Ada Harriet Miser Kepley - Part II
May 7, 2010
Although she was the first woman to graduate from &#&law school&#& in the United States, she wasn't admitted to the bar because of her sex, as a woman, she was denied a license to practice law and therefore she never officially became a lawyer following Illinois and United States Supreme Court decisions upholding an Illinois statute. In 1869 those cases were brought by Myra Bradwell first to the Illinois Supreme Court, and on appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1873. Her application was denied for a license to practice law by women because textually: "That God designed the sexes to occupy different spheres of action, and that it belonged to men to make, apply, and execute the laws, was regarded as an almost axiomatic truth." And "In view of these facts, we are certainly warranted in saying that when the legislature gave to this court the power of granting licenses to practice law, it was with not the slightest expectation that this privilege be extended to women." So, Ada Kepley was unable to gain admission to the practice of law in Illinois. Ada Harriet Miser Kepley was an energetic woman. Her true legacy was not in the legal field. Ada's main effort had been diverted to reform issues: women's suffrage, equal rights for women and temperance. Ada didn't have children, but her temperance crusade centered around her establishment of the Band of Hope, a youth-oriented temperance group, which focused on educating the local children to whom she taught about the dangers of alcohol. Temperance work was Kepley's passion. She held office in the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) at the local, county, state, and national levels and she performed daring actions in the name of their cause, and braved both legal restraint and physical assault. Equally interested in women's suffrage, Kepley was the Prohibition Party candidate for Illinois State Attorney General in 1881. Although she had no chance of winning, she used her candidacy to promote not only temperance, but women's right to vote and hold public office. Kepley participated in many women's organizations, being notably the Equity Club, a correspondence network which between 1886 and 1890 supported women pioneering in the legal profession. Due to bad economical situations after her husband's death in 1906 life was very difficult for her. With no family of her own, as she was too proud to accept charity from friends, her last years were spent living in poverty in Effingham, where she was regarded as an eccentric figure. But it is better to remember she was a brave woman, a fighter. She wrote in her autobiography, "I like to be at the front of great movements as far as possible." |