Juanita Westmoreland-Traore
Juanita Westmoreland-Traoré is a notable figure in Canadian history, recognized as the first Black judge appointed in Quebec and the first Black dean of a Canadian law school. Born in 1942 to Guyanese immigrants in Verdun, Quebec, her upbringing was shaped by significant community influences, particularly during the US civil rights and feminist movements. She pursued higher education rigorously, obtaining a law degree from the University of Montreal and a doctorate from the University of Paris II, and began her legal career in 1970 alongside her uncle, the only Black lawyer in Quebec at the time.
Westmoreland-Traoré transitioned from practicing law to academia, teaching at several universities while also serving as dean at the University of Windsor. Her judicial career spanned from 1999 to 2012, during which she made landmark rulings, including cases addressing racial profiling. A staunch advocate for human rights and social justice, she has held numerous leadership roles, including with the United Nations and various Canadian legal organizations. Her impact on the legal profession is profound, especially in promoting equality and diversity within the field. Westmoreland-Traoré’s legacy is celebrated through scholarships and awards that honor her contributions to advancing human rights in Canada.
Juanita Westmoreland-Traore
Judge
- Born: March 10, 1942
- Place of Birth: Verdun, Quebec
- Education: University of Montreal; University of Paris II
- Significance: Juanita Westmoreland-Traoré was a lawyer, an educator, and a human rights activist who became the first Black judge ever to be appointed in Quebec and the first Black dean of a Canadian law school.
Background
Juanita Westmoreland-Traoré was born in 1942, the only child of Guyanese immigrants in Verdun, now part of Montreal in Quebec, Canada. Her father was a porter for the Pullman Company. Because her mother died when she was young and her father traveled for work, Westmoreland-Traoré moved often and was raised largely by her grandmother, aunts, and uncles. Coming of age during the US civil rights movement, the feminist movement, and the Quiet Revolution in Quebec, Westmoreland-Traoré admired US Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall and actively participated in her community as secretary of the Negro Citizenship Association.
Westmoreland-Traoré received her bachelor’s degree of arts, with highest honors, from Marianopolis College in 1963. She then went on to earn a law degree from the University of Montreal in 1966 and a doctorate of state in public law and administrative science from the University of Paris II. During her legal studies, Westmoreland-Traoré was involved in Operations Crossroads Africa (now Canadian Crossroads International), which took her to Senegal in 1964 and then to Togo in 1965. Westmoreland-Traoré’s legal career moved from legal practice to teaching and eventually to serving in the judiciary.
Legal and Judicial Career
At the time that Westmoreland-Traoré began her legal career, her uncle Frederick Phillips was the only Black lawyer in Quebec. He was joined in 1970 by Westmoreland-Traoré, who passed the Quebec bar (Barreau du Québec) in 1969 and began practicing law the following year as part of the Mergler, Melançon, Bless firm, where she worked until 1976. From 1976 until 1991, Westmoreland-Traoré taught at the Universities of Montreal and Quebec, both in Montreal. Her areas of specialty were citizenship and immigration, human rights, and family law. In addition to her work in Quebec, Westmoreland-Traoré served as dean of the University of Windsor Faculty of Law in Ontario from 1996 to 1999, passing the Ontario bar in 1997. She was then appointed judge for the Court of Quebec’s Criminal and Penal Division and Youth Division, a position she held from 1999 until her retirement from civic service in 2012.
Westmoreland-Traoré helped establish the provincial Council of Cultural Communities and Immigration and presided over it from 1985 to 1990. She also served as employment equity commissioner for Ontario from 1991 to 1995 and then as adviser to the United Nations regarding Haiti’s National Commission on Truth and Justice in 1995. Westmoreland-Traoré was a board member for the International Association of Women Judges, Canadian Chapter, and cochaired the Canadian Association of Provincial Court Judges’ Equality and Diversity Committee.
Throughout her legal and judicial career, Westmoreland-Traoré challenged the racial status quo and handed down sometimes controversial rulings based on her understandings of social context as well as the evidence and jurisprudence. For example, in 2005, she acquitted a Black youth charged with possession of drugs with intent to distribute in which she found the police had engaged in illegal racial profiling. Westmoreland-Traoré also cowrote a judicial guide on diversity and equality, touching on such areas as classism, ageism, ableism, and racism, over a period of four decades. In 2021, she and retired Harry LaForme submitted a report to the Minister of Justice on the creation of an independent commission to consider wrongful conviction applications. The Canadian government committed to creating the commission a year later. In 2023, David Lametti, the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, proposed legislation to establish the commission.
Impact
Westmoreland-Traoré was actively committed to serve her community and an influential promoter of rights for equality, social justice, and humanity. In addition to her fight against discrimination and exclusion, through her leadership, she has opened new horizons in the legal field for women of all ethnic origins and made the face of Canada’s legal landscape more representative of contemporary society.
Throughout her career, Westmoreland-Traoré has been honored with numerous awards for her accomplishments to promote and advance human rights. She was named an officer of the National Order of Quebec in 1991 and has received honorary degrees from the Universities of Ottawa and Quebec in Montreal. Among her accolades have been the Canadian Bar Association’s 2005 Touchstone Award for "promoting equality in the legal profession, the judiciary, or the legal community"; the Quebec Human Rights and Youth Commission’s 2008 Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms Award for her unwavering, lifelong battle against discrimination; and the Barreau du Québec’s 2009 Christine Tourigny Award of Merit for her advancement of women within the legal profession. Her legacy continues through the University of Quebec in Montreal’s annual Juanita Westmoreland-Traoré Scholarship for law students who promote social equality and human rights through their legal work and the Windsor Law’s Judge Juanita Westmoreland-Traoré Leadership Scholarship for law students active in a minority community who demonstrate leadership.
Personal life
Westmoreland-Traoré is married to Ismaïl Traoré, with whom she has two grown sons.
Bibliography
Armstrong, Neil. "Legal Trailblazer Organized Herself to Succeed." Pride. Pride News Magazine, 18 Mar. 2015. Web. 13 Sept. 2016.
DeGuire, Patricia. "Legal Icon Westmoreland-Traore Retires." Voices 18.2 (2012): 1–3. Digital file.
Gardiner, Heather. "UQAM Scholarship Recognizes Quebec’s First Black Woman Judge." Canadian Lawyer & Law Times: Legal Feeds. Thomson Reuters, 25 Mar. 2013. Web. 15 Sept. 2016.
Joy, Lisa. "Judges Heading Creation of Wrongful Conviction Commission Call for Release of Saskatchewan Sister." SaskToday, 5 Sept. 2021, www.sasktoday.ca/north/local-news/judges-heading-creation-of-wrongful-conviction-commission-call-for-release-of-saskatchewan-sisters-4458245. Accessed 11 Oct. 2024.
Mills, Jennifer. "Conferencing as a Site for the Mobilization of Black Feminist Identities in the Congress of Black Women of Canada, 1973-1983." Journal of Black Studies 46.4 (2015): 415–41. Print.
"Minister of Justice Introduces Legislation (David and Joyce Milgaard’s Law) to Establish an Independent Miscarriage of Justice Review Commission." Department of Justice Canada, 16 Feb. 2023, www.canada.ca/en/department-justice/news/2023/02/minister-of-justice-introduces-legislation-david-and-joyce-milgaards-law-to-establish-an-independent-miscarriage-of-justice-review-commission.html. Accessed 11 Oct. 2024.
"A Miscarriages of Justice Commission." Government of Canada, 3 Feb. 2022, www.sasktoday.ca/north/local-news/judges-heading-creation-of-wrongful-conviction-commission-call-for-release-of-saskatchewan-sisters-4458245. Accessed 11 Oct. 2024.
Potvin, Maryse. "Interethnic Relations and Racism in Quebec." Quebec Questions: Quebec Studies for the Twenty-First Century (2010): 267–86. Print.
"Social Justice, Law and Equality: Honouring Judge Juanita Westmoreland-Traoré." McGill Centre for Human Rights & Legal Pluralism. McGill U, 2016. Web. 15 Sept. 2016.