Most lawyers agree that becoming an Article III judge — such as on the U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska — is to reach the top of the profession.

And why not? The job is a virtual lifetime appointment. The pay is excellent: $230,000, with raises enacted by Congress for the years to come. A judge is housed in elegant chambers, has plenty of help and underground parking, handles mostly interesting cases and deals with some of the best litigators in the area.

One federal judge, kidding about the job, said, “When you walk into court, everybody stands up, and when you’re chatting with fellow lawyers and say something that’s even mildly amusing, they laugh like you’re Bob Hope.”

The Daily Record reported recently that John Gerrard, 68, will step down as an active district judge in a year and take senior status, opening a vacancy for a new judge.

Nebraska now has three active federal judges: Gerrard, Bob Rossiter and Brian Buescher. Joe Batallion and Richard Kopf are senior judges carrying active caseloads.

The district has three active magistrate judges: Susan Bazis, Cheryl Zwart and Mike Nelson. F.A. Gossett, III, is what is called a “recalled magistrate judge,” a misleading title, since it means that he may be recalled to duty when needed; it has no relation to the kind of “recall,” by which people may kick an elected official out of office.

Federal district judges tend to stay on the job for a long time, even when they take senior status. Batallion, for example, was confirmed in 1997 and took senior status eight years ago. If you count the five years Kopf served as a magistrate judge before his appointment to the Article III seat, he has been on the job for 35 years.

The late Warren Urbom was appointed by President Richard Nixon in 1970 and served 47 years. And there were legends such as Joseph Woodrough, named as a trial judge by President Woodrow Wilson, then by FDR to the Eighth Circuit in 1933. He died in office at age 104!

The chief justices of the Nebraska Supreme Court, in modern times — i.e., since the adoption of the Merit Plan in 1962 — have tended to stay on the job for an average of less than nine years. Thomas White served as chief for three years, John Hendry for eight and Norman Krivosha for nine. The all-time record tenure was held by Robert Simmons, who sat for 24 years.

Judge Laurie Smith Camp, who was appointed by President George W. Bush and confirmed unanimously by the Senate, was the first woman to serve on the federal district bench in Nebraska, and the only Article III female judge in this state to date.

President Joe Biden has pledged to make the federal judiciary more diverse, by race, by gender and by professional expertise. In his first year, 80% of his appointments were women and more than 50% were people of color, according to Colleen Long of The Associated Press, writing on Feb. 9.

Richard Shugrue is a professor emeritus at the Creighton University School of Law and a columnist for The Daily Record.