FIDA is a non-profit, non-partisan and non-governmental membership organization committed to the enhancement of the status of women and children through legal aid, legal literacy, and education programmes, advocacy, law reform, research and publications. Founder members were: Rosalind G. Bates from U.S.A., Esther Talamantes from Mexico, Luisa Maria Capo from Puerto Rico, Isabel Sierro Pérez from Cuba and Alma Paredes from Salvador. The first Convention took place in 1945 in Havana, Cuba, and the first president was Isabel Sierro Pérez. FIDA has grown to have members in 72 countries all over the world. THE FOUNDERS OF FIDA:
Esther Talamantes' nephew, Antonio Ramirez Talamantes writes: In 1944 in Mexico City there took place the “Congress of the International Bar Association” at which my aunt Esther Talamantes was present. She was the only female Mexican lawyer that attended the congress; and there she met Linda Bates a lawyer from the United States. As a result of their conversations the idea of founding the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) was born and was formally established that same year on the fourth of August 1944 in Mexico. This is the reason for the Spanish name of the organization. Esther Talamantes’ work in forming this organization of women lawyers from all over the world deserves recognition. There are at present members from 72 countries. Lic Esther Talamantes was a founder and lifetime Vice President of FIDA, and in 1962 was the second World President of FIDA. She died in Mexico City in February 2015 at the age of 95. Linda Bates and Esther Talamantes were the founders of FIDA. In 1944 at the International Bar Association Conference in Mexico City, Linda was a candidate for the board of the International Bar Association but as she was a woman she was not accepted. Disgusted at the discriminatory culture of the International Bar Association, the two of them made the decision to start a lawyer’s association only for women, and so founded the International Federation of Women Lawyers or FIDA; its Spanish acronym. Linda’s life ended tragically in 1961. She was murdered sometime between Nov. 13-14, 1961. Her body was found at her home on the 14th. The family believes it was a murder carried out by a hired killer. She had received a phone call telling her that if she did not withdraw from a case in which a great deal of money was involved, she would be killed. She went to the court and put the phone call on the record, but took no other precautions. No one has ever been brought to justice for the crime. When the news broke, the Los Angeles City Council adjourned for the day in a state of shock. She was divorced at the time from her second husband. Her first husband Ernest Sutherland Bates had died in 1939. ACTIVITIES:
(i) To enhance and promote the welfare of women and children, realizing that on the well-being of women’s and children’s depends the happiness of the home and the strength of society. (ii) To promote the study of comparative law. (iii) To promote the principles and the aims of the United Nations in their legal and social aspects. FIDA seeks to enhance the status of women by effectively pursuing the following priority themes:
(a) Equality
(b) Development
(c) Education
(d) Health education (including drug addiction)
(e) Eradication of prostitution
(f) Support for “Aids” programs
(g) Abolition of harmful traditional practice, inimical to the welfare of women and children, through primary health care
(h) Protection of women and children against violence in the family and supporting programmes for the achievement of world peace. The Federation Executive Officers establish, and each Country Vice-President follows closely, the legal, economic and social position of women and children in their respective (72) countries and direct the efforts of the membership towards securing better conditions through improved legislation and other visible ways:
(a) The Federation supports the United Nations in all its programs;
(b) Organizes Women Lawyers and Bar Associations in 72 countries;
(c) Advocates the establishment of juvenile courts staffed by competent and qualified women judges, wherever possible;
(d) Works for better penal laws and administration;
(e) Urges political and civil equality of rights for women;
(f) Encourages greater participation of women in public office;
(g) Urges changes in both public and private law affecting women;
(h) Arranges conferences and forum discussions on legal questions. In the last several years, our Federation membership has grown dramatically. FIDA has had an influx of brilliant young members from all over the world, dedicated to the betterment of their own and all society, attracted to our organization by its internationalism. REALIZING OBJECTIVES:
FIDA seeks to realize its objectives mainly through three avenues:
(i) Its work at the United Nations;
(ii) Its work at FIDA’s biennial conventions; and
(iii) Through its publications. OUR WORK AT THE UNITED NATIONS:
Under its consultative status, FIDA has the privilege and the right to attend meetings of the United Nations Economic and Social Council and some of its functional and special commissions, such as the Commission on the Status of Women, the Commission of Human Rights, the Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and the Protection of the Minorities and others, and many Committees formed in connection with the work of these commissions. The federation participates in their work by making its position known on various subjects through oral interventions and written statements made by FIDA’s representatives at those meetings. FIDA is a member of the Non Governmental Organizations Board of Directors and enjoys consultative status Number 2. CONVENTIONS:
Our Federation holds international conventions every three years (formally every two years) in the country of the current president. These conventions rotate by regions so that every region and the various countries in those regions may have equal opportunity to have a president and a convention. At the conventions our members generally make a comparative study of some particular phase of the law, write papers, and after debate, come to consensus conclusions, embodied in resolutions which are thereafter published in our periodicals and circulated to be acted upon by our members in their respective countries. The conventions also give us the opportunity to become personally acquainted with members from different regions and cultures, to understand each other better and to formulate policies to make our Federation more effective in carrying out our objectives. OUR PUBLICATIONS:
The purpose of our publications is twofold, to keep open lines of communication with our members and to keep them informed about our work and results. The Abogada Newsletter: The International Women Lawyers Newsletter published quarterly in three languages, viz: – English, French and Spanish;
La Abogada Internacional – Convention Review issued every three years.;
papers are also prepared by individual members or committees which are read at various Conferences and Conventions of the Federation. FIDA GRAND BAHAMA CHAPTER
