Civil Rights Giant Thurgood Marshall Dies
Former Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, one of the greatest figures in the history of the civil rights movement, died on this day.
Marshall became head of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund on October 11, 1939, and was the lead attorney in the historic Brown v. Board of Education decision, decided by the Supreme Court on May 17, 1954.
President Lyndon B. Johnson nominated Marshall to the Supreme Court in June 1967, calling it, “The right thing to do, the right time to do it, the right man and the right place,” and Marshall joined the Court on October 2, 1967. Marshall was the first African-American to serve on the Court; he sat on the Court until his retirement in 1991.
On the Court, he was one of the most consistent civil libertarians. Marshall died of heart failure on this day at age 84.
Read: Carl Rowan, Dream Makers, Dream Breakers: The World of Justice Thurgood Marshall (1993)
See a 1950’s TV interview with Marshall: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoPLitU6jVg
Visit the Thurgood Marshall Fund to assist student attend historically black colleges: http://www.thurgoodmarshallfund.net/