Murphy, Emily Gowan (1868-1933), was a Canadian social reformer and author. She helped win legal and political rights for Canadian women.
In the early 1900’s, Murphy helped establish a court in Edmonton, Alberta, that handled cases involving women. From 1916 to 1931, she served as the court’s first judge and as the first woman magistrate in the British Empire. A book she wrote about drug abuse, The Black Candle (1922), helped lead to the passage of drug laws in Canada.
In 1927, Murphy led a group of five women in a court battle to determine whether women were “persons” under the British North America Act, which then served as Canada’s constitution. The Privy Council in England, the highest judicial authority in the British Empire, ruled in the women’s favor in 1929. The council’s ruling enabled women to serve in the Canadian Senate.
Murphy wrote several books under the pen name of “Janey Canuck,” including The Impressions of Janey Canuck Abroad (1901) and Janey Canuck in the West (1910). Murphy was born Emily Gowan Ferguson on March 14, 1868, in Cookstown, Ontario. She married Arthur Murphy, an Anglican minister, in 1887. She died on Oct. 27, 1933.
