Catharine McCulloch: Illinois Suffragist and Lawyer

Catharine Waugh McCulloch was a lawyer, suffragist, and activist. She was born Catharine Waugh in New York in 1862, and her family later moved to Illinois, where she was raised. She graduated from the Rockford Female Seminary in 1882 where she wrote a thesis, “Woman’s Wages,” and earned both her B.A. and M.A. degrees. She went on to study at the Union College of Law in Chicago, and after she graduated, Waugh was admitted to the Illinois state bar in 1886. She searched for a position with a Chicago law firm, but she found that there were few opportunities for female lawyers, despite her skills and qualifications, so she returned to Rockford to establish a practice there.

Waugh was a member of the Equity Club from 1888 to 1890. This group was a national correspondence club for female lawyers to discuss personal and professional issues, from topics of how philanthropy and reform fit in with the practice of law to how one could balance married life with a career and aspirations in law. Catharine Waugh married Frank Hathorn McCulloch in 1890. He was also a lawyer and was supportive of Catharine’s career ambitions. The two had four children together and established a Chicago law practice called McCulloch & McCulloch.

Catharine McCulloch was an active public speaker for issues of temperance, suffrage, and legal rights for women, and she served as the legislative chair of the Illinois Equal Suffrage Association from 1890 to 1912. She worked on a bill to ensure women’s suffrage for local and presidential elections in Illinois, and she actively lobbied for the bill by organizing tours across the state to build suffrage support.

In 1899 McCulloch published a novel called Mr. Lex, which depicted the legal disadvantages that women and mothers faced. The book contributed to a shift in popular opinion that led to the 1901 passage of a bill that McCulloch drafted to give wives equal guardianship rights with their husbands over their children. In 1905 the legislature passed another bill that McCulloch had written; this bill raised the age of consent for women from the age of fourteen to sixteen.

In 1907 McCulloch was elected Justice of the Peace in Evanston, Illinois, making her the first woman in Illinois elected to the position. This victory came six years before women had the right to vote statewide in municipal and presidential elections; it wasn’t until 1913 that Governor Edward Dunne signed a bill into law making Illinois the first state east of the Mississippi River where women could vote for presidential electors. McCulloch was re-elected in 1909, and she also served as master in chancery of the Cook County Superior Court.

McCulloch authored “Illinois Laws Concerning Women,” an accessible discussion of Illinois laws concerning women prior to the passage of the suffrage law. She described her aim in writing this booklet in an explanatory note:

“This is not an elaborate scholarly digest, but an informal, chatty discussion of Illinois laws concerning women. The technical phraseology of the statutes and the deliberate, many worded opinions of the court are not here used. The intention, however, is to state the substance of the law with accuracy. If any one desires more detailed information as to a particular matter, any lawyer can point out the statute or decision which more fully and elaborately declared the law.”

After this publication, McCulloch went on to write “Woman Suffrage Law,” an overview of the law passed by Illinois Legislature in 1913 described in layman’s terms.

Beyond these efforts to support suffrage and make the law more easily accessible for women, McCulloch was an active member of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) and served as its legal adviser and its first vice president. She continued to work with the group once it became the League of Women Voters in 1920 after the 19th Amendment was passed. McCulloch was also the president of the Women’s Bar Association of Illinois from 1916 to 1920 and was actively engaged with a number of women’s organizations in Illinois.

In 1940, the Catharine and Frank McCulloch were both named “Senior Counsellors” by the Illinois Bar Association to honor the many years they had worked in law. Catharine McCulloch passed away in Evanston in 1945.

You can see McCulloch’s two booklets from the Busey-Yntema Collection, 1902-1999 (MS 989), along with other items related to the suffrage movement, in the IHLC’s exhibition, Votes for Women, on view now through June 2019.

 

Other Resources

Campbell, Karlyn Kohrs. Women Public Speakers in the United States, 1800-1925: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook. Greenwood Publishing Group, 1993.

Drachman, Virginia G.  “McCulloch, Catharine Gouger Waugh (1862-1945), lawyer and social reformer.” American National Biography, 2000. http://www.anb.org/view/10.1093/anb/9780198606697.001.0001/anb-9780198606697-e-1501052

“McCulloch, Catharine (1862–1945).” Dictionary of Women Worldwide: 25,000 Women Through the Ages, edited by Anne Commire and Deborah Klezmer, vol. 2. Detroit, MI: Yorkin Publications, 2007. http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/CX2588816047/GVRL?u=uiuc_uc&sid=GVRL&xid=140cbb4e

“McCulloch, Catharine Waugh.” Marquis Who Was Who in America 1607-1984, 2009. http://proxy2.library.illinois.edu/login?url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/marqwas/mcculloch_catharine_waugh/0?institutionId=386

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