Don’t Call Me Miss Ellen

When I was practicing law, I frequently appeared before an administration judge. This one trial, the old dude who the agency hired to act as the judge would call me Miss Ellen. He called the opposition Mr. Cockrell. Me, Miss Ellen. I was a lawyer. The male person on the other side of the case was a lawyer. But I was being talked down to every time the judge called my name.

The guy who headed up the department was disgusted. He said something to the old dude—who he was paying to act as judge—about his behavior. The old dude quit that.

Why was this behavior even recognized as unacceptable? How did everyone but the old dude know it wasn’t acceptable to call me Miss Ellen?

Because a Black woman took her time and money to make it so.

In 1963, a Black woman went to the Supreme Court to force a racist-ass prosecutor to address her with her last name: Miss Mary Hamilton.

So if you are a woman in a professional setting who is treated with the same respectful salutation as your male counterpart you can thank a Black woman for that.

Black History Month 2025: How extraordinary Black Americans intersected with my life.