Jewel

Jewel Prescott, a timid, rookie lawyer, moves cross-country when she inherits her grandmother’s house. At her new law firm, she is assigned a case that brings up nightmares from her childhood.

Two of her grandmother’s friends urge her to read her great grandmother’s diaries in the attic, because she changed the course of history.

Jewel’s great grandmother, Izetta Jewel, is a renowned stage actress and suffragist. A historical public figure, she is one of the founders of the National’s Woman’s Party, fighting for women’s right to vote. Izetta marries Congressman William Brown, but kills him when he gets in the way of her work for women’s suffrage. Izetta and the Silent Sentinals (National Woman’s Party) picket the White House, and are thrown in a jail workhouse, beaten, tortured, and force fed. Izetta and the suffragists go to court and fight for their release. President Wilson gives a speech stating his approval of women’s suffrage, leading to the passage of the 19th amendment, granting women the right to vote.

Izetta’s struggle and perseverance for women’s justice inspires to fight for her client’s accidental death case, which mirrors the death of her own mother. Jewel finds an expert witness, Jeremy Branch, who developed car crash dummies for automobile safety tests. Jewel takes her case to court, citing that her client’s death could have been prevented. Dr. Branch testifies that he repeatedly reported to his supervisors the increase of serious injury and deaths of females. The reason: the adult female car crash dummy is the same one as the 12 year-old child dummy. Dr. Branch submitted a solution – a car crash dummy with correct female dimensions. His recommendations were denied – 21 times over 45 years. Jewel wins her case, and the Judge orders the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to create a female car crash dummy, to save women’s lives.

Izetta’s inspiration gives Jewel the courage to demonstrate that women’s lives matter. She opens her own law firm, and with the spirit of her great-grandmother, continues the fight against women’s injustice.