Marin Women's Hall of Fame

            When Joyce Luther, a child of Dutch, Indonesian, and Chinese ancestry, was born on May 6, 1941, forces that would shape her early, tumultuous years had long been at play. Her birthplace, the island group comprising West Java, now known as Indonesia, is the gateway between the Pacific and Indian Oceans. The islands had been desired holdings of European explorers since the thirteenth century, not only because of their strategic location within lucrative trading routes, but also because of the wealth of natural resources found there.

            In the early sixteenth century, Jan Pieter Zoon Coen, a Dutch explorer with the East Indian Company, established control over the spice and coffee trade and began to dominate the archipelago. The Dutch continued to rule their colony for over 350 years, until March 1, 1942, when the Japanese Imperial Army invaded West Java and began a campaign of Japanization, banning every aspect of Dutch colonial rule. Concurrent with the Japanese invasion and takeover of West Java, Indonesian nationalists began to demonstrate for independence from the Dutch.

            Over the next three years, more than 100,000 Dutch citizens, including Joyce’s father, disappeared into Japanese concentration camps. Families were driven from their homes, robbed of their possessions, and placed in prison camps.

            At least 40,000 Dutch military men became prisoners of war. Most were shipped to camps in Thailand and Burma to work on railroads. Others were put to work in Japanese coal mines. Joyce’s father died in the concentration camp when she was just one year old.

            The group suffering most from the decolonialzation conflict was the Dutch-Indonesian population, or Dutch Indo’s, such as Joyce Luther, who was in danger because of her mixed heritage.

            “My aunt, grandmother, and I were warned that there would be an attack by the Indonesians,” recalls Joyce, “and we were summoned after midnight and taken to a protective camp.” The family lost their home and all of their belongings. Eventually, Joyce’s mother was able to rent rooms for the family in a private home. Joyce recalls that from then on, until she and her mother immigrated to the Netherlands, her bed was made of three suitcases, covered with a mattress and sheets.

            After the war between the Allies and the Japanese, Indonesian nationalists proclaimed independence on August 17, 1945. The son of a Javanese aristocrat and his Balinese wife, a man named Sukarno, had met an Indonesian nationalist at his Dutch school and later joined ranks with the Japanese occupying Indonesia. Sukarno helped the Japanese regime by recruiting thousands of laborers for the Japanese army. With Mohammed Hatta, a supporter of Indonesian independence since his school days in the Netherlands, Sukarno led the fight for Indonesian independence.

            After the Japanese surrender, on November 10, 1945, allied forces landed in Surabaya to retake Indonesia for the Dutch. Indonesians, under Sukarno and Hatta, fought back, and the process of political independence from the Netherlands was set in motion. Sukarno and Hatta became president and vice-president of Indonesia respectively.

            In 1951, Joyce’s mother, who had been working as a typist for the Dutch Green Berets, was warned that if she did not surrender her Dutch citizenship, she would not be assured of a job. Joyce and her mother left their homeland and resettled in the last remaining part of the Dutch colony, what is now known as Irian Jawa and what was then called West New Guinea.

            Joyce’s mother went to work as a typist for an oil company and the family was again the target of discrimination: the oil firm’s employees hired directly from the Netherlands received preferential treatment over the refugees from Indonesia, especially with respect to housing and education. Ten-year-old Joyce, her mother, and her grandmother shared a Quonset hut with four other families. Joyce recalls the harsh conditions of life in the West New Guinea jungle.

            “The bathroom was a small enclosure outside the hut. The bathtub consisted of an oil drum which one filled with a can of water. The toilet facilities were as far from the hut as possible and close to the dense jungle; they consisted of a cement ditch.” Joyce adds that they had no kitchen and no refrigeration. At noon each day, her mother gave Joyce twenty-five cents to buy ice cubes at a tiny Chinese store nearby. “I would take a small thermos, fill it with ice, and this we would use to cool our drinking water in the intense tropical heat.” There was no fresh milk available and Joyce’s mother mixed water with canned, evaporated milk for her daughter.

             Despite the difficult conditions, Joyce remembers her grandmother, an illiterate Chinese woman whose marriage to Joyce’s grandfather was arranged when the bride was only fourteen years of age, as a wonderful cook and her mother as a tough, resourceful woman who saw their small family through a time of severe hardship. “I don’t believe either my grandmother or my mother ever had a vacation of any kind,” recalls Joyce, “they were hardworking women.”

            Excluded from attending the public schools in New Guinea, Joyce attended a missionary school and began to teach herself English by listening to rock and roll song lyrics broadcast from Australia. Four years after arriving in West New Guinea, Joyce and her mother relocated to the Netherlands, where Joyce was enrolled in a college preparatory course.

            When a cancerous tumor was found in Joyce’s right leg, the leg was amputated below the knee. Joyce, a promising student who excelled in her schoolwork, was only sixteen years old and faced with the fact that because of her illness, she had missed too much of the rigorous pre-university coursework and would have to sacrifice her dreams of attaining a professional degree. She enrolled in a secretarial school and decided to put her love of languages to work by studying English more intensively in hopes of becoming an interpreter. “I did not feel sorry for myself,” says Joyce, “and I wanted to be independent.”  Within four years of her surgery, Joyce saw an opportunity to immigrate to the U.S.

            “At the time, it was very difficult for anyone born in Asia to immigrate to the United States,” explains Joyce, “but New Guinea had been given up by the Dutch to Indonesia and many displaced Dutch people fled to Holland.”

            President Sukarno had consistently laid claim to West New Guinea and finally, in 1961, threatened to take it by force. President Kennedy intervened; a crisis in Southeast Asia could drive Sukarno into an alliance with the Soviet Union, which was considered far more dangerous to the U.S. than an angry European ally such as the Netherlands. As a consequence, the U.S. aligned itself with Sukarno and the Netherlands transferred the sovereignty of New Guinea to the United Nations; it was annexed by Indonesia one year later.

            “The U. S. Government agreed that those who’d fled to Holland from New Guinea could relocate to the U.S. as part of the newly expanded immigration quota,” explains Joyce. “Holland is a small country that suddenly found itself overrun by refugees from New Guinea. I saw a window of opportunity when the U.S. increased its immigration quota for the Netherlands and applied for one of the special visas. To this day, I consider myself very fortunate to have been granted the opportunity to come to the U.S.”

            Joyce immigrated and settled in southern California at the age of twenty with modest ambitions of finding factory or office work. She became a secretary in one of the larger insurance companies at Occidental Life, working there for several years until she lost her mother to lung cancer.

            With a small inheritance, funds her mother had saved over many years, Joyce saw another opportunity to pursue her deferred dream of higher education. “I told myself, ‘It’s now or never. I should give up my job and go to college full-time’.” With that, she resigned from her position, enrolled at Pasadena City College, and took a part-time secretarial position at nearby Cal Tech. “Some dream of wealth,” says Joyce, “but I had always dreamed of earning a university degree.” By taking a large number of courses each semester and attending school year round, Joyce calculated that she could finish a four-year course of study in just three years.

            Joyce demonstrated outstanding scholarship throughout her extensive college and post-graduate career. At Pasadena City College, she consistently made the Dean’s List for superior academic achievement and garnered numerous honors, especially several acknowledging her superior grasp of foreign languages. She received a scholarship from the national honorary society for foreign languages, Alpha Mu Gamma, and was elected a member of the state scholarship society of Alpha Gamma Sigma. Joyce was also the recipient of the Clara Bates Giddings Scholarship for excellence in German. Pasadena City College awarded her “Honors Extraordinary” in German. In 1991, the Community College League of California recognized her remarkable work with the Distinguished Alumni Award for “exemplifying in life’s endeavors the value of California Community Colleges.”

             Continuing to work at least 20 hours per week, Joyce went on to graduate magna cum laude from the University of Southern California, where she was elected to the Phi Kappa Phi and Phi Beta Kappa societies. Her outstanding academic achievement earned Joyce scholarships during her tenure at USC, where she completed her undergraduate studies with a grade point average of 3.94. Less than three years later, Joyce earned a Masters in Public Administration, graduating with a perfect 4.0 grade point average and receiving the Pfiffner Award for the Outstanding Thesis of the Academic Year.

            As a student at USC’s Gould School of Law, Joyce received the coveted American Jurisprudence Award in Torts. By 1974, she had earned her law degree. Some years later, USC would award her an Alumni Merit Award.

            Joyce’s quick grasp of legal issues and in-depth understanding of law combined with a strong work ethic and sense of determination quickly landed her a succession of prestigious positions in the legal community. She first went to work as a Deputy Attorney General in Los Angeles. The Attorney General’s Office is charged with the protection of state lands and resources, the monitoring of corporate practices, and assumes leadership as the state’s central law enforcement authority. In May of 1992, the Asian and Pacific Islander Employee Advisory Committee of the Attorney General’s Office awarded Joyce the Attorney General Award “for outstanding scholarship and distinguished judicial achievements."

            Four years later, Joyce was hired as a Senior Attorney working for the State Court of Appeal in Los Angeles. This court re-examines cases based on legal interpretation and there are six districts in the Court of Appeal.

            In 1986, Joyce became a Municipal Court Judge in Los Angeles County. The municipal court is responsible for the adjudication of civil cases involving sums less than $25,000 as well as small claims. Less than two years later, she became an Associate Justice pro tempore in the State Court of Appeal. Next, as a Superior Court Judge in Los Angeles County, Joyce heard civil cases involving sums over $25,000, divorce proceedings, probates, serious juvenile offenses and criminal offenses.

            Joyce’s experience in the adjudication of proceedings in both of the lower courts, as well as her growing reputation as a skilled and knowledgeable jurist, led to her appointment as Associate Justice to the Court of Appeal in Los Angeles in April of 1988. Just one year later, Joyce Luther Kennard was appointed by Governor George Dukmejian to the California Supreme Court. With her appointment, Joyce became the second woman justice, and the first Asian Pacific Islander to serve on the court. 

            One chief justice and six associate justices are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the Commission on Judicial Appointments. Appointments are confirmed by the public at the following general election and justices come before voters again at the end of their twelve-year terms. The Supreme Court of California conducts regular sessions in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Sacrament. Decisions made by the Supreme Court, the highest court in the state, are binding over the other courts.

            Justice Kennard has proven herself a tireless defender of individual civil rights and a fearless dissenter when faced with a majority rule that does not reflect her interpretation of law. She has heard controversial cases, such as Curran v. Mount Diablo Council of the Boy Scouts of America, which was, at the time, the oldest pending challenge to the BSA’s exclusion of gay men and boys from the organization. In another well-publicized case, Justice Kennard and her associates on the bench heard the People v. Woods, in which the justices considered the question of whether or not a probation search of a probationer’s residence is unlawful if the purpose of the search is to obtain evidence against an occupant who is not on probation.

            Justice Kennard has heard cases involving wrongful discharge, racial harassment in the workplace, and discrimination. She is recognized as an independent thinker and a skilled, articulate writer of legal opinions. Her early experiences of suffering at the hands of the Japanese during World War II and of facing racial discrimination in New Guinea following the war of independence in Indonesia have clearly given Justice Kennard a deep appreciation of the enormous liberty afforded citizens of the United States. “Americans born in the U.S. do not always fully appreciate the freedom we have here to speak our minds without fear of reprisal,” she notes.

            Since her appointment to the Supreme Court of California, Joyce has received countless honors and awards, only a small number of which are noted here. She has been awarded honorary degrees as Doctor of Laws from Southwestern University’s School of Law, Whittier Law School, Pepperdine School of Law, and California Western School of Law. The California Trial Lawyers’ Association voted her Justice of the Year 1991, “in recognition of her untiring efforts and enlightened approach toward the improvement of the administration of justice.”  The St. Thomas More Law Honor Society and Loyola Law School recognized Joyce with the St. Thomas More Medallion Award, a prize honoring those individuals who’ve made outstanding contributions to the legal profession and society.

            The American Bar Association’s Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement Award was granted to honor Joyce as one of the “outstanding women lawyers throughout the country who have achieved professional excellence within their area of specialty and have actively paved the way to success for other women lawyers.” Three years later, Joyce earned the ABA’s “Spirit of Excellence Award” from the organization’s Commission on Opportunities for Minorities in the Profession, an award that recognizes “the contributions to the legal profession of lawyers and judges of color who have actively paved the way to success for other minority lawyers.”

            Joyce is not only a survivor of great political turmoil and of economic and social hardship—challenges she faced largely because of her ethnicity—but is also a recognized role model to those who share her cultural heritage. The Chinese Historical Society of Southern California awarded her the Chinese-American Pioneers from Southern California in the Judiciary Award for her “professional achievements and leadership in gaining milestones significant to our community and its future generations.” The Netherlands-American Arts and Cultural Foundation awarded her the First Annual Netherlands-American Heritage Award to “recognize the contributions made by people of Dutch origin to the political, economical, and cultural growth of the United States.” The National Asian Pacific American Law Students Association awarded Joyce its Founders’ Award for her “outstanding service to the Asian Pacific American community” in the same year that the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association recognized her with its Trailblazer Award, an honor granted Asian-Americans who achieve nationally-recognized success.

            Looking at her personal and professional achievements, it is perhaps all too easy to forget that Joyce overcame the obstacles inherent in political and social persecution as an amputee who had lost her leg in adolescence. The Los Angeles County Commission on Disabilities honored her with the organization’s Access Award, which reads, “to recognize your accomplishments and your service to the Commission. Your on-going efforts on behalf of persons with disabilities and the example you set as a role model have earned you the respect and admiration of the entire community.”

            When asked to what she attributes her overwhelming success, Joyce responds, “In my earliest years, my mother’s strong support and her example of determination took me far. Later, my husband became my strongest advocate, and, throughout my career, my friends have been a constant source of encouragement and support. I treasure friendship; even though I may not speak with my friends for as long as six months at a time, when we do ultimately reconnect with one another, it’s always as though we’ve just spoken the day before.”

            What advice does Joyce offer to any young person considering a career in law? “Don’t give up,” she says, “the road to success is a tough one. You’ll stumble occasionally; just get up and go on. And don’t give up your ideals.  Someone once said, ‘Ideals are like stars: you can’t touch them but, just as a traveler at sea is guided by the stars, your ideals can guide you.’ Always have integrity and hold on to dreams. Langston Hughes said it this way: ‘Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly’.”

            Having traveled a long and arduous journey from a war zone in West Java to a seat on California’s highest court, Justice Joyce Luther Kennard is living evidence that the American Dream is yet attainable for those individuals with the talent, dedication, resourcefulness, and determination to succeed, no matter what obstacles they may encounter.