ABA Senior Lawyers Division Women Trailblazers in the Law ORAL HISTORY of CHRISTINE DURHAM Interviewer: Carolyn McHugh Dates of Interviews: June 1, 2009 June 25, 2009 September 21, 2009 October 20, 2009 January 6, 2010
ORAL HISTORY OF CHIEF JUSTICE CHRISTINE M. DURHAM Taken by Judge Carolyn B. McHugh SESSION 1 June 1, 2009 CBM: This is the first session of the oral history of Chief Justice Christine M. Durham of the Utah Supreme Court which is being taken as part of the Women's Trailblazers in the Law, a project of the American Bar Association, Senior Lawyers Division. It is being conducted by Judge Carolyn B. McHugh of the Utah Court of Appeals on June 1, 2009. Today is the first day of the oral history of Justice Durham, and we are meeting in her chambers at the Matheson Courthouse in Salt Lake City, Utah. Would you please state your full name because I have often wondered what the "M" is for. [Laughter] And tell me where you were born and when you were born? CMD: My full name is Christine Louise Meaders -- which is my birth name -- Durham. I was born on August 3, 1945 in Los Angeles, California. CBM: How long did you live in Los Angeles? CMD: I lived there until the summer of 1957, when my nuclear family left southern California and moved to the Washington, D.C. area. I went all through grade school in southern California. CBM: Tell me a little bit about what you can remember about your experience in Los Angeles? CMD: I have only impressionist memories of Los Angeles in that era and no way of verifying whether they are accurate or not. But as a child, I really thought southern California was the coolest place in the world. I was aware of the energy associated with the postwar economic boom. My mother came from a third generation California family that DC:2611255v1
arrived in the nineteenth century, and my father's family moved to California from Kansas during the early days of the Depression. My father, for example was getting his college degree on the GI Bill until 1955 when I was 10 years old. So during my early years, my mother worked nights at Bank of America and my father worked part-time while going to school. I remember a billboard we used to pass while driving my dad downtown to work, which had the population of Los Angeles on it; it was one of those rotating signs that moved and I remembered getting very excited the day Los Angeles surpassed New York City as the biggest American city. There was a sense that this was a new place with lots of energy; my parents were very much a part of that post-war growth period. They bought a small tract house when I was six and moved into what was then semi-rural suburbs (and is now of course densely urban). I remember growing up across the street from a vacant lot that had recently been farmland. I was the oldest child and, since my mother was working nights to help sustain the family while my dad was finishing school, I had a lot of responsibility. My younger sister is three and a half years younger than I and my brother is about six years younger. I remember having a lot of responsibilities-helping with breakfast, dishes, housekeeping. CBM: So there were three of you? CMD: There were three of us, that's right. Actually my younger siblings were half siblings. My mother had eloped at the end of her senior year in high school and married her high school sweetheart, he is my biological father. He was drafted into World War II and I don't know a lot (no one in my family would ever talk much about the circumstances) but the upshot was that my biological father and mother divorced sometime in my first year of life. I am not even sure if I know the dates. My mother met my adoptive father 2
when they were both working the night shift at Bank of America, and they married when I was about a year and a half. He adopted me when I was two. I did not know that until I was 12. My parents did not tell me I was adopted until 1957, when we were getting ready to leave LA to move to Washington. Such a move in those days was major. Thus, at age 11 my parents sat me down one night and explained that I have a biological father, that he would like to see me before we left the state. This was a very strange experience. I learned at the same time that a family friend (whom I referred to as my aunt Margaret), who used to drive up from San Diego regularly to visit me, was actually my paternal grandmother. CBM: How did that make you feel? CMD: Well, the chief memory I have of these events is of not knowing how to feel. The emotional messages from my parents were very neutral. The information was just dropped on me with no background, no explanations, no content. I had a two or three hour lunch with my biological father at Clifton's cafeteria in downtown Los Angeles. I remember being all dressed up in my Easter dress but I have only the vaguest recollection of him, or of the conversation. I think I was receiving subliminal signals not to make too much of the experience because I never really had a chance to process it in any way, then or later. Subsequently, I remained in touch with my paternal grandmother and she would give me news of her son. He had remarried, settled in the San Francisco area, had five children of his own. Years later, after my husband and I had settled in Utah, I established some contact with his family and met with him and his wife. CBM: That's interesting. DC:2611255v1 3
CMD: My parents' generation was one that did not explore emotions. For example, I do not know the circumstances of my birth. My father was in basic training in the military in the San Francisco area at the time, and my mother was in Los Angeles. I don't even know where she was living or who took her to the hospital. CBM: You don't have a birth story. CMD: I don't have a birth story, exactly. A few years ago I asked my uncle, who is my mother's sole surviving sibling, what he knew about what happened around my birth and what happened between my mother and my biological father. He said, "Well I really don't want to talk about it." That was pretty much the family dynamic They did not talk about things. I have asked my adopted father, with whom I have a very good, very close relationship, what he knows of my story, and he says he knows nothing. He apparently married this woman with a one year old baby and just took it as it came. I once asked him when he first found out that I existed. He told me that my mother and he used to ride the bus sometimes to and from work and she would talk about me. "I thought for awhile that you were the dog. [Laugher] Luckily for me, when he learned I was actually a baby, he took me into his heart along with my mother. He loved and adored me, and took good care of both of us. CBM: It sounds as if your mother was lucky, as well. CMD: Yes. Another thing I remember about growing up in Los Angeles at that time was how wonderful the public schools were. I attended local public schools and even at the time I was aware of how fabulous the teachers were, how many opportunities we got for field trips, cultural experiences. I remember the third or fourth grade a wonderful visit to the Los Angeles harbor, and afterwards actually building a miniature harbor in the 4
classroom. I had a strong sense of eagerness about school; I loved being good at learning. CBM: Before we go too far into your education, I'd like to just make sure I am clear on what your parents each did for a living. You said that they worked at Bank of America, what did they both do? CMD: Right, my mother posted financial information onto some form of punch card, she was called a punch card operator. My father did accounting work; he majored in business and accounting in college. During college he was a clerk at the bank for a couple of years. Then he took the civil service exam and worked as a clerk with the IRS. When he graduated and got his CPA, he joined the IRS as a revenue agent in LA. Subsequently he went to Washington DC to join the Office of International Operations at the Treasury Department. Three years later they sent him to France. We lived in France from 1960 to 1965 and after that my father did other international work. Treasury "loaned" him to US AID, where he served on something called the Foreign Task Assistance Staff. He would go to countries in South America and advise them on how to set up an internal revenue system. We don't often reflect on how significant a part of our democracy our internal revenue system is. We are pretty cavalier about it, but it is a remarkable system. So, I grew up as the daughter of a tax agent, and to this day I am grateful to pay my fair share of taxes. CBM: I never knew... CMD: My mother, after she was able to quit her night job when my father finished school, became a stay at home mom. Although this gets a little bit ahead, when we went to Virginia, when I was in middle school and my siblings were in grade school, we all 5
came home one day and at dinner my mother looked around and said, "Does anybody notice anything different around here?" I said, "No, we can't tell." She said, "Well that's good. I took a part-time job a while back and I wondered if it was depriving anybody of anything." She had found a job as a bookkeeper with a small business, and worked there until we left for France. I think she regretted that she never had any college. She was very bright, but in her family, it was her brother who got to go to college, not her. As her life progressed, she used to talk about going back to college but then they started working and living in Europe and South America and there were few opportunities. When they retired, I said, "Now is your chance, Mom, to go back and get your degree." She said, "I don't need a degree. I speak four languages, I've travelled the world and I am fine as I am." She was always a voracious reader, and was really selfeducated. CBM: What are the names of your siblings? CMD: My sister who is four years younger is Therese Meaders Moore. Therese was named after a French woman that my father met during World War II. He went into France immediately after the invasion forces as a supply sergeant, and was stationed in a little town called "Compiegne," which is about ten miles north of Paris. One night he met an inebriated Frenchman who was celebrating the liberation of Paris. The Frenchman took him home and introduced him to his wife and her two sisters. They became close, fast friends, so that when our family moved to France in 1960, it was like having readymade aunts and an uncle. My sister is named after Therese Bourg. My younger brother is William Anderson Meaders. He is a lawyer here in Salt Lake City. CBM: Oh, he is? 6
CMD: He is a senior partner at the firm of Kirton and McConkie. CBM: And, so, your sister is three years younger? CMD: Yes, three and a half CBM: And your brother is another two years younger? CMD: Another two years, right. CBM: I just wanted to get a sense of the family. Do you remember -- anything you were in Los Angles, when you started preschool, I take it CMD: Right. CBM: Did you go to preschool? CMD: No, I don't think preschool was very common in that era. Certainly not in our family's experience. Neither of my grandfathers on either side finished high school. My mother finished high school, and of course my dad went to college, in large part due to the G.I. Bill. Both of my parents came from very modest backgrounds economically and educationally. I attended Spencer V. Williams elementary school in Downey California from kindergarten through 6th grade. CBM: Is it still there? CMD: It is still there; I have been back to see it once. CBM: Can you remember anything about whether you were a good student, mediocre student? CMD: I was always a very good student and I knew from a young age that I was smart. That was not always a good thing as a little girl. I wore glasses from the age of two and was sometimes called "Four-eyes" or "the Brain." I of course would have preferred to be cute and popular. I was born with focus astigmatism. CBM: Myopic? 7
CMD: No, it was a muscle problem. I had my first surgery when I was just about a year and a half old, and another surgery when I was three. I did love reading, and indulged constantly. I remember car trips, meetings, sneaking away to hide in the backyard and read. Pulling the covers up over my bed at night; going into the bathroom and reading by the night light. I even read walking to school. That was my escape, and the way I explored places and ideas beyond my experience. CBM: Do you remember any books that really struck you at that period in your life, that made an impression on you? CMD: Well, I had an aunt who was a librarian very interested in children's literature. She regularly supplied us with the most wonderful books: Kenneth Grahame, A.A. Milne, E.B. White, and countless others. I read all the children's classics. It was a family affair. Also, by the time I was 10 or 11, my mother was of the habit of taking us to the library weekly and approving of reading. So basically I read everything I could put my hands on. I don't know how discerning or discriminating I was, but my aunt and my parents helped. My father traveled occasionally, and it was a tradition that when he was gone, we would eat dinner on TV trays and read. CBM: I know that you are a practicing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints. Was that true when you were a child in California? CMD: Yes and no. My mother came from Mormon ancestry but her branch of the family had decided that Utah was not the promised land and moved on to California in the 19th century. For the most part, they had left the church so I was not aware that my mother had Mormon connections. I was apparently blessed in church and had some aunts and uncles who were active, but we didn't affiliate. When I was seven or eight, Mormon 8
missionaries knocked on the door and my father, who was a friendly soul, invited them in. He went through apparently three or four sets of missionaries over two years, and finally decided that he was going to convert to the Mormon church. So it was at that point (that was when I was about seven or eight) that my mother came back into the Mormon church and I was actually baptized when I was eight. So I had both the experience of growing up of knowing my nuclear family before church affiliation and after. My father had an abundant zeal as do many converts, and he was very attached to the church. CBM: So that would have been, is that after you moved to Washington, D.C.? CMD: No that was still in Los Angeles. CBM: Okay, how did that affect you, I assume that most of the kids that you went to school with... CMD: I was always, all through high school, almost the only Mormon in my social group and in my school setting. I don't recall that being, I honestly don't recall that being much of an issue at any point in time. I remember in middle school, one of my best friends was Jewish. I went to the synagogue with her and she occasionally joined me in church activities. I just saw it as the one manifestation of my identity akin to that of others. I was everywhere a member of a religious minority but never felt isolated because of that. CBM: Do you think that experience has made you more empathetic of people who are in the minority? CMD: It's possible. I know that it contributed to my need to think and act independently. I probably learned at a young age not to care too much about what other people thought about my choices. That may be overstating it, but I remember not really feeling a need 9
to seek other people's approval about my beliefs. CBM: What about activity when you were young? Did you play sports? Were you musical? What did you do? CMD: I was athletic. I loved sports and riding a bike. In the area where I grew up, we were very free to roam. I was pretty good in sports, you know, dodge ball and kickball, basketball. I was very good at basketball through high school. I learned to read music when I took accordion lessons in the fifties (we had a cute neighbor boy who played accordion), and later the piano and group singing. CBM: Great, you be our entertainment at the judicial conference... LAUGHTER. CMD: I was homebound for three months in 1958 with mononucleosis and my parents bought an old piano. Between what I knew from my accordion days and days with nothing to do, I taught myself how to play the piano. Later, in Paris, I took piano lessons and improved. CBM: Anything else you can remember about your early years in Los Angeles? CMD: I do remember some idyllic summer vacations. We didn't have much money so we always camped, but we vacationed throughout Southern California, especially the beach. I liked riding the waves and hiking. Swimming was my greatest joy, next to reading. CBM: Well I think this a good place to break. CMD: This is fun. 10