A Woman’s Place Is in the Classroom
Ada Kepley
Ada Harriet Miser Kepley (1847-1925) became the first American woman to graduate from law school when she completed a bachelor of laws degree from the Union College of Law, which is now Northwestern Pritzker School of Law.
Kepley hailed from Effingham, a small town in South Central Illinois. At a time when separate spheres dominated society, she came from a home in which both parents worked. Her mother sold books and newspapers and managed a lending library. According to the US Census Bureau, in 1870, women comprised a mere 0.07% of the gainfully employed population over 16 years old. However, from a young age, Kepley’s mother provided her with an example of a working woman.
In 1867, she married Henry B. Kepley, an attorney from Effingham. Kepley worked in her husband’s law practice, and he encouraged her to get a formal legal education. In her memoir, she writes, “In the year 1869 my husband, Henry B. Kepley, suggested I attend law school, and I made application to the Hon. Henry Booth of Chicago and received a kindly letter from that noble gentleman saying there was no objection….” During this period, Kepley left her hometown and travelled 200 miles to Chicago to complete the (then) one-year legal program at Union College of Law.
Kepley’s decision to pursue a legal education was not without struggles, some detrimental and others ornamental. Concerning the latter, an 1870 article in the Chicago Legal News, which was run by a woman, Myra Bradwell, reported: “Previous to the commencement exercises, there was some question with the College authorities as to the proper wording of the degree to be conferred upon Mrs. Kepley. It was stated that it could not be Maid of Laws, as she was possessed of a ‘married disability’ in the shape of a husband. We never yet heard that being a husband disqualified a man from receiving the degree of Bachelor of Laws.”
More seriously, although Kepley had completed her legal education, she was nevertheless denied admission to the Illinois Bar because she was a woman. This frustrated Kepley not only because she was prohibited from practicing law, but also because she was denied while Richard Dawson, who also graduated that same year, was permitted entrance to the Bar. Like Kepley, Dawson was also a “first”: the first Black graduate of the Law School. After the Civil War, white women had hoped to be included as freed slaves and people of color across the country were finally getting the rights they so deserved. Unfortunately, this didn’t happen, and what could have been the banding together of two marginalized groups instead led to, for women like Kepley, an ugly “us vs. them” mentality.
The right to participate in the professions was logically tied to other rights women sought at the time, such as the right to serve on juries and, most significantly, the right to vote. Granting a woman a license to practice law threatened her disenfranchised status, which some felt must be maintained. Her married status was also an issue. Bradwell, editor of the Chicago Legal News, had previously been denied admission to the Bar, as well, and had legally fought that decision. She argued, among other things, that while wives were considered under the legal standing of their husbands, Illinois allowed married women to conduct some legal transactions on their own, and therefore the ability to practice law should be included.
Ultimately, Henry Kepley, Kepley’s husband, filed a bill in support of women professionals that was entered into law in 1872. Kepley again applied—and this time received admission—to the Bar in 1881. Despite this, and despite the fact that an Effingham County judge had previously granted her license to practice locally, Kepley decided to focus her efforts elsewhere. She instead devoted her life to furthering the causes of women’s equality, Temperance, and work in the Unitarian denomination. Nevertheless, her efforts on behalf of women in law reverberate to this day.
Recommended Resources
Adelman, Charlotte. “A History of Women Lawyers in Illinois.” Illinois Bar Journal 74, no. 9 (May, 1986): 424-428.
Bradwell, Myra. Chicago Legal News : a Journal of Legal Intelligence. Chicago: Chicago Legal News Co.
Drachman, Virginia G. “Kepley, Ada Harriet Miser (1847-1925), lawyer and social reformer.” American National Biography. 1 Feb. 2000; https://www.anb.org/view/10.1093/anb/9780198606697.001.0001/anb-9780198606697-e-1100991.
—–. Sisters in Law : Women Lawyers in Modern American History. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1998.
Kepley, Ada Harriet Miser. A Farm Philosophy: A Love Story. Teutopolis: Worman’s Printery, [c. 1912]. Please note: Some of the views expressed in Kepley’s book, especially those regarding race, are neither supported nor condoned by the Law School.
Norgren, Jill. Rebels at the Bar: The Fascinating, Forgotten Stories of America’s First Women Lawyers. New York: NYU Press, 2013.
