Inez Smith Reid

After graduating from Yale Law School without a job, Reid received a Ford Foundation Foreign Area Training Fellowship and enrolled in a master's degree program at UCLA, where she studied political science with a concentration in African studies. The following year, she accepted a position as a professor in Congo-Leopoldville at the Ecole Nationale de Droit et d'Administration.[13] The opportunity was jointly funded by Yale Law School, the Ford Foundation and the Congolese government, and her role was to teach students studying to become magistrate judges. Reid taught her law students in French amidst the ongoing Congo Crisis. She worked alongside European professors and administrators who at times belittled her American education. In Africa, just like in the other places she lived and worked, Reid experienced racism and had to prove herself to those around her.[8]

Her teaching experience, coupled with the limited job market for Black law school graduates, propelled Judge Reid into education after she finished her time in Congo. She started her twelve-year teaching career in 1964 at the State University of New York at New Paltz, where she taught African studies and political science, while enrolled in graduate school at Columbia University. In 1965, Reid was a lecturer in political science at Hunter College.[14] She would go on to teach at Lehman College, Brooklyn College, Barnard College, the University of Virginia School of Law, the West Virginia University College of Law, American University, and the City University of New York at New Paltz. At Brooklyn College, she was an associate professor, and at American University she was a constitutional scholar and an adjunct professor in the Department of Government.[15][16] In addition to law, Reid taught political science and African studies, and she published in the fields of constitutional law, African-American studies, African studies, and environmental law.[16][10]

Reid supplemented her work as a professor with involvement in non-government organizations that served Black women and community development.[8] While she was teaching at Barnard College in the 1970s, her brother encouraged her to pursue opportunities that used her law degree. Reid took a leave of absence at Barnard to serve as the General Counsel for the New York State Division of Youth under Governor Hugh Carey's administration in 1976.[10]

In 1977 she was called upon by President Carter's administration to serve as the Deputy General Counsel for Regulation Review of what was the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Reid for the Carter Administration again as the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1979.[8] At the EPA, Reid was responsible for conducting audits, investigations and reviews on the EPA's programs, legislation and proposed regulations. During her time there, her main goals were promoting efficiency and economy in government programs and implementing programs to prevent and detect abuse, fraud, waste and mismanagement within EPA programs.[17]

When President Reagan was elected, Reid and her fellow Inspector Generals that served under the Carter Administration were all fired. In March 1981, Reid moved on to serve as chief of the Legislation and Opinion section in the office of what was then called the Corporation Counsel for the District of Columbia, which is now the Attorney General of the District of Columbia. This office had a staff of 100 lawyers which represented the city in civil litigation as well as a wide variety of misdemeanor prosecutions, more serious traffic charges, and juvenile cases. Reid was nominated as the new Corporation Counsel by Mayor Marion Barry on September 15, 1983, replacing her former boss Judith W. Rogers. Though Reid was considered a little known figure in Washington, her nomination was praised by Councilmember Wilhelmina J. Rolark (D-Ward 8), who was the head of the Council's Judiciary Committee at the time.[10]

As the Corporation Counsel, Judge Reid oversaw all the official legal affairs of the District, supervised about 200 employees and had an operating budget of $6.2 million. Her annual salary was $63,700.[18]

Reid faced controversy in November 1983 when she promoted Laphalia Joyce Gause to a position as her executive assistant that would pay $43,000 per year after Reid cosigned a note for Gause to buy a $191,000 house.[19][8] Reid argued that there was no impropriety surrounding the promotion because Gause had been recommended for the position by her former supervisor and Reid consulted an ethics counselor before she moved on the promotion. Mayor Barry's legal counsel investigated the incident and found no "abuse of discretion" by Reid, but noted a "real or apparent" conflict of interest.[19]

In 1985, Judge Reid took a year-long leave from the Corporation Counsel's office to teach at the University of West Virginia College of Law. In 1986, after she completed the one-year leave, she left the Corporation Counsel's office to take a job with the law firm of Finley, Kumble, Wagner, Heine, Underberg, Manley & Casey. There, Reid used her previous experience as Inspector General of the EPA to specialize in environmental litigation, appellate cases and white collar crime. Reid also worked at the law firms of Laxalt, Washington, Perito & Dubuc, Graham & James, and Lewis, White & Clay.[19][12]

In 1995, Reid was nominated to the D.C. Court of Appeals by President Bill Clinton. Reid replaced Emmet G. Sullivan, who was appointed to the U.S. District Court bench. Judge Reid was sworn in by her twin brother, George Bundy Smith who was serving as an associate judge of the New York Appeals court.[20]

The National Law Journal reported in 2010 that Reid was the court's most prolific judge, issuing 85 written opinions over the course of four years. She was in the middle of the nine active judges on the court in terms of timing, as she averaged about 246 days per written opinion.[3]

Reid was one of the five affirming judges in a 2010 case surrounding same-sex marriage. In the 81-page opinion, Reid and four other judges concluded that the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics acted within the law when it rejected an initiative presented by an anti-gay marriage group to institute a referendum on same-sex marriage in the District.[21]

Reid retired from active service on the appeals court on April 2, 2011. She served as a senior judge for six more years until her retirement on December 12, 2017.