the Ninth Circuit, the federal judiciary followed suit and sought to investigate any gender bias that might exist in the courts and seek ways to remedy the problems. The progress made by these courts was almost terminated in 1995, when the new Republican majority that swept into Congress under the Contract with America sought to cut off funding that had been provided to run these task forces on the federal level. The new majority "believed that bias task forces by the federal judiciary were both unnecessary and undesirable". However, the appropriation remained intact and tasks forces, such as Chief Judge Sloviter's Third Circuit Task Force, could continue to pursue their charters. Since 1992, women's representation in law school classes has approached 50%. However, the percentage of female federal judges is fairly lower. As of 2016, only 36% of judges on the federal courts of appeals were women, that is 60 out of 167 active judges. Women represented only 15% of judges on the Third Circuit, only 20% of judges on the Eight Circuit and only 25% of judges on the Tenth Circuit. As for women of color, there is even a smaller number. Only 12 women (7% of judges) of color were on the U.S. courts of appeals. In addition to other task forces, the Ninth Circuit's report found that many women believe that a major hindrance to attaining a judicial position is the lack of women "power players" in the connected "old boys' clubs" that often influence judicial appointments. Women judges and women lawyers attribute male-domination of the judiciary in large part to the exclusion of women from the networks that influence judicial appointments. Women lawyers attribute the small number of women appointed to bench and bar committees to the exclusion of women from formal and informal selection processes. A large proportion of women lawyers believe that men have a better chance than women to be promoted to law firm partnerships and to equivalent positions in public law organizations. (See Sandra Day O'Connor, The Effects of Gender in the Federal Courts: The Final Report of the Ninth Circuit Gender Bias Task Force: The Quality of Justice, 67 S. Cal. L. Rev. 745, 786-87 (1994).) Inappropriate interactions Many of the task forces found both explicit and implicit unacceptable treatment of female lawyers by male judges. For instance, in 1988, a senior status federal district court judge refused to address a