against another woman attempting to be a solicitor, Bertha Cave, ruled in Bebb that women were incapable of carrying out a public function in common law. And stated that this disability that must remain "unless and until" Parliament changed the law; in other words, that women could not be solicitors because no woman had ever been a solicitor. She was represented by Lord Robert Cecil KC and R. A. Wright when the decision was upheld in the Court of Appeal in December 1913, heard by the Master of the Rolls Lord Cozens-Hardy, Lord Justice Swinfen Eady and Lord Justice Phillimore (included in the law reports in 1914), a key statement in the Court's view was the “long uniform and interrupted usage, which we ought … to be very loth to depart from” that only men had become solicitors, therefore women were not able to do so. Bebb continued with political and feminist activism. The publicity from her case – the press was mostly in her favour – helped the campaign for women's admission to the legal profession in Britain, and the passage of the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919 allowed women to be lawyers. Later life, death and legacy In the meantime, Bebb married a solicitor, Thomas Weldon Thomson, at St Mary Abbots church in Kensington, London, in April 1917. Her husband was born in 1872, the second son of Captain William Thomson of the 78th Highlanders. Her husband had several brothers, including Henry Broughton Thomson, and William Montgomery Thomson of the Seaforth Highlanders. In August 1917, Bebb now Mrs Thomson was appointed assistant commissioner for enforcement for the Ministry of Food in its Midland Division, with work that included prosecuting black-marketeers. Bebb was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1921. Bebb had applied to join Lincoln's Inn as a student barrister in 1918, but she was refused. She gave birth to a daughter, Diana, on 23 December 1919. The Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919 was passed into law the next day, on 24 December. She applied again to join Lincoln's Inn that month, and was admitted as a student on 27 January 1920. Bebb attended a banquet at the House of Commons on 8 March 1920 to celebrate the passing of the Act, where she proposed a toast. In August 1920, she gave up her work at the Ministry of Food in order