King Hall Students Obtain Honorary Bar Admission for Chinese Immigrant Lawyer

Thanks to the efforts of students in the UC Davis School of Law Asian Pacific American Law Students Association (APALSA), the State Bar of California will award posthumous honorary admission to Hong Yen Chang, a Chinese immigrant lawyer who was denied admission in 1890 as a result of laws that discriminated against the Chinese. The ceremonial resolution will be presented at the State Bar of California's 2014 Annual Meeting in September.

The effort to posthumously admit Chang was initiated by APALSA students earlier this year. Working under the direction of Professor Gabriel "Jack" Chin, APALSA's faculty adviser, and with the assistance of the UC Davis School of Law California Supreme Court Clinic, students filed a petition with the State Bar requesting Chang's admission.

Chang, who graduated from Columbia Law School and was licensed to practice in New York, was denied the opportunity work as a lawyer in California because the federal Chinese Exclusion Act banned Chinese immigrants from naturalizing as citizens and state law prohibited noncitizens from being licensed as attorneys. Those laws have since been repealed, the students pointed out, successfully convincing the State Bar to posthumously admit Chang.

APALSA will persist in petitioning the California Supreme Court to overrule its earlier decision and grant posthumous admission to Chang, Professor Chin said.  "This is a good first step, but since Chang was excluded by the Supreme Court in 1890, and the State Bar only has the power to make recommendations to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court should act."