Out in the untamed lands of the Wild West, the law has had a long history, and this year marks another milestone as the State Bar of Arizona turns 75.

According to the state Bar’s website, the first statewide Bar association was created in 1895 and lawyers held regular meetings. In 1902, the Bar raised membership dues from $1 to $5. The Bar also led the rewriting of a civil code for the Arizona Territory that year.

The Arizona Bar Association was first incorporated in 1906, and in 1912 adopted the ethical rules of the American Bar Association and began official admission procedures for the practice of law. The University of Arizona College of Law was created in 1925 to expand upon what had previously been a department of study.

Then in 1933, the State Bar of Arizona was created as an integrated or mandatory membership organization by an act of Legislature to serve the legal profession and the public.

At that time, 654 attorneys and 22 judges worked in the state, but just 175 belonged to the voluntary Arizona Bar Association. The state Bar has held annual conventions since 1933, except for 1945 during World War II.

Today, the State Bar of Arizona employs approximately 100 people who serve more than 13,000 active attorneys and a growing population of Arizona citizens.

It is the mission of the State Bar of Arizona to serve the public and enhance the legal profession by promoting the competency, ethics and professionalism of its members and enhancing the administration of justice.

It has achieved this mission over the last 75 years by sticking to these six key values that guide its work, according to its website:

Integrity: A commitment to truth in all of its forms and in all of its actions. It is adherence to the spirit as well as to the letter of the law. It is consistency, transparency, and accountability for what we say and what we do, as individuals, as professionals, and as an organization.

Service to clients and the public: A commitment to advocate the causes of others with all of our strength, as we would advocate for ourselves in the most important of personal concerns.

Diversity: A commitment to ensuring that the legal profession and the justice system reflect the community they serve in all of its social, economic, and geographical diversity.

Professionalism: A commitment to each other and to all whom they encounter to act with the highest level of sensitivity to the feelings of others.

Promoting justice: A commitment to ensuring, at every risk to ourselves, that others have access to the system of justice in which we serve as officers of the court. It is living in their daily lives the oath of allegiance to the Constitutions of the United States and of the State of Arizona.

Leadership: A commitment to use whatever influence they are privileged to acquire to advance the just causes of those whose influence is less. It is understanding at all times that actions are observed and may be emulated.

It is the commitment to these values that has brought the State Bar of Arizona where it is today and will lead it in the next 75 years.

State Bar of Arizona

320 S. Convent

(520) 623-9944

www.azbar.org

4201 N. 24th Street,

Suite 200, Phoenix

(602) 252-4804