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'My Efforts to Become a Lawyer"
Article in which Lockwood discusses her early life and her career as a lawyer, with a focus on the discrimination she faced as a woman.
Lockwood, Belva Ann, 1830-1917
1888-02
15 pages
reformatted digital
Belva Ann Lockwood Papers, SCPC-DG-098
Belva Ann Lockwood Papers, SCPC-DG-098 --http://archives.tricolib.brynmawr.edu/resources/scpc-dg-098
Lockwood-0068
MY EFFORTS TO BECOME A LAWYER. 923
triculated, partly as a novelty, I suppose, but certainly without any ade-
quate idea of the amount of labor involved. Many of them left with
the close of the first quarter ; but'some continued through the year, and
a few of them held on until the middle of the second year. Only two
persons, Lydia S. Hall and myself, completed the course. At first, be-
sides the regular class-recitations, we were admitted to the lectures with
the young men; although the recitations had been separate. This was
a compromise between prejudice and progress. It was not long before
there commenced to be a growl by the young men, some of them de-
claring openly that they would not graduate with women. The women
were notified that they could no longer attend the lectures, but would be
permitted to complete the course of studies. As Commencement day
approached, it became very evident that we were not to receive our
diplomas, nor be permitted to appear on the stage with the young men
at graduation, This was a heavy blow to my aspirations, as the diploma
would have been the entering wedge into the court and saved me the
weary contest which followed.
For a time I yielded quite ungracefully to the inevitable, while
Lydia §. Hall solaced herself by marrying a man named Graffan and
leaving the city. She was not a young women at that. time, but a staid
matron, past forty ; and after her departure I entirely lost sight of her,
and suppose she became “merged,” as Blackstone says, in her husband.
I was not to be squelched so easily.
I asked a member of the bar, Francis Miller, Esq., to move my
admission to the bar of the Supreme Court, D.C., which he did, some
time in the latter part of July, 1872, and I was referred to the ex-
amining committee for report. I at once hunted up the committee and
asked for the examination. It was with evident reluctance that the
committee came together for the examination, which was quite rigid
and lasted for three days. I waited for weeks after this, but the com-
mittee did not report. Thereupon I entered complaint of their action
to the Supreme Justice, David K. Cartler, and another committce was
appointed. It was Judge Cartter who one year -before, in the revision
of the Laws of the District of Columbia, knowing that some women
in the District were preparing for admission to the bar, had asked that
the rule of court be so amended as to strike out the word “ male,” and
it had been done, so that this disability no longer stood in my way.
The new committee, like the old one, examined me for three days, but
would not report. They were opposed to the innovation. The age of
progress that had to some extent softencd and liberalized the judges of
the District Supreme Court had not touched the old-time conservatisin
of the bar. I was blocked, discouraged, pro tempore, but had not the
remotest idea of giving up.
Desperate enough for any adventure, I now, at the request of Theo-
dore Tilton, went on a‘canvassing and campaigning tour through the
Southern States in the interest of the New York Tribune and (Golden
Age, and of Horace Greeley, whom the Liberal Republicans had nomi-
nated for the Presidency in July, 1872. My trip was a reasonably
successful one, but it did not elect Greeley.
After the political sky had cleared, T made my appearance at a
Vou. SLIE—15
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Lockwood-0068_09
reformatted digital
Belva Ann Lockwood Papers, SCPC-DG-098 --http://archives.tricolib.brynmawr.edu/resources/scpc-dg-098
Lockwood-0068_09