AUGUSTA – After taking the oath of office Thursday, Leigh Ingalls Saufley played down her historic status as Maine’s first female chief justice, saying she hopes to be a role model for girls and boys alike.

With her husband, son and daughter looking on, the 47-year-old Saufley was sworn in by Gov. Angus King shortly after the Senate confirmed her nomination as head of Maine’s judicial branch by a 27-0 vote.

During a ceremony in his office attended by ranking jurists, King said Saufley’s gender had nothing to do with her appointment, which he called “one of the most difficult decisions I’ve had to make” because any member of the Supreme Judicial Court would have been qualified.

King also declared that the day was historic for three reasons. Besides becoming Maine’s first female chief justice, Saufley is the first chief justice to have served as a judge at Maine’s district, superior and supreme court levels, and the youngest person to hold the post.

“Rumor has it that I am the youngest chief justice in the state’s history by something like eight or nine days, so I’m not sure that’s the hugest honor in the world. But it never hurts to be the youngest,” she quipped.

Saufley said the greatest honor for her was to be confirmed in the same ceremonial session in which the state Senate leadership was transferred, without bitterness, from Democratic to Republican.

“We should be pretty damned proud of this state. We just watched the absolute peaceful, professional transfer of power from one party to another under the most extraordinary circumstances that we’ve ever seen,” Saufley said.

“And it was done without rancor and it was done with a group of people who are all just interested in working together,” she added after Michael Michaud of East Millinocket, who has been Senate president for the past year, handed the gavel to Richard Bennett of Norway.

Before the vote, Sen. Anne Rand described Saufley as a product of Maine public schools from kindergarten to law school and lauded her selection as an “extremely wise choice.”

Rand, hoping to put the event into perspective, asked males in the audience to imagine how they would feel if every past chief justice had been a woman, and a man was being appointed to the post.

“Maybe you can get an inkling how very important and how very special a day this is … for me and the majority of women and girls in the state,” said Rand, D-Portland.

Saufley acknowledged that she will be a role model as first female chief justice, but said, “I certainly hope to be a role model for young women, but also young men.

“I hope to be able to do the job in a way that brings the courts into people’s homes in a way that they understand what we do and what our system of justice is all about,” said Saufley, who lives in Portland.

She said she wants to improve accessibility to the courts by removing physical barriers and making sure all litigants – especially those with little understanding of how the courts operate – have adequate representation.

Saufley said she plans to continue a practice started by her predecessor, Daniel Wathen, to sit in on courts at all three levels. She noted that the other supreme court justices have sat in the trial courts “in order to stay in touch with what’s happening out there.”

The biggest problem facing the courts is a lack of money, which has left them overburdened with cases, she said.