Today in Labor History February 15, 1879: President Rutherford Hayes signed a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court. That same year, Belva Lockwood, a women’s rights and suffrage activist, became the first woman to argue a case before the Supreme Court.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #feminism #SCOTUS #WomensRights #WomensSuffrage #BelvaLockwood

"In the years just after the Civil War, as women began joining the legal profession, only a handful of spirited applicants succeeded in breaking through the cultural barriers that made it difficult to train for the law or win bar membership [...] The hostility toward women with professional aspirations was so great that only the very brave pushed ahead."
#history #BelvaLockwood #lawyer #law #womensrights #minorityrights
https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2005/spring/belva-lockwood-1