The great achievement of Marshall's career as a civil-rights lawyer was his victory in the landmark 1954 Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. The class-action lawsuit was filed on behalf of a group of Black parents in Topeka, Kansas, whose children were forced to attend all-Black segregated schools. Through Brown v.
Instead of Maryland, Marshall attended law school in Washington, D.C. at Howard University, another historically Black school. The dean of Howard Law School at the time was the pioneering civil rights lawyer Charles Houston. Marshall quickly fell under the tutelage of Houston, a notorious disciplinarian and extraordinarily demanding professor.
In 1961, President John F. Kennedy appointed Marshall to the U.S. Court of Appeals, and in 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson made him the first Black Solicitor General. It was clear the successful attorney was well on his way to making a case for a Supreme Court nomination.
Thurgood Marshall argued thirty-two cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, more than anyone else in history. In 1935, Marshall’s first major court victory came in Murray v. Pearson, when he, alongside his mentor Houston, successfully sued the University of Maryland for denying a Black applicant admission to its law school because of his race.
In 1933, Marshall received his law degree and was ranked first in his class. After graduation from Howard, Marshall opened a private practice law firm in Baltimore.
After graduating from law school, Marshall started a private law practice in Baltimore. He began his 25-year affiliation with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1934 by representing the organization in the law school discrimination suit Murray v. Pearson.
24 yearsWho Was Thurgood Marshall? Thurgood Marshall was an American lawyer who was appointed as an associate justice of the Supreme Court in 1967. He was the first African American to hold the position and served for 24 years, until 1991. Marshall studied law at Howard University.
Thurgood Marshall's Family Marshall was born to Norma A. Marshall and William Canfield on July 2, 1908. His parents were mulatottes, which are people classified as being at least half white.
Ketanji Brown Jackson has been confirmed as the first African-American woman to serve as a justice of the United States Supreme Court.
Thurgood MarshallThurgood Marshall was the first African American to serve as a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. He joined the Court in 1967, the year this photo was taken. On October 2, 1967, Thurgood Marshall took the judicial oath of the U.S. Supreme Court, becoming the first Black person to serve on the Court.
The 51-year-old Crump has been at the center of virtually every racial firestorm in the last eight years. He is the nation's most famous civil rights attorney — you've probably seen him even if you don't know his name.
Sandra Day O'ConnorAs the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court of the United States, Sandra Day O'Connor became an inspiration to millions.
Clarence ThomasClarence Thomas, (born June 23, 1948, Pinpoint, near Savannah, Georgia, U.S.), associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1991, the second African American to serve on the court.
Here are some of his most powerful quotes: "Where you see wrong or inequality or injustice, speak out, because this is your country. This is your democracy. Make it.
United States Supreme Court#JusticeSeat1Thurgood Marshall102Clarence Thomas10
84 years oldHe was 84 years old and had been retired since June 1991. Marshall had been in failing health in recent months. He died at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, where he had been since Thursday.
Marshall's given name was Thoroughgood. 3. After graduating high school near the top of his class, Marshall went to Lincoln University where he planned to study dentistry. 4. He was twice suspended for hazing and pranking other students.
The 51-year-old Crump has been at the center of virtually every racial firestorm in the last eight years. He is the nation's most famous civil rights attorney — you've probably seen him even if you don't know his name.
Howard University School of...1933Frederick Douglass High School1925Lincoln UniversityThurgood Marshall/Education
Justice Thurgood Marshall, a living hero of the civil rights movement and one of the last liberal voices on the Supreme Court, announced his retirement today after 24 years that ended in mounting anger and discouragement as he watched the ascendancy of a conservative-dominated bench.
His father, William Marshall, was a railroad porter, and his mother, Norma, was a teacher. After he completed high school in 1925, Marshall attended Lincoln University in Chester County, Pennsylvania. Just before he graduated, he married his first wife, ...
Sources. Thurgood Marshall—perhaps best known as the first African American Supreme Court justice—played an instrumental role in promoting racial equality during the civil rights movement. As a practicing attorney, Marshall argued a record-breaking 32 cases before the Supreme Court, winning 29 of them.
Marshall decided to attend Howard University Law School, where he became a protégé of the well-known dean, Charles Hamilton Houston, who encouraged students to use the law as a means for social transformation. In 1933, Marshall received his law degree and was ranked first in his class.
Life as a Lawyer. In 1935, Marshall’s first major court victory came in Murray v. Pearson, when he, alongside his mentor Houston, successfully sued the University of Maryland for denying a Black applicant admission to its law school because of his race.
During his 24-year term as Supreme Court justice, Marshall’s passionate support for individual and civil rights guided his policies and decisions. Most historians regard him as an influential figure in shaping social policies and upholding laws to protect minorities.
Chambers v. Florida (1940): Marshall successfully defended four convicted Black men who were coerced by police into confessing to murder. Smith v. Allwright (1944): In this decision, the Supreme Court overturned a Texas state law that authorized the use of whites-only primary elections in certain Southern states.
In 1933, Marshall received his law degree and was ranked first in his class. After graduation from Howard, Marshall opened a private practice law firm in Baltimore.
Thurgood Marshall was an American lawyer who was appointed as an associate justice of the Supreme Court in 1967. He was the first African American to hold the position and served for 24 years, until 1991. Marshall studied law at Howard University. As counsel to the NAACP, he utilized the judiciary to champion equality for African Americans. In 1954, he won the Brown v. Board of Education case, in which the Supreme Court ended racial segregation in public schools.
In 1965, Kennedy's successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, appointed Marshall to serve as the first Black U.S. solicitor general, the attorney designated to argue on behalf of the federal government before the Supreme Court.
Pearson in January 1936, the first in a long string of cases designed to undermine the legal basis for de jure racial segregation in the United States. Chambers v. Florida. Marshall's first victory before the Supreme Court came in Chambers v.
Another crucial Supreme Court victory for Marshall came in the 1944 case of Smith v. Allwright, in which the Court struck down the Democratic Party's use of white people-only primary elections in various Southern states.
Despite being overqualified academically, Marshall was rejected because of his race. This firsthand experience with discrimination in education made a lasting impression on Marshall and helped determine the future course of his career.
Over several decades, Marshall argued and won a variety of cases to strike down many forms of legalized racism, helping to inspire the American civil rights movement.
Marshall studied law at Howard University. As counsel to the NAACP, he utilized the judiciary to champion equality for African Americans. In 1954, he won the Brown v. Board of Education case, in which the Supreme Court ended racial segregation in public schools.
Thurgood Marshall. Thurgood Marshall was a civil rights lawyer who used the courts to fight Jim Crow and dismantle segregation in the U.S. Marshall was a towering figure who became the nation's first Black United States Supreme Court Justice.
A native of Baltimore, Maryland, Marshall graduated from Lincoln University in Pennsylvania in 1930. He applied to the University of Maryland Law School but was rejected because he was Black. Marshall received his law degree from Howard University Law School in 1933, graduating first in his class.
During his nearly 25-year tenure on the Supreme Court, Marshall fought for affirmative action for minorities, held strong against the death penalty, and supported of a woman's right to choose if an abortion was appropriate for her.
Pearson. Working with his mentor Charles Hamilton Houston, Marshall sued the school for denying admission to Black applicants solely on the basis of race. The legal duo successfully argued that the law school violated the 14th Amendment guarantee of protection of the law, an amendment that addresses citizenship and the rights of citizens.
His mission was equal justice for all. Marshall used the power of the courts to fight racism and discrimination, tear down Jim Crow segregation, change the status quo, and make life better for the most vulnerable in our nation.
Marshall's most famous case was the landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education case in which Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren noted, "in the field of public education, the doctrine of 'separate but equal' has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.".
Soon after, Marshall joined Houston at NAACP as a staff lawyer. In 1940, he was named chief of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which was created to mount a legal assault against segregation. Marshall became one of the nation's leading attorneys.
In 1961, President Kennedy nominated Marshall to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit in which he wrote 112 opinions, none of which were overturned on appeal. Four years later, he was appointed by President Johnson to be solicitor general, and in 1967 President Johnson nominated him to the Supreme Court to which he commented: “I have a lifetime appointment and I intend to serve it. I expect to die at 110, shot by a jealous husband.” On the appointment, President Johnson later said that Marshall’s nomination was “the right thing to do, the right time to do it, the right man and the right place.”
Marshall was born on July 2, 1908 , in Baltimore, Maryland, to William Marshall, railroad porter, who later worked on the staff of Gibson Island Club, a white-only country club and Norma Williams, a school teacher. One of his great-grandfathers had been taken as a slave from the Congo to Maryland where he was eventually freed. Marshall graduated from Lincoln University in 1930 and applied to University of Maryland Law School – he was denied admission because the school was still segregated at that time. So Marshall matriculated to Howard University Law School where he graduated first in his class and met his mentor, Charles Hamilton Huston, with whom he enjoyed a lifelong friendship. In an interview published in 1992 in the American Bar Association Journal, Marshall wrote that “Charlie Houston insisted that we be social engineers rather than lawyers,” a mantra that he upheld and personified.
In 1936, Marshall became the NAACP’s chief legal counsel. The NAACP’s initial goal was to funnel equal resources to black schools. Marshall successfully challenged the board to only litigate cases that would address the heart of segregation.
Among Marshall’s salient majority opinions for the Supreme Court were: Amalgamated Food Employees Union v. Logan Valley Plaza, in 1968, which determined that a mall was “public forum” and unable to exclude picketers; Stanley v. Georgia, in 1969, held that pornography, when owned privately, could not be prosecuted.
In 1957 , LDF, led by Marshall, became an entirely separate entity from the NAACP with its own leadership and board of directors and has remained a separate organization to this day.
Georgia, in 1969, held that pornography, when owned privately, could not be prosecuted. “If the First Amendment means anything, it means that a state has no business telling a man, sitting alone in his own house, what books he may read or what films he may watch”; and Bounds v.
On the appointment, President Johnson later said that Marshall’s nomination was “the right thing to do, the right time to do it, the right man and the right place.”.