Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1895-07-24
JERSEYS WOMAN LAWYER.
Miss Mary PhiIbrook Admitted to the Lar
After Long Fight.

After fight lasting IS months Miss
Mary Philbrook of 154 Magnolia av-
enue, Jersey City, has succeeded in get
ting herself admitted to the bar OF New
Jersey. Miss Philbrook is the first won-
an to take the examination in that state,
and before she could make even so much
progress she had to fight the supreme
court through the legislature and prac-
tically force the justices of that court to
grant the required permission. The ex-
animation, though rigid, did not bother
the young woman, and she passed with
high honors and today is the only wom-
an lawyer in the state Of New Jersey.
Miss Philbrook is the daughter of q
lawyer and has a brother who is law
yer. She has been interested in all
things pertaining to the law for years,
and with the idea of studying for amuse-
ment rather than for profit she entered
the Office Of Corporation Attorney James
F. Minturn of Hoboken several years
ago In addition to her regular work
she read lawbooks and studied compl-
Gated cases that came into the Office I'M
til she became so thoroughly conversant
with law that on the advice of her en-
ployers she decided to make application
to the supreme court for admission to
the bar.
She made the application at Trenton
in February, 1894, and Justice Depew
promptly refused to allow her to take
the examination on the ground that
there was no law in the state providing
for the admission of women. Nothing
daunted, Miss Philbrook started in sim
gle handed to fight the supreme court. If
there was no law for the admission of
women, she argued, there should be one,
and she drew up bill herself covering
! the point, which bill she succeeded in
having presented to the legislature.
She spent almost all her time in Tren
ton working for her bill, and when the
bill was turned over to legislative
committee she obtained permission to
appear before the commission and argue
in it's favor. She did go before the COM
mittee and made speech the result Of
which was that the bill went through,
and then Miss Philbrook filed her APP
plication once more, and this time she
was informed that she might take the
examination.
The young woman began the exami-
nation on Tuesday and finished it on
Wednesday afternoon. Thursday morn
ing it was announced that she had sue
cessfully passed both the oral and writ
ten examinations, and shortly after noon
she was sworn in.
Miss Philbrook is q tall, slim young
woman, with black hair and sparkling
black eyes. She is modest, and when a
reporter saw her yesterday afternoon she
was not at all eager to talk about her
case.
II understand that am the first wo-
man lawyer in the state of New Jersey, "
she said, "and I am very proud Of it;
but, above all things, I desire to avoid
publicity. I did not go into the thing
with the idea Of obtaining notoriety,
but simply because I believed that il
was my due, having studied law con-
,, scientiously for several years. found
plenty Of obstacles in the way, but hav
ing once started to get there I realized
' that it would never do to give up, ant
: then, again, thought it would be goot
I practice removing these obstacles, ant
I went at it in the best way knew how
: Fortunately was successful.
!. 81 have not laid out any plans as yet
though I will remain in the office where
have been for some time. There viii
do all the legal work am called upol
). to do by my employers and shall at thu
same time handle as much business fol
,. myself as I can get. I am averse to do
= ing court work and will confine mysel
,. as much as possible to Office practice. /
). it becomes necessary at any time, how
,. ever, for me to enter the courts, shall
:. not hesitate to do so. For the present
). though, shall probably go on in tn
same way that have for the past year
!. One thing about my victory makes m
= happier than anything else, and that i
). that it has been my lot to open up tn
b field Of law to women in the state O
= New Jersey. That regard as my great
est triumph.
Miss Philbrook takes an interest il
n all things pertaining to women and is
member Of the State Suffrage associa
D. ton, which is now fighting for schoo
suffrage in New Jersey. Her connectio
q. with woman's affairs, however, she vii
not discuss, as she says she has no dc
sire to be prominent in woman's right
movements New York Sun.