Mary Fairhurst

Quality 0.50 · 2 views · Updated 2 months ago

American judge (1957–2021)

title: "Mary Fairhurst" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1957-births", "2021-deaths", "21st-century-american-judges", "21st-century-american-women-judges", "chief-justices-of-the-washington-supreme-court", "gonzaga-university-school-of-law-alumni", "justices-of-the-washington-supreme-court", "people-from-olympia,-washington", "washington-(state)-democrats", "women-chief-justices-of-state-supreme-courts-in-the-united-states"] description: "American judge (1957–2021)" topic_path: "law" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Fairhurst" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary American judge (1957–2021) ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox officeholder"]

Field	Value
name	Mary Fairhurst
office	Chief Justice of the Washington Supreme Court
term_start	January 9, 2017
term_end	January 5, 2020
predecessor	Barbara Madsen
successor	Debra L. Stephens
office1	Associate Justice of the Washington Supreme Court
term_start1	January 13, 2003
term_end1	January 5, 2020
predecessor1	Charles Z. Smith
successor1	Raquel Montoya-Lewis
birth_name	Mary Elizabeth Fairhurst
birth_date
birth_place	Pendleton, Oregon, U.S.
death_date
death_place	Olympia, Washington, U.S.
party	Democratic
education	Gonzaga University (BA, JD)
partner	Bob Douglas
::

Mary Elizabeth Fairhurst (August 13, 1957 — December 28, 2021) was an American attorney and jurist who served as a justice and chief justice of the Washington Supreme Court.

Early life and education

A native of Olympia, Washington, Fairhurst earned her undergraduate degree in political science from Gonzaga University in 1979, graduating cum laude. In 1984, she earned her Juris Doctor from Gonzaga University School of Law, graduating magna cum laude.

Career

Fairhurst served in the Attorney General of Washington's office under Christine Gregoire and Ken Eikenberry. Fairhurst worked on a constitutional amendment to increase the rights of crime victims. She also organized statewide conferences on domestic violence.

Fairhurt joined the Washington Supreme Court after a successful election in 2003. In 2008, she won re-election against Michael J. Bond. On November 4, 2016, it was announced that Fairhurst had been elected Chief Justice of the Washington State Supreme Court.

Fairhurst served as the president of the Washington State Bar Association. She also served on the Bar Board of Governors representing Washington's 3rd congressional district and as the President of the Washington Women Lawyers.

In October 2018, Fairhurst wrote the majority opinion on a ruling to abolish state's death penalty.{{Bluebook journal |first=|last=Note|title=Recent Case: Washington State Supreme Court Declares Death Penalty Unconstitutional In Washington|volume=132| journal=Harv. L. Rev.|page=1764|url=https://harvardlawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/1764-1771_Online.pdf|year=2019}} In 2019, Fairhurst received the American Inns of Court Professionalism Award for the Ninth Circuit at the Judicial Conference of the Ninth Circuit in Spokane, Washington.

Retirement and death

In October 2019, Fairhurst announced that she would retire from the court in January 2020, citing health concerns. On December 4, 2019, Governor Jay Inslee nominated Raquel Montoya-Lewis to succeed Fairhurst. Montoya-Lewis is the first Native American to serve on the Washington Supreme Court.

In 2020, Fairhurst received the Charles A. Goldmark Distinguished Service Award. On August 22, 2020, Fairhurst became the seventh Lynn Allen Award recipient.

Fairhurst died from cancer in Olympia, Washington, on December 28, 2021, at the age of 64. She had been treated for colon cancer starting in 2008.

References

(December 29, 2021). "Retired Washington Supreme Court Justice Mary E. Fairhurst passes away at 64". Washington Courts.
"Re-Elect Justice Mary Fairhurst - About Mary".
"Thoughts and Prayers for the Honorable Mary Fairhurst {{!}} Gonzaga University".
(November 4, 2016). "Mary Fairhurst elected chief justice of state Supreme Court". The Seattle Times.
"Washington State Courts - Supreme Court Bios - Justice Mary E. Fairhurst". Courts.wa.gov.
"Washington State Courts - Supreme Court Bios - Chief Justice Mary E. Fairhurst".
{{cite court. (2018). link
"Chief Justice Mary e. Fairhurst to Receive the 2019 American Inns of Court Professionalism Award for the Ninth Circuit".
(October 3, 2019). "Washington Supreme Court Chief Justice Mary Fairhurst will retire to focus on her health".
(October 3, 2019). "Washington Supreme Court Chief Justice Mary Fairhurst to retire after colon cancer diagnosis".
"Raquel Montoya-Lewis named as first Native American to Washington Supreme Court {{!}} The Spokesman-Review".
https://legalfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Award-History-and-Recipients_rev-2019-1.pdf {{Bare URL PDF. (March 2022)
(August 24, 2020). "Mary Fairhurst honored with Lynn Allen Award at NPI's Summer Anniversary Picnic".
Sowersby, Shauna. (December 29, 2021). "Former Chief Justice of Washington Supreme Court has died of cancer at 64". The News Tribune.

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::