Leila Josephine Robinson, 1850-1891

Lelia Josephine Robinson, lawyer and author, was born in Boston on July 25, 1850, educated in the Boston public schools, and graduated from Boston University Law School in June 1881. After an unsuccessful application to the Massachusetts Bar to practice law, LJR opened an independent practice on the basis of her law school diploma. She appeared before the state legislature in support of a law to admit women to the bar on the same terms as men. The law was passed in 1882 and she received a license to practice as a member of the Suffolk County bar. In 1884, LJR moved to Seattle and practiced law there for several years before returning to Boston.

LJR was a member of the Equity Club (EC), an organization founded in the late 1880s by students attending the University of Michigan Law School, Ann Arbor, to facilitate communication among women law students and women lawyers. LJR wrote at least three books: Law Made Easy, Law of Husband and Wife, and Wills and Inheritances. She married a man named Sawtelle in 1890 and died in 1891.