Table of Contents
• Who was Thurgood Marshall?
•Movie
•Early Life
•Education
•Early Career
•Career
•“America’s outstanding civil rights lawyer”
•Important cases that he argued
•Out come of Brown v. Board of Education
•Brown v. Board of Education combined these cases
•First African American justice
•Things to think about…
Who was Thurgood Marshall?
•Thurgood Marshall was an
American jurist and the first
African American to serve on
the Supreme Court of the
United States.
•Attorney Thurgood
Marshall led the civil rights
case of Brown v. Board of
Education of Topeka to a
successful hearing at the
Supreme Court of the United
States in 1954.
Click the
movie
Early Life
•Marshall was born in
Baltimore, Maryland on July
2, 1908.
•He was the great grandson
of a slave.
•His father instilled in him
an appreciation for the
Constitution of the United
States and the rule of law.
•He was punished for his
school misbehavior by
being forced to write copies
of the Constitution, which
he later said piqued his
interest in the document.
Education
Marshall attended Lincoln
University in Pennsylvania,
working a number of jobs to pay
his tuition. He became more
serious about his studies after
being suspended briefly in his
second year. After receiving his
bachelor's degree, he enrolled in
the law school at Howard
University in Washington, D.C.,
in 1930 and graduated in 1933.
While at Howard he was
influenced by Charles Houston
(1895–1950) and other legal
scholars who developed and
perfected methods for winning
civil rights lawsuits.
Early Career
Passing the Maryland bar
exam (an exam that is
given by the body that
governs law and that must
be passed before one is
allowed to practice law) in
1933, Marshall practiced in
Baltimore until 1938. He
also served as counsel for
the Baltimore branch of the
National Association for
the Advancement of
Colored People (NAACP).
Career
In 1935 he successfully attacked
segregation (separation based on race) and
discrimination (unequal treatment) in
education when he participated in the
desegregation of the University of
Maryland Law School, to which he had
been denied admission because of his race.
Marshall became director of the NAACP's
Legal Defense and Education Fund in 1939.
A year earlier he had been admitted to
practice before the U.S. Supreme Court, the
U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the
fourth, fifth, and eighth circuits, and the
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District
of Louisiana.
“America’s outstanding civil rights lawyer”
After winning twenty-nine of the thirtytwo civil rights cases that he brought
before the Supreme Court, Marshall
earned the reputation of "America's
outstanding civil rights lawyer." During
the trials, he and his aides were often
threatened with death in the lower courts
of some southern states.
Cases he brought before the
Supreme Court
3
29
Cases he
argued and
won
Cases he
argued and
lost
Some of the important cases he argued
became landmarks in the ending of
segregation as well as constitutional
precedents (examples to help justify
similar decisions in the future) with their
decisions.
Important cases that he argued
Year
Court Case
What it’s about
1944
Smith v. Allwright
Gave African Americans the right to vote
in Democratic primary elections
1946
Morgan v. Virginia
Outlawed the state’s policy of
segregation as it applied to bus
transportation between different
states.
1950
Sweatt v. Painter
Required the admission of an African
American student to the University
of Texas Law School.
1954
Brown v. Board of Education
Outlawed segregation in public
schools and more or less ended the
practice once and for all.
Outcome of Brown v. Board of Education
9
9
8
Number
of
Justices
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0
Voted in favor of desegregating schools
Opposed to desegregating schools
Brown v. Board of Education combined these cases
Briggs v. Elliott
Brown v. Board of
Education
Davis v. County School
Board of Prince Edward
County
Gebhart v. Belton
Bolling v. Sharpe
First African American justice
In 1967 President Johnson nominated
Marshall as associate justice to the U.S.
Supreme Court. Marshall's nomination
was strongly opposed by several southern
senators on the Judiciary Committee, but
in the end he was confirmed by a vote of
sixty-nine to eleven. He took his seat on
October 2, 1967, becoming the first African
American justice to sit on the Supreme
Court.
During his time on the Supreme Court, he
remained a strong believer in individual
rights and never wavered in his devotion
to end discrimination.
Marshall vowed to serve until he was 110;
however, he was finally forced by illness to
give up his seat in 1991. He died in 1993 at
the age of eighty-four.
Things to think about…
What is Marshall wearing in all the
pictures and videos that you have seen?
• What would Marshall talk about at a
dinner party?
• Think about what type of food
Marshall ate.
• Think about what music he would
have listened to.
•
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Food that Marshall may have eaten…
o Yams
o Rice
o Okra
o Grits
o Macaroni and Cheese
o Fried Chicken
o Fish
o Greens
Types of music Marshall would have
listened to…
• R&B
•Little Richard, James Brown, and Ray Charles
• Gospel Music
• Mahalia Jackson, James Cleveland, and Andrae
Crouch
• Soul
• Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, and Booker T.