WOMEN LAWYERS OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE ON THE EVE AND DURING THE FIRST WORLD WAR

Abstract

Higher legal education became available to Russian women at the beginning of the 20th century. There were many educational institutions in the country where women were allowed to receive such an education, at the same time, they had the opportunity to graduate from universities with degrees in law. The number of women lawyers increased dramatically, but they were barred from entering the legal profession. Attempts by some to become attorneys were unsuccessful, and the tsarist legislator did not allow women’s advocacy. Restrictions on employment in justice set up lawyers to fight for the right to work there on equal terms with men, and this struggle took on organized forms. The feminist Society of St. Petersburg Women Lawyers, founded in 1913, aimed to provide graduates of law faculties with full access to practical law, for which the issue of employment of female lawyers was specially studied, educational and propaganda activities were carried out. The conditions of the First World War served as a trigger for what was happening to a large extent. They accelerated the feminization of labor and the legal field was no exception. Due to mobilization, the legal profession had a loss in the male workforce, which hundreds of Russian women with legal qualifications were ready to make up. Not having the right to realized themselves in the courts, they first of all became workers of consultations, where they applied their knowledge and abilities in work related to the lawyer. For women lawyers of the Russian Empire, access to the legal profession was opened only after its fall, when the Provisional Government allowed women’s advocacy.