Diversity and Inclusion Oversight Committee
The Diversity and Inclusion Oversight Committee’s
Diversity and Inclusion Trailblazer Award celebrates an individual who contributes to and enhances diversity and inclusion within the Wisconsin legal profession. This award recognizes a lawyer who is participating in activities that increase the public’s awareness of diversity and inclusion efforts in the legal profession.
Judge Carl Ashley, Chief Judge of Wisconsin’s First Judicial District, is this year’s recipient of the Diversity & Inclusion Trailblazer Award. Since he began his career as a lawyer in 1983, Judge Ashley has been a staunch advocate for more diversity and inclusion in Wisconsin’s legal profession. Throughout his career, he has been actively involved in the Wisconsin Association of African American Lawyers, the Milwaukee Bar Association, and the State Bar of Wisconsin, consistently championing diversity as a key issue.
In 2012, Judge Ashley was selected as chair of the State Bar’s Diversity Task Force, which was charged with studying the status of diversity in Wisconsin’s legal profession and developing an action plan for increasing diversity and inclusion. Under his leadership, the task force drafted and submitted a comprehensive report, replete with specific recommendations to the State Bar Board of Governors. The report was unanimously approved by the Board of Governors and now serves as a template for State Bar programming and future commitments. Judge Ashley also chaired the State Bar Diversity and Inclusion Oversight Committee from 2014 to 2021, which serves as the “think tank” for ideas on carrying out diversity and inclusion goals. The Diversity and Inclusion Oversight Committee now stands as a model for other states working toward similar goals.
Judge Ashley has served on the bench in every division (misdemeanor, felony, family court, large claims civil, and children’s court), as well as the Adult Drug Treatment Court, Veterans Treatment Court, and Domestic Violence Court. He is Chair of the Supreme Court Planning and Policy Subcommittee on Effective Justice Strategies and Chair of the Milwaukee County Race, Equity, and Procedural Justice Committee. In recognition of his outstanding contributions to the profession, Judge Ashley has been the recipient of several awards, including the Wisconsin Law Journal’s Innovator of the Year Award in 2003, the State Bar’s Judge of the Year Award in 2011, the State Bar’s President’s Award in 2014-15, and the Charles L. Goldberg Distinguished Service Award from the Wisconsin Law Foundation in 2019.
