Transcripts For CSPAN3 The Woman Who Would Be President 20140720

Yes. Jills book tells the story of a woman who would not be put down. The book paints a vivid pore train of Belva Lockwood. And should gain from her life the public attention long overdo. Women in the public eye nowadays are courted by various archives seeking to be the repository of their papers. Not so in lockwoods time. Piecing together her work and days required the relentless pursuit of a determined sleuth and thats just what jill became in this process. A most persistent detective. In the introduction to the biography. I noticed that Elizabeth Stanton had compared lockwood to shakespeares portia and she does resemble it in this respect. They were both individuals of impressive intellect, who demonstrated that woman can hold their own as advocates for justice. Like shakespeares portia lockwood used wit and lockwood used no disguise in tackling the prevailing notions that woman and lawyering, no less politics do not mix. Not only did they became the first woman admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court and the first woman to argue before the court, but she ran twice both campaigns for the office of president of the United States. Her frontrunner status was achieved by unflagging effort. In 1869, then the mother of two, and approaching her 39th birthday, she embarked on her lifelong ambition to become a lawyer. Her efforts to obtain admission to d. C. Area law schools were at first unsuccessful. She was initially rejected. Her presence would be likely to distract the attention of the young men. She persevered until National University law school allowed her to matriculate. She encountered yet another obstacle when the school refused to issue her the diploma which she had earned. Men in the class were again the asserted obstacle, women were not created for the practice of law, it was widely believed and graduating with women would lessen the value of mens diplomas. Harvard law school gave similar reasons for excluding women until 1950. Ultimately lockwood wrote to president grant, who was the head of the university, she wasted no words, i have passed through the curriculum of study and demand my diploma. Grant didnt answer, but two weeks later, in september 1973, the University Chancellor awarded lockwood her diploma. She practiced in the districts of columbia for three years, handling all manner of cases, and in 1876, she qualified for and sought a mission to the bar of the United States Supreme Court. Chief justices reported the denial of her application. The explanation by the uniform practice of the court and by the Fair Construction of its rules, none but men are permitted to appear before it as attorneys and counselors. It was not known at the time when the chief justice made that report that the tally was 63 and that the chief justice was in fact one of the three votes for lockwoods admission. Undaunted, she lobbied congress, to grant her plea, and she succeeded in february 18, 79. Congress decreed that any woman possessing the necessary qualifications shall on motion be admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the United States. Lockwoods case is an example that i often give that sometimes the legislature is more in tune with the winds of change than the court is. Some 21 months after she gained admission, lockwood became the first woman to participate in oral argument at the court. She next and last argued for the court in 1906, then with three decades as a claims attorney, she helped to secure a multimillion dollar award for the cherokees who had suffered removal from their Ancestral Lands and relocation without compensation. Lockwood was not content to rest on her personal achievements, she sought not only the suffrage for women but for political and civil rights. Although she couldnt vote for president , she ran for that office in 1884 and 1888, pointing out that nothing in the constitution barred women from becoming president. She wrote in a letter to her future running mate murrieta stowe, we should never have equal rights until we take them it, nor respect until we command it. That same determination characterizes the first woman to serve as a justice of the court, my dear and very much missed sandra de oconnor. The first step in getting power is to become visible to others and then to put on an impressive show. As women achieve power the barriers will fall, as society sees what women can do as women see what women can do, there will be more women out there doing things and well all be better off for it. So much has changed for the better since Belva Lockwoods years. Admission ceremonies at the court nowadays include women in numbers and it is no longer unusual for women to represent both sides in the cases we hear. Women today serve as president s of Bar Associations, federal judges, state court judges, selected representatives at every level, local, state and federal. Still, the presence of only one woman on the Current High Court indicates the need for women of lockwoods sense to see the changes she helped to inaugurate through to full fruition. Im very glad to be here at the announcement of the publication of this book and i know all of you have the same treat in store that i had when i read the manuscript, thank you. [applause] Justice Ginsburg has to get back for an event at the court, but we are so grateful that she was able to be here with us even briefly. I will mention that she picked up on the absence of archives back then having to do with women and one of the things that will perhaps rectify that situation already more than it is currently being rectified is the creation of the National Womens History Museum. I want to thank the museum for cosponsoring this event and the National Womens law center and the George Washington University Womens studies program. Just the fact that we have all of those cosponsors to thank is quite indicative of how far we have come from the time of Belva Lockwood. With that, let me turn it over to jill norgren. It is a pleasure to be here. Tell me if the mic is picking up. And a pleasure to thank Justice Ginsburg for all that she contributed to this book. To thank the staff of the Wilson Center library and my former Wilson Center interns now spread around the world, i heard from only one of them two weeks ago who is in beijing who had seen an advertisement for the book and emailed to me what a small world we live in. I want to thank these interns in particular for the help they gave me during a wonderful year of fellowship residence here at the center. It is a pleasure to acknowledge people at the National Archives and the library of congress and the National Museum of women americans history. Im delighted in particular to say how grateful i am to robert ellis jr. Of the National Archives, a longterm supporter of this project. There would be no book without a publisher, the editors and the staff of the New York University press stepped forward to publish this biography and they have been a joy to work with. I want to thank a 10yearold girl in new york city. My granddaughter elena ronnor who gave me my first tutorial in powerpoint. Lets now turn to the life of Belva Lockwood. Born Belva Bennett in northern new york. In the winter of 1866, only months after the end of the civil war, Belva Lockwood, then mcnail, a 35yearold widowed School Teacher arrived in a very unformed washington d. C. , a rather rural and dusty place still from upstate new york. Hers was a journey of reinvention. Her early life was c conventional. The tragedy of becoming a widow at the age of 22 dramatically altered her life. Three years after uriah mcnails death she became one of the first students at genesee college. She made the decision to move to washington. She dreamed of a life in politics or in law. Despite certain stark realities that women were not permitted to vote, or serve on juries, and that no woman at that time had been admitted to a law school. The capacity was a hot bed of reform activity when she arrived. And she was soon helping to organize a local womens Suffrage Association and lobbying congress for equal pay to government employees. She remarried in 1868 only to find her marital status to Ezekiel Lockwood a source of discrimination after she sought admission to law school and the d. C. Bar. Lets pick up the story in 1873, keeping in mind the several themes of her life. Ambition, free speech and the ideal of equality. With this discussion i hope to provoke your interest in this extraordinary women. Her story goes beyond anthony, beyond carnegie and cleveland. 1873 was a critical year for lockwood, she had fought her way into law school and successfully completed the course of study only as Justice Ginsburg mentioned to be told because she was a women, the faculty would not grant her a diploma. She struggled to overcome this discrimination with patience, and sitting through oral organizations not required. She determined to establish her own law practice, made one last desperate appeal, the one that Justice Ginsburg mentioned to the president of the United States who happened to be the president exofficio of her law school. She sent two letters, the first was long and delight detailing her efforts as a law student. The second, as the justice mentioned, was brusk and demanding. You can see her that she says to him in effect, do you have the authority here . Are you the head of this . And if so, she ends this letter, i am entitled to and i demand my diploma. She did indeed receive the diploma two weeks later and days after that was admitted to the d. C. Bar. This permitted her then to set up the larger Legal Practice that she had intended. Her practice took advantage of the washington d. C. Location, she specialized in claims against the government, patent claims, veterans benefits, divorces, a whole range of issues. It was a solo practice aid by her daughter laura who by then was in her early 20s. Painters, veterans, small Property Owners and a few women in distress. She had several notable cases, one, she defended in criminal court a women charged, in several other cases in civil court she helped women who wished to bring damages claims against men they said had seduced them or for breach of marriage contract, which was a big thing in the 19th century. Lockwood saw her male law colleagues riding around on bicycles. She saw that it was an effective mode of transportation, that they were getting more work done, more quickly, and so although no women engaged in bicycle riding, which was considered completely inmodest. She went out and researched it and bought herself this adult tricycle and was seen on the streets of the district riding it with her bag of briefs to court. By 1877, she was able to declare a certain middle class professional status by purchasing a home on f street near the mci. It was not grand, it was a mortgaged house in the commercial district. It was her home, an office, and a long Term Investment which she would variously use as equity against loans. Here somewhat later in the year she bought it, you see f street, a busy commercial street. I dont know if you can read it, but on the Tall Building there, you can see it is called the barrister building. The site of the office that published one of the law reporters here in the district. It was a boarding house. Washington has a long tradition of boarding houses of providing for people who are transients and here is a photograph that appeared in the New York Times in january of california representative George Miller with the gentleman from congress who board with him. Lockwood did something which is in the fine tradition of the hill. How do we look at her in the late 1870s . Shes conventional, a wife, a mother, a homeowner, a regular churchgoer, shes at the same time radical and independent. She has joined and is very active in the leadership of the National Women Suffrage Association which the stanton and anthony faction of the movement. Shes joined the most radical peace group in the United States, the philadelphia universal based peace union. In todays language we would call it a human rights organization, a group very, very committed to issues of social justice. Within the Womens Movement she fights very hard for the rights of mormon women, this was something that divided the movement at the time and she never stepped back from her support. She cast herself into a fiveyear battle which begins in 1874. She was denied admission to a federal court. To the u. S. Court of claims, where she wished to represent a client. Th they turned her back for several reasons and suggested that if she was not happy with their decision, that she should go to the Supreme Court. She decided instead, being someone who at this point was very comfortable lobbying congress, she had come to washington and she observed and her taught herself the arts of lobbying, she went to congress, she enlisted then representative Benjamin Butler, wellknown from the civil war to introduce legislation in the house and she found a supporter in the senate. But it was just ahead of its time and while it did fairly well in the house, it was killed in committee in the senate. She then thought she might try to have a member of the Washington Community move her admission at the u. S. Supreme court. She knew that the rules of the high court demanded that any candidate practice for three years. She at this point had to wait and when she had been a member of the d. C. Bar for three years, she went to albert riddle, an attorney in the district who had come as an congressman from ohio and stayed on as an attorney and district attorney. Very involved in reform movements. He moved her admission. As Justice Ginsburg said, when the court voted on the issue, they were split, with six votes against her, she found herself, again, turned back. The court sent her back to congress, of course knowing that she had not succeed at congress the first time, so they were doing her no favors sending her back there. She said when she went back to congress, that nothing was too daring to attempt, she had nothing to lose. She at this point had lost before two of the branches of the government, but again, she was able to find male allies and again a bill that would prevent such discrimination was introduced. She was asked to testify, and her testimony gives us some indication of why she was so committed to this. This was not some abstract legal question of her of womens rights. This was very concrete. She had spent many years as a single mother. By this time her second husband, actually is months from dying in january of 77 and for her economic independence, the economic independence of women as they are connected to economic rights were critical. She understood how women would be held back until they had that kind of economic independence and security. The house approves the bill and that leaves her understanding that shes facing a more conservative senate. The very powerful senator tables the bill. Her allies, again, we see this dance between supporters and opponents, her allies revive it in committee, but then it receives two adverse reports. It looks very grim. And then Aaron Sargent forces the vote before summer recess, they lose, but it suggests to the senate that they are a force to be contended with and in the fall they better expect to face this issue again. Lockwood comes back from the washington summer doldrums. She had an intuitive feel of how to work with the press. She initiated a petition drive which resulted in 160 male attorneys here in the district saying we have no problem with women attorneys, you guys up there in the senate, you vote this bill. She did the same thing among new york attorneys, she was all over the place lobbying, and sargent at a particular moment, when they know one of their opponents is going to be out of town pulls it all together for a floor vote and he says returning to women attorneys in this very moving speech, it is oppression to hedge you out by law from profitable employment an monopolize them for ourselves. They succeed in the senate, they already have their positive vote in the house. We have then one of the very First Federal measures in support of womens rights. The court has to reconvene, it is in recess. It does so on the 3rd and lockwood, as we can only imagine, makes the most triumphant of appearances, she takes the oath and kisses the bible and becomes the first woman of the Supreme Court bar. The crusade opens the whole federal bar to women attorneys. There are no photographs in papers at this time. This is a photograph that the court very nicely provided to us today. Taken a little bit later, but it gives us a sense, and here we have an illustration from a wellknown journal, drawn a year later, but again, it gives us an idea of the space and this particular illustration is Belva Lockwood on your left, moving the admission of African American attorney samuel lowry, and what i always find very moving when i look at this, she seems to be the outsider. I dont know whether thats my construction on it. Here you have the certificate issued to her and here is the language, thats difficult to read, but indicating that the motion was made by riddle and shes now duly a counselor of the Supreme Court. After such a personal and legislative triumph, where did she go . Many of us would hold court with the reporters and that would be that. As i said, this is a story about ambition, as well as commitment to ideals, so lockwood looked to a larger stage and the stage that she found a few years after this was that of u. S. National politics. Specifically, the president ial campaign of 1884, which pitted in the main Grover Cleveland against james blaine. Here we have cleveland, but we have the postal stamp issued in 1986 in the Great American series to give you an idea. And so im interested in asking, why did she run . Ego clearly, she was restless, she had a sense of humor, i think she clearly found it interesting and sort of funny that she and all of the women she knew couldnt vote and yet there was nothing that prohibited them for running for the highest office in the land, but also, she had been one of the women suffrage leaders who had gone to the Republican Party Convention Earlier that summer. They were trying to interest the leadership of the party in putting women suffrage on the platform, and they were rebuffed, the men didnt have the gumption, that also, i think, left the women trying to figure out what their next act would be, and murrieta stowe, who was the california publisher and editor, had had a message for women, at least since 1880. Run for office. It will empower you and it will educate you in politics. So that when we get the vote well know what to do. Lockwood accepted the nomination of stowes equal rights party, which was really a nonparty, it was a name only, to be its candidate. I think stowe and her friends probably saw it all as a joke, but lockwood took the nomination and ran with it. Deciding to make a national campaign, she began with rallies outside of d. C. Out in maryland, she held a second rally in her home on f street. Without a real party and without a treasury, she had to come up with a way of funding a national campaign. She did that with a very nice business model. She offered herself as a public lecturer, she appeared at churches, civic halls and county fairs. This is her campaign. Portrait and also the cover of the book. Again, because theres no photography in newspapers, were very limited in sort of our window on to the campaign. And one of the ways then of seeing the campaign, although, i will be the first to tell you, it is one that very much skews our vision, are cartoons. Lockwood was one of the several Third Party Candidates and the Third Party Candidates along with the two male candidates were very much taken up. In the puck two weeks after she accepted the nomination. The caption says now let the show go on and it shows lockwood with Benjamin Butler who was running on another third party ticket. A few weeks later, the magazine came up with a more biting cartoon. More biting because lockwood is more scantily dressed. More caricatured in this. Shes surrounded by stanton and the other thirdparty candidates. Lockwood did not have the full support of Women Suffrage Movement and anthony really stood on the sidelines, but the cartoonist didnt know that. They stood on the sidelines because there was still the hope of working with the parties and they were worried that the candidate would be ridiculed. Then we come to election day, this is before the australian ballot where everything is printed on one page. Every party issues its own ballot and here we have one that would have been used in new york state. To show the amount of interest in the campaign, i was quite surprised to find this. At christmastime, 1884, there were still cartoons that were taking up the campaign and lockwoods involvement in it. Again, lockwood and ben butler, had she won, which of course she did not. U. S. Political history would have looked quite different. This is a rundown that appeared in the New York Times easter ea this winter. A very small vote about 5,000. But an enormous civics lesson. A demonstration that a woman could be a candidate. A woman emerges as a role model. Women candidates should be taken seriously by the public and the media. And a step closer to understanding that a vibrant democracy cannot be an exclusive mens club. Again, theres the question of life after such an enormous event and again lockwood refused to step back. She used her Public Notice to become a paid lecturer, before radio, television, and the internet was a major form both of entertainment and education, you found at this time, mark twain and francis willard, many wellknown people earning money and spreading their message on the lecture circuit. She continued her practice. She attempted entrepreneurial activities. She increased her involvement with the Peace Movement being decades ahead of most americans in her advocacy of arbitration as a method of conflict resolution and international courts, and at the very end of her life became attorney general for a very interesting group, that we cant talk about today, but i urge you to read about it in the book. The american womens republic, which is a precursor of the league of women voters, interested in training women and educating women in politics. Just to give you an idea as we close. This is one of the ads when she was on the lecture circuit, which she did for about eight years, quite elaborate hand bills. Another one which listed some of her dozen lecture topics and then on the business side of things, she like, for example, clara barton and like figures today, offered herself as someone would endorse commercial products. The one that she testified about was this blood and nerve remedy and that amused me because she was a member of the Temperance Movement and these blood and nerve remedies could have 20, 25 alcohol. She also attempted to capitalize a homeopathic remedies business. I have no evidence whether she got it off the ground. Tobacco cards, any of you ekt l collectors, you probably know about them. This was auctioned off about three weeks ago in texas. I hadnt seen it before that. She brings her legal career nearly to a close. She actually appears in a rather interesting case involving a woman committed to st. Elizabeth. She wins for her clients a share of a 5 million judgment. This was a case that began 30 years before. She was 75 at the time. On her i think this was actually on her birthday, a News Reporter asked her about women in politics. She talked about women in the house and the senate, remember Jeanette Rankin becomes the first women there in 1916. She says it will happen if a woman demonstrates shes fitted to be president. It will be entirely on her own merits however, no movement can place her simply because she is probably a woman. We lost that little bit there. Im always moved when i look at this signature card of lockwoods thats in my possession. Because i think she was never able to sign this signature a ballot or Voter Registration form of any kind. Despite the fact that her country did not permit her and other women in the main. Of course because of federalism, women were voting at this time in some states. She continued to pursue her commitment to womens rights throughout her long life. She never let bitterness about these issues get to her. She educated herself. As we saw, we became a professional and role model. She achieved economic independence, though she was never wealthy. Opened the federal bar to women. Ran for the presidency, campaigned for peace and international courts. She proved, i think, what a woman could become. A story of triumphs. Let me end with a story in the telling. Jeanette rankin comes into the house in 1916. A woman doesnt actually win election to the senate until 1932. There were some appointments to the fill out the terms of dead husbands that came before that. We dont see the nomination and confirmation of a woman to the Supreme Court until 1981 and then only followed by just ginsburg in 1993. Of course, were still waiting with with respect to the issue of a woman in the white house. Joe freeman, who is here today, a scholar and writer, have you a book thats going to come out on this, correct . [indiscernible] has sent out information to those of us who are interested, that between 1964 and 2004, over 50 women were on at least one ballot as candidates for president both as minor party and candidates in primary. Slowly, slowly, theres an inclusion, but certainly on that score, at least, we havent gotten there. So thank you very much. [applause] thank you so much. Next were going to hear from professor wendy williams. Hi. My first question is, well, well get to the questions later. You call this book the woman who would be president. I want to call this book washingtons first lady lawyer. I found this book on Belva Lockwood extremely exciting, and it set off all kinds of thoughts and connections in my own mind, and i want to touch upon just a few of those. By the end of maybe 3 4 of the way through the book, a whole new sort of layer of my understanding of womens active entry into the profession of law and what they did with it was coming home to me. And also, because of the time period in which this happened with the constitutional amendments being added to the constitution, guaranteeing first equality and then the right of African American men to vote, it was a constitutional it was not just that these women lawyers became lawyers, it was because they then used their legal skills to contribute both to the law of the land and to the constitutional struggles that were beginning then and werent culminated for women until we finally got Ruth Ginsburg on the court and sandra de oconnor. It is not just that Belva Lockwood is a remarkable foremother here, i think. My excitement wasnt because of that, exactly. Although she is extraordinary, and it wasnt really because i lack familiarity with the broad outline and maybe the details of this historical time period and what women were up to on their own behalf to make themselves full citizens of the country. And indeed, ive been teaching a course on this for years at georgetown. The thing i love, jill, is that you put her in her Historical Context in such an encompassing and careful and satisfying way. I love the way you told this story. You take an extraordinary woman and you put her in her social, professional, family and political context in a way that connects her to the other important things going on in her time period and it shows both how she absorbed some of the possibilities of what was going on and contributing to the ongoing unfolding. The first parts are the easy part. The woman you convey here, giving the list of the things she did. Extraordinary. It is a story of going where no woman has gone before. The independent heroine of an important story. And she was a great person and she did great thing, but at the same time, i appreciated you taking this very winning story about this young women who managed to overcome all of these obstacles and do great things. You took that, and you qualified that story. And you expanded that story in ways i want to comment on. You qualified it in the sense that you didnt make her out to be a perfect person. How her ambitions sometimes affected her judgment. You observed that sometimes she didnt fully and expecting that women should work like men, she didnt fully credit the support system that he had in place which was making possible what she was doing. A support system that included for a period of time, a husband who was behind her an helped set up the situation in which they could earn money, a remarkable daughter, who sort of hung out in the background somewhere and took care of the law Office Routines and also in a way tried to blow her mothers horn and explain her mother to the public through her articles. You talked about not just how this family operated to support her, but how she came into washington, just at the right moment. She came into washington at a time when equality was in the air. The Great Questions of constitutional equality were actually on the table and being debated and what she did was, she managed to surround herself with both religious people whose convictions were consistent with some of these new ideas and with other leading and very independent women who could also provide her support and inspiration. So, even though her personal papers got destroyed, you managed portray her as a whole person. And i found a great deal to appreciate in all of that. The other thing i guess i would say is, like this is not just a simple story of this is a woman with great determination and she moved mountains, this is a story about, as i mentioned before, a person who found herself, to a large degree, in the right place at the right time, with the right support system. Something i dont think she herself fully appreciated, but which comes through in the book. I think i know there are some High School Students around here somewhere, maybe not in this room, but in the next room and i want to say to them, that history is a kind of funny thing, sometimes we think of it just in terms of the great and famous people and what they do, and she was a great and famous person who disappeared after her period, and referen rescued fin jill in her great story. It is that great people may be people who are able to sense an opening in their times for something that hasnt been possible before. She couldnt she could not have been what she was, if she had been trying to do what she was trying to do, even 20 years before. I think it is important to see that the great people are really products of a lot of good luck, good support systems, a general willingness of a public consciousness to at least begin changing, something that some of her forebearers were not privileged to experience. And okay, so she wasnt joan of arc and she wasnt the lone ranger, those are important insights that you bring to your work. I was thinking about this, what if she had been born earlier . What if she had come into her own in the time that Elizabeth Katy stanton and her friends in seneca falls were gathering for that first remarkable meeting which issued declaration of sentiments. In that declaration of sentiments, these women talked, and a few men, too, i have to say were there, very clearly and bravely about how women were fundamentally excluded from all that men deemed worth while in terms of positions, pursuits, et cetera. And that women in the home were still bound within the laws of coverageture, they were basically by law required to make their husband the head in all things. Details to be provided. Under those circumstances, she couldnt have gotten where she was going. Other things had to happen first. Some of those other things, she participated in. One of the important things that happened after the declaration of sentiments was that women began to get petitions and circulate and go to legislat e legislatures and knock on doors and get it overturned so women could act as human beings before the law and in the public sphere. It is public because of that beginning of an undoing, of the rule of coverture that there was a place for woman like her to step into, a right to make her own decisions about her life and a right to represent people in the public sphere, in this case legal clients. Let me talk a little bit about coverture, i think it is an important backdrop that illustrates how extraordinary these early women were and what it was that had to be overcome. It is kind of and here, again, a somewhat inspirational story, if you leave out nasty things like some racism here and there and some other unfortunate developments, but nonetheless. In seneca falls, the women had talked about womens second class status this way. They listed the fact that women lacked the vote. Women had no voice in the formulation of laws. If they were married. They had no right no control their own property, which they are brought with them into marriage. Their husband could mortgage it, et. Their personal property was his if he chose to claim it. In the eyes of the law, as the declaration said, she was civically dead. She could not go to court in her own right. Her husband had to go as her representative. If there was a question of death or divorce, not so easy to get in those days and also not very favorable to women when they did become available. The guardianship of the children went to the husband automatically. There was the civil death idea, included the idea that not only could women not enter into their own contracts and be their own Business People if they were married, couldnt go to court representing themselves, it carried with it the sort of external problems which women like Belva Lockwood dramatically ran up against, just the mere idea of being able to be a lawyer was problematic for women, because if you couldnt enter into contracts, how could you enter into a legal relationship and represent people . All right. So at the heart of all of this, this idea of coverture had robbed women of their agency to do what men did. Okay. Fast forward a bit, and into the 70s. We see in 1869, the first woman takes the exams and becomes a lawyer. 1869. Thats the first one. And in the decades that follow, in the decades of the 70s, the idea catches on. I know 75 lawyers doesnt sound like much today when 50 of the students in law schools are women. In those days it was pretty good. Among them were women who were able to not only fight for their own way into a position where they could be lawyers, but use the fact that they were lawyers to press forward on behalf of all women. So you have Belva Lockwood, so you have, for example, her sort of mirror image out in california, what was her name . Clara fault. Clara shortridge fault. She studied law. She became the first woman to actually be admitted to law practice. She felt a little embarrassed because she had studied law as an apprentice rather than going to law school. She decided she better go to law school. She then applied to law school but within a few days shes told that women cant go to the law school that she went to. At which point, she works toward getting the law that would exclude her from law school eliminated. She is instrumental inni gettin constitutional provision that says women can pursue. There are Great Stories about women going into law and deploying law on behalf of other women. So why didnt you call this washingtons lady lawyer. My footnote, my last point here, you heard a few minutes ago, from Justice Ginsburg, and working on the things that she experienced in her young life as somebody who decided to go to law school and met obstacles, had a she had a full scholarship to harvard taken away from her because she got married and her husband was supposed to support her and the money went to more worthy candidates to graduating from law school and finding that no Major Law Firm would take her, even though she had transferred to columbia and graduated first in her class. The justices of the Supreme Court were not interested in her. Frankfurter said he wasnt ready for a woman yet. Im so glad i have a panel with me. Hes dead. If he had spoken from the grave though, he might have said the same thing, theres that. So the story unfolds, a great verse in this period that you talked about, and then a great verse in the early 70s. Meeting obstacles, found herself in a position of law where she, too, could broaden the path and open doors for women. I just want to thank you so much for the work youve done here. It is thrilling. Thank you. [applause] judge farin. Thank you. Belva lockwood is a compelling story. And jill norgren has made it read like a novel. It is beautifully written and it is short. You dont have to wade through a lot of nonessential details, get it, read it, and youll be very glad you did. To me, the book is interesting for three reasons, it is about a woman who had an unusual variety of performing interests and commitments. Whole variety of things that youll find interesting if you read this book. Jill does a superb job of putting her in the larger context of women reformers who often Work Together and sometimes fought together. Thats a story that youll find worth following. For me though, is the fact that Belva Lockwood had to work hard to make a living while she was taking on these causes, this is the story of Belva Lockwood becoming a lawyer. Youve heard all about, i have never more to say. I was charged with some rising in summarizing in greater detail how silly men were to try to keep her out of the law. Ill give you details that you have not yet heard. You have heard in 1869 when she was almost 39 years old, she sat in on some lectures at an institution i had never heard about called columbian college, which eventually became George Washington university. Where they were starting law courses. They said you can sit in, but we cannot grant you submission. After due consultation the faculty have decided it would not be expedient as it would likely distract the attention of the young men. As you heard a year later, national law school, which also eventually merged into George Washington university. Invited women to attend their classes, but their discussions were separated in other rooms. Perhaps for the same reason. Lock wood completed the course. And expected her diploma and they said no. Lockwood knew that a diploma was not essential for admission to the bar in those days. She arranged for an oral bar exam and she passed. But the male practitioners of the day lobbied against her admission to the bar and they did not do so. So she went to court and the judge came upon a great solution, he ordered another bar exam. Nothing happened. So lockwood said, well, i guess the only way to get admission would be to get a diploma. The District Of Columbia had what they called a diploma privilege, that anyone who got a Law School Degree would automatically be admitted. Ill try georgetown, they turned her down. She started at harvard where she was welcomed. In 1873 she got her diploma from the national law school. Perhaps because she was so abstinent in the letters with she wrote. She now was entitled to the bar of the District Of Columbia. That didnt help, because each court had its own admission requirements. She wanted to work in the court of claims, they turned her down, because their rules said we provide for the admission of men and she wasnt one. So she turned around and came back to them not long after that, applied again and they said no, because it is not that youre not a man, it is youre a married woman. And this is where this coverture comes into play. Under this doctrine, through marriage husband and wife become one, thats biblical, right . And the man covered for the woman and she had no control and she no legally existence, and how can somebody who doesnt legally exist be admitted to the bar. The District Of Columbia abolished the doctrine of coverture and in all references to the masculine gender it includes the feminine. Shes home free. No. Theres no expressed statute or rule including women. And she was turned down again. S s she went to congress and came up with a bill that said no women should be barred from practice in other court on account of sex or coverture. Lockwood said maybe i can get admitted to the Supreme Court and Everything Else will flow. She went to the Supreme Court and they turned her down. Said the court does not feel called upon to make a change. We cant adopt in he rule unless Congress Tells us it is all right. Thats how far they went to avoid the question. She goes back to congress, where her bill finally passed. It was signed by president hayes in 1879. About ten years after she started the whole business beginning her classes at columbian college. The next year Belva Lockwood was the first woman to argue before the Supreme Court. Even the Supreme Court, 14 years later, got a case called lockwood. She tried to get it in the commonwealth of virginia, she was turned down. And the Supreme Court of the United States turned down her complaint because of states rights. They took the position that it was not a privilege or immunity of the United States protected by the 14th amendment. Lockwood made a great start and there was still a long way to go for equality for women and i, too, attended a university that was totally lopsided with men, where all of those awful putdowns took place. Thank goodness were at a place now that i think most of that is forgotten. Not forgotten. Over, finished. Either forgotten but not gone, or gone but not forgotten. In any event, read this book, youll like it. Thank you. [applause] thank you so much. Okay. The floor is now open to all of you from the audience for your questions and comments. When you ask a question, will you be good enough to identify yourself and just wait for the microphone to be brought to you. Who would like to start us off . Susan, can you come over here . Linda, over here. Linda greenhouse. All of you have alluded to the fact that this fabulous history of this great person was really lost for decades, and whats your theory . How could she have sort of disappeared from public consciousness for such a long time . Well, a niece by marriage did try and write her story beginning actually in the period of world war i, she was an amateur that didnt succeed. Her papers were destroyed, they were sent by her grandson at the time of her death to the Salvation Army to become pulp. At that time it wasnt within the culture to save papers in general and i suspect the papers of women. Didnt have much money, probably nowhere to store. A very Large Library of legal papers. She had a peace library, she housed a branch of International Peace in her home for years. There was nothing like the radcliffe encouraging to keep papers themselves or pass them on. Even though we had the modern woman and the jazz woman and rosy the riveter. We somehow lost our bearings, i think in writing history of 19th century women. Perhaps because the archives werent there. One of the slides that i didnt show today but has interested me and addresses lindas question, as late as 1958, a u. S. Savings bond advertise menment was appeg in magazines using her picture, name and accomplishments. I found one that appeared in 1958 in holiday magazine. Im fascinated by that. So she was in somebody sight. During world war ii a merchant marine ship was named after her. I think until we had that both of women running bookstores, im thinking here of a very important women in terms of womens history. Madeline stern who started writing about american women who had been lost in the 1950s and then academic women like lerner and others that we just didnt have the writers with the resources and the knowledge to reclaim. So, you know, and i think we have been fortunate both that our universities have helped to train us, our newspapers have begun to cover women somewhat more systematically, even though sometimes there has to be a little booting and kicking, and our granting agencies, i mean, i didnt say this, and i certainly should. Both my university, the Wilson Center, which i did mention and the National Endowment for the humanity supported this project and i think it is one reason why men and women who write for the commercial press, who dont have the contracts couldnt do this book. I guess i would add one other thing, too, and it has to do with coverture in a sense. It is simply that the people writing history until the 70s revolution were predominately male, period. We tend to notice most the people we identify with most. Honestly, the thing thats so remarkable about that early period is how much of that was lost and for how long it was lost. But beginning in the 70s and going forward. One of the projects for the women who were finally getting the ph. D. S and finally becoming historians and women becoming lawyers in much larger numbers was to go back and dig out those stories and start to tell them. One of the people who does that most routinely is Ruth Ginsburg. Shes goes back and she finds out about somebody, she writes it up and the next time somebody asks her to speak, thats what she presents, no matter what else is going on, thats what she does. She talks about the pathmarkers, and she honors them, and she talks about them, and you and i both have joined in an enterprise of writing about these things because of our great interests in the half of the people that were left out of the major dominate history during the period when we grew up. A payback on wendys comment by saying there was also the issue of the publisher. Which is why i wanted to single out my publisher. Theres the sense in particular with with respect to the figures from the 19th and early 20th century. That they are not going to sell their books and i could list for you today a number of biographies that are sitting in desks, and ive read some of them, and they are very credible, and they just cant find publishers. So thats an additional frustration point. Jill, this is really great. Weve been waiting for belva for a little while now. Tell people who you are. Im kent hughes i run a program on science, technology and america and the global economy, which includes women. We owe jill a particular debt, because some of you may remember the west wing tv show and the first lady on the west wing was going to go off and give a lecture on Belva Lockwood, and we all know who she was thanks to jill. I was curious about the daughter. You mentioned the daughter and how she kept things going and apparently did some publicity or something of that nature, but did she aspire to be a lawyer, what did she do with her life . She did a year. Of sorts. It is very interesting and again, the lack of personal letters and diaries. Her daughter laura mcnull followed her mother from the age of 16, when she came back from sort of a little womens seminary and lived with her mother even after her marriage at this house on f street. Laura is a shadowy figure to me. I like her enormously, she seems to try and emerge with her own identity but doesnt. She writes a newspaper column thats quite sort of sassy. I think for regional markets the place i was able to trace it was lockport new york, the biggest down near where her mother was born. I have evidence that it perhaps appeared in some maryland newspapers. She writes that on and off for almost ten years. In some of these articles she becomes her mothers naughty alter ego. Shell talk about members of the congress is in rather biting ways. And she does attends law school with her mother. I found one letter or something that indicated that for a year, but then stopped. And becomes really, i think, an Office Manager and again sort of out of an apprenticeship because an attorney in the firm. Her mother was specific when she was interviewed by the great daredevil reporter nelly bly, belva said she practiced with her daughter laura. But laura, for those who have used washington d. C. Boyds directory. Give your name, your address and your profession and laura never claimed herself as an attorney. I cant explain that, i dont know if her mother wanted to make it a bit more grand and wanted to make her daughter more grand, but shes a very interesting figure and she takes ill when shes 44 and dies within a couple of weeks. So she dies in 1894, her husband lives for another seven years and then in 1901, 70 or 71yearold Belva Lockwood becomes the primary guardian of an 11yearold boy and it is the grandson who destroys her papers ultimately. Other questions . My name is sheridan harvey, i like to go to the Congressional Cemetery sometimes because i live on capitol hill, it is always a real challenge to find her grave. If you could get a better stone or something so we could find it, and why is she there . Thank you for all of your work at Wonderful Library of congress and the wonderful work youve done on women. I assume because thats where they put her, those who preceded, her daughter had a little girl inez who died when she was about four or five and had another child who probably died immediately or very shortly after birth. So those two children were there as well. And when my husband and i first learned that she was there and went looking for her, we were certainly very taken at how far away from anything it was. And one of the stones is actually in error, i believe it describes her daughters first child as an aunt, when it is actually a grand and ive never come across a person who was an aunt. So some of you may know that the Congressional Cemetery is having a 100th birthday celebration. Is patrick here . No. Around the weekend of may 19th. So some other authors and i will be there talking about some of the folks who are in the cemetery. Other questions . I want to pose one to the panelists, linda, thank you for raising the whole question of why is there not more womens history and i really would like the panel to address the question of what will happen to womens history in the near future, 19th century womens history, not the internet generation, whatever, because ive been thinking about your question since you posed it and remembering that when i started in academia before the 1970s revolution. First of all there werent any womens studies departments and as wendy quite correctly said, historians were men and they didnt think women were worth studying because they had not had a sufficient public face and what was history and biography then it was all the public sphere. I know one of the questions that jill has confronted constantly as she has put this book together and has written the book, cant you give us more of a human being here . Which is not something you would have heard about mens biographies. They wanted all of the great publishmen publishmen publishments. Papers were not kept and so on. I know that jill, in working on this biography, opened files, old case files of Belva Lockwoods that apparently had not been opened since they were first put into the National Archives. To what extent will we be able to reclaim these things . The history of women in the 19th century and perhaps the early 20th century, not to mention times much before that . Womens History Month being a particularly good time to ask this question. Maybe we could hear from people from the womens museum. Im interested in, for example, what the role of the internet will be in expanding our understanding of history in general and of course the history of women. I sometimes wonder if womens history is burdened by its language. I wonder if i use a vocabulary, lets say, talking about lockwood of her being part of a prodemocracy movement, whether that would shift interest in audience, particularly as the United States, for example, has been involved in attempting to get governments abroad interested and willing in letting women into their government. So, you know, i dont know whether were burdened by the way that we talk about it. I think the very practical problems that i spoke about before, where there are granting agencies or publishers will support this kind of work. It will have a lot to do with what happens. Whether youre a young professor looking for promotion, or whether youre a writer, who needs to pay her rent, ultimately it becomes very difficult to do work and we know that biography in general is simply not something you do quickly. Theres too much sleuthing. You either have hundreds of thousands of documents, which she encountered in her biography of justice brandwise or my looking under every rock or pebble for things. It is very timeconsuming. What im very seriously thinking about as i contemplate my next book, which will probably be a womens biography, is really whether to stay with these forms, or whether to look to the internet. Which of course involves having some Nice University that will let you put things up on their serve, could we hear a little bit, your vision . Yes, thank you. One of the things that characterizes your research, the need to access public records like the archives and the Court Records was what was kept, so it probably took too much energy to sort out the womens papers, thats why we had that come down to us. One of the things that thats the core organizational method is to reach out to womens organizations, many times women through volunteer societies, came together and organized themselves. Many of these organizations still have records of their activiti activities. You didnt mention it, but it is my understanding that Belva Lockwood was a founder of the womens Bar Association of the District Of Columbia, so that might serve as kind of a source for obtaining the records that the public gatekeepers of information would not have deemed very important. What do you think about the internet or electronic it certainly offers people to put a lot of information out there, but it is really not vetted. So one really doesnt know whether youre getting a good solid information. As a museum, one of the projects were about to unveil, we hope, is one that would enable women to go online and create a registry of their own accomplishments or somebody in their family, or acquaintance that they want to honor. We are taking account of the fact that that may be a very good way of collecting data on woman today that we might lose in the future. But, again, you were quite conscious and the academic would remind us that it is not being vetted. Nobody is going in and determining whether information that someone posts is in fact accurate information, certainly you would get a breath of experience that would be lacking without the meeting. The social movement is peer reviewed. We have the wikipedia problem, right . So we need a lot of you to go out there with taperecorders and things of that kinds and get us good information. Theres a question over here . Ann stone with the National Womens History Museum. A couple of things, one, is her house Still Standing . No. I figured so. And two, to dovetail with susans points about the internet. Youre right, obviously a lot of the internet is not vetted, but our site is, were very careful about what we put up. So certainly that should be a home that you could feel you could bring Additional Information for us to post. An it has always been part of the five Point Program of the museum. When we finally get congress to give us our site, which we are going to pay for, just give us the vacant building, we get our full endowment together, one of the goals to have money available for research. Knowing that much of womens history is still not known. So certainly in the future and anybody here that wants to write their check out to the National Womens History Museum endowment fund. Certainly our site should be a home that you feel you could bring information to. Thank you. Well oh, one more, im sorry. Go ahead. Hi, im Patrick Crowley from Congressional Cemetery. It is our bicentennial may 19th. Sorry. I would like to recommend ann royal who is a fascinating journalist. She married a wealthy man, when he died, his family took everything an left her pennyless and she took to writing to support her child. Do you have dates . Thats interesting because the person im thinking about writing is also a journalist and publisher, miriam leslie, it is interesting, although i think quite a different story, in the sense of more af Katherine Graham story. Maybe we need a book about women journalists of that moment, great idea, thank you. I would just like to throw out a couple pieces of trivia, first, theres a statue, a small one of Belva Lockwood, on just outside the elevator on the inside of the Clerks Office of the federal strict court that was presented by the womens Bar Association, and i forget the year. It might be nice if somebody could arrange to have it in the public area. The other thing is, just a couple of comments about women at the bar, generally, in the United States and im sure you all can correct me if i have the facts wrong here. But i think the first women lawyer in the United States actually came from england. Her name was Margaret Brent and i think she was in maryland in 1968 or Something Like that. And then it wasnt until 1869 or Something Like when Washington University in st. Louis was one of the first universities that admitted women to their law school and there were two who became members of the bar, one graduated, the other didnt. The State University of ohio, its predecessor. The midwest was at the forefront of some of this. The first woman admitted to the bar in the District Of Columbia was charlotte ray, who proceeded lockwood, who was the second one, i believe. Charlotte ray was a graduate of howard. Charlotte ray is an interesting case, because she signed her name c. Ray and they didnt really think. Carl . Well, it is not clear they knew she was a woman. Professor j. Clay smith insists they did know she was a woman. Well, hes the first one who said they might not. I guess hes progressed. Charlotte ray we should certainly write more about and cannot because theres so many few papers about her. She came from an illustrious African American family. Her father was described as the Jesse Jackson of his day. She was admitted to the d. C. Bar on the motion of her entire class and one could see the pages of the entries with the National Archives. We know she did make an effort early on to practice, and whether the combination effects and race defeated her, or whether she decided in the end, she didnt wish to practice law, we have no record on this, but she does apparently turn to teaching and at some point moves to new york, perhaps to brooklyn, and we lose a lot of her trail. She and her center write a little book, which i think is up in the schaumberg library about their dad, but thats all we know about her. In d. C. , a couple of women started whats now american University Law school, and they did it because they were tutoring young women who couldnt you know, get into law school, so they were going to start one of their own. And theres been some interesting work done on that by mary clark who is a professor at a. U. So all of these things that happened, just never made it to the surface until people started looking. Back to the computer thing, just one thought there, there are some the computer is a wonderful thing, theres some classes now that post the student papers on various topics, Barbara Babcock, for example, has a wonderful website and here at georgetown, a similar website. One thing to do is to Check University websites and see if some faculty member is producing that kind of material putting their student material up as well. Im glad you mentioned that, because Barbara Babcock has used her women in law seminar at Stanford Law School to help students as their terms project, explore a women connected in some way with law, and one of the things that i think is really superb about the project is not that we get at the end of this a 20 to 40 or 50 page paper from each of these students, but because they are at stanford and they have access to an absolutely superb library and library staff, these young men and women in professor babcocks past, have just churned up, is the only word for, incredible original documents. It has been extraordinary. Thank you for bringing that up. I think the bottom line is, there are a lot of stories out there still to be told. I would like very much to thank jill norgren for having brought one of those to life so we can benefit from that. Will you join us after this session in a little wine and cheese reception outside, at which youre more than welcome to mingle with all of us. Before you do that, please join me in thanking our three panelists. [applause] youre watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend on cspan 3. To join the conversation like us on facebook at cspan history. Up next, an interview from the 2014 organization of the historians annual meeting. This years conference was held in atlanta about 2,000 historians attended. Bart elmore is a professor at the university of alabama and the author of the book citizen