"Judge Stout recalls undergraduate days at UI," June 17, 1974

The Daily Iowan — Iowa City, Iowa- Receives alumni honor Judge Stout recalls undergraduate days at UI By MARK MEYER ; Survival Services Editor - Juanita Kidd Stout is a brown woman with bright eyes whose speech combines the learnedness of a Philadelphia lawyer with the vestiges of an Oklahoma twang. She graduated from the University of Iowa in 1939, and on Saturday she returned to accept the University's highest honor, the Distinguished Service Award. Ms. Stout was granted the award in recognition of her achievements as a lawyer and judge. She is currently sitting as a judge in the Court of Common Pleas, a Pennsylvania State Court with jurisdiction in Philadelphia County. The story of Juanita Kidd Stout is not your everyday rags to riches tale. She is a woman with "a little Indian blood, a little white blood, and a whole lot of Negro blood" in her background. She was born and raised in Wewoka, Oklahoma, just 70 miles down the road from Oklahoma City, and she left the dust-bowl during the Depression to pursue an education in music in Iowa City, Iowa. With credentials like those, her chances of success in the legal profession were minimal. In contrast to the stereotypical situation, Ms. Stout wanted to be a lawyer but her parents wanted her to study something respectable, like music. "I've always wanted to be a lawyer; ever since I was three years old I have been determined to pursue that career. I don't know why. No one else in my family had been an attorney," she stated. She began her piano lessons at age five, and after graduating from high school she chose to attend the University of Iowa because, "it was the cheapest place I could find that had a good music department." Iowa City, in the 1930's, was not a mecca of interracial brotherhood. For instance, non-whites were not allowed to live in the dormitories. Consequently, when Ms. Stout stepped off the Greyhound bus early in the morning of her arrival in Iowa City, her initial task was to find a place to live. Her scheme was to walk up and down the streets of the town until she saw a black face. It took a while to find one. Finally, shortly after noon, she saw a black baby in diapers playing on the porch of a house on Prentiss Street. Ms. Stout knocked on the door and was greeted by Helen Lemme, a person Ms. Stout now describes as "the finest woman I have ever known." Helen Lemme took her in and Ms. Stout stayed at the Prentiss Street house for the duration of her Iowa City education. Theirs was a talented household, for Helen Lemme has received a number of honors for her work in civic organizations, one of which is the dedication of an Iowa City school in her name. The encounter with Helen Lemme is one aspect of the good fortune that has characterized Ms. Stout's career. A second element of that success was facilitated by her encounter with Professor Clapp in the music department. "Professor Clapp was a man with a big belly that used to hang over the keyboard when he played the piano, and he was a very intense and demanding person. He required that his students practice constantly. His motto was correct practice makes perfect, and he bullied his students until they met his standards." Apparently Professor Clapp pounded his ideas into his students the way he pounded away at the piano, for Ms. Stout attributes her success to her ability to do hard work, an ability necessary to survive the Professor's tutelage. She cites examples of her workhorse capabilities. After receiving her Juris Doctor from the University of Indiana, one of her initial public jobs was as chief of the Board of Pardons and Parole in Philadelphia. "I love to do legal research and writing," she related. "For three years while I was at Pardons and Parole I got up every morning, seven days a week, at four o'clock to go down to the job to do research. I worked until eight when everyone else arrived, and then the regular work-day began." Later, when she had been elected to her job on the Court of Common Pleas, she was to preside over a case involving Regulation R of the Securities and Exchange Commission Rules. "I had never heard of Regulation R," she remembers, "but for two weeks I read every journal, Exchange Commission Release and law review article I could find that dealt with the Regulation. At the end of that period I was probably the world's expert on the rule." Ms. Stout claims that she has never encountered discrimination because of her sex or her race in her professional relations as a private attorney, a public attorney, or on the bench. In fact, she feels that it was a definite asset in her private practice. "Many of my clients would say to me that they had never been to an attorney before, and that they were skeptical about seeking legal aid. But they believe that a woman lawyer would be honest." In her role as a judge, Ms. Stout dispenses with racial distinctions. "I'll mete out sentence to a criminal regardless of color. You have to remember that most crimes perpetrated by black people are perpetrated against other black people. To argue blackness to me is to get nowhere." Ms. Stout is eligible to retire from the bench in five years and then begin to collect a pension. Unlike other persons who have been devoted to their careers, she does not plan to be bored by retirement. "That is the time of my life that I am going to bloom," she asserts. "I plan to spend at least one year on each of the continents. I want to learn several languages, to write, to teach, and I love to cook. I want to return to school and study anything that strikes my fancy." Ms. Stout, in addition to her other attributes, comes from a family whose members take pride in their longevity. Her father is still alive at age 91. At age 55, Ms. Stout feels that her life is indeed just beginning. If so, she may return to Iowa City in another 25 years to collect more awards. University of Iowa Libraries. University Archives