Thurgood+Marshall

Born July 2nd, 1908 - Died January 4th, 1993**
 * Thurgood Marshall

//American jurist and the first African-American to seve on the Supreme Court of the United States//

A prominent figure of the Civl Rights Movement, Thurgood Marshall was a lawyer before he became a judge, most famous for his victory in the historic case of //Brown vs. Board of Education//, which overturned segregation in schools, making the principle of 'separate but equal' void. As the first African-American to be nominated as a judge of the Supreme Court, Marshall broke cultural and racial boundaries critical to the process of integration. Though less well-known that the other two famous leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, Marshall is credited with ending the legality of segregation and diminishing the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow racism in the United States (Williams, 2000). Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Marshall experienced the effects of legal segregation first hand when refused entry to the University of Maryland School of Law based on his race, and so pursued law at Howard University School of Law, graduating first in his class in 1933. Returning to Baltimore, Marshall began working for the key civil rights group, the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP). In 1936 he won his first major civil rights case in the form of //Murray v.// Pearson, a case in which Marshall argued that Donald Gains Murray, an African-American student with excellent credentials, was being forced to attend lesser Negro institutions to study law due to his being denied entry to the same university Marshall had been refused by, the University of Maryland School of Law (Thurgood Marshall College, 2002). Though convinced he would lose the case, the Maryland Court of Appeals ruled against the state of Maryland and the Attorney General, stating that under constitutional law the schools must be made equal or the separation would have to cease. Though an important milestone, the case had no real authority outside of Maryland.

In 1940, at the age of 32, Marshall won his first Supreme Court case, //Chambers v. Florida//, leading to his appointment as Chief Counsel for the NAACP, a position in which he won 29 of the 32 Supreme Court cases he argued. Among them were cases in which the court declared unconstitutional a Southern state's exclusion of African American voters from primary elections (//Smith// v. //Allwright// in 1944), and state enforcement of racial restrictions of housing (//Shelley// v. //Kraemer// in 1948) (biography.com, 2010). The most significant of all these cases was //Brown vs. Board of Education,// in 1954. The case overturned the constitutional ideal that the races should be 'separate but equal', stating that, in the case of education, the principle could not be applied as no educational facilities that the African-Americans had access to was truly equal to the white institutions. The landmark case resulted in the gradual legal desegregation of the United States, laying the foundation for the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.

His legal achievements led to his successful nomination by President Lyndon B. Johnson to become a Supreme Court judge, which allowed him to argue and fight for civil rights at a higher level as the first African-American Supreme Court Judge, a milestone for the movement as a whole. Thurgood Marshall led the legal battle from the Civil Rights Movement, and is one of the most significant figures in American civil rights history.


 * Timeline**
 * **1908** Birth of Thurgood Marshall
 * **1930** Marshall graduated with honors from Lincoln U. (cum laude)
 * **1933** Received law degree from Howard U. (magna cum laude); began private practice in Baltimore
 * **1934** Began work for Baltimore branch of NAACP
 * **1935** With Charles Houston, won his first major civil rights case, Murray v. Pearson
 * **1936** Became assistant special counsel for NAACP in New York
 * **1940** Won first of 29 Supreme Court victories (Chambers v. Florida)
 * **1944** Successfully argued Smith v. Allwright, overthrowing the South's "white primary"
 * **1948** Won Shelley v. Kraemer, in which the Supreme Court struck down legality of racially restrictive covenants
 * **1950** Won Supreme Court victories in two graduate-school integration cases, Sweatt v. Painter and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents
 * **1951** Visited South Korea and Japan to investigate charges of racism in U.S. armed forces. He reported that the general practice was one of "rigid segregation".
 * **1954** Wons Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas landmark case that demolished the legal basis for segregation in America
 * **1961** Defended civil rights demonstrators, winning Supreme Circuit Court victory in Garner v. Louisiana; nominated to Second Court of Appeals by President John F. Kennedy
 * **1961** Appointed circuit judge, making 112 rulings, all later upheld by Supreme Court (1961-1965)
 * **1965** Appointed U.S. solicitor general by President Lyndon Johnson; won 14 of the 19 cases he argued for the government (1965-1967)
 * **1967** Became first African American elevated to U.S. Supreme Court (1967-1991)
 * **1991** Retired from the Supreme Court
 * **1993** Died at 84 on January 24

Thurgood Marshall College (2002). //Thurgood Marshall - Supreme Court Justice.// Retrieved June 06, 2010, from Thurgood Marshall Biography: [] //Thurgood Marshall Biography.//[] //Introduction to the Book//[]
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