Spider Woman: A Life – by the former President of the Supreme Court

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While there is much to marvel at in Brenda Hale’s list of achievements, this Spider Woman has no need of the superpowers of her comic book namesake. both an orthodox application of basic principles of our constitutional law and a remarkable assertion of judicial independence to protect our constitution from an unprecedented – at least in modern times – abuse of prime ministerial power. Cooperative and engaged, she looks for all the world like a person who is enjoying herself, nothing on her face but the cool clarity for which she is known; not a trace of impatience at the frippery.

Spider Woman by Lady Hale | Waterstones Spider Woman by Lady Hale | Waterstones

What was it like for you to watch the US supreme court overturning of Roe v Wade, a decision that makes abortion illegal in some US states? Brenda Marjorie Hale, Baroness Hale, DBE, QC, PC, FBA is a British legal academic, barrister, judge and a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. But the two do have a few things in common, among them superhuman strength, incredible stamina, and a resistance to certain poisons (down the years, Hale has proved herself, if not oblivious to the toxin of sexism, then able to survive, and even to thrive, in the face of it). I am sitting at my desk in my office in Conquest House, at the corner of Theobalds Road and John Street, just north of Gray’s Inn. It sounds like a lifelong ambition for Hale: to be there on the battlefield, when authoritarianism came knocking for decency, and lawyers were the last line of defence.

She deploys a lawyer’s caution around the word “sorry”: I may have regrets, it says, but none of them are actionable. In July 2017, she was appointed to be the next President of the Supreme Court, succeeding Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury. The United Kingdom doesn’t have a written constitution, so all we [the courts] can do is try to make sure that the government sticks within the limits of what the law allows. I must confess that there are parts of the book I couldn't understand completely in relation to legal processes and cases. To receive the best experience possible, please make sure any ad blockers are switched off, or add https://experience.

Spider Woman bites back - The New European The Spider Woman bites back - The New European

Wise, warm and inspiring, Spider Woman tells the story of how a self-professed ‘girly swot’ found that she could overcome the odds stacked against her, as well as showing how the law shapes our world and supports us in crisis. Tucked away between King’s College Chapel and the Senate House are the Old Schools, more eighteenthcentury elegance, where the Law Faculty is based, and the Squire Law Library.As a judge she “relished having to decide a point of law” which is why she would accept nothing less than a place on the High Court bench, or above, where “the law is made”.

Lady Hale on judgments and jewellery: ‘Maybe I should have Lady Hale on judgments and jewellery: ‘Maybe I should have

That was the case in which Lady Hale, the court’s president achieved quasi-celebrity status, not for her calm management of the hearing or her diplomatic skill in arriving at a clear, unanimous and definitive judgment in such a controversial case… but for wearing, as she delivered the court’s televised judgment summary, a glittery spider brooch. Here, in an exclusive extract from her memoir, Lady Hale describes some of her own moments of 'imposter syndrome', from being the first pupil from her state school to be offered a place at Cambridge University to being sworn in as the first female president of The Supreme Court. Three years later, in 2019, the supreme court had an even more loaded case to decide, and by then Hale was its president.Another intervener was the former Prime Minister, Sir John Major, whose counsel, Lord Garnier QC, with perhaps unnecessary modesty, titles his contribution “Some musings from the edge of the court”.