Resilience and Grit

from San Antonio Lawyer, November/December 2021

TCPA Cases after the 2019 Amendments

Retired Chief Justice Catherine Stone

By Sara Dysart

Cover and article photography by Mewborne Photography shot on location at the Hopscotch art gallery in San Antonio.

If you were raised by a single mother, realized that education was the key to a different life, and took friend and mentor’s advice to “leave while they still love you,” then you may have a lot in common with retired Chief Justice Catherine Stone. Although she reached the highest echelons of our profession, Catherine and her life story are thoroughly relatable.

After retiring from the appellate bench in 2014, Chief Justice Stone joined the law firm of Langley & Banack, Inc., where she leads the Appellate Practice Group and the Alternative Dispute Resolution Practice Group. She offers full appellate services, including appellate and trial briefing and strategy, oral arguments, brief editing, and review. She has also leveraged her decades of judicial service in her Alternative

Dispute Resolution Practice, providing valuable insight to litigants and counsel in mediation and arbitration settings.

How did this distinguished jurist and advocate get from an early childhood in Biddeford, Maine, to San Antonio, Texas, to become the Chief Justice of the Fourth Court of Appeals and now one of the most acclaimed Texas appellate attorneys? Resilience and grit!

**Chief Justice Stone at the at the Hopscotch art gallery in San Antonio.**
Photo by Mewborne Photography

When Catherine Stone and I started St. Mary’s University School of Law in the fall of 1978, approximately one-third of our law school class was women. Looking back on our experiences, they seem to have been in tune with the mantra, “We have come a long way, baby!” followed by the refrain, “We have much further to go!” Catherine recalls that, in the late 1970s, women law students and lawyers were treated differently from their male peers. But, even in the early years of her practice, “women were speaking up; men were learning; and social norms were changing.” While our profession has made great strides toward equity, Catherine remains distressed by what she perceives as “the misogyny that motivates legislation and public discourse,” and she is “ready for the dialogue to change at a very early age so that boys and girls are not in competition for who is the better, stronger, smarter human being.”

While we cheer the advances made by women lawyers of our generation and those that followed, we recognize the remaining hurdles. These sentiments are perhaps best conveyed by Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s quip that there will be enough female justices on the Supreme Court “when there are nine!” With grit, resilience, and inspiration from trailblazing women like Catherine, we are on the right path.

Her Mother’s Life Could Have Been Different

Catherine faced many challenges before becoming a lawyer. She was the second oldest of five sisters, born when her mother was only nineteen years old. Catherine describes her childhood as “chaotic and complicated.” The first in her family to go to college, Catherine did not have a lot of role models. Nevertheless, she is grateful for her grandmothers and aunts, “who rolled up their sleeves and got the job done, whatever the job was.” They instilled in her a strong work ethic while “the women libbers of the 1960s and early 1970s . . . paved the way for [her] and inspired [her] to dream big.” For Catherine, those influences culminated at Assumption College (now University), where “women were expected to take on a full role in society.”

The cultural shifts that took place in the mid-twentieth century are not mere abstractions. “I think my mother’s life could have been different had she had the benefit of a more open society for women,” Catherine said, reflecting on the relative openness she experienced compared to her mother’s generation, and drawing tears from this author. Catherine’s story is one of success, but even when we celebrate it, we should not forget about the “uneven playing field” that many generations of women experienced. For many of us, including Catherine, witnessing the struggles of our mothers and extended female family members encouraged us to dream big.

An Education in Foreign Affairs

By second or third grade, young Catherine found refuge in school. By junior high school, she realized that education was her “key to a different life.” She liked politics, history, reading, and logic—all a good fit for law school but not within the realm of possibilities she imagined for herself. Catherine earned a scholarship to Assumption College, where she studied foreign affairs.

Catherine’s senior year in college, she started what she calls her own “foreign affair.” A graduate student from Dallas named Tom Stone entered the picture. Catherine and her friends called him “Tex.” Catherine, having resided in the Northeast her entire life, made Tex her first foreign affair and Texas her “first foreign affair assignment.” Catherine and Tom married in Massachusetts after she graduated from college and flew to Dallas the very next day, her twenty-third birthday. They have lived in Texas ever since and will celebrate their forty-fifth wedding anniversary this year.

Catherine and Tom agreed that the next educational opportunity would be Catherine’s because Tom had his master’s degree. Catherine opted for law school over doctoral studies in political philosophy because she thought “lawyering would be more secure than academia.” Her first choice of law schools was St. Mary’s University because she “wanted to continue the Catholic social justice education [she] had received at Assumption.”

Catherine and Tom lived in Beaumont for two years and then moved to San Antonio so that she could attend St. Mary’s University School of Law. After she graduated from law school, Tom commuted to the University of Texas to obtain a Ph.D. in clinical psychology. Dr. Stone has maintained a private clinical practice for more years than he cares to admit.

Catherine and Tom have three sons—Liam, Nathaniel, and Jacob— who are adults and have their own successful lives. Catherine and Tom have had a household of pets, especially dogs, starting with a black Lab- Rhodesian Ridgeback mix. Catherine named him “Yankee” to make it clear to her in-laws that their son had married a “strong-willed woman from Maine.” The in-laws’ dog was named “Rebel.”

Life as a Law Student and Mother

Catherine remembers law school as “a great experience, if you can actually put ‘law school’ and ‘great’ in the same sentence.” She started law school in 1978, pregnant with their oldest son, Liam, who was born shortly after first semester finals. She took a year off, returning to law school the second semester of the following year. She wrote one year for the Law Journal and two years for the Legal Research Board. She was “not super social as far as hanging out or going to Fatso’s after classes” because she “had a kiddo at home,” but she liked her professors and classmates.

Catherine’s success in law school—despite the additional challenge of being a new mother—contributed to changing attitudes about the compatibility of family and professional responsibilities. She recalls:

Many years ago, I heard someone say that women walk around with the jigsaw puzzle of their family constantly in their brain, and they are always moving the pieces to make them fit best for the moment. That is true whether your family is a spouse and kids, siblings and parents, or yourself and your pet. I think women leaders have this capability to move the pieces around whether it is their work family or their home family.

Catherine Stone’s family in 2019 in Maine. Son Jacob; daughter-in-law Melissa Mayorga-Stone; son Liam with grandson Henry on his shoulders; husband Tom; Catherine Stone; son Nathaniel and daughter-in-law Shreya Sethi-Stone
Photo Courtesy of Catherine Stone

**Judge Stone and her husband.**
Photo Courtesy of Catherine Stone

**Judge Stone with friend and fellow attorney, Gayla Corley.**
Photo Courtesy of Catherine Stone

Life as a Young Lawyer and Mother

After graduating from St. Mary’s, Catherine served as a briefing attorney for the Fourth Court of Appeals for a year. She then joined the law firm of Watkins, Mireles, Brock & Barrientos, where she worked with her first mentor Phil Watkins, whom she describes as “crazy smart.” She learned a lot from the lawyers at this firm and is grateful for the experience to this day.

Catherine remembers especially fondly working with our late District Judge Andy Mireles, who died way too young. The then-attorney Andy Mireles would give her a “hard time” about leaving the law office at 5:30 p.m. each day. Knowing that she was going home to her young family, he would make jests like, “This isn’t Kelly Field. Why are you leaving so early?” Catherine took his comments in good humor, noting that, in later years, he publicly commended her “for putting family first.” She concludes, warmly, “I know Andy could be gruff on the bench, but he truly cared about others and was more bark than bite.”

After eight years with Watkins, Mireles, Brock & Barrientos, Catherine followed her dream and started her own appellate practice, where she was able to keep hours more conducive to the lifestyle she desired. She continued her solo practice for three years until she was appointed to Judge Fred Biery’s place on the Fourth Court of Appeals, following his appointment to the United States District Court.

**Catherine in 2019, visiting a Maine lighthouse that George Washington designed in 1787.**
Photo Courtesy of Catherine Stone

An Adventure in Innocence—Running for the Fourth Court of Appeals

Following her appointment, Catherine was quickly initiated into the complexities of judicial campaigning because she immediately had to run to retain her seat. In 1994, five of the Fourth Court justices, including the chief justice, were up for election, and Catherine spent a lot of time campaigning with Alma Lopez and Phil Hardberger. The campaign trail, stretching through thirty-two counties in south Texas, was the genesis of their long-lasting friendships. Justice Hardberger and Justice Stone “were sworn in together in April 1994 at a big shindig held outdoors at a parking lot that is now the site of the Elizondo Tower.”

Catherine was re-elected in 2000 and 2006. In 2008, when she ran for Chief Justice, following in the footsteps of her campaign buddies former Chief Justice Hardberger and former Chief Justice Lopez, it “was more of a solo event.” By then, Justice Stone knew and loved so many citizens throughout the Fourth Court Judicial District that she was “pretty comfortable with the campaign.” The differences in communities were pronounced—with tacos and enchiladas served to the sound of mariachi bands in Laredo and Rio Grande City, and sausage and sauerkraut served to the sound of “umpapa” bands in Fredericksburg and Kerrville.

To retired Chief Justice Stone, her “years on the bench felt like a superb gift,” during which she “made many friends among the voters in the thirty-two counties and worked with incredibly smart and fun justices.” After twenty-one years on the Fourth Court of Appeals, including serving as Chief Justice during the last six years, she followed her friend and mentor Jane Macon’s advice to “leave while they still love you.” When it came to the question of what to do next, Macon had more sage advice: “Do what you are good at, practice appellate law.”

Changes in the Practice of Law

In her work today, former Chief Justice Stone recognizes that the practice of law changed during her decades on the bench, starting with the impacts of the internet and cell phones. The expectations of everyone involved in litigation are on a 24-7 cycle. She hears older attorneys bemoaning a lack of work ethic and civility among younger lawyers, but she is optimistic in that she suspects “lawyers learn to be more patient and civil after they have had a few years in the trenches and realize that the lawyer they are being rude to will be with them on another case down the road.”

Hon. Catherine Stone, with (left to right) Judge Grace Uzomba, County Court 2; Hon. Sandee Bryan Marion, Chief Justice (2014-2020) and Justice (2002-2014), 4th Court of Appeals; Hon. Alma Lopez, Chief Justice (2002-2008) and Justice (1993-2002), 4th Court of Appeals.
Photo Courtesy of Catherine Stone

Community Leader

Chief Justice Stone has received numerous accolades and served with many bar and community associations, including as Chair of the Texas Council of Chief Justices (2011-13). Having observed many leaders and served in many leadership positions, she has distilled the essence of leadership in a manner that applies in any industry or circumstance. Catherine defines leadership as “the art or practice of having an overall vision of movement toward a desired goal; a willingness to receive, discuss, and implement ideas from anyone and everyone on the team; and a realization that each success is not about the leader, but about every person involved in the process.”

Perhaps her most noteworthy appointment came in 2018, when Catherine was tapped to chair a commission that examined the sexual abuse cases against priests in the Archdiocese of San Antonio. The results of this commission are published, and its recommendations are being addressed. She was honored to lead the commission, not only because of her personal experience as a survivor of child sex abuse, but also because she was aware of the extent and gravity of this problem in our community, having reviewed hundreds of trials involving child sexual abuse. 1 She felt an obligation to serve on the commission so that she could “be part of the solution.” 2

Catherine’s former colleagues on the Fourth Court agreed that her character made her particularly qualified for this role. Former Chief Justice Hardberger expressed confidence that Catherine would “not mince words,” whatever the evidence showed, and former Justice Phyllis Speedlin echoed that Catherine’s sole concern was “getting it right.” 3 Sandee Bryan Marion, who succeeded Catherine as Chief Justice, emphasized that Catherine’s empathy rendered her “so well-suited and prepared for this task” because she understood “the fallacies of humans.” 4 Former Chief Justice Marion noted that while former Chief Justice Stone’s experience “clearly shaped her,” it had not made her resentful. 5 With true resilience, Catherine “has moved past it and has come out the other side.” 6