Deborah Cook waited almost two years to learn the good news. In May 2003, the U.S. Senate voted 66 to 25 to confirm her nomination to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. As the judge to that court, she rules on appeals from the federal district courts in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee. In the federal court system, only the U.S. Supreme Court is higher that the 12 appellate circuits. Cook’s appointment is for life.
Cook is a strict constructionist of the law and is considered a conservative. Thus, her nomination caused much controversy in liberal Democratic circles. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass, was particularly critical of Cook’s record on worker’s rights. “She seems to think ‘the law’ should almost always protect corporations and not injured workers.” Cook objected to that characterization, “It was just an incredible distortion.”
When President George W. Bush nominated Cook for the federal court in May 2001, she was serving on the Ohio Supreme Court. She was first elected to that seat in 1994 and re-elected in November 2000.
Prior to her election to the Ohio Supreme Court, Cook served as a judge of the Ninth District Court of Appeals covering Summit, Wayne, Medina and Lorain counties for the four years prior to taking the Ohio Supreme Court bench
A native of Pittsburgh, Cook received her Bachelor of Arts (1974) and her Juris Doctor (1978) degrees from The University of Akron. Following graduation from law school until her election to the Court of Appeals, Cook was with Akron’s oldest law firm, Roderick, Myers & Linton and became the firm’s first female partner. She later married partner Robert Linton.
Cook was president of Delta Gamma and president of her senior class at The University of Akron and is a member of the Omicron Delta Kappa leadership and academic honorary. Cook received the Delta Gamma National Shield Award for Leadership and Volunteerism and the Akron Women’s Network 1991 Woman of the Year Award. The university presented her with an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree in 1996 and in 1997 she received The University of Akron’s Alumni Award.
Cook chaired the Commission on Public Legal Education and was a member of the Ohio Courts Futures Commission and the Ohio Commission on Dispute Resolution and Conflict Management. She is a past president of the Akron Bar Association Foundation, a fellow of the American Bar Foundation, and a member of the Akron Bar Association disciplinary committee.
On the community side, Cook has served on the Akron Art Museum Board of Trustees, Summit County United Way Board of Trustees, Volunteer Center Board of Trustees, and Women’s Network Board of Directors. She was also a past chair of the Junior Leadership Akron Project, Safe Landing Shelter volunteer, Mobile Meals volunteer; Akron School of Law Board of Trustees, and The University of Akron Alumni Board.
Photo courtesy of the Beacon Journal.
–Zachary Jackson