Elizabeth Williams graduated from Cleveland Law School in 1908 and is believed to be the school’s first female graduate. She was admitted to the bar in the state of Ohio that same year, first practicing with the firm of Lozier & Lozier. In 1913, along with Mary Grossman (1912), Williams applied for membership in the Cleveland Bar Association; both were elected members at a 1914 meeting. She was also a member of the Ohio State Bar Association. She joined the firm of Smith, Taft, and Arter, and in 1915 married John A. Smith, the firm’s senior partner. Active in the women’s suffrage movement, she served as a delegate on behalf of the Woman’s (City) Club of Cleveland at its national convention in Atlantic City in 1916.