Barbara M. Durham (October 6, 1942 – December 30, 2002) was the first-ever female chief justice of the Washington Supreme Court.

[1] In January 1999, President Bill Clinton nominated Durham to a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that had been vacated by Judge Betty Binns Fletcher taking senior status.

The conservative Durham's nomination by a Democratic president was part of a deal brokered between the White House and Washington's senators at the time, Slade Gorton and Patty Murray.

On September 15, 1999, Durham resigned from the Washington Supreme Court more than three years before the end of her term, declining to give any specifics.

"[5] After Durham's death, however, it came out that she had been suffering from a variety of medical problems, including early-onset Alzheimer's disease, which were the cause of her absences in her final year on the state supreme court.

[3] "I don't know how to put this delicately...Things were becoming more difficult for her than they once were," said former state Supreme Court Justice Robert Utter in an article in The Seattle Times.