America's First Woman Lawyer: The Biography of Myra BradwellDuring her lifetime, Myra Bradwell (1831-1894) - America's first woman lawyer as well as publisher and editor-in-chief of a prestigious legal newspaper - did more to establish and aid the rights of women and other legally handicapped people than any other woman of her day. Her female contemporaries - Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone - are known to all. Now it is time for Myra Bradwell to assume her rightful place among women's rights leaders of the nineteenth century. With author Jane Friedman's discovery of previously unpublished letters and valuable documents, Bradwell's fascinating story can at last be told.In a 1982 opinion, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor cited Myra Bradwell's hard-fought, successful campaign (culminating in 1869) to practice law, but few who read that opinion recognized Bradwell's name. In this work, Friedman reintroduces Bradwell, a feminist and long-term editor/publisher of the weekly Chicago Legal News. Friedman's accounts of Bradwell's fight to secure Mary Todd Lincoln's release from an asylum and her efforts on behalf of women's equality in various occupations are thoroughly absorbing, as are discussions of Bradwell's controversies concerning Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. This book restores an important figure to her rightful place in American history and indicates that even an imperfect human being can be a splendid role model. Highly recommended. -Library Journal[This] biography of Myra Bradwell contributes to a new and growing interest in the history of women in the legal profession . . . Although she lost in the Superme Court in 1873, the agitation her case provoked led to important reforms, and several states, including Illinois, passed legislation allowing women to practice law . . . Friedman has uncovered some interesting letters from Susan B. Anthony to Bradwell that help to place Bradwell at the center of the nineteenth-century women's rights movement and that reveal the strained relationship between these two influential women. -American History ReviewExcellent reading for those who wish to learn more about a woman who struggled to open up the legal profession to women. -Women & Criminal Justice |
Contents
Acknowledgments | 9 |
Release of Mary Todd Lincoln from Bellevue Place Asylum | 47 |
Bradwells Granddaughter | 71 |
Unlocking the Gates of | 129 |
Opening the Doors | 155 |
Epilogue | 211 |
Other editions - View all
America's First Woman Lawyer: The Biography of Myra Bradwell Jane M. Friedman No preview available - 2019 |
America's First Woman Lawyer: The Biography of Myra Bradwell Jane M. Friedman No preview available - 2019 |
America's First Woman Lawyer: The Biography of Myra Bradwell Jane M. Friedman No preview available - 2019 |
Common terms and phrases
admission admitted Amendment appointed April Arabella Mansfield attorneys August author's possession Batavia Belva Lockwood Bessie bill Bradwell's Century Chicago Legal Chicago Tribune CLN 1 November concluded constitutional convention Cook County custody decision editorial election Elgin Emphasis added enacted fact February federal female friends Governor History Hulett husband Ibid Illinois legislature Illinois Supreme Court insane asylum James Bradwell judicial jurors jury Justice Drake Justice Ryan Kepley Kogan Law School lawyer Legal News Company legal profession legislation letter Lockwood male married woman Mary Livermore Mary Todd Lincoln matter Middleville mother MTL Insanity File Myra and James Myra believed Myra Bradwell Myra Pritchard Myra wrote Myra's newspaper nineteenth-century opinion Packard Patterson person practice law published reprinted in CLN right to practice right to vote Robert Lincoln Robert Todd Lincoln simply Springfield statute Susan trial true womanhood U.S. Supreme Court wife woman suffrage women York