Hon. Charles Z. Smith Receives WSBA Lifetime Service Award

Seattle , Washington , September 12, 2001 — Washington State Supreme Court Justice Charles Z. Smith will receive the Washington State Bar Association (WSBA) Lifetime Service Award today in Seattle . This is a special award given for a lifetime of service to the WSBA and the public. It is given only when there is someone especially deserving of this recognition.

Justice Smith was appointed to the Washington State Supreme Court by Governor Booth Gardner in 1988. He has been elected unopposed ever since. For nearly 20 years, he has been a professor of law emeritus at the University of Washington School of Law. He retired from the University of Washington School of Law in 1983, where he served as a professor and associate dean. Justice Smith has been a principal in a private law firm, served as a King County Superior Court Judge and a Seattle Municipal Court Judge, and served as a special assistant to U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.

Justice Smith has worked on numerous juvenile-justice projects, and is a member of the Criminal Justice Standards and the Juvenile Justice committees of the American Bar Association (ABA). As an active member of the ABA , he served on the Task Force on Minorities in the Judiciary, the Committee on Criminal Justice Improvements, and the Task Force on Internal Communications. Locally, Justice Smith served as chairperson of the Seattle Mayor's Panel on Disparate Employee Discipline, the Supreme Court Minority and Justice Task Force, and the Washington State Minority and Justice Commission. He served for 10 years as moderator of the National Consortium of Task Forces and Commissions on Racial and Ethnic Bias in the Courts. Justice Smith is a former chair of the Community Council at the Washington State Reformatory, and served on the King County Jail/Correctional Facilities Advisory Committee.

WSBA governor Zulema Hinojos-Fall nominated Justice Smith for encouraging the recruitment of diverse law students, mentoring new lawyers of color, and providing leadership in the community. She wrote: "There ought not be any doubt that Justice Smith's professional career has been a sterling example of his commitment to public service through the practice of law. His bio tells the tale of his lifetime of achievement, but does not begin to address the impact his example of accomplishment and professional dedication had on all of us attorneys of color."

The Washington State Bar Association is a private, nonprofit organization authorized by the Washington State Supreme Court to license the state's 26,600 lawyers. The WSBA both regulates lawyers under the authority of the Court and serves its members as a professional association — all without public funding. As a regulatory agency, it administers the bar exam, provides record-keeping and licensing functions, and administers the lawyer discipline program. As a professional association, the WSBA provides continuing legal education for attorneys, in addition to numerous other educational and member service activities.