[applause] >> my name is clara shortridge fultz. and they call me the lady lawyer. as a child i wanted to be a lawyer. i went to my father and told him i want to be a lawyer and he said you would make a great lawyer. if you were a boy. so i buried that dream. but i never forgot. at 15, i met a handsome union soldier named jeremiah fultz and we eloped. we moved west to greener pasttures. first to oregon. then san jose, california. it was around 1876 and i had just had my fifth child. i was working at home as a dress maker and the sheriff came to the door and took my sewing machine for a debt that my husband owed. well, i knew this was illegal. i had been reading blackstone since i was 10. so i went to the court and i pled my own case and won. then, after that, mr. fultz decided he needed to go on to greener pasttures and he left so i realized that i was going to be the court of myself and my children. so i decided now is my chance to be a lawyer. why couldn't i be a lawyer? well, it is right there in the code. you have to be of good moral character. i'm that. you hav

clara shortridge fultz who was introducing her proposed law on lawyers for the poor here at the 1893 chicago worlds fair. >> thank you. the recommend disof many of the evils of -- remedies of many of the evils nice the appointment of a public defender. for every public prosecutor there should be a public defender chosen in the same way, paid out of the same funds as public prosecutor. police and sheriffs should be equally at hor command -- his or her command. it should meet the legitimate mat expenses. let the criminal court recognize on the basis of an exact and equal justice. let our courts be broad enough and generous enough to make the law a shield, not just a sword. and there will come to this date as a natural consequence all of those blessings which flow from the constitutional ob indications consciously kept and the government's duties sacredly performed. that was one of my proudest moments. over 36 states picked up the program but it was kind of troubling me. it took over 20 years for california to open up the public defender's office. first in los angeles in 1916 and then h