Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 2.djvu/641

Rh Rights Bill," for your petitioner to be refused a license to practice law, upon the sole ground of her "married condition."

VIII. And your petitioner further claims, that having been born in the State of Vermont, and having been a citizen of the State last named, and of the United States, and having removed to the State of Illinois, where she has resided for many years, that under the second section of the IV. Article of the Constitution of the United States, which is in these words, "The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States," she has guaranteed to her the privileges and immunities which every other citizen of the State of Illinois has, among which may be named the protection of the Government, the right to the enjoyment of life and liberty, to acquire and possess property, to reside in the State, to carry on trade, and the right to follow any professional pursuit under the laws of the State, which must work equally upon all the citizens of the State, and that under this section of the Constitution she has a right to receive a license to practice law upon the same terms and conditions as the most favored citizen of the State of Illinois.

(People vs. Washington, 36 California R., 662. Corfield vs. Coryell, 4 Washington C. R., 381.)

On last week the court filed an opinion denying the application, for a very carefully prepared copy of which we are indebted to Mr. Freeman:

[In the matter of the application of Mrs. Myra Bradwell for a license to practice as an Attorney-at-Law.] .—At the last term of the court Mrs. Myra Bradwell applied for a license as an attorney-at-law, presenting the ordinary certificates of character and qualifications. The license was refused, and it was stated as a sufficient reason, that under the decisions of this court the applicant, as a married woman, would be bound neither by her express contracts, nor by those implied contracts which it is the policy of the law to create between attorney and client. Since the announcement of our decision, the applicant has filed a printed argument in which her right to a license is earnestly and ably maintained. Of the ample qualifications of the applicant we have no doubt, and we put our decision in writing in order that she or other persons interested may bring the question before the next Legislature.

The applicant, in her printed argument, combats the decision of the court in the case of Carpenter vs. Mitchell, June term, 1869, in which we held a married woman was not bound by contracts having no relation to her own property. We are not inclined to go over again the grounds of that decision. It was the result of a good deal of deliberation and discussion in our council chamber, and the confidence of the present members of this court in its correctness can not easily be shaken. We are in accord with all the courts in this country which have had occasion to pass upon a similar question, the Supreme Court of Wisconsin in Conway vs. Smith, 13 Wis., 125, differing from us only on the minor point as to whether, in regard to contracts concerning the separate property of married women, the law side of the court would take jurisdiction.