been educated. And that was just more than I could fathom. I just thought to myself, "Well, I'd be a lost ball in high grass up there." So he said, "Well, if you are just determined that you have to stay in the South, then apply to schools where you'll have more exposure, like Duke and Vanderbilt." So I did. I applied to the University of Tennessee and also applied to Vanderbilt and Duke. And I ended up going to 5

7 Duke simply because they accepted me one day before I got the notice from Vanderbilt. I had no idea -- there was no rational reason for a choice, just you should apply to Duke and Vanderbilt because at least it's a more national student body. I had never been to Duke, never seen Duke, and had no idea what Duke Law School was about. But I got the acceptance, and I said, "Well, that's fine. I'll just go there." And that was a really broadening experience for me to go to Duke, for a whole range of reasons. What did the rest of your family think about that? It seems like you were sort of an "in-between" generation. You weren't necessarily expected to stay home and raise a family, but yet women were not quite as familiar in law school and professional schools. What did the rest of the family think about that? MT: I don't think they thought anything about it at the time, because I don't think they looked down the road to what would be the end result of getting a professional degree. I think that when it really hit home was when I started working and, in particular, what I do. It was and is, I think, very hard for my parents to accept. I think they... they're not openly hostile. They admire the fact that I've done something with my life, but it's still very hard--particularly being a public defender. So even now, almost twenty years later, they're still feeling the same things? 6

8 MT: Well, I used to laugh because at points I felt that even though Mother and Daddy knew rationally that this was not true, at points I think that my parents have actually chosen to believe that my husband makes me work and that he makes me do this job in particular, although rationally they know that's not true. Because my husband is one of the most low-key people that anybody has ever met. So I kind of laugh about it in my mind that it's sort of like psychiatric denial. She couldn't possibly be choosing to do this, and so therefore there must be some other reason. What does your husband do? MT: He's a lawyer. I met him... we were in the same class at Duke and I met him. And we decided to get married after we got out of law school. He was from Fayetteville, which is how we ended up here, because he wanted to come back to Fayetteville. That's how we ended up living here. You mentioned that being at Duke broadened you. Could you elaborate on that a little bit? MT: Well, in lots of ways. Number one, this sounds very sheltered, but this is just the way I grew up. Frankly, I had never even-- I had never really known people from other parts of the country other than the South. And the student body in the law school at Duke was from all over the country. One of the things that I look back now on and laugh about is that I can remember being in the registration line the first day at Duke Law School. It was alphabetical. And I can't even remember his name 7

9 now-- I wish I could. But anyway, my maiden name was Lockett, so it was somebody whose last name was with an "L." He was in the registration line with me and got to talking. And he was from some place in either New Jersey or New York-- I can't remember which. And kept on talking and kept on talking, because it was a long line and we had to stand there for hours. At one point in the conversation, he said, "Well, maybe sometime you'd like to go to the 'sho-wer.'" And all I could think of to say was, "No, I don't want to do anything." But I had no idea, no clue what he was saying. It just, "no, no," you know. Well, later on we got to be friends. And I just laughed about it because I said, "I had no idea what you were talking about." Well, what he was saying was the "sea-shore." But they said "shore," where I grew up saying you went to the "beach." And I had no idea. So in that way it's kind of funny. But in that way it was really broadening to me. But I think probably the most important thing is, you know-- and I know it sounds conceited, and I don't mean it that way--but it was a real leveling experience for me to go to Duke Law School. I had always been fortunate to be gifted. And I had never had any trouble in school. I had always been at the top of my class no matter where I was or in what circumstance, and was valedictorian of my class in high school. You know, practically a 4.0 average in college. You know, but that was a state university that's not well known for academics. And when I got to Duke, for the first time in my life, 8

10 I realized that there were people in this world that were smarter than I was. And, you know, you really ought not to have to be as old as 21 or 22, however old I was when I started law school, to realize that. But it was my first realization. And there were people who were incredibly smart. And law school was difficult for me. I really had to work. And it was the first time I was around people who also worked harder than I did. I had always worked hard, but things had come so easily that even though I was working harder than other people, in retrospect it wasn't hard work at all. And law school was difficult for me, very difficult. Did you ever think about quitting, or did you get discouraged to the point of quitting? MT: No, I never thought about quitting, because that's not in my nature. I just never thought about that. But it was really hard. And when I started at Duke the first year, we had year-long courses and no breaks until May and that was it. And I can remember taking the civil procedure exam. I was so lost that I thought I was in the wrong room and that it was a con law exam instead. I went up to the professor and I said, "I think I've got the wrong exam." And he said, "Sit down. You've got the right one." And I can't remember what the grading system was at Duke. It was something foreign. They've changed it now. But I remember when the grades came. I had gone back to Knoxville and was clerking in the summer. When the grades came, I looked at that and I thought, "I failed a four-hour course." It turns out 9

11 it was a "C" or something, but I had never seen a grade that low, and I was panic stricken. I have failed a course." Because, I just thought, "Oh, my word, Because it was so low I just didn't-- you know, it wasn't on the scale. I had never seen anything like that before. MT: So what kept you going? Well, I guess it's just never been in my nature to quit. You know, I just felt like you started something and would finish something. After the first year I was more settled, too. Everybody goes through this, I think, in law school. And I was more settled and realized that if I worked, I wasn't going to flunk out, though I certainly wasn't going to be Law Review, but that I would be able to make it through. All I needed to do was put my mind to it. And that's what I did. What was it like to be a woman in law school at that point in time? How many other women were there in your class? MT: I think roughly our class started out being about 125 people, and there were about 25 women. I started law school in '71 and that was right about the time when there started to be more open admissions for women. I guess we may have finished up with about 100 or maybe fewer. I can't remember. And there were a few women who dropped out. But proportionately, there were more men who dropped out than women. And there were eight or ten of us who were very close. And, I never felt like there was any sort of discrimination against us or anything else of the kind, 10

12 though we were certainly not 50 percent of the class or anything. I really enjoyed it and met some really interesting people. What about the Vietnam War? Did that impact the day-to-day life of law school at all? MT: Well, about the time I got in law school, I think my head started to change around and I was exposed to a whole lot more and I think I really sort of started changing my attitude about things. My husband, John-- to whom I'm married now, but we were not married in law school-- was a Vietnam protester, had hair down to his rear end and wore sandals. And I went to law school with a sorority pin on one boob and a fraternity pin on the other. And that was sort of my first exposure to any kind of anti-war sentiment-- the people at the law school. It was real interesting to me because when he was in college, John had gone around lecturing to the Kiwanis and the Geese and the Elks and whoever all those other clubs are, about the immorality of the Vietnam War. And his mother had been right there behind him, which must have been...it shows what kind of person she is. And there was a point in time-- his draft number was four or something-- and there was a point in time when I think he was seriously considering moving to Canada. That was the first time I was really ever exposed to anything like that and really came to grips with, you know, these are people my age who are over there and who are dying and why. Were you dating him at the time that he thought about moving to Canada? 11

13 MT: Uh-huh (yes). What about the civil rights movement? It was all tied in together. Did that play a part too? MT: Much less, I think. And it may have been because of my background and, you know, I just wasn't really clued in. But the other thing is Duke Law School was very white, too, at the time. And I think there was much less exposure to that than probably in some other places there would have been. Even with the black students in the law school, there was, I think, a significant separateness, which was noticeable. And that's a two-way street. I don't know who felt more uncomfortable with who. I had a good friend who was black and was my first friend who was black--that was when I was in law school. But his family was very upper middle class kind of a guy. And maybe that's why he and I were able to be friends. really realized that he was black. I mean, I'm not sure that he But the other black students I really did not know as well. And there are people now that I consider to be very good friends of mine that I was in law school with that I really did not know other than to know who they were and what their names were when I was there. One of them is Dan Blue, who was in school with me. And we really didn't know each other. Another is Brenda Becton. And we just really didn't know each other. I know them well now. But it was very separate and they were a very small minority. schools today? Do you keep up with race relations in the law The reason I ask is-- 12

14 MT: (Interposing) No. I have very little contact with Duke these days. The reason I ask is that in recent years there's been talk of the same kind of problems, that there's kind of a "color line" in the law school. And still, twenty years later, the minority students feel like they're very isolated from the goings on in the rest of the school. MT: Well, I don't know what's going on in the law school, but I think we have gone backwards rather than forwards-- is what has happened. I base that just on my experiences with clients, with cases, with things like that. I think that over a twelve-year period, beginning in 1980, that gradually it has again become acceptable to hate people based on color, based on socioeconomic differences and that sort of thing. And I think things that were not acceptable to be said out loud, at least, in the '60s and '70s have become much more acceptable. I hope that that's going to change now. But if there are those complaints now in the law school, I think I can understand it, because I think it's reflective of what I see in society as a whole. Do you see a turnaround any time soon? MT: I hope so. I sure hope so. I mean, obviously I'm not objective politically. But I think that both Presidents Reagan and Bush made it very acceptable for people to hate other people. The kinds of campaigns that were run -- Willie Horton is an example -- just made it very comfortable. And once again, people could not only think it in their hearts, but they could 13

15 say it out loud. Because if the top leaders in our country were allowed to say it out loud, then certainly it would be acceptable for the rest of us. What do you think the best things that the new administration can do are to fix this? MT: Well, Clinton says that he wants our government to look like the country at large. And I certainly hope that that's true, and I think it is with the appointments that he has made so far. Also I think that it's not just the thing that minorities and women should be included. But also if you look at the age of people. I think that's going to make a big difference. Because I think that people of the age of Reagan and George Bush literally... It sounds oversimplified, but, literally, they did grow up in another generation. And I would hope that as people begin to take over leadership positions now who are in their 40s, that maybe other people wouldn't consider young but I consider young, that there will be some change. I'm hopeful, for example, that this might be the last major political campaign when the fact that a woman works professionally is considered a campaign negative. I'm hoping that is what Hillary Clinton has done for us and has done for the rest of the populous. And I don't say that with any negativism toward people who choose to be homemakers. But, I thought it was just really astounding during the campaign when, during that particular portion of the campaign, when there was so much criticism leveled at her for being an independent professional 14

16 woman. And so I'm hoping that that will change. I was also hopeful that we might see the last of negativism with regard to the Vietnam War. I'm not sure-- it's really very disturbing to me to read in the Raleigh paper about an incredibly wonderful and well-qualified man who apparently was not allowed to have an advisory position in Wake County primarily because he does not believe in war and has tried to promote peaceful solutions to problems. I just, I was real hopeful after the Clinton election. But then we have to remember that change comes slowly. But I think Clinton's cabinet is setting that tone. And in terms of the judiciary, I think that, and I'm hopeful, that he's going to be open to women and minorities in very important judicial positions. And from what I've heard, they are and we'll see from those appointments. But I think that might be a big step in the right direction. When you first decided to become a public defender, were there many women in that field? MT: No, and I really never chose to be a public defender. When John and I decided to get married... that was somewhere during our third year of law school. He was very, very smart and could have been on Law Review but was anti-everything and chose not to be on Law Review, because that was some sort of terrible elitist sort of thing. But anyway, he wanted to clerk for-- be a judicial clerk-- which are traditionally positions reserved for the people who are at the top of the class. But we 15

17 had decided to get married, so he would apply for a clerkship with a judge and then I would apply. We acted like we were not a matched set and when we would be called for interviews, we would say, "Can I bring this other one along, because we've only got one car and transportation is difficult?" Well, it didn't take a very bright person to figure out what was going on. And so John did not get any of his clerkships, and I think it was because of me. Because they realized--what am I going to do? "If I hire him, what am I going to do with her? They're going to be miserable." So he decided he wanted to come back to Fayetteville to practice law because this was his home. And so I said, "Fine." So he told me the firms in town that he considered to be reputable people and I should write these particular firms and ask for a job. Well, I got no interviews at all. And the few pieces of correspondence that I got back were, "Thank you very much. We have all the secretaries we need right this minute. But if we have an opening, we'll let you know." People had obviously not even read the resume to find out that I was applying for a job as a lawyer rather than a secretary. Now, Fayetteville is not the most cosmopolitan of places. And I'm sure that had I been applying in Atlanta or New York or Houston or L.A. or places like that, I wouldn't have the same experience. But I remember at one point telling John, "Exactly why is it we're going to go live in this hellhole anyway?" But I simply didn't even get any interviews and I think 16

18 it was just unheard of at the time here for a woman to be a lawyer. One weekend we came down to spend the weekend with John's mother. She knew about the difficulty I was having, and she had a young couple over to eat dinner. And he was a lawyer who had worked in the public defender's office and had gone out into private practice, and she was a newspaper reporter. We were talking, and I was bemoaning my situation about how in this hellhole I couldn't even get an interview, much less a job, but that I wasn't going to worry about it, because I could always teach piano. And the man--it was Bill Geimer--said, "Well, have you ever thought about working in the public defender's office? And I said, "Well, no, I've never thought about that. That's far too tacky to have been in my repertoire from Duke Law School." And he said, "Well, I worked there and it's a really good experience. You ought to think about it, and you ought to call the guy who's the public defender and just talk to him about it." And so I thought, "Well, I'll do that." So I called Jimmy Little, and he interviewed me. I don't know why he interviewed me. And ultimately, I don't know why he offered me a job. But there were two of us from my class at Duke who were applying for the same job, a guy named John Decker and I. I remember that Jimmy called me during final exams my third year. It was right in the middle of exams. He said, "Could you come down here to Fayetteville this afternoon to talk?" This was after I had gone through the interview, and I 17

19 said, "Sure." Well, I figured that anybody who would call me up in the middle of exams was certainly calling me down there to say, "You've got a job." So when I arrived... and it was these luxurious quarters--it was a trailer on the parking lot of the old courthouse. So I arrived at the trailer and here was John Decker sitting right there. There was one job and we knew it. And I said, "What are you doing here?" And he said, "Jimmy called me and asked me to come down here." I said, "He called me and asked me too." So he called us in there, and he said, "Well, I've got one job. And I would really like to offer it to both of you. I don't know what I'm going to do." And I said, "Well, I don't know either. Are we supposed to go out on the parking lot and just duke it out and whoever wins the fist fight gets the job?" So ultimately what happened was that somehow they came up with some extra position or something, and both John Decker and I got hired as assistant public defenders and came to work here. And that's really how I started out. I mean, I really had no clue what a public defender was and certainly had no burning ambition to be one at the time. It was a job, and I was thankful for it. So what changed-- you've been here 20 years--when did you decide to stay? MT: I have no idea. From the very beginning, I just loved it. I guess it's just one of those things that's completely fortuitous. You know, something happens, and you end up being in a job that you really love. I have, I would say, 18

20 completely changed. Many, many things about me are different now as a result of working in this office. I am so grateful for the things that I've learned and the things I've been exposed to and the opportunities that I've had. And to this day, though I have no idea what in the world or why in the world Jimmy Little decided to hire me, I am undyingly grateful. Were there any other attorneys or judges early on in your career that you particular learned from or that influenced you? MT: Jimmy was certainly the most influential one early on, and he was only here eighteen months and then decided to go into private practice. That was really a blow. I thought, "what in the world is going to happen now?" And when he decided to leave, he called me in. And he said, "Mary Ann, I think you should take over this office," and I was just really shocked. I was eighteen months out of law school, and there were people-- it was a much smaller office at the time--but there were people in the office who were senior to me. And I said, "Why?" And he said, "I can't articulate it. But I just really think that it would be good for you to take over this office." And I said, "Well, I don't know how in the world that's going to be able to be accomplished." He said, "Well, you're going to have to build up support in the Bar. You're just going to have to go around and sell yourself to the Bar," which was an interesting experience, going around and talking to lawyers who were well respected and thirty and forty years older than I was to tell 19

21 them how somebody who was an upstart with eighteen months of experience and who also was a woman who couldn't even get a job in the first place should be able to take over the office. That was hard. How did you convince them? MT: I don't know. I just told them, "I'm capable of doing this, and I want to do this, and I'll do hard work and do a good job." And I think that's what I have done. I think if people had anything to say about what I do, they'd say, "She works hard." I've always done that. I've always believed if you do something, you need to try to do it the very best that you can and halfway is not acceptable, so I don't know. There were other people who were interested and I was appointed, and I think that was fortuitous too. I mean, there have been so many things that have happened to me that I think are just blind luck. Back then we were appointed by the governor. And the people who were nominated by the Bar for consideration as public defender were all Democrats with a republican governor. And I believe, though I have no way of knowing this, I believe that I was appointed because the governor's appointment secretary was a Dukie. When he found out that I was Dukie, I think I got the edge over the others, who were men who had more experience than I did. Once you were here, how do you think you learned to do what you needed to do? MT: Well, a lot of it was completely by trial and 20

22 error. And I think that I changed a lot. I didn't see it myself, but other people tell me. There was a judge one time who told me this-- it was a judge who was here during the first six months or a year or something that I was working. He said to me one time, "Mary Ann, the first time I came through," he said, "I can remember a case that you were trying. And I can remember seeing you crumpled up in the hallway in tears after the case was over." And he said, "And the next time I came through, which was about a year later, you were hard as nails and just as cynical as you could be." I don't think he meant cynical in a negative way. And I don't know whether that's true or not. People tell me now, once they get to know me, they tell me I'm a very intimidating person and that people are afraid of me, which just comes as a huge shock to me, except every once in a while somebody will say it, which will reinforce that that must be true, because I don't see myself that way at all. But I suppose that I started to have to be hard. I learned early on that this-- and certainly it was more true then than it is now-- that the legal profession is clearly a male-dominated profession, and that if you fall into any stereotypical behavior that you'll be in trouble. So I learned very early on--don't do things with your voice that are stereotypically feminine, and don't let anybody see you cry and that sort of thing. And I think I've been able to help the men in my office that way. I've taught them that it's okay to cry. Because for one thing, And that's a great 21

23 relief to them I think that it's okay to cry. The only thing that you can't do is you can't do it where anybody can see you. You come in my office, and you cry in my office, and you and I will cry together. And after that, we'll go out and kick some rear end. Do you think today it's still like that for women, you still can't have a high voice, you still can't cry out in the hall of the courtroom? MT: Yes. Do you think that will ever change? MT: Well, I think it may change some. But on the other hand, there is a certain level of professional behavior that's expected. And I think that it is probably not acceptable for men to cry in a courtroom either, at least to a point where it's not seen as to be something that you have some control over. There are certainly more women in practice now and it's not nearly so unheard of. There will clearly be a lot of change in the legal profession as more and more women come along. I've seen it already. There are still problems, and a lot of the problems that some women experience, I have not. I'm not sure exactly why, but I think there may be a number of answers. Number one, having become the head of this office so early, even though being a public defender is certainly no position of power, at least being the head of the office carries some aura of power with it. And I've been married all of my professional career, and my 22

24 husband's family is well known. I think I've not experienced some of the really negative things that other women experience. I've seen other women in my office who experience very, very negative behavior and actions. Do you feel a lot of resentment from men in the office who are below you professionally--who you are in charge of--and do they resent that? MT: No. I don't think so. Although you'd probably best ask them. (End of tape one, side A) I've always had a great staff. And I don't think there's any resentment at all. We just have a very democratic office. I don't like to manage. I like to handle my own cases. I do as little management as possible. As a matter of fact, they've got a sign on my door that says, "I am in charge here." And I put a note under it that says, "or at least let me continue to believe that I am." And I think that's kind of how we work around here. I know I have heard a lot of people speaking about the career of being a public defender as a very difficult one, and that a lot of public defenders do what I've heard referred to as "burn out." What has kept you from doing that? MT: I don't really know. I mean, it's true that there's a lot of burnout of public defenders. I mean that's just the usual way that things go. I suppose part of it is that there's always been a new challenge. Death penalty cases present a very unique challenge. And there has always been that. I 23

25 think another thing that's kept me here is that I've got a wonderful office as public defender offices go-- incredibly experienced. My senior assistant has been here since I have another lawyer who's been here since '79 and it goes on down. So I have people who have really stayed. We're very supportive of each other. People are more than willing to help somebody else when they're in trouble, help them with their cases, listen to their facts, help them think of legal arguments. It's a really wonderful atmosphere in which to work. And I think that keeps me and others here. I don't know. I've always said you had to be crazy to work here anyway, and so maybe part of me is just a little bit crazy. What's the best part of your job? MT: I say I love it, but I'm trying to think of what's the best part of it. Well, I guess one best part of it is that I don't have to hassle about money. Several times I have thought about going into private practice. And I just would have an awful lot of difficulty charging somebody money for something that I do. I just can't imagine. You know, how much is it worth? Gee, in a death penalty case everybody else charges $50,000. Maybe I could charge 50. That's about how much I'm worth. And I think that that's a real luxury not to have to worry about that and not have to worry about office overhead and that sort of thing. In a way, this is the purest form of legal practice, which is--i'm just here to represent this client or these clients. And there are no other concerns. I am just here 24

26 to represent these people and do the best job I can. So in a way, a public defender office is the very purest form of just straight-out legal practice. None of the problems of being lawyer and businessman at the same time. MT: MT: MT: resources. Exactly. Lawyer and marketer. Yeah. What about the worst part of the job? Well, the worst part of the job is lack of Being a public defender also means that even though you don't have money worries about the office overhead and marketing and making a name for yourself in the community, you also don't have any money to represent people with. You have to beg, borrow, or steal to get what you need, and it's never adequate. Right now it just frustrates me so that I've got five secretaries and one word processor. I've got one secretary who's going to have to quit because her eyes have gone so bad trying to type in poor lighting on a piece of equipment that in a private law firm would have been discarded twenty years ago. So that part is really frustrating. In terms of what I do personally, I guess it's like the best and the worst all rolled into one. are really, really emotionally draining. The death penalty cases And I guess there's no greater challenge than to try to save somebody's life. But on the other hand, it's a very, very draining job to do. 25

27 Of all the cases that you've had over the years, is there any one that stands out as the most satisfying? MT: I don't think any one. I think I've tried so many, I think the satisfaction has been in learning to feel satisfied and learning to feel proud, if not happy, that someone is sentenced to life imprisonment rather than death. I have not heard a jury say "not guilty on all counts" since And for a while, that was very tough, very tough. You know, I ought to be able to win a case. It was ego, I suppose. And I don't know whether it's rationalization or not, but the way I cope is I have redefined winning. Winning to me is that a client is not sitting on death row. Has there been a case that you remember as the most difficult or frustrating? MT: Well, all of them have their own difficulties and their frustrations. It wasn't a death case, but I think I got a real baptism of fire very early on when I represented a young 16- year-old black kid who was charged with the murder of a white kid in a high school. And it was a real baptism for me. I think it had a lot to do with a lot that I've learned or believed about the criminal justice system. I can remember going to the high school to interview... the state claimed it had 12 0 eyewitnesses to this murder. I can remember something like that. And they had been able to interview them all at the high school, and so I demanded that they all be assembled in the same spot for me to interview. I 26

28 remember the assistant principal-- his title was something else, but he was assistant principal-- when we were in the auditorium, saying to me, "Don't leave your purse here. These niggers will steal you blind." And then I knew right then and there everything that the case was about. It was my first real handson exposure to racism, I think. I mean, that's a long time to go through. I think that was in But that was my first real exposure to it and my first real understanding of what was going on. I also remember the basketball coach at the school telling me that my client, who had been an excellent basketball player in junior high school, had not been allowed to play on the basketball team because his mother did not have the money to pay for the uniform. And I was just astounded. I was just shocked. I said, "This is public education, is it not?" to look at things with whole different eyes. And then I began I saw this school that my husband actually had attended, which had been the white high school when he was growing up. Here was a school that had a mixture of the most upper middle class white kids driving to school in their own cars given to them by their mommies and daddies, and they were nice new cars. And kids from the projects who were bussed in whose moms didn't have the $15 to pay for the basketball uniform. That was a difficult case and a baptism of fire for me. What is-- is there a case or an accomplishment or a project that you feel the most proud of? 27

29 MT: Well, all of the cases in which we've been able to get life sentences for people I'm really proud of. Again, it may be rationalization, but I've just redefined what winning is. And I feel very satisfied that we've been able to save a lot of people. I feel really good about that. In general, I feel like that in some small way, I hope that I've been able to make a lot of things more acceptable to people. I hope that I have made being a public defender a position that people can be proud of and much more acceptable. I hope that I've been able to make being a woman lawyer more acceptable. And I think in some small way I have been. When I was elected president of the Academy of Trial Lawyers, that was a real milestone for me, because I was the first woman and the first woman who was elected president of any voluntary bar organization in this state. And the other women came right fast after that. And so I... and I think and believe that it's in some very small way helped other people come into law. And I think that people who have come to know me have more respect for public defenders and what they do. I understand that you were a large impetus behind the formation of the North Carolina State Appellate Defender's Office. How did that project get started? MT: Well, that really got started with Jimmy Little, who was my boss when I was hired here. We got to thinking about more and more how there was specialization and that there were not only time constraints, which prevented us from really doing 28

30 the kind of work on appeal that needed to be done on behalf of our clients, but that we didn't necessarily have lawyers in trial offices who had the requisite skills to be good appellate lawyers. And of course we looked around the country and looked at other models and decided that we wanted to pursue that on a grant basis. So we did a lot of work, and we got some support from some influential people in the Bar and went to Chief Justice Branch about it. And he was from over in the eastern part of the state from a very rural county over there. When we first talked to the Chief Justice, he said, "I understand all the benefits of it. And, you know, you might have a more experienced staff and perhaps a better level of advocacy, but I am real concerned about taking this work away from the court-appointed lawyers. And I think they would really be upset if we took this appellate work away from them." And I remember I was so bumptious at the time that I just, I looked at him and I said, "Well, why don't you go home this weekend and talk to some of those court-appointed lawyers at home and ask them just how thrilled they are to have to do court-appointed appeals to the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court and then I'll come back." And I did, and he was very open. And he said, "You're right." He said, "This is awful. They don't want to. They feel like they're not paid. They don't know what they're doing. You know, it's just not anything that they want to do." So we were able to get his support. 29

31 We started out with a grant program and then it was eventually taken over by the state and it has become a statefunded office. And we were really, really fortunate because, after we got everything off the ground and ready to go, we were all ready to gear up, and we were thinking about hiring an appellate defender. And I thought, "Oh, gee, nobody is going to apply for the job, or at least nobody good. What are we going to do? Because here we have all those grand ideas and what if nobody wants this job?" So I went around, and I recruited a lawyer who had been in my office at one point in time. And I said, "Would you do this? Would you apply for the job?" And I thought, "Well, at least, you know, he's a very good lawyer, and he would do a good job." And it was just like manna from heaven. Adam Stein applied, and I could not believe it. I mean, here was a lawyer of incredible accomplishment and of great stature in the state applying for this job. And it was just, it was just wonderful. And so Adam became the first appellate defender and of course brought with it everything that he had accomplished over the course of just an astounding legal career. And it was just wonderful. He set the tone for a tremendously effective office which still carries through today. Adam hired a lawyer who had worked... started out in this office. And when Adam left, he became the public defender. So Tye Hunter is the public defender now and started out right here with us. What about the sub group of the Appellate 30

32 Defender's Office, the Death Penalty Resource Center--did you have a part in establishing that? MT: Yeah. That really was my brain child. We were looking around... when I got active with the Academy of Trial Lawyers, I sort of agreed to be head of the death penalty committee. And what happened is informally I just became the person that everybody would call--lawyers who were appointed in these capital cases. I'd try to advise them over the telephone, or people would come here and we would talk for an hour. I realized, number one, that though I had some experience, I was certainly not the best or the most knowledgeable person to be helping them. And, number two, I really just didn't have the time to do that and maintain my own caseload. There was an equivalent of a resource center in Florida that I knew about, because I knew people who were involved in that effort. And I just decided that this was what we needed. The committee met, and I said, "Well, this is what I want to do." And they said, "It will never be done, Mary Ann." And I said, "Ya'll don't worry about it. Ya'll do these other things and I'm going to do this." So I got Rich Rosen at the [UNC] law school and I said, "This is going to be our project, and we're going to get us a grant together, and we're going to get us a 501(C)(3) status and all, and we're simply going to get this done. And we did. We got our first funding from the Academy of Trial Lawyers, some little piddling amount. Eventually that got funded through the 31

33 Appellate Defender's Office and has been a tremendous resource for the lawyers in the state, because there's so much to be learned and so much work to be done in terms of the litigation of the capital cases. [It] has a wonderful staff and just does an awful lot of very important work. And I am really proud of having been involved with the Resource Center. What has it been like practicing as a criminal defense lawyer in Fayetteville, which I understand is a fairly conservative environment? MT: Well, I can't complain about Fayetteville. I laugh--it's not the garden spot of the South by any means. But the people have been nice to me. I think the people in the legal community have been accepting, and I'm grateful for that. Like I said, I have not had near the number of negative experiences that I think many other woman, particularly in my age range, have experienced. And the Bar here has been very supportive of both me and this office as a whole. They may be unusual, but I appreciate it. How do you respond to people who ask you, "How can you possibly defend people who have committed these horrible crimes," or "How can you defend somebody who you know is guilty?" What do you say? MT: Well, depending on who the audience is, you say one thing or another. I used to laugh and say when people would say to me out in the community, "Well, how can you represent somebody that's guilty?" I would say, "Well, golly, I've been

34 doing this for nineteen years. I haven't had a guilty one yet. I don't know what I'll do if I do. I guess I'd just have to give them to somebody else." And then, there's the standard sort of, you know, everybody is entitled to a lawyer under the Constitution, and that certainly flies with some people. I think mostly what I do is choose not to respond to that and to avoid the issue. Of course, people in legal circles don't ask you questions like that. It's only when you're out there in the community. It's very hard for people to accept this. But it is a fact and it is a truism that nobody believes in the Constitution until it's their son or their daughter who's charged with something. And not that, everybody-i-know's son or daughter is going to be charged with first-degree murder, but everybody-i know's-son or daughter is going to be picked up for speeding or have a traffic ticket. And I think that's really when it comes home to roost. And I think that a lot of times it's just wasted breath to try to convince people of the merits of why you do what you do. I don't think my parents can understand it at all. And there are a lot of people who can't. Like I say, you may have to be crazy to do this job. I'm not sure. There are some people that I am convinced are just public defenders at heart. that's all they want to be. And that's what they want to be, and They're just cut out for that. So do you think that's what you are and you just didn't realize it until you actually got here? 33

35 MT: I think it was completely fortuitous but I think that it's just been a great experience for me. And I think that I was. I don't know whether I could have early on, because so many traits are learned. But I just would have an awful lot of difficulty charging somebody money. I just couldn't figure out how to do that. I would probably just take cases for apples and peanuts and turkeys or something. Have you ever had any of your clients ask you why you do what you do? MT: Oh, yeah. The clients are great. You know, we're not "real lawyers." We're just public defenders interning to be real lawyers. And when are you going to be a real lawyer? So you have that all the time, and I laugh about that. There's always this suspicion that, "If you're paid for by the state, then are you really my lawyer and are you really in some kind of conspiracy with the prosecutor to sell me down the river?" And so there's always some of that with some clients, though not all. But it's understandable, because it's the American way. You get what you pay for. And if you're not paying for it, you must not be getting anything. You know if you buy a Cadillac, you're getting something really good because it cost a ton of money. But if you buy a Hyundai, it must not be worth much because you're not paying anything for it. So, you have to put that into perspective that we've taught people to think that way, and so it's not unusual that they do. Have you ever had any clients try to pay you in 34