The above Facebook comment was written, "after further review." Initially, I had assumed and speculated that either John S. Rock of Portland, Maine, and Boston, Massachusetts--who was a doctor, dentist, lawyer and abolitionist in the 1850's; or, John Mercer Langston, who maintained an actual law practice in the 1850's in Oberlin, Ohio and was the founder of the Howard Law School and its first Dean in 1869, was the first black lawyer in America.
Turns out that it was neither Rock nor Langston, but Allen, who was the first black lawyer, being admitted to practice in the 1840's after examination in both states, first Maine, and later Massachusetts. Allen never practiced law, because no white clients would have him. He pursued other unspecified business interests.
Rock was similarly plagued by lack of clients, so he practiced medicine and dentistry, principally upon runaway slaves, furnished by Bostonians. He was also the first black man admitted to the bar of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Langston, on the other hand, had a thriving law practice in Ohio in the 1850's. His autobiography recites that he was also the first black elected official in the United States, a town clerk near Cleveland. He also aided John Brown in recruiting men for his raid on Harper's Ferry in 1859, sending him two preeminent martyrs, among many other distinctions. His autobiography is commended to you, "From Virginia Plantation to the U.S. Capitol..."
