Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 3.djvu/628

is this: Mrs. Bradwell made application for a license to practice law. The court refused it on the ground of her being a married woman. She immediately brought a suit to test the legality of this decision. This interesting case was carried to the Supreme Court of the United States, which sustained the decision of the lower courts.^[1] Miss Hulett had reason to expect that since she was unmarried, this decision would not prejudice her case. Just on the threshold of her chosen profession, the rewards of youthful aspirations and earnest study apparently within her grasp, her dismay may be imagined when no response whatever was vouchsafed her petition. A fainter heart would have accepted the situation. To battle successfully with old prejudices, entrenched in the strongholds of the law, required not only marked ability; but also a courage which could not surrender. Miss Hulett took a country school for four months, and bravely went to work again. While teaching and "boarding round," she prepared a lecture, "Justice vs. The Supreme Court," in which she vigorously and eloquently stated her case. This lecture was delivered in Rockford, Freeport, and many other towns, enlisting everywhere sympathy and admiration in her behalf. After taking counsel with Lieutenant-Governor Early and other prominent members of the legislature, she drafted a bill, the provisions of which are:

Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois represented in the General Assembly, That no person shall be precluded or debarred from any occupation, profession, or employment (except military), on account of sex. Provided this act shall not be construed to affect the eligibility of any person to an elective office.

Nothing in this act shall be construed as requiring any female to work on streets or roads, or serve on juries, All laws inconsistent with this act are hereby repealed.

Friends obtained for this bill a very favorable introduction into the legislature, where it passed and received the Governor's signature. Passing up the steps to her home one rainy day, the telegram announcing that the bill had become a law was placed in her hands, and in referring to the incident, Miss Hulett said: "I shall never again know a moment of such supreme happiness." We can only add in this connection that after a most vigorous examination she stood at the head of a class of twenty-eight, all the other members being gentlemen. This time the Supreme Court made the amende honorable, courteously and cordially welcoming her into the ranks of the profession on her birthday, June 4, 1873, and at the age of nineteen Miss Hulett commenced the practice of law.

But Miss Hulett's career, so full of promise, was soon ended. The announcement of her untimely death, which occurred at San Diego, Cal., March 26, 1877, sent a pang to the hearts of those who knew her personally, and of thousands who regarded her with pride as a representative woman. A Chicago correspondent says:

The daily press of the city have already borne ample testimony to her professional talents and success and to the esteem and admiration accorded her by the bar of Chicago and by the general public; for her somewhat exceptional position as well as her ability had made her one of the marked characters of the city. Her short life, so successful and brilliant to the public eye, was not without its dark and thorny places. Unusual responsibilities of a domestic nature, opposition of various kinds and keen disappointments only nerved her to greater persistency, and her courage was upheld by the generous and abundant recognition which she received on every hand from leading members of the bar—a recognition for which she never failed, when opportunity offered, to express her sense of profound obligation—and she was accustomed to say that the law was the most liberal of the professions, Much as Miss Hulett had accomplished hitherto, it was felt that she had only crossed the threshold of a career of surpassing usefulness; all things seemed possible to one so richly endowed; her mental vigor seemed matched by a physique, the apparent type of blooming health; but the seeds of disease were inherited and only awaited a combination of circumstances to as-

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1. For Mrs. Bradwell's case see Vol. II., page 601.