Features FIRST 100 YEARS FIRST 100 YEARS

Edward O’Sullivan, the Minister admission as barristers. In 1902, Ada and by the leading politicians of the day, for Lands, who was sympathetic to the Evans had qualified in law from the including men such as Bernard Wise and suffrage cause, wrote to Scott asking Law School of the University of Sydney. Charles Wade. Stella Miles Franklin said what women wanted in the way of Despite being properly qualified, she Scott had “a genius for making delight of BY THE SKIN OF remedial legislation. She scrawled on the was not admitted to practise because it association”. back of his letter a staccato manifesto: was thought that a woman was not a Famously, Scott considered life too “[O]wn their own children, family “person” for the purposes of the LPA. short to waste it in the service of one THEIR TEETH maintenance, Infants’ Protection Bill, Between February 1904 and 1917, man. She used her comparative wealth Equal Pay for equal work, offices of dignity Evans wrote to successive Attorneys- and connections to promote causes that JUSTICE VIRGINIA BELL AC, who was sworn and power in the State, juries, judges, General seeking change in the law. She was would expand women’s material options Police matrons, economic independence for assisted by feminists who had been active beyond either marriage or prostitution. in as a Supreme Court judge in 1999 and as a married women.” in the Womanhood Suffrage League and One gesture in this direction was her gift Justice of the High Court of Australia in 2009, In 1912, Scott delivered a speech to who after gaining the franchise had made in 1921 of 50 pounds to the University of the National Council of Women titled the removal of the disqualification high Sydney as a prize for women law students. explains the dicey history leading to the passing “Laws Women Need”. [Among many on their list of needed reforms. These were Despite her circumstances of of the Women’s Legal Status Act in 1918. things] she called for women to be remarkable women. advantage, clear-eyed Scott had eligible for appointment as magistrates, In her day, Scott was one of Sydney’s sympathy for women whose life justices of the peace, jurors, judges, and most well connected and well known experience was far from privileged. In members of parliament and councils. women. For many years she conducted 1903, she campaigned on behalf of Ethel IN 1902, THE NEWLY FEDERATED COMMONWEALTH was fêted as something of a celebrity a salon from her home in Jersey Road, Herringe, a young woman convicted of Australia led the world by its provision for women to vote throughout her trip to the US. Before An important centenary Woollahra, on Friday afternoons. It was of the manslaughter of her former and to stand for election to the Commonwealth Parliament leaving, she had an audience in the Oval This year marks the centenary of the attended by notable artists and writers employer who had seduced her and on a universal and equal basis with men. That year, Vida Office with President Theodore Roosevelt enactment of the Women’s Legal refused to marry her after learning of Goldstein, an Australian suffragist, was the Australian and who told her that Australia’s experiment in Status Act 1918 (NSW) which largely her pregnancy. Herringe gave birth to New Zealand delegate to the International Women’s Suffrage equality was “a great object lesson”. addressed the last of Scott’s agenda twins in Darlinghurst jail. They were Conference in Washington. The Womanhood Within a few years, Goldstein, like items. It provided that a person shall immediately taken from her. Carrie Catt, the President of the American Suffrage League, Suffrage League fellow pioneering feminist Rose Scott, had not by reason of sex be deemed to be Scott viewed this as barbarous with politicians with the disarming frankness of the Americans, told Goldstein Sir William Lyne come to see the vote as, if not a hollow under any disability or subject to any cruelty. She took up Herringe’s cause, that Americans associated Australia with being “the abode of and Sir John See victory, certainly a victory that was far disqualification from being elected pressing Bernard Wise unsuccessfully strange beasts and barbarians”. Catt thought it remarkable that after women won from securing women equality with men. to act as a member of the Legislative for her release from custody. She argued the right to vote this exotic land should have supplied a delegate who was so up in NSW via the Their economic dependence, exclusion Assembly, or as an elected member of that, just as the law acknowledged to date and fully cognisant of the rights of her sex. Such was Female Suffrage from public office and subjugation by a local council, or to be appointed a provocation in the case of a man killing the novelty of Australia’s treatment of women that Goldstein Act, passed in 1902. a double-standard in matters of sexual judge or magistrate, or to be admitted his wife or her lover when caught in morality put women well behind the to practice as a barrister or solicitor. flagrante, there should be recognition of eight ball. The laws that perpetuated What was the source of the the provocation experienced by women this inequality were largely those disqualification of women from being at the hands of men in mitigation of the enacted by State legislatures and, while elected to parliament or entering the severity of the criminal law. women could stand for election to the legal profession? In the case of election Below, the charge sheet for Ethel Herringe, In Scott’s view, Herringe was a a woman convicted of manslaughter of her Commonwealth Parliament, they were to the Assembly, the answer was clear. employer who refused to marry her once he political prisoner: a woman who had ineligible to be returned to either house TheWomen’s Franchise Act 1902 (NSW) knew she was pregnant with twins. sought to retrieve her honour in a of the NSW Parliament. gave women the right to vote, and by s 4 Above, Rose Scott who took on Herringe’s case situation in which the law had failed to once her babies were taken from her. In 1908, the NSW Government provided that nothing in that Act should Sources: ancestry.com.au, State Library NSW provide her with effective redress. under Premier Charles Wade introduced be taken to “enable or qualify a woman Wise may have frequented Scott’s the Contagious Diseases Bill. If enacted, to be nominated as a candidate at any salon but the gulf between them was its practical operation would have election or to be elected as a member” unbridgeable. As Attorney-General, allowed the indefinite incarceration of of the Legislative Assembly. Wise had opposed the Crimes (Girls’ prostitutes were arrested for soliciting The position was a little more Protection) Bill which sought to raise the and found to have a venereal disease. nuanced under the Legal Practitioners age of consent for girls from 14 years. Goldstein protested, what difference Act 1898 (NSW) (“the LPA”), which Scott was committed to this measure, had women’s suffrage achieved if the established a board comprising the having seen the exploitation of girls who government felt safe to introduce a judges of the Supreme Court, the measure like it? Attorney-General and two barristers to approve “properly qualified persons” for

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BEFORE THEIR TIME: women pioneers of law 1921 1924 1955 1972 1979 1981 2008 2013 2015 ADA EVANS:FIRST WOMAN TO MARIE BYLES: FIRST WOMAN ELIZABETH EVATT: FIRST ANN PLOTKE: FIRST WOMAN MAHLA PEARLMAN: FIRST MARY GAUDRON: FIRST JULIE WARD: FIRST WOMAN MARGARET BEAZLEY: GABRIELLE UPTON GRADUATE WITH A BACHELOR TO PRACTISE AS A SOLICITOR WOMAN TO RECEIVE THE ELECTED TO THE LAW WOMAN APPOINTED TO WOMAN APPOINTED SOLICITOR- APPOINTED DIRECTLY TO THE FIRST WOMAN PRESIDENT FIRST WOMAN NSW OF LAWS IN 1901 AND FIRST TO IN NSW AND FIRST WOMAN TO UNIVERSITY MEDAL IN LAW SOCIETY COUNCIL SOLICITORS ADMISSION BOARD, GENERAL IN AUSTRALIA AND FIRST SUPREME COURT OF THE NSW COURT ATTORNEY-GENERAL BE ADMITTED TO THE NSW BAR ATTEND AN INCORPORATED FROM SYDNEY UNIVERSITY FIRST WOMAN PRESIDENT OF WOMAN APPOINTED TO THE OF APPEAL LAW INSTITUTE AGM THE LAW SOCIETY IN 1981 HIGH COURT IN 1987 were too young to have much, if any, October 1918. In speaking for the Bill, the electorate would not return women maiden speech delivered on 26 August take women away from their household published on the Silver Jubilee of understanding of sexual intercourse or Attorney-General David Hall suggested to parliament and the legal profession 1925 gives the measure of the woman. She responsibilities; and, perhaps more the Feminist Club. She bemoaned its consequences. Wise, for his part, was that NSW was lagging behind the other would not be overwhelmed by them. pointed out to her fellow members that: troubling, it would empower them to sit that 20 years had passed and yet few concerned with the risk of blackmail States in permitting women to enter the Unpalatable as this view may have been, “Every turn of the political wheel in judgment on men. women were establishing themselves in by promiscuous, precocious harlots. legal profession; he recalled one woman there was an essential truth to it. The touches [women]. As women tax payers While the Women’s Legal Status Act professional and public life. While one Among the arguments against the who had passed her examination for social and economic pressures which and workers, they are subject to the laws permitted women to be appointed as sympathises with her frustration, it is Bill was the view that in sub-tropical admission to the Bar at the same time as largely kept women in the home were you make, the inadequate wages you judges, it can hardly be thought that fair to observe that before the changes in Australian conditions, girls ripened into he had. He graciously acknowledged that not about to give way in the face of a impose, the taxes you collect, the injustices anyone who supported it entertained the society associated with the 60s and early womanhood earlier than in other climes. her pass was better than his, and he noted change to their status at law. you perpetuate, the anomalies you tolerate, notion that a woman would be appointed 70s, among which effective birth control The Women’s Progressive Association that she had occasionally communicated Few women stood for Parliament and they suffer under the many vital and as a judge. And they were right. No must surely rank high, the forces limiting under the leadership of Annie Golding with his department, inquiring when she and fewer were returned. The first important matters you forget to handle”. woman was appointed as a judge in NSW the practical achievement of equality in the was associated with the Labor party and would be permitted to practise for the woman elected to the NSW Legislative As the banners currently adorning until the appointment of Jane Mathews to public sphere were powerful. in 1916 the Labor Party Conference profession for which she had qualified Assembly was Millicent Preston-Stanley. Parliament House in celebration of the the District Court in 1980. One gets a sense of some of those was persuaded to pass a motion urging herself 17 or 18 years earlier. Preston-Stanley was one of the new centenary of the Women’s Legal Status The incapacity of women to serve as forces in the way women lawyers were the passing of legislation to redress The Bill encountered an obstacle generation of feminists. In 1919, she Act attest, women parliamentarians jurors remained until the enactment of portrayed in the media. Following women’s legal status. On 18 August in the Legislative Council. It would became the President of the Feminist were thin on the ground in the years the Jury (Amendment) Act 1947 (NSW), Ada’s Evans’ admission to the Bar she 1916, Attorney-General David Hall have removed the disqualification Club. Preston-Stanley was a powerful that followed its enactment. Things were which made provision for women to was reported to have been pursued by introduced the Women’s Legal Status on women sitting in the Legislative advocate for women particularly on not much brighter for women in the legal serve on juries if they took the trouble to “a flight of photographers and cinema- Bill to the Legislative Assembly. It was Council. Any measure to alter the issues of infant and maternal mortality profession. Ada Evans commenced her apply to be included on the jury roll. In men”. Much was made in the press of not plain sailing. On its second reading, Constitution of the Legislative Council and the guardianship of children. One apprenticeship as a student-at-law in May moving the Bill, the Attorney-General her attire and her “low and sweet” voice. Thomas Waddell successfully raised a had to originate in that chamber. The stimulus to her activism may have been 1919. On 12 May 1921, 19 years after stated that it was not his intention to When Sybil Morrison, the first practising point of order and the bill was ruled out. Bill as drafted was assessed to be an her mother’s struggle to fend for herself graduating in law, she was admitted as the compel women to serve on juries, noting barrister at the NSW Bar, turned up at Attorney-General Hall introduced invasion of the privileges of the Council and raise her children after Preston- first female barrister in NSW. it would be foolish to insist that the the Water Police Court briefed by female a fresh Bill on 13 September 1916. and was returned to the Legislative Stanley’s father deserted the family. wives of certain Honourable Members solicitor, Chris Jollie-Smith, the press Waddell excelled himself in his opposition Assembly. There it was amended to Preston-Stanley was elected as a A change to jury service and other public women who had so reassured the public that they were both on this occasion. He said he would confine its operation to the removal of member of the Nationalist Party to the There was one notable omission from many public duties to attend to should “entirely feminine”. have no objection to the Bill if the the disqualification on the election of Legislative Assembly in May 1925. Her the disqualifications which the Women’s be required to do so. In practice, the The notion that as a woman lawyer constituencies were divided into two and women to the Assembly. On its Legal Status Act removed and that amendment had little effect because of you were at risk of losing your femininity women elected their own representatives return to the Legislative Council, concerned jury service. This was not an the lack of suitable accommodation for – if you did not take steps to keep a pretty and men elected theirs. it received a warmer reception. accidental omission. women jurors. A further amendment steady grip on it – still had currency when When he settled down, Mr Waddell Albeit Dr Nash, one of the When the first Bill was introduced in 1968 provided for the inclusion of I started my law studies at the University asked how any women could “have as few members who had been in in 1916, the Attorney-General was women in the jury rolls for districts of Queensland in 1969. I was one of two much knowledge as a man of the mining Parliament, when the Women’s asked whether it was proposed to permit where facilities permitted. women in my year and the girls in the laws, the land laws, and the many other Franchise Act 1902 (NSW) was women to act as jurors, to which he firmly A woman unlike a man was able to higher years were kind enough to hold a matters with which parliamentary enacted, stated he looked upon responded “no”. On 21 August 1918, when obtain exemption from jury service on function for us at which, over glasses of representatives have to deal”? The Bill had the measure as a joke. he met yet another delegation of women notice to the officer responsible for the Sparkling Blue Porphyry Pearl, we were its supporters with more than one member An undercurrent in the activists, the Attorney-General expressed rolls. I had graduated in law before a given tips on how we could maintain our pointing to women’s work in support of the parliamentary debates, albeit his sympathy with many of their demands, fundamental obligation of citizenship, femininity despite being law students. war effort as giving the lie to the suggestion generally expressed with more but that did not extend to women serving jury service, applied in NSW equally to If time permitted I would share them that they were not equipped to take their circumspection than by Nash, on juries. He saw no indication that women and men. with you. place in parliament. was the view that the enactment women would wish to be jurors. In 1939, NSW barrister, Nerida The Womanhood Suffrage League of NSW This is an edited extract from Justice Virginia A second Women’s Legal Status Bill of the Women’s Legal Status Bill by Freeman Bros Studio, 1892. The prospect of women jurors was Cohen, described the impact of the Bell’s address at the Francis Forbes Lecture was introduced to the Parliament in would not disrupt the apple cart; Source: State Library of NSW threatening on two fronts: it would Women’s Legal Status Act in a paper on 30 May in Sydney.

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