Iris de Freitas Brazao was a authorized luminary who shattered the career’s glass ceiling within the Caribbean. She had the excellence of being the primary lady barrister-at-law within the Commonwealth Caribbean.
It’s 100 years since Iris first graduated from the College of Oxford, a exceptional achievement to be celebrated. Matriculating in 1923 for the Bachelor of Arts, her programs for the BA included Roman Legislation, the English Authorized System, Constitutional Legislation and Authorized Historical past, Worldwide Legislation and Roman-Dutch Legislation. Information of Roman Dutch-Legislation was notably vital as this served because the priority for a lot of rulings in her residence nation of British Guiana (now Guyana). Considerably, Iris was taught by Dr Ivy Williams, the primary lady to be known as to the bar in England and a professor at St Anne’s School at Oxford. Iris was initially enrolled as a Society of Oxford Residence-Scholar (now St Anne’s School). Notably, Iris’s 1925 commencement occurred 10 years earlier than Dr Merze Tate, who in 1935 turned the primary African-American lady to graduate from Oxford.
Iris continued her research at Oxford and was awarded an instructional scholarship. In 1926, she graduated as soon as once more, this time with a postgraduate qualification, the Bachelor of Civil Legislation.
Earlier than Oxford, Iris studied briefly on the College of Toronto in 1918, and at Aberystwyth College, Wales, from 1919 the place she later graduated with each a BA (1922) and an LLB (1927). Her English regulation professor at Aberystwyth College (then College School of Wales (UCW)) was T. Arthur Levi, who was an Oxford graduate. He famous in June 1923 that: ‘Iris has proved top-of-the-line regulation college students we now have ever had within the faculty.’ Iris was elected president of the UCW Ladies’s Sectional Council and vp of the Wales College students’ Consultant Council from 1922 to 1923. Her educational authorized research concluded in 1929 when she was known as to the bar on the Honourable Society of the Interior Temple.
Iris’s in depth {qualifications} are of explicit curiosity. Throughout my analysis, I discovered the interconnected nature of her research in England and Wales. I famous in my latest ebook, Iris De Freitas Brazao, Authorized Luminary and Trailblazer: Caribbean, Canada, Wales, England 1896-1989, that ‘the Twenties for Iris de Freitas was an instructional season of examine and scholarship throughout continents amid systemic racism and sexism, in addition to the aftermath of the primary world conflict and the onset of the 1918-1920 influenza pandemic. She emerged on the finish of the Twenties with 5 spectacular {qualifications} and have become the primary lady barrister-at-law known as to the bar within the Commonwealth Caribbean. Much more exceptional was that Iris accomplished most of those research consecutively and at instances intertwined.’ The fortitude and energy that it took for her to persevere whereas finishing her research regardless of the challenges is phenomenal. She returned to practise in British Guiana in 1929 to a lot acclaim.
Her many accomplishments embody being the primary lady in British Guiana to prosecute a homicide trial in 1932. This was 16 years earlier than Helena Normanton led the prosecution of the primary homicide trial by a lady barrister-at-law in England.
Considerably, Iris was additionally the primary lady of African descent to graduate from the College of Oxford and the Honourable Society of the Interior Temple. Iris additionally served as: the primary feminine Crown prosecutor in British Guiana; the one lady to be a signatory to registration of the British Guiana Employees’ League; the one feminine member of the British Guiana Franchise Fee within the Thirties; and the primary feminine member of the British Guiana Public Service Fee within the Fifties. She died in Georgetown, Guyana, in 1989. Guyana’s lawyer basic Keith Massiah acknowledged that her many firsts had been ‘enough by [themselves] to win her enduring fame’.
The phrases of the late Honourable Desiree Bernard, former chancellor of Guyana, are most becoming: ‘Iris had good purpose to be happy with the progress that ladies have made within the authorized career. Ladies at the moment are prosecutors, magistrates and judges, positions which girls within the early years of this century [20th] would by no means have dreamt of holding.’ The modern interval is now thought of the golden age of ladies in regulation.
Within the UK, because the Legislation Society celebrates its two hundredth anniversary this 12 months, it’s becoming to notice that Dr I. Stephanie Boyce FKC, FRSA served as the primary Black feminine president of the Society from 2021/22, whereas this 12 months Barbara Mills KC made historical past when she was appointed as the primary Black chair of the Bar Council. Iris de Freitas Brazao would seemingly have been very proud.
On the Aberystwyth College Hugh Owen Library, a room was named in her honour in 2016. It’s my hope that Iris may also be honoured by her alma mater the College of Oxford on this the centenary 12 months of her commencement.
Dr Joanne Collins-Gonsalves is a fellow of the Royal Historic Society and managing director of the Historic Analysis Worldwide Inc, Canada. This text was tailored from her latest ebook Iris De Freitas Brazao, Authorized Luminary and Trailblazer: Caribbean, Canada, Wales, England 1896-1989
