Women lawyers of this country are entitled to practice before all courts, State and national, the same as male lawyers. When not admitted under existing statutes, the respective legislatures, so far, with two exceptions, have promptly passed enabling acts. Women anxious for admission were the first to advocate these. One exception to the usual legislative promptness is found in the case of Annie Smith, of Danville, Virginia. The Judge of the Corporation Court, to whom she applied in 1889 for a certificate to enable her to be examined, refused it on the ground that for a woman to obtain license the present statute would have to be amended. Mrs. Smith, aided by her husband, an attorney, vainly endeavored to secure the necessary enactment during the last session of the State Legislature. The bill, a general one, was voted down; but a private bill, to enable Mrs. Smith only to obtain license, was favorably reported. The Legislature, however, adjourned before final action on it. Mr. and Mrs. Smith will continue their efforts until successful.
The other exception was a prior one, but admission came without legislation. This is found in the case of Carrie Burnham Kilgore, of Philadelphia. Speaking of her twelve years’ struggle for admission, Miss Martin, in her article on “Admission of Women to the Bar,” already cited, says: “In December, 1874, Carrie Burnham (now Kilgore), of Philadelphia, began the long and tedious warfare that she has been obliged to wage for admission in Pennsylvania. The Board of Examiners refused to examine her, because there was ‘no precedent for the admission of a woman to the bar of this county,’ and the Court refused to grant a rule on the board requiring them to examine her. Mrs. Kilgore then tried to have a law passed forbidding exclusion on account of sex, but the Judiciary Committee of the Senate took the position that the law as it stood was broad enough, and so it would seem to be. The Act of 1834 declares, ‘The Judges of the several Courts of Record in the Commonwealth shall respectively have power to admit a competent number of persons of an honest disposition, and learned in the law, to practice as attorneys in their respective courts.’ The Senate finally passed the clause desired, at two or three sessions, but it was never reached in the House. Finally Mrs. Kilgore gained admission to the Law School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1881, where she had previously been denied, and by virtue of her diploma from there, in 1883, was admitted to the Orphans’ Court of Philadelphia. She was then admitted to one of the Common Pleas Courts, but denied admission to the other three, though it is the custom when a person has been admitted to one, to admit to the rest as a matter of course. As soon after admission to the Common Pleas Court as the law allows, two years, and in May of this year, 1886, Mrs. Kilgore applied and was admitted to the Supreme Court of the State, and by virtue of this admission, all the lower Courts are now compelled to admit her. Thus, Pennsylvania has accomplished after twelve years, what Iowa did seventeen years ago without any ado, and with a statute that might have afforded a reasonable ground for refusal, which the Pennsylvania statute did not.” Since her admission, Mrs. Kilgore has been in active general practice. Her husband, an able lawyer, in whose office she studied and worked, died two years ago, in 1888. He had a large clientage. After his death, Mrs. Kilgore was requested to take charge of his cases in all but one instance. She is the attorney for Harmon Lodge, I.O.O.F., and the Relief Mining and Milling Company. Several times she has been appointed master and examiner by the courts. A special correspondent of the Chicago Daily Tribune, in its issue of April 5, 1890, speaking of Mrs. Kilgore’s efforts and successes concludes with: “She has several interesting children and a delightful home, neither her struggle for woman’s rights nor her devotion to her professional concerns having interfered with her domestic duties nor estranged her from the hearth.”
This reminds us of many interesting cases of motherly care and devotion on the part of women practitioners, two of which we cannot refrain from mentioning. One is in regard to Ohio’s first woman lawyer, Annie Cronise Lutes, of Tiffin, who was admitted to practice before the courts of that State in April, 1873. Her sister, Florence Cronise, was admitted in September of the same year. These two sisters, since their admission, have pursued the steady, straight practice of law without deviation. For several years they were law partners. In 1880, Mrs. Lutes and her husband, who had been fellow students in the same office, and were admitted to the bar at the same time, formed a partnership. (This left Miss Florence to practice alone, which she has since done with signal success.) Mr. and Mrs. Lutes were married in 1874. They have three daughters. The two eldest (aged fourteen and twelve respectively) are attending the Heidelberg University, at Tiffin, taking the full classical course, for which they were prepared under the instruction of their mother, never having attended public school. The full force of this fact will become apparent further on. In 1881 Mr. Lutes became totally deaf. In a letter showing the extent of their law practice, which was published in the article on “Women Lawyers in the United States,” already cited, Mr. Lutes says:
“Our practice is general in character, and extends to the courts of this State and the United States courts for the Northern District of Ohio. The following facts will enable you to form an estimate as to the nature and extent of Mrs. Lutes’s practice and experience at the bar. The bar of this county has forty-five members. The total number of civil cases on the trial docket of the term just closed was 226; of that number, our firm was retained in fifty cases, which is probably a fair average of our share of the business for this county, and our practice also extends to a considerable extent to the adjoining counties of this district.”
Mr. Lutes’s infirmity necessarily imposes extra duties on his faithful partner, which the following extract from the Chicago Daily Tribune, of April 5, 1890, graphically pictures: “Mr. Lutes is totally deaf, but his wife sits by him in court and repeats word for word what is said, and although her lips make no audible sound, every word said by judge, jury, or opposing counsel is understood. Without her assistance he would be perfectly helpless, so far as his law practice is concerned. The two work together on every case that is brought to them, and it is seldom a person sees one without the other. Their practice is lucrative and extensive.”
The other case is that of Clara S. Foltz. Her married life was unfortunate. She had the family to support. This she did by undertaking dressmaking and millinery, and then conducting classes in voice culture and keeping boarders. An attorney who “admired her keen reasoning powers and her incisive logic,” one day said: “Mrs. Foltz, you are such a good mother that I believe you would make an able lawyer. Here is a copy of Kent’s Commentaries. I wish you would take it home and read it.” She did so as she nursed her babies—five of them now. Shortly afterward she began the study of law in an office. Subsequently she secured a divorce and the custody of her children. In September, 1878, she was admitted to practice and removed to San Francisco for a course in the Hastings Law College. She made application for admission as a student in the college and the dean permitted her to attend the lecture for three days, while the directors were deciding what to do about it. They refused her application on the ground that it was “not wise or expedient, or for the best interest of the college, to admit any female as a student therein.” Mrs. Foltz informed the dean that she meant to attend the lectures—peaceably if she could, but forcibly if she must. She promptly commenced action for a mandate to compel the directors to admit her. She won. The directors appealed the case to the State Supreme Court. Mrs. Foltz appeared and argued her side of the case, making the point that the Law College was a branch of the University, and that woman’s right to enter the latter was unquestioned. The Court agreed with her, and held that “An applicant for admission as a student to the Hastings Law College cannot lawfully be rejected on the sole ground that she is a female.” (Foltz v. Hoge, et al., Cal. Supreme Court Rep., vol. liv. p. 28.) She entered the college and remained there eighteen months, attending three classes daily to overtake her class. Finally overstudy, lack of means, and the care of her children, prostrated her. It was a severe disappointment not to be able to complete the prescribed three years’ course and win her degree. She will yet gain it. Mrs. Foltz thus tells the story of her first case:
“I firmly believe in the Infinite. The day the Supreme Court admitted me—it was on Thursday—I traveled from San Jose to San Francisco. An old gentleman who knew of my struggles and ambitions was on the train. He explained in an apologetic way that he thought perhaps I would be willing to assist him in finding a land claim that he had pre-empted, and which another settler contested. My would-be client had all the necessary proofs and witnesses ready, and the case was to come up at ten o’clock the following day. I had never been in a land office. I was ignorant of the methods of procedure, but I could soon learn. I accepted the case.
“That day was a crisis in my life. To pay the ten dollar fee of the Supreme Court I pawned this breastpin—dear old pin! Next morning, before I was up, a knock came to my door as the clock struck seven. My client was there. I dressed myself and carried on a conversation through the door. What would I charge for my services, he asked. I did not know, but ventured a guess at the correct figure. I would undertake the case for $25. He hesitated a little, and said that after witnesses fees and other expenses were paid he would have but $15 left, and that if I had a mind to take that sum it would be all right. I accepted eagerly, for I needed the money. Next I invited the witnesses in and questioned them. We parted to meet at the land office, but I went down in advance to see the Surveyor-General. I hold that the truth is always the best, so I told him that I had a case at ten o’clock, but knew nothing about land-office matters, and that I wanted to learn the law. He was very kind and furnished me with a pamphlet of instructions. Then I ventured to request that the case might go over to 1 P. M. He found that it could. I was immensely relieved and hastened off with my precious pamphlet. Client and witnesses were on the stairs. I informed them of the change in time and turned back. Didn’t I get that pamphlet by heart though! And I won my first case, redeemed my cherished pin, and paid my board bill.”
Laura De Force Gordon, who was also denied admission to the Hastings Law College, and aided Mrs. Foltz in her mandamus case, successfully defended a Spaniard charged with murder, within two months after her admission to the bar in 1879. “Among her most noted criminal cases was that of The People v. Sproule, which was indeed in some respects the most remarkable trial in the whole range of criminal jurisprudence in California. The defendant had shot and killed a young man named Andrews, by mistake for one Espey, the seducer of Sproule’s wife. It was a fearful tragedy, and the excitement was so great that the jail had to be guarded for a week to prevent the lynching of the prisoner. Mrs. Gordon undertook his defense, against the advice of the most distinguished lawyers in the State, and obtained a verdict of “Not guilty” amid the most deafening cheers of men and hysterical cries of women, half-weeping jurymen joining in the general clamor of rejoicing.” (“Women Lawyers in the United States,” in The Green Bag, January, 1890.)
In speaking of her practice, Mrs. Lockwood says: “My first was a divorce case and I won it, but the man refused to pay the alimony. The judge told me there was no law to make him pay it. I told him there was, and I showed him I could issue a ne exeat. I issued the writ, and the man was clapped into prison until he agreed to pay the alimony. Years afterward a similar case came up and the men who were the lawyers asked if there was no way to compel a man to stay in the District until he paid the alimony. The clerk said: ‘Belva Lockwood is the only one who has ever issued a ne exeat in the District; you had better consult her.’ Many a time I have been saved by a little wit. Once my client, a woman, got upon the witness stand, in spite of all I could do, and acknowledged she had committed the crime of which she was accused. It was for shooting a constable, and that woman described the whole thing, talking until I was glued to my seat with fright. When she stopped and I had to get up I didn’t know what I was going to say, but I began, ‘Gentlemen of the jury, the laws must be enforced. My client has committed the double offense of resisting an officer of the law and shooting a man. The District is under the common law. That law says a woman must obey her husband. Her husband told her to load a gun and shoot the first officer that tried to force his way into the house. She obeyed him. Gentlemen, I claim that that husband loaded the gun and shot the officer, and as the judge will not postpone this case until I can have the husband brought from the West, where he is, I claim you are not trying the right prisoner. You would not have a woman resist her husband?’ The jury brought in the verdict of ‘Not guilty,’ and the judge, a crusty gentleman, said, when the next case was brought up: ‘I will call a new jury for this case, as the old one has just done a hard day’s work.’”