Betty Dickey (born February 23, 1940) is the first woman to serve as the chief justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court. She was born in

Black Rock, Arkansas Black Rock is a city in Lawrence County, Arkansas, United States, along the Black River. The population was 662 at the 2010 census. Geography Black Rock is located in northern Lawrence County at (36.107794, -91.098913), at the eastern edge of ...

on February 23, 1940, to Millard and Myrtle Clark. Dickey earned her Bachelor’s degree (1962) and

Juris Doctor The Juris Doctor (J.D. or JD), also known as Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D., JD, D.Jur., or DJur), is a graduate-entry professional degree in law and one of several Doctor of Law degrees. The J.D. is the standard degree obtained to practice law ...

(1985) from the

University of Arkansas The University of Arkansas (U of A, UArk, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Fayetteville, Arkansas. It is the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas System and the largest university in the state. Founded as Arkansas ...

at Fayetteville and

Little Rock ( The "Little Rock") , government_type = Council-manager , leader_title = Mayor , leader_name = Frank Scott Jr. , leader_party = D , leader_title2 = Council , leader_name2 ...

respectively. She initially worked as an educator before learning about the law in the office of her former husband

Jay Dickey Jay Woodson Dickey Jr. (December 14, 1939 – April 20, 2017), was a Republican U.S. Representative for Arkansas's 4th congressional district from 1993 to 2001. The amendment known as the Dickey Amendment (1996) blocks the Centers for Disease Con ...

, Jr., Esq. In 1985, Dickey was admitted to practice law in Arkansas. She served as an Assistant City Attorney for Pine Bluff, Arkansas and the City Attorney for Redfield, Arkansas while developing her own private practice. On January 5, 2004, then Governor

Mike Huckabee Michael Dale Huckabee (born August 24, 1955) is an American politician, Baptist minister, and political commentator who served as the 44th governor of Arkansas from 1996 to 2007. He was a candidate for the Republican Party presidential nomina ...

appointed Dickey as the interim Chief Justice of the

Supreme Court of Arkansas The Supreme Court of Arkansas is the highest court in the state judiciary of Arkansas. It has ultimate and largely discretionary appellate jurisdiction over all state court cases that involve a point of state law, and original jurisdiction o ...

. Prior to the appointment, Dickey had served as staff attorney for the Soil and Water Conservation Committee, prosecuting attorney for the Eleventh Judicial District and chief legal counsel in the Governor's Office. Although Dickey was appointed on an interim basis, she was the first woman in the court's history to serve as chief justice. Her successor, Jim Hannah, was elected to the position in November 2004 following a special election and Dickey stepped down on January 1, 2005. Governor Huckabee thereafter appointed Dickey to serve the remainder of Hannah's term as an associate justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, and she remained on the bench until December 2006. In 2018, Dickey was appointed as a liaison for Preferred Family Healthcare.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dickey, Betty Justices of the Arkansas Supreme Court American women judges University of Arkansas alumni 1940 births Living people People from Lawrence County, Arkansas 21st-century American women 21st-century women judges

See also

References