Barbara Haynes, a champion for Tennessee women in law, dies at 84

The first woman to serve as a judge on Nashville’s General Sessions Court has died. Barbara Haynes was 84 years old.

Haynes was a Nashville native who grew up in Bordeaux and Inglewood. She was the first of her family to go to college, at the University of Tennessee, and later graduated at the top of her class at the Nashville School of Law. A decade later, she was appointed to lead an overhaul of the state’s sentencing guidelines, the first reworking of that part of the criminal code in more than a century. Haynes won her seat as circuit judge in 1990, and held the position until her retirement in 2011, while her husband, Joe, had a parallel legal career and served as a state senator.

The Tennessean notes that Haynes stood out for touches like wearing red judicial robes and keeping fresh flowers in the courtroom. But she was also known for fairness and compassion, and for her efforts to bring support for gender equality in her profession. She was a founder of the Lawyers Association for Women and she made a point of trying to hire female clerks.

“Judge Haynes began her career when there were too few women on the bench,” Nashville Mayor John Cooper wrote in a statement. “The people who appeared in her court will tell you she presided with wisdom, compassion and common sense.”

Haynes won multiple awards for her public service and advocacy work for women’s issues, including the University of Tennessee Centennial Leader Award, the Tennessee Bar Association’s William M. Leech Public Service Award, the Nashville Bar Association’s John C. Tune Award and the Tennessee Bar Association’s Justice Frank F. Drowota III Outstanding Judicial Service Award.

“Judge Barbara Haynes was a role model, mentor and champion for women across Tennessee. She was a friend to all and excelled as a lawyer and judge,” Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Sharon Lee wrote via Twitter. 

“She was blazingly smart, hilariously funny, genuinely courageous, and uncommonly generous — usually all at the same time,” state Sen. Jeff Yarbro, D-Nashville, wrote on Twitter. “Our city is a better place because she was called to serve it.”

The family is asking that anyone wanting to remember Judge Haynes do so by making a charitable donation. A celebration of life event will be scheduled at a later date.