A Lady Has the Floor: Belva Lockwood Speaks Out for Women's Rights by Kate Hannigan (review)

For an ambitious girl born in 1830 New York state, every milestone passed meant another struggle overcome. A college degree? A battle to be admitted into a men's educational system. A law degree? It took a letter to President Grant to claim the document she had already earned. The right to argue a case in any court of law? That took a five-year crusade. A run for the presidency? Good luck with that, when the all-male electorate thinks it's a hoot to dress up like women to mock your campaign. Nonetheless, Belva Ann Bennett Lockwood managed to rack up a string of women's "firsts" by storming the gates during a period in which Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony could seem somewhat passive in comparison. Not all Lockwood's accomplishments are made clear for young listeners, though, who would benefit from fuller explanation of why Lockwood could practice law but not argue before the Supreme Court, and who would also be interested in how her rising career worked in with the marriages noted in the concluding timeline. Jay eschews both caricature and portraiture in the art, quoting instead a folk-art style with elongated figures, muted tones, and a crazed finish to convey a sense of antiquity. A bibliography, sources notes, and a late nineteenth-century photograph of Lockwood are appended.