“Inscribed above the front entrance to this [Supreme] Court building are the words, ‘Equal Justice Under Law.’  Surely no individual did more to make these words a reality than Thurgood Marshall.” – Chief Justice William Rehnquist

This month Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit was nominated to the Supreme Court of the United States. She would be the first African American woman to serve on the Court. 

As we look towards the future, on this last day of Black History Month, we should also reflect on the past and the first African American, Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall, nominated to the Supreme Court in 1967 by President Lyndon Johnson. Johnson said Marshall was “best qualified by training and by very valuable service to the country. … I believe it is the right thing to do, the right time to do it, the right man and the right place.”¹

Watch his nomination here: “Thurgood Marshall Nominated to Supreme Court” (Washington D.C., 6/13/1967)

After being turned down by the University of Maryland School of Law due to his race, Thurgood Marshall attended and graduated from the historic Howard University Law school. As a practicing attorney, Marshall, took on the challenge of civil rights violations in the Jim Crow south fighting segregation and establishing legal precedent after where civil rights had been ignored, abused or trampled. In 1938, he became an attorney for the NAACP and in 1940 became the NAACP’s chief counsel and founder of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.²  Prior to his appointment to the Supreme Court, he won 29 of the 32 cases he brought before the Court. His Smith v. Allwright (1944) overturned a Texas law that authorized the use of whites-only primary elections, Shelley v. Kraemer (1948) challenging the legality of racially restrictive housing covenants and his most famous case was the landmark Brown v. Board of Education (1954) where the Court ultimately ruled that racial segregation in public schools violated the 14^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.³ 

Listen to him describe the impact of Brown v. Board of Education here: “Thurgood Marshall on civil rights after Brown v Board of Education”

In his 24 years on the Supreme Court Justice Marshall supported individual and civil rights, as well as equal justice for all from a woman’s right to choose to ending Jim Crow segregation to affirmative action. Justice Marshall, given the nickname, “Mr. Civil Rights” for his work fighting segregation and championing equality, stepped down from the bench in 1991 and passed away in 1993.    

Learn more about Thurgood Marshall and his legacy here: “Moments In History: Remembering Thurgood Marshall”

1, Thurgood Marshall’s unique Supreme Court legacy.  (August 30, 2021).  Retrieved February 26, 2022, from https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/blog/thurgood-marshalls-unique-supreme-court-legacy

 2, Bio Thurgood Marshall. Retrieved February 26, 2022, from

http://law.howard.edu/brownat50/BrownBios/BioJusticeThurgoodMarshall.html

3, Civil Rights Leaders: Thurgood Marshall. Retrieved February 26, 2022, from 

https://naacp.org/find-resources/history-explained/civil-rights-leaders/thurgood-marshall