Rebecca Lovenstein

Rebecca Pearl Lovenstein (1888–1971) was one of the first two women to pass the written bar exam in the state of Virginia in 1920.

Biography Lovenstein née Greenberg was born on May 25, 1888, in Vilnius, Russian Empire. Her family emigrated to the United States in the 1890s. They lived in Durham, North Carolina. Lovenstein attended Duke University for two years. In 1907, she married a trial lawyer, Benjamin Lovenstein, with whom she had three children. The family settled in Richmond, Virginia, and Lovenstein took law courses at night.

In 1920, after the passage of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, the state of Virginia began allowing women to practice law. The same year, Lovenstein and Carrie M. Gregory passed the written bar exam and earned their licenses to practice law. Lovenstein went on to practice law with her husband.

She died on February 10, 1971, in New York.