Adams, Annette Abbott (12 March 1877–26 October 1956), lawyer and judge, was born in Prattville, California, the daughter of Hiram Brown Abbott, a storekeeper and justice of the peace, and Annette Frances Stubbs, a teacher. Adams earned a teaching credential from Chico State Normal School in 1897 and became schoolmistress of a country school until she entered the University of California-Berkeley in 1901. After receiving her bachelor’s degree in 1904, she taught high school in a rural county, serving as principal from 1907 to 1910. Encouraged by county trial judge John E. Raker, Adams entered Boalt Hall and supported herself while earning a J.D. The dean recommended her, the only woman in the class of 1912, to Western Pacific Railway for their house counsel. The company rejected her on the basis of gender, and she opened a private practice in Plumas County. She hired an instructor to learn how to change her voice from soprano to baritone to suit her masculine legal role. In 1906 she married Martin H. Adams but left him after one month. By 1914 she let others assume that she was a widow, although she and Adams never divorced. For thirty years she shared her home with her brother....
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Adams, Annette Abbott (1877-1956), lawyer and judge
Beverly B. Cook
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Alexander, Raymond Pace (13 October 1898–24 November 1974), lawyer, judge, and civil rights leader
David A. Canton
Alexander, Raymond Pace (13 October 1898–24 November 1974), lawyer, judge, and civil rights leader, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the third son of Hillard Boone and Virginia Pace Alexander, both slaves in Virginia who were freed in 1865 and migrated to Philadelphia in 1880. His background was working-class poor and he grew up in Philadelphia's seventh ward, an all-black community made famous by W. E. B. Du Bois's seminal study ...
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Alexander, Raymond Pace (13 October 1898–24 November 1974)
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Allen, Macon Bolling (1816-1894), lawyer and judge
Johnie D. Smith
Allen, Macon Bolling (1816–15 October 1894), lawyer and judge, was born A. Macon Bolling in Indiana; the names of his parents and exact date of birth are unknown. He changed his name to Macon Bolling Allen by act of the Massachusetts legislature on 26 January 1844. Details of Allen’s early life and education are sketchy and contradictory. His birth name is given in some sources as Malcolm B. Allen, and his birthplace as South Carolina. Evidence suggests that he lived in Maine and Massachusetts as a young man. Maine denied his initial application to the Maine bar because of allegations that he was not a state citizen, but he purportedly ran a Portland business before 1844. It is known that he read law in the Maine offices of two white abolitionist lawyers, Samuel E. Sewell and General Samuel Fessenden, and that the latter promoted his admission to the Maine bar in 1844....
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Alpern, Anne X. (1903-1981), attorney and judge
Robert L. Gale and Thaddeus Russell
Alpern, Anne X. (1903–02 February 1981), attorney and judge, was born in Russia, the daughter of Joseph Alpern and Mary Leaser. (Alpern would never explain what the X in her name stood for, and it was rumored that early in her life she added it simply for fun.) The family immigrated to western Pennsylvania when she was an infant. They settled in Scenery Hill, near Washington, Pennsylvania, where her father owned a general store. Alpern attended Nicholas Elementary School and Scenery Hill High School in the town of Washington. After the family moved to Pittsburgh, she enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh, from which she graduated in 1923 with a B.A. in education. Urged by her father to study law as a result of his admiration for ...
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Appleton, John (1804-1891), lawyer and judge
David M. Gold
Appleton, John (12 July 1804–07 February 1891), lawyer and judge, was born in New Ipswich, New Hampshire, the son of John Appleton and Elizabeth Peabody, farmers. After graduating from Bowdoin College in 1822, Appleton taught school briefly, then studied law in the offices of George F. Farley of Massachusetts and Nathan Dane Appleton, a relative and prominent attorney in Maine....
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Auchmuty, Robert (1687-1750), lawyer and Massachusetts vice admiralty judge
L. Kinvin Wroth
Auchmuty, Robert (1687–28 April 1750), lawyer and Massachusetts vice admiralty judge, was born in Newtown Flood, County Longford, Ireland, of a Scottish family of noble lineage. He was the son of Captain John Auchmuty, a member of Parliament, and Isabella Stirling.
Auchmuty received his legal training in London at the Middle Temple beginning in 1705 and was called to the bar in 1711. He emigrated to Massachusetts in 1716, apparently as a protégé of the new royal governor, ...
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Axtell, Samuel Beach (1819-1891), politician, lawyer, and jurist
Carole B. Larson
Axtell, Samuel Beach (14 October 1819–06 August 1891), politician, lawyer, and jurist, was born near Columbus, Ohio, the son of Samuel Loree Axtell and Nancy Sanders, farmers. Axtell graduated from Western Reserve College in Hudson, Ohio, and, after studying law, was admitted to the bar. He married Adaline S. Williams in 1840, and in 1843 they moved to Mount Clemens, Michigan, where Axtell established a law practice. The couple had at least one child. In 1851 Axtell migrated to California, where he invested in the booming mining industry and practiced law. Politically active as a Democrat, he helped organize Amador County east of Sacramento in 1854 and was elected as the new county’s first district attorney, a post to which he was reelected in 1856 and 1858....
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Baldwin, Simeon (1761-1851), lawyer and jurist
Lawrence B. Goodheart
Baldwin, Simeon (14 December 1761–26 May 1851), lawyer and jurist, was born in Norwich, Connecticut, the son of Ebenezer Baldwin, a blacksmith and farmer, and Bethiah Barker. His mother died when he was a few weeks old. After a period of study with his brother the Reverend Ebenezer Baldwin in Danbury and additional schooling in Coventry and Lebanon, Baldwin attended Yale University from 1777 to 1781, a period that was interrupted by the fighting of the revolutionary war. After graduation from Yale, he taught school in New Haven and in Albany, New York, in order to support himself while deciding on a career. He became a close friend of ...
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Barron, Jennie Loitman (1891-1969), suffragist, lawyer, and judge
Jilda M. Aliotta
Barron, Jennie Loitman (12 October 1891–28 March 1969), suffragist, lawyer, and judge, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the daughter of Morris Loitman, a needle trades worker and later an insurance agent, and Fannie Castelman, a needle trades worker. From her Russian immigrant parents, Jennie Loitman learned the value of education. She graduated from grammar school at age twelve and from Boston’s Girls High School at age fifteen. While in high school she worked as an after school “hand” in a shoe factory. She taught Americanization classes in the evening and sold copies of William Shakespeare’s works door to door to pay her way through Boston University, where she received three degrees, an A.B. in 1911, an LL.B. in 1913, and an LL.M. in 1914....
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Bartelme, Mary Margaret (1866-1954), lawyer and judge
Marilyn Elizabeth Perry
Bartelme, Mary Margaret (24 July 1866–25 July 1954), lawyer and judge, was born in Chicago, Illinois, the daughter of Balthazar Bartelme, a building contractor, and Jeanette Hoff. She attended local schools, graduating from high school in 1882. She then attended Cook County Normal School, graduating to teach in the Chicago school system for five years. Originally she had planned a career in medicine, but a woman doctor advised against it and told her to meet with attorney ...
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Beatty, William Henry (1838-1914), attorney and jurist
Gordon Morris Bakken
Beatty, William Henry (18 February 1838–04 August 1914), attorney and jurist, was born in Monclova, Ohio, the son of Henry Oscar Beatty, a lawyer, and Margaret Boone. Beatty grew up in Washington, Kentucky, but his father moved both his law practice and family to Sacramento, California, in 1853. In 1855 William returned to the East to attend a preparatory academy in Kentucky, perhaps Center College in Danville, where his uncle, Armand Beatty, was once president. William also studied at the University of Virginia for two years before returning in 1858 to his father’s office to read law. Admitted to the California bar in 1861, he associated with his father’s law firm....
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Biddle, Francis Beverley (1886-1968), lawyer, judge, and U.S. attorney general
Elizabeth Zoe Vicary
Biddle, Francis Beverley (09 May 1886–04 October 1968), lawyer, judge, and U.S. attorney general, was born in Paris, France, the son of Algernon Sydney Biddle, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and Frances Robinson. Biddle attended Haverford Academy (1895–1899); Groton Academy (1899–1905), where he excelled at boxing and gymnastics; and Harvard University, from which he graduated with a B.A. cum laude in 1909 and an LL.B. in 1911. His first job upon graduating was as personal secretary to Associate Justice ...
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Bond, Hugh Lennox (1828-1893), lawyer and judge
Donna Grear Parker
Bond, Hugh Lennox (16 December 1828–24 October 1893), lawyer and judge, was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of Thomas E. Bond, a doctor and clergyman, and Christina Birckhead. Having been sent to New York at a very young age, Bond enrolled at the University of the City of New York, where he received his undergraduate degree in 1848. Bond’s family was firmly rooted in Maryland, and he soon returned to Baltimore, where his father had established the city’s first medical school. Bond chose to pursue a career in law, and by 1851 he had been admitted to the state bar. Two years later he married Anne Griffith Penniman, also of Baltimore....
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Bradbury, Theophilus (1739-1803), lawyer, jurist, and congressman
William Pencak
Bradbury, Theophilus (13 November 1739–06 September 1803), lawyer, jurist, and congressman, was born in Newbury (now Newburyport), Massachusetts, the son of Theophilus Bradbury, a wealthy sea captain, and Ann Woodman. Graduated from Harvard College in 1757, he moved to Falmouth (now in Maine but a part of Massachusetts until 1820), where he briefly taught school. When courts were organized in Cumberland and Lincoln counties in 1761, Bradbury was the first man admitted to the bar. Bradbury’s knowledge of the law and effective, dignified courtroom manner led to his appointment as collector of the excise on liquor, tea, coffee, and china in Maine for the province. In 1762 he married Sarah Jones; they had seven children....
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Buchanan, John Alexander (1843-1921), lawyer and judge
Peter Wallenstein
Buchanan, John Alexander (07 October 1843–02 September 1921), lawyer and judge, was born near the village of Groseclose in Smyth County, Virginia, the son of James Augustus Buchanan and Mary Glenn Thomas, farmers. He attended local schools and was still enrolled at the Marion Male Academy when, at the age of seventeen, he joined the Confederate army. He enlisted in July 1861 as a private in the Smyth County Blues, which became Company D of the Fourth Virginia Infantry, part of the Stonewall Brigade. Though home on sick leave for several months beginning in October 1861 and again beginning in September 1862 (he was certified as suffering from asthma), he saw action in various capacities before being wounded and captured at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in July 1863. He was sent successively to Fort McHenry, Fort Delaware, and then Point Lookout, all in Maryland, where he remained from September 1863 until February 1865, when he was released in a prisoner exchange....
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Buck, Carrick Hume (1900-1959), lawyer
Terri Ann M. K. Motosue
Buck, Carrick Hume (05 July 1900–18 October 1959), lawyer, was born in Las Vegas, New Mexico, the daughter of Arthur Perry Buck, a sheep and cattle rancher, and Henrietta Hume Pettijohn, a lawyer. Buck decided on a legal career after watching defense lawyer Earl Rogers during a trial. Buck’s mother may have also influenced her decision to pursue law. Henrietta Hume Buck is distinguished as the first woman admitted to the New Mexico bar. In 1920 Carrick Buck completed her legal education at the University of Southern California, the same institution from which she had received her undergraduate degree. At age twenty-one Buck began her career as the youngest woman admitted to the California bar, one year after women received the right to vote....
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Cady, Daniel (1773-1859), lawyer and judge
Judith Wellman
Cady, Daniel (29 April 1773–31 October 1859), lawyer and judge, was born in Chatham (now Canaan), New York, the son of Eleazer Cady and Tryphena Beebe, farmers. All his life, in work, family, religion, and personal character, Cady reflected the conservative tradition of his Connecticut-born parents. Several sources suggest that as a young man Cady worked as a shoemaker. His oldest daughter, Tryphena Cady Bayard, discounted this story, however, as the fabrication of Cady’s political opponents during his race for Congress in 1814. A story that he early lost the sight in one eye may also be apocryphal. When he was about sixteen years old he became a teacher to support himself while he studied law. He completed his legal studies in Troy, New York, with John Woodworth, who later became an attorney general and justice of the supreme court in New York, and was admitted to the bar in 1795. He practiced in Florida, New York, for a brief period before he moved to Johnstown, New York, the county seat of Montgomery County, about 1799. Except for 1843–1847, when he resided in Albany, Cady remained in Johnstown for the rest of his life. In 1801 he married Margaret Chinn Livingston, the daughter of Elizabeth Simpson and revolutionary war colonel ...
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Casey, Joseph (1814-1879), lawyer and jurist
Francis Helminski
Casey, Joseph (17 December 1814–10 February 1879), lawyer and jurist, was born in Ringgold’s Manor, Washington County, Maryland, the son of Joseph Casey, an educator and native of Ireland, and Rebecca McLaughlin of Pennsylvania. Casey’s family separated after experiencing what were probably financial difficulties when he was a young child. In 1819 Casey was sent to live with a blacksmith’s family in Newville, Pennsylvania, where his family had moved. He remained there until he was fourteen years old, when he returned to his father’s house in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania. Casey’s formal education was sparse, but he showed intelligence and became an enthusiastic reader, memorizing much of the Psalms and New Testament. He was a lifelong Presbyterian, but “free from all sectarian bigotry or bias” ( ...
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Chew, Benjamin (29 November 1722–20 January 1810), lawyer and judge
L. Kinvin Wroth
Chew, Benjamin (29 November 1722–20 January 1810), lawyer and judge, was born at West River, Anne Arundel County, Maryland, the son of Samuel Chew, a physician who became chief justice of the lower counties of Pennsylvania (present-day Delaware), and Mary Galloway. In 1732 increasing pressure for religious conformity in once-tolerant Maryland led Chew’s father, a Quaker, to seek the more congenial atmosphere of Philadelphia. There Chew received a classical education and from 1736 or 1737 to 1741 studied law under ...
