The Rainbow Minute
The Rainbow MinuteThe Rainbow Minute
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
“Judge Victoria Kolakowski" Read by Ted Heck
Alameda County, California became the seat of the first openly-transgender trial judge in the U.S., after Victoria Kolakowski was elected on November 2, 2010. The big news was that her transgender status was never an issue during her campaign. She had transitioned from male to female in the 1980’s while attending Louisiana State University.
Kolakowski had served as a lawyer for 21 years and an administrative law judge for the past four years.
Originally prohibited from taking her bar exam because of her transgender status, she faced discrimination as a lawyer, but she never forgot these words which she said at her confirmation: "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, then what am I? And if not now, when?"
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