Olga Petit

Olga Petit or Sophie Balachowsky-Petit (16 March 1870 – 1966) was a Russian-born, French lawyer. She is noted as the first woman to take the legal oath in France. She is also known for assisting Russian emigres settling in the country after the Russian Revolution.

Early life Olga Petit was born Scheina Lea Balachowsky on 16 March 1870, at Korsun (modern-day Korsun-Shevchenkivskiy, Ukraine), a city of the Russian Empire, to Herz and Clara Balachowsky. Her father was an industrialist. She relocated to Paris to study law at the Faculty of Law of Paris from the Sorbonne University. There she stayed with Zinaida Vengerova, She was renamed Sophie in France and was sometimes called Sonia while the name Olga was attached to her full name.

Olga Petit married Jules Virgile Eugène Petit on 28 May 1896. He was also a lawyer and a political journalist. An account cited that he was her law school classmate. At this time, she was described as the young Russian from Kiev who introduced him to Russian Socialist Revolutionaries.

Legal oath On 6 December 1900, Petit took the legal oath and became a qualified lawyer. She was 30 years old. The oath was administered before the First Chamber of the Court of Appeals of Paris presided by Émile Forichon. It was reported that the court was packed with people who wanted to witness the event and Petit was accompanied by her husband.

Olga Petit's father Herz Balachowsky was a Ukrainian industrialist. There was a minor controversy regarding her admission to the Bar. An account cited that she was allowed to take the oath first, preceding Jeanne Chauvin by several days because the latter had actively campaigned for the legislative initiative that sought women to practice law in France. The members of the Paris Council did not want to give Chauvin the honor of being the first woman lawyer in the country. This work is a historical review and analysis of laws and ordinances in France and England before 1688. While she was the first woman to take the legal oath, she was second to file a legal pleading to Chauvin, who secured this record when she pleaded for a case involving counterfeit corsets. Shestov was particularly close to Petit. Her brother Daniil was married to the philosopher's sister, Sof'ya Shvartsman.