List of first women lawyers and judges in Mississippi

This is a list of the first women lawyer(s) and judge(s) in Mississippi. It includes the year in which the women were admitted to practice law (in parentheses). Also included are women who achieved other distinctions such becoming the first in their state to graduate from law school or become a political figure

Firsts in state history

Lawyers

First female: Susie Blue Buchanan (1918)
First African American female: Marian Wright Edelman (1963)
First known Hispanic American female: Doris Bobadilla (1991)

State judges

First female: Zelma Wells Price (1929) in 1955
First African American female: Constance Slaughter-Harvey (1970) in 1976
First female (Mississippi Supreme Court): Lenore L. Prather (1955) in 1982
First female (Mississippi Court of Appeals): Mary Libby Payne in 1995
First female (Chief Justice; Mississippi Supreme Court): Lenore L. Prather (1955) in 1998
First African American female (Mississippi Court of Appeals): Ermea Russell in 2011
First female (Chief Judge; Mississippi Court of Appeals): Donna Barnes in 2019
First African American (female) (Twenty-Second Circuit Court District): Tomika Harris-Irving in 2019

Federal judges

First African American (female) (Magistrate Judge; U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi): Linda Anderson in 2006
First female (U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi): Sharion Aycock (1980) in 2007
First female (bankruptcy court): Katharine Malley Samson in 2010
First African American female (U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi): Debra M. Brown (1997) in 2013

Attorney General of Mississippi

First female: Lynn Fitch in 2020

Assistant Attorney General

First female: Evelyn Gandy (1947) in 1959

United States Attorney

First female: Felicia C. Adams in 2011

Assistant United States Attorney

First female: Euple Dozier in 1955

District Attorney

First African American female: E. Faye Peterson in 2001

Assistant District Attorney

First female: Kathy King Jackson in 1977:

Political Office

First female (Lieutenant Governor of Mississippi): Evelyn Gandy (1947) from 1976-1980

Mississippi Bar Association

First female: Joy Lambert Phillips (1980) in 2005
First African American female: Patricia W. Bennett in 2018

Firsts in local history

Patricia Burchell: First female to serve as the District Attorney for Forrest and Perry Counties, Mississippi (2010)
Latrice Westbrooks: First African American female to serve as the Assistant District Attorney for the Second Circuit Court District (1997) [<nowiki/>Hancock, Harrison and Stone Counties, Mississippi]
Michele Purvis Harris (1987): First female (and African American female) to serve as the Chief City Prosecutor for the City of Jackson, Mississippi (1994) [Hinds, Madison and Rankin Counties, Mississippi]
Mary Lee Toles: First African American (female) judge in Natchez, Mississippi [<nowiki/>Adams County, Mississippi]
Marie Kepper (1954): First female judge in Forrest County, Mississippi
Clare Sekul Hornsby: First female to serve as the president of the Harrison County Bar Association
Faye Peterson: First African American female to serve as the District Attorney for Hinds County, Mississippi
Michele Purvis Harris (1987): First female (and African American female) to serve as the Chief City Prosecutor for the City of Jackson, Mississippi (1994) and the Public Defender for Hinds County, Mississippi (2012)
Ermea Russell: First African American female to serve as a circuit judge in Hinds County, Mississippi (1998)
LaRita Cooper-Stokes: First African American female elected to serve as a judge in Hinds County, Mississippi (2014)
Tomie Green: First female (and African American) to serve as the Senior Circuit Judge in the Seventh Circuit Court District [<nowiki/>Hinds County, Mississippi]
Constance Slaughter-Harvey: First African American female graduate of the University of Mississippi School of Law [<nowiki/>Lafayette County, Mississippi]. She was the first African American female judge in Scott County, Mississippi (1976).
Callestyne Perry Hall-Crawford: First African American (female) to serve as the Assistant City Attorney of Greenwoo<nowiki/>d, Leflore County, Mississippi (1996)
Edna Loeb (1936): First female lawyer in Lowndes County, Mississippi
Adrian McIntosh Haynes: First [African American] female judge in Monroe County, Mississippi (2020)
Patricia Wise: First female (and African American female) to serve as President of the Magnolia Bar Association [<nowiki/>Pike County, Mississippi]
Shequeena McKenzie: First African American (female) judge in McComb, Mississippi (2022) [<nowiki/>Pike County, Mississippi<nowiki/>]
Carol L. White-Richard: First African-American female to serve as the Public Defender for Washington County, Mississippi
Caroline Crawley Moore: First female prosecutor in Winton County, Mississippi (2008)
Ruth Campbell (1918): First female called to the Yazoo County Bar Association, Mississippi

References