For women’s history month, we are sharing this post about the first-time women served on a jury in Cecil County.
Although women gained the right to vote in 1920, they had to push for equal rights when it came to jury duty. The new voting privilege did not automatically allow them to sit on juries, the Baltimore Sun reported: “Merely because she may help decide who shall be elected sheriff, court clerk, mayor or president it does not follow that she may also decide who is guilty of murder, arson, or wife-beating.”
The first time in the history of Cecil County women were selected to serve on the county’s petit (trial) jury for the September 1947 term of the court, the Cecil Democrat reported. Alice H. Kinter, of Chesapeake City, was the first county woman to be picked for the service, in a drawing made by Judge Floyd J. Kintner on Aug. 19, 1947. Other women selected for that term included Mazie B. Boulden, Beulah E. Gorrell, and Edith L. Wilson. By the way, there were also two African-American citizens, Lewis Williams and Harry Briscoe, on the jury pool for that term.
