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MARSHALL, THURGOOD 1908-1993

DIRECTOR OF LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND OF NAACP (1939-1961); ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT (1967-1991)

Championing Civil Rights

Marshall's years at the NAACP were spent representing people who had been denied their legal rights because of their race. He won twenty-nine of the thirty-two civil rights cases he brought before the Supreme Court including the 1950 Sweatt v. Painter which set the ground for Brown.

In the National Spotlight

Marshall's most notable case, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, put segregation squarely before the nation in 1954. He argued, along with George Hayes and James Nabrit, Jr., that the separated schools for black and white children were not equal and black students were being denied the equal protection under the law guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.

Supreme Court Justice

His appointment to the Supreme Court by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1967 made him the first black to sit on the court. He was a respected justice throughout his term on the court, which ended with his retirement in 1992.