Southern District of New York / Appointed 1983 / Served to 2009

Shirley Wohl Kram

Judge, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York

Appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1983 and confirmed by voice vote, Shirley Wohl Kram was a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. She earned a law degree from Brooklyn Law School in 1950. Rulings & record ↓ Sources ↓

Lived
1922–2009
Appointed by
Ronald Reagan, 1983
Confirmed
by voice vote
Education
Brooklyn Law School 1950
Succeeded by
John George Koeltl

Federal judicial service

YearCourtAppointed byVote
1983Southern District of New YorkReagan (R)Voice vote

Party letters show the appointing president’s party, not the judge’s own. A voice vote means the chamber approved aloud. No senator-by-senator tally is recorded.

Confirmation vote

Voice vote

The Senate approved this confirmation aloud, with no senator-by-senator tally recorded. Recorded roll-call votes begin in 1989.

Education

Judicial Record

Caseload & case types

In our data, Kram was assigned 1,669 district-court cases (1977–2009). Median time from filing to termination: 482 days across 1,666 closed cases.

Contract23%
Personal-injury torts17%
Prisoner & habeas14%
Antitrust, securities & banking12%
Labor & ERISA8%
Civil rights6%
Other20%

Case assignment is from CourtListener’s PACER-derived docket records: a partial sample, not a complete caseload, reflecting the judge last assigned each case. How we count.

In our data, Kram authored 345 published opinions for the court (1983–2009). Most cited: Howard v. Klynveld Peat Marwick Goerdeler (146 citations).

A selective record from published opinions in the CourtListener corpus, not every ruling; most unpublished district orders are not included. Counts and rankings are objective and recomputable: how we count. We describe the record, not the judge.

Recent & notable rulings

Showing the 15 most-cited of 345 authored opinions in our data. “Cited” is inbound citations across the CourtListener corpus. Case links open the ruling’s full text (CourtListener) or its page here; read the methodology and verify against the primary source.

Questions & answers

Who appointed Shirley Wohl Kram?
President Ronald Reagan appointed Shirley Wohl Kram to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in 1983.
Was Shirley Wohl Kram appointed by a Democrat or a Republican?
Shirley Wohl Kram was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, a Republican. JudicialFinder records the appointing president's party, not a judge's own politics.
What was Shirley Wohl Kram's confirmation vote?
Shirley Wohl Kram was confirmed by voice vote on March 2, 1983. No senator-by-senator tally was recorded.
Which court was Shirley Wohl Kram on?
Shirley Wohl Kram was a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Sources

Each fact on this page traces to a primary public record.

How we source & reconcile data → Data & Sources

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26 years on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Data as of 2026-08-10. Informational only; verify against the primary source before relying. Not a consumer report (FCRA).