Mary Philbrook (1872-1958) was the first female attorney in New Jersey, and the first female to be admitted to the bar association in New Jersey. The New Jersey Supreme Court initially refused Philbrook's petition in 1894 on the grounds that no other woman in the state had ever sought admission to the bar. Supporting the New Jersey Woman Suffrage Association, she lobbied in the New Jersey legislature to allow women to practice law. She was finally admitted to the bar in 1895. She used her legal training for the advancement of women's rights, the social settlement movement in Jersey City, and the gender-free writing of the New Jersey Constitution of 1947. As a result, she is known as a prominent New Jersey woman in the fight for equal rights