Rhoda Valentine Lewis

Rhoda Valentine Lewis (August 31, 1906 – September 12, 1991) was the first female justice on the Supreme Court of Hawaii.

Early life Lewis was born in Chicago on August 31, 1906, to parents Charles Tobias and Josephine Lewis. She moved to Honolulu and attended the Punahou School; then moved to Manila, and attended the American-European School; and graduated from the Frances Willard Jr. High School in Berkeley, California. She graduated from Stanford University in 1927, and received her Juris Doctor from Stanford Law School in 1929, graduating first in her class, and becoming a member of the Order of the Coif.

Career Lewis worked for a former Stanford Professor, before working for a law firm in Buffalo, New York. In 1937 she moved back to Hawaii, where she worked for the Honolulu Prosecutor's Office and then the Attorney General's Office. Lewis left the court in 1967 and the following year was on the Hawaii Constitutional Convention of 1968. From 1971 to 1972 she worked as a reporter for the Committee on the Coordination of Rules and Statutes.

Personal life Lewis died on September 12, 1991.