Biography of leigh saufley

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She was the first woman and the youngest person to serve as Maine’s Chief Justice.

Follow Ballotpedia. She first became a member of the state's highest court on October 20, , when she was appointed by then-governor Angus King , a political independent. In , Saufley became the first woman and the youngest member of the court to be appointed chief justice. She was re-appointed chief justice in and in Saufley retired from the court on April 14, She left the position to become the dean of the University of Maine School of Law.

Saufley graduated from the University of Maine at Orono in In , she received her J. In October , political science professors Adam Bonica and Michael Woodruff of Stanford University attempted to determine the partisan ideology of state supreme court justices.

Leigh Ingalls Saufley (born June 21, ) is an American lawyer who is the dean of the University of Maine School of Law. She was previously Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court.

They created a scoring system in which a score above 0 indicated a more conservative-leaning ideology, while scores below 0 were more liberal. Saufley received a campaign finance score of -1, indicating a liberal ideological leaning. This was less liberal than the average score of The study was based on data from campaign contributions by the judges themselves, the partisan leaning of those who contributed to the judges' campaigns, or, in the absence of elections, the ideology of the appointing body governor or legislature.