On April 19, 1939, Texas Gov. Wilbert Lee “Pappy” O’Daniel signed the State Bar Act, which created the State Bar of Texas.
To help mark the occasion of our 75th anniversary, we’ve created an interactive timeline at texasbar.com/75.
From the formation of the first bar association in Texas in April 1868 to the State Bar of Texas’s move to a Prime Partner bank in November 2013, the timeline features a variety of facts from State Bar history.
The State Bar Act of 1939 created a unified State Bar, governed its operations and responsibilities, and mandated that all attorneys licensed to practice law in Texas be members. For a quick refresher on the act, you can read this story in the April Texas Bar Journal.